Masayuki Takayanagi

 

Masayuki "Jojo" Takayanagi was a cool guy. I mean, you gotta be cool to deserve the Jojo nickname, right? Part of the pantheon of Japanese cool guys who are rarely/never seen without sunglasses (i.e. Masahiko Togashi [also happen to had shared the same stage], Keiji Haino; just to name a few). A guy way ahead of its time, going as far as to denounce every of his contemporaries who were afraid to follow on his "new direction". So radical, even radicals booed him off stage. Most of his best and well known works are posthumous releases. A Free Jazz titan, and an obvious influence to the likes of Hijokaidan. So underrated!

It was kinda hard to choose which record(s) of his to talk about, even harder to describe his sound. He has phases; The Cool Jazz beginnings, the transition period into Free Jaz segueing into full blown chaotic Free Jazz to just straight up Noise. I'll just leave this description from a critic, taken from the JP Wiki, which is the most apt: "[...] an abstract and metaphysical space with dynamic and competitive sounds."

But yeah, Blank Forms just re-released his best one, the best place to begin, and a couple others. The famous P.S.F. also had some famous archival recordings released, and Jinya has been releasing just about everything he has recorded that haven't came to light before, so they're easily, readly downloadable available. What I'll talk about is a couple more obscure CDs (by Jinya too) that don't appear that often, and are hardly mentioned much places.

Coming from the period where Takayanagi's "New Direction Unit" group was active as a trio, drums and two guitars, when he was playing the most radical form of Free Jazz, pushing the line to be just free imrpovisation, almost pure Noise at times. "Mass Hysterism In Another Situation" is the most brutal documented performance from this period, verging into Hijokaidan territory. But...

 

Another Situation Vol.18 Part 1

...this one goes more into subdued territory, with more spaces and dynamic. Plenty of variation of noises, little to no distortion, with short feedback fade-ins, bowed strings, and all sorts of clanks and plings and crashs. Not dissimilar from the aforementioned album on Blank Forms, kinda atmospheric, but it throws out any resemblance of melody, rather just using the guitars as texture and noise makers. Sadly, this was just given as a bonus with a couple of reissues. It deserves its own release.

Masayuki Takayanagi Archive 2

No graphic art for the cover, not even a title?! Just sad. This one is aslo super deserving of attention. Similar to the one before, but much more noisy, mostly due to the recording, but it does goes much harder. More percussion pieces, super heavy toms, more feedback, much more angry clanking and scratching, but not without dynamics. Even has some distorted voices here and there. Maybe they're screaming into the guitar pick-ups? That's a nice image, some cool live show antics. Cool guy stuff, you know? This one is a winner too.

You wanna be a cool guy/gal too, right? So get it already!