The David Sylvian Appreciation Society

Discussion in 'Music Corner' started by Mirror Image, Aug 28, 2017.

  1. Mirror Image

    Mirror Image 200 Years Of Anton Bruckner Thread Starter

    Location:
    United States
    [​IMG]

    The David Sylvian that fronted new wave pop band Japan wore luminescent hair and glam make-up; on the cover of his solo debut, 1984's Brilliant Trees, he was stylish and refined, a gentleman popster. But the illustration that introduces 2003's Blemish sends a different message: he's bedraggled and unshaven, his far-off expression turned haunted. The new millennium has seen a more serious Sylvian, several steps further along on his musical journey and seeking new sounds to explain new traumas.

    While Japan started off as one of many '70s New Romantic bands, they made an unpredictable break with their hit "Ghosts" – a searching and evocative single where spare rhythms and fleeting electronic sounds lay under Sylvian's smouldering tenor. "Writing 'Ghosts' was a turning point for me," Sylvian recalls. "So much of what we created with Japan was built upon artifice. With that song I'd felt I'd had the breakthrough I was looking for. I'd touched upon something true to myself and expressed it in a way that didn't leave me feeling overly vulnerable. In the coming years I'd forget about all notions of vulnerability, opening up the material to a greater emotional intensity. I knew that I had to find my own voice, both figuratively and literally."

    On his solo records of the '80s, Sylvian's explorations in music took him from the pop-funk, stylish jazz and windswept exotica of 1984's Brilliant Trees; the ambient landscapes and epic ballads of 1985's Gone to Earth; and the romantic orchestrations of 1987's Secrets of the Beehive. His collaborators included leaders of progressive music, from jazzmen such as Mark Isham, John Taylor and Kenny Wheeler to the rock and fusion guitarists Robert Fripp, Bill Nelson, and David Torn. All three albums married strong melodies to intricate atmospheres.

    "The details are what always interested me. And so I just began to spend more and more time on those details, until they came to the forefront of the material-textures and atmospherics. I began to elaborate on those more and more and push the rhythmic element a little bit further back."

    Other projects from that period included ambient works with trumpeter Jon Hassell and Can alumnus Holger Czukay, as well as a collection of photographic collages titled Perspectives, whose exhibition in Tokyo sparked the documentary video, Preparations For a Journey. Regular collaborations with composer and Yellow Magic Orchestra star Ryuichi Sakamoto yielded Sylvian's first international hit, "Forbidden Colours."

    In the early '90s, Sylvian embarked on a series of acclaimed tours with Robert Fripp, leading to their 1993 studio release 'The First Day' as well as their 1994 multi-media installation 'Redemption – Approaching Silence' in Tokyo's P3 gallery. This followed Sylvian's first foray into the world of art installations in 1990, when in collaboration with Russell Mills, Sylvian created the installation entitled 'Ember Glance (the permanence of memory)' also held in Tokyo. And 1991 saw the release of Rain Tree Crow, a Japan reunion under a different name. But Sylvian grew less prolific as the decade wore on, enjoying his new marriage to Ingrid Chavez and taking four years to finish 1999's Dead Bees on a Cake. As seductive yet eclectic as any of his prior work, Dead Bees included the hit single "I Surrender," where Sylvian crafts an eye-openingly beautiful vessel around his spiritual journey. Immediately following Dead Bees on a Cake, Sylvian also released a retrospective of his work titled Everything and Nothing, a re-arrangement and re-evaluation of his career dating back to Japan.

    Sylvian's work with his spiritual teachers has led him through a rigorous process of study and self-examination. Says Sylvian, "I've never come across anything that is as pinpoint accurate as the message you get through the guru. You go through this process with other people who have common goals, you see them confronting their fears, the tests that they're put through, and you look at the manner in which they're tested and think, 'I could handle that.' But when the opportunity for you to learn from your fears comes along, it's like, 'Jesus Christ, give me any other lesson you choose, but not that one.'"

    His determination to confront his vulnerabilities led to arguably his most powerful album to date, 2003's Blemish. Recorded in his home studio in six weeks, with contributions received via the Internet from improv legend Derek Bailey and electronica artist Christian Fennesz, Blemish captured Sylvian in the process of breaking up with his wife. "I wanted to get into those difficult emotions, and penetrate them as deeply as I felt I was capable of doing, in the security of that working space. So although there were elements of my life that were bringing all these negative emotions to the fore, what I was doing in the studio was taking them further – whereas in life we try to restrain them, we hold them back. We don't allow ourselves to go too far with it because they feel dangerous, they feel threatening," says Sylvian. "Living through these emotions was very difficult, but finding a voice for them was so cathartic. After that six-week period, I'd felt I'd worked through some very difficult emotions. I felt an enormous amount of release."

    Blemish also marked the debut of his own independent label, SamadhiSound. "I think of [SamadhiSound] as being global, and not necessarily based in the States. It's stretched between the States, Europe, and Japan. I think nowadays it doesn't really matter where we are physically located. We create our own culture around us to a large extent, whether it's what we're listening to, what we're watching, what we're reading – it can have very little to do with one's immediate cultural environment. We are in a global culture in that respect." Samadhi has featured artists from around the world, including new releases by Sweet Billy Pilgrim, Harold Budd, Thomas Feiner, and David Toop, and the last studio recordings by Derek Bailey. This reach is also borne out in a remix album, The Only Daughter, where pieces from Blemish are reinterpreted by artists including Burnt Friedman, Sweet Billy Pilgrim, and Jan Bang and Erik Honoré.

    Most of the pieces on Blemish depart from traditional pop song forms, a process that began all the way back with "Ghosts" and that continues in his solo work. More recently, he has also released Snow Borne Sorrow and Money for All, an LP and EP from the band Nine Horses. Nine Horses is a trio that includes his brother and regular collaborator Steve Jansen and electronica artist Burnt Friedman, as well as contributions from singer Stina Nordenstem, trumpeter Arve Henriksen, and Ryuichi Sakamoto on piano. Alluring and urbane, the project's trip-hop textures belie its troubled lyrics, inspired by both personal affairs and world concerns. His single with Sakamoto, "World Citizen" – recently featured on the soundtrack to the film Babel – bluntly captures his concerns as a global artist living in post-9/11 America. "It wasn't my natural inclination to get into writing protest songs. But it was a request from Ryuichi to give it a bash. And I felt that there was very little dissent being vocalized in the States," says Sylvian. "I feel furious at what's being done in the name of the American people."

    In 2009, the project that began in Blemish continues with Manafon, an album that assembles the world’s leading free improvisers, including Evan Parker, Keith Rowe, Fennesz, Sachiko M, Otomo Yoshihide, and John Tilbury, among several others. In small ensembles, the improvisers create backdrops for the skeletal songs, and challenge the relationship between improvisation and composition, ensembles and lead voices, and intimacy and solitude. Lyrically challenging, it is also one of the most astonishingly and unpredictably beautiful works Sylvian has produced.

    Most recently Sylvian revisited the presentation of his music in forms beyond the CD. 'When loud weather buffeted Naoshima' was commissioned by the Naoshima Fukutake Art Museum Foundation on the island of Naoshima, Japan, as part of the NAOSHIMA STANDARD 2 exhibition which ran from Oct 2006 to April 2007. The composition was site specific. In fact, Sylvian has said that the work isn't really complete until the sounds of the town Honmura are incorporated into the listening experience. The piece has since been added to the foundation’s permanent collection. In 2009, Sylvian collaborated with composer Dai Fujikura and a small ensemble on the audio installation “When we return you won’t recognize us,” located on Gran Canaria of the Canary Islands. The work was inspired by a 2003 genetics research article focusing on the Canary Islands, which discovered that despite Spanish colonization and the slave trade, fully half to three-quarters of the population retains its aboriginal genetic lineage. As Sylvian writes, “My interest lay in the connection between the physical or scientific reality of our biological make-up, the links to lineage (genetic genealogy), location and, to move beyond the realm of science into intuitive logic, the interior life of a community or people. An implied cultural heritage.”

    With the release of Manafon, Sylvian continues to confront the challenges, both personal and global, that have enriched his work for three decades. And he continues to follow this path – with patience, perseverance, and beauty.


    [Article taken https://www.davidsylvian.com]

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    I’ve become quite enraptured by Sylvian’s music over the past year or so. Of course, he’s a musician that wasn’t completely new to me. I’ve known a good bit of his work for close to 20 years. Perhaps an interesting to do is go through his discography and we could give our opinion of each album? Instead of creating a poll for each solo album, I think this might be a bit more interesting.

    Up first:

    DAVID SYLVIAN - "BRILLIANT TREES"
    1984

    Virgin V2290

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    Pulling Punches
    The Ink In The Well
    Nostalgia
    Red Guitar
    Weathered Wall
    Backwaters
    Brilliant Trees

    Recorded in late 1983 at Hansa tone Studios in Berlin with producer Steve Nye. A recording of considerable significance in David's output instigating as it does new working methods and a level of inquiry that radically broadened the emotional range and scope of his work. The cast of collaborators includes Ryuichi Sakamoto, Holger Czukay, Jon Hassell and Kenny Wheeler. Critically celebrated on its release Brilliant Trees went straight into the UK chart at number 4.
     
  2. Sordel

    Sordel Forum Resident

    Location:
    Switzerland
    Well, David Sylvian's one of my favourite recording artists of all time: in fact, he's one of a dozen artists that I consider to be personal touchstones.

    Brilliant Trees is a stunning piece of work with the highlights being 'The Ink In The Well' and the title track. Of course Sylvian had already written 'Ghosts' & 'Nightporter' so the maturity of the writing shouldn't come as a surprise, but it's still unusual to hear such a consistent voice in the solo debut of someone coming from a group. Peter Gabriel's first album, for example, is all over the place; very good, but hardly stylistically of a piece.

    This isn't my favourite Sylvian album, but if he had never recorded anything else we could still speak of it as a standout from the decade.
     
  3. Mirror Image

    Mirror Image 200 Years Of Anton Bruckner Thread Starter

    Location:
    United States
    Agreed about Brilliant Trees. I think it’s overall quite a strong debut no doubt about it. I always had a soft spot for the title track. It’s absolutely dripping with atmosphere and that kind of soundscape we’ll hear on later albums. I also like The Ink In The Well and Nostalgia a lot. But, like I said, the whole album is strong.
     
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  4. RudolphS

    RudolphS Forum Resident

    Location:
    Rio de Janeiro
    From 1978 (Japan debut) to 1987 David Sylvian was impeccable, an utterly interesting 10 years of artistic development. But to be honest, after that I started to lose interest in Sylvian, got a bit tired of his introvert approach (although his Nine Horses side-project in 2005 was a nice surprise).
     
  5. Pavol Stromcek

    Pavol Stromcek Senior Member

    Location:
    SF Bay Area
    I love Japan (especially Quiet Life, Polaroids, and Tin Drum), and I also love Sylvian's 80s solo albums, but he started losing me in the 90s, and for me things went further downhill from there (except for Nine Horses, which has some compelling moments).

    Brilliant Trees is an exceptional work. It's a highly cohesive and focused set of songs, and I like the way he's able to weave back and forth between poppier compositions and more drawn out, simpler songs that rely more heavily on atmosphere. It strikes a great balance. I might rate Gone to Earth and Beehive a tiny bit more, as I like how the former goes much further towards embracing an otherworldly atmosphere, while the latter ups the ante on the tastefully melodic pop front. All three albums are outstanding, though.
     
  6. Mirror Image

    Mirror Image 200 Years Of Anton Bruckner Thread Starter

    Location:
    United States
    The problem with much of his later work is the sheer unpredictability of it. I rather liked Nine Horses’ Snow Borne Sorrow and his own Dead Bees on a Cake. Albums like Blemish and Manafon leave me scratching my head. Surprisingly, I’m more interested in his solo work than anything he did with Japan. Rain Tree Crow (w/ the members of Japan) was more to my own tastes than anything he did with Japan IMHO.
     
    Thorpy likes this.
  7. DaveinMA

    DaveinMA Some guy

    I probably need to pick up Brilliant Trees and Rain Tree Crow, but I have most of everything else. I'm not a fan of any Japan that I've heard; too much new wave/icky 80s sound to my taste. Were you initially drawn in by the Kenny Wheeler connection?
     
  8. Sordel

    Sordel Forum Resident

    Location:
    Switzerland
    The Tin Drum is a classic for a reason, but even if the albums don't appeal try to hear 'Some Kind Of Fool' if you can: although it's credited to Japan it's very much a 'solo' David Sylvian song.
     
    oldturkey likes this.
  9. Mirror Image

    Mirror Image 200 Years Of Anton Bruckner Thread Starter

    Location:
    United States
    I liked the whole New Wave thing, but I just thought Japan were a bit outside of what I usually liked within that style. Actually, I was drawn into Sylvian’s sound-world through Robert Fripp, but it was certainly a delightful bonus whenever I found out that other great musicians like Kenny Wheeler, Trey Gunn, Mark Isham, Bill Frisell, Marc Ribot, Steve Jansen (Sylvian’s brother), David Torn, among others have been involved with Sylvian at some point or another.
     
  10. xj32

    xj32 Forum Resident

    Location:
    Racine, WI
    Rain Tree Crow may be my number one album of all time or close to it.
     
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  11. Mirror Image

    Mirror Image 200 Years Of Anton Bruckner Thread Starter

    Location:
    United States
    It’s a good one for sure. The last piece on that album, Cries And Whispers is especially moving.
     
  12. Mirror Image

    Mirror Image 200 Years Of Anton Bruckner Thread Starter

    Location:
    United States
    Getting back to Brilliant Trees, I do think a lot of this album. The Sylvian sound-world seems to be fully-formed with those ambiguous chordal washes from the keyboards and guitar textures. Apparently, from many of the reviews I’ve read, I’m not the only one with a high appraisal of it.
     
    Gavinyl likes this.
  13. ThomasL

    ThomasL Forum Resident

    Location:
    Copenhagen
    For me it's Polaroids, Tin Drum, Brilliant Trees, Secrets of the Beehive and Nine Horses.
     
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  14. Mirror Image

    Mirror Image 200 Years Of Anton Bruckner Thread Starter

    Location:
    United States
    No love for Gone to Earth?
     
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  15. carlwm

    carlwm Forum Resident

    Location:
    wales
    He's a genius.

    I only like some of what he does but I'm intrigued by all of it.
     
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  16. Radio KTmS

    Radio KTmS i am a dj, i am what i play

    DUDE,
    GET OUT OF MY HEAD.
    i appropriated his entire discography last week,
    and haven't stop listening since.
    i can't believe it took me this long to pay attention to his work,
    but regardless,
    i'm glad that i finally have!
     
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  17. jo66hn

    jo66hn Forum Resident

    Location:
    Los Angeles
    Wonderful singer song writer.
    I've been a fan since 1984.
    Brilliant Trees is a great first solo album.
    To me it was a natural, less affected, yet mature progression from Tin Drum.
    As with most of Japan's work it was beautifully arranged.
    Not my all time favourite Sylvian but it's right up there.

    "I'm cutting branches from the trees
    Shaped by years of memories
    To exorcise their ghosts from inside of me"

    A very under rated lyricist as well.
     
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  18. ThomasL

    ThomasL Forum Resident

    Location:
    Copenhagen
    I like some of it: Taking the Veil, Laughter & Forgetting, Silver Moon..But I was never too excited by the "ambient" part of it.
     
  19. jo66hn

    jo66hn Forum Resident

    Location:
    Los Angeles
    My favourite album. I'm not making a case for it, it just works for me.
     
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  20. Victor/Victrola

    Victor/Victrola Makng shure its write

    I only have a few albums by Sylvian (Dead Bees, Secrets of the Beehive, Gone To Earth) but I find him to be a fascinating and very original artist. Earth was the first one I heard, and probably remains my favorite.
     
  21. agn

    agn Forum Resident

    Location:
    New Jersey
    All of David's solo albums through Blemish are fabulous. My favorites are Gone To Earth and Secrets of the Beehive. Addictive stuff for sure. A Fire in the Forest, Laughter and Forgetting and others stayed in my head for weeks.
     
  22. Roger Thornhill

    Roger Thornhill Senior Member

    Location:
    Ilford, Essex, UK
    Noticeable that in his first of the three Trophies books of lyrics, "Ghosts" is Step one and the only song from the Japan era that he considers worthy of being included.

    I only really picked up on Japan at the stage of Tin Drum and bought Brilliant Trees when it came out. For me it is one of the key albums of the decade and easily gets into any top 10 album list that I produce. I have a NME review by Richard Cook which I'll scan in tomorrow and post here.

    True story - a couple of months after it was released, I took my wife to Bath for the weekend. Walking around we happened upon this pizza restaurant for lunch and went in. And what should be playing over their hi-fi but this album. When they got to the end of side one, someone very obligingly turned the record over (pre-CD days) and we listened to all of side two...

    It is one of the very few albums that I have on vinyl and CD as I was playing it so much I needed a CD version to play in the car. OK, so that's going to be given a spin tomorrow now I've been reminded of it.
     
  23. Mirror Image

    Mirror Image 200 Years Of Anton Bruckner Thread Starter

    Location:
    United States
    :righton:

    Better late than never as they say! Any favorites so far?
     
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  24. Mirror Image

    Mirror Image 200 Years Of Anton Bruckner Thread Starter

    Location:
    United States
    Ah, well, that’s certainly good to know you do like some of the album. I like the vocal pieces the best, but will admit that the ambient side of the album has some alluring music.
     
  25. Radio KTmS

    Radio KTmS i am a dj, i am what i play

    i second (or third) gone to earth,
    and really like the fripp collaborations as well.
     
    drasil likes this.

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