Robert Bloemkolk
Stumbled on this because Marc Masters bought it. One of those private presses which actually delivers. He could have been a weird Japanese James Taylor but turned out an artist and an architect. Cool record.
Favorite track: まちぼうけ (Waiting In Vain).
Lars Gotrich
Private-press Japanese psych from 1974. These bluesy psych-folk songs bloom from a vibrant backing band. At times, I'm reminded of Roy Harper's existential acoustic epics, but also CSNY's bright and breezy twang, tossing in some electric guitar fuzz with mandolin and banjo. www.vikingschoice.org/archive/swedish-christian-fuzz-post-punk-trompe-loeil/Favorite track: 赤い鳥 (Red Bird).
In 1974, Shin Otowa 音羽信 (Elia Taniguchi) recorded this album, わすれがたみ (wasuregatami, "memento") at Gyoen Studio in Tokyo with his friend Makoto Kubota & others, with assistance from his life partner Yuko Suzakui 朱雀井ゆう子, who worked at the studio at the time. It was self released on vinyl - only a few hundred copies were made nearly 50 years ago. After this project was finished, Taniguchi-san went on to live in Ibiza, Spain, from the mid 70's to the mid 80's, and after went on to become a successful architect and poet, running an architecture firm in Tokyo. Throughout his career, he has designed large commercial buildings in Tokyo and elsewhere (including Shisedo HQ in Ginza), residential and office spaces, a big shopping mall with an outdoor plaza that sees 35 million visitors a year, concept cities in China, and more. He has also written dozens of books of poetry, art theory, architecture, and music. He currently resides in a rural area in the Tokyo suburbs and continues to be an involved artist and musician.
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Eye Vybe is thrilled to announce the first release of the year - a reissue of Shin Otowa’s “わすれがたみ”, a 1974 private press Japanese psych folk relic that is finally seeing the light of day again. Many thanks to Makoto Kubota (of Les Rallizes Denudes) for facilitating this project 🙂
This cassette reissue comes with a full fold-out lyric sheet and features photos not previously released with the LP. Professionally dubbed and packaged at National Audio Company, this tape will start shipping sometime in May of 2022.
SHIN OTOWA: Guitar, Vocal, Whistle, and Arrangement
MAKOTO KUBOTA: Guitar, Arrangement, and Big Help
YOMA FUJITA: Guitar, Mandolin
TAKASHI ONZO: Bass
KIMIDIRI HAYASHI: Ocarina (A - 3)
KAMESAKU NISHIDE: Banjo (A - 4, 6)
TAKATOSHI KIBE: Guitar (B - 4)
Produced by OTOWA SHIN and SUZAKUI YUKO
Recording Enginer and Mastering: SUZAKUI YUKO
Photograph: TAKATOSHI Kibe
Assistant Producer: Kimi-chan
Remastered in 2007 by KUBOTA MAKOTO
cassette layout design by karissa talanian
album reissued on cassette by eye vybe records in 2022
originally self released in 1974