koenjihyakkei!

my orig. post on noize board:

anyone else heard the nivraym remaster/re-recording/whatever-it-is on skin graft? old release sounded like it was never mastered or something, which I thought really did it a disservice. the mix on this one seems much cleaner to my ears.

arrangements are a bit different too. most noticeably w/sax parts that pop up here-and-there. seems like they've toned down the use of guitars too.

this is probably my fave koenji record (even tho it easily seems to be the consensus pick for WORST koenji release!), so I'm pretty happy about this.

so, anyone else hear the nivraym reissue? love this band.

i always loved this one despite the muddy barely audbile drums etc. now it is rebuilt as the number one killer koenji disc. that extra counterpoint sax on axall hasck kills me -and new guitar bits you can hear! bizarrely i still prefer the muddy old version of becctum pollt but in general the new version of the disc just floors me i love it!

agreed on "becctum polt" but I've been struggling with figuring out why I prefer the old one. it seems... heavier, maybe? tho "becctum polt" is my all-time most listened to koenji track, so it could just be that I'm super used to old ver.

the sax works its way into these new arrangements particularly well, yeah. but the whole thing is just really well done. when I first threw it on, I was also genuinely floored by how much BETTER it sounded!

and I still remember downloading some songs from the old version of this album on... uh, audiogalaxy, I think? (lol.) chalked up the poor sound to crappy, low bitrate mp3s. was sooooo bummed when I bought the japanese import discovered that my legit copy still sounded like that. couldn't believe yoshida & co. would obv. put so much effort into writing these songs but so little effort into capturing them on a recording!

havent heard the remaster, but if it's better sound I'm curious. I still like this record, just not the sound

you should def. check it out then. sounds way better.

picked it up at amoeba today -- and wow this is like a new record! some of it really did sound like complete re-recordings

yeah, I am a little curious about how much of this was totally re-recorded. (and for "hundred sights..." which I'm less familiar with.)

also picked up their latest dvd. maybe I just wasn't in the mood but I have to say, I struggled with the improv stuff and eventually just gave up and skipped to the band material. (which was cool, but nothing too different from the records.)

DORICHE VOMITAAAA

For "100 Sights" I think Yoshida re-recorded the drums, and then remixed it. Not sure about this one.

new album this year!?!?!

!!!!!!

Where did you find out about that? Can't find anything myself. I can see they've been touring recently

Oh wait, here

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wI-5PPOVlv0&ab_channel=TheMAGAIBUTSU

Confirmed in the comments by the man himself

Are they good beyond that one album?

all Koenjihyakkei albums are good, just depends if you want psycho metal-zeuhl (early) or Canterbury-esque complexo-zuehl (later)

Oh, they both sound good, but I've not heard the latter. Consider me intrigued!

here's a track from their last record (11 years old now!)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LHDOALyDOO8

this is lovely, thanks!

Just listened to all of Nivraym. What an album! I suppose I will head next to the album the above track is taken from

"Axall Hasck" from that album is so amazing, just totally next level

it all sounds like the most demented bits of Yes and Magma used as the basis for something approaching pop music

Canterbury-esque complexo-zuehl (later)

this description is making me wary

just listen to a minute of their music, you'll figure it out right away

any minute, really

haha, I'm not really into AMM and other Canterbury scene music -- it feels too sedate and prissy for me (ditto Yes and Steely Dan, etc.).
I also find babies creepy and disturbing, and I'm sure these feelings are related.

ha Sarah, this band def not prissy. Canterbury aspect only present due to horns, and general complexity of composition. But this is the guy from Ruins, so essentially, you can also think of it as a big band version of that.

I have their earlier albums! I am familiar with this band. We have discussed this band IRL !

Sorry haha! Yeah, I thought it was strange you wouldn't have already known them

ITS HAPPENING YALL

https://www.facebook.com/tatsuya.yoshida.906/posts/1517199295069467

Excite!!

:-o

the best prog band in the world is back. HELL YES.

well, that st. anger snare drum those few secs on the clip shook me a little. I'd be madly in anger with koenjihyakkei if the whole album had that drum sound but it goes away after that. phew! this sounds great.

I may be misremembering but I think Yoshida has a drumset with two snares, one of which goes *ping* and one that doesn't

on the original version of 1000 Sights it sounds like he's beating up a dumpster

hahaha

two snares theory sounds plausible. listening to angherr shisspa and it's pretty audible on "grahbem jorgazz" during the sax freakout about 1.5mins in. similar reverb tunnel sound too.

think this is now my most anticipated record of the year. unless there's a new boredoms record, maybe.

https://skingraftrecords.bandcamp.com/album/nivraym-revisited

finally gonna be available on vinyl. curious what the "remaster" is - didn't the 2009 version feature a pretty different mix than the original? so is this a different one on top of that?

oh, nice! a little pricey… hmmm, do i buy this record a third time now? haha

still the one i throw on the most. hope we get a new one at some point.

best band.