P-Model/Susumu Hirasawa appriciation station

If you don't know who P-Model is:

P-Model was a Japanese techno-pop band started in 1979 by frontman Susumu Hirasawa. The band has included many lineup revisions over the years but Hirasawa was always at the helm of operations. P-Model officially disbanded in 1999 (20 years after its formation), although many of its members continue to release solo albums and collaborate with each other on different projects.

I discovered the guy several years ago (once Polysics covered one of their songs) and they quickly became one of my favorite technopop groups. Their first album is basically quirky New Wave in the vein of early XTC. However Hirasawa really stepped up his songwriting and vocal abilities since then and has gone into some pretty fascinating directions. He's done a number of anime soundtracks that have earned him a little bit of fame outside of Japan, but he's still largely unknown. But the music is so damn epic and melodic that I had to start a thread hoping others would discover the music. Not only is the music incredible, but his discography is a hell of a piece of work (P-Model has a 16-disc boxset out; Hirasawa has done 11 solo albums and a bunch of soundtracks)

His music doesn't really sound like anything else out there, but imagine a fusion of Cardiacs and YMO and I guess you're there.

To help you along, here's some of P-Model's music...I want to limit this to 5 for now

"No Room" (1992): I couldn't find a recording of "Art Mania" from their 1979 debut, which this song is more or less based on. Great technopop...can't help feeling a little jittery after listening
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r6as7e2-lB4

"Dance Subomp" (1985): A good example of one of his songs that is kind of minimal but very epic. Love the vocals here.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FFcpy3t5Uwc

"Cyborg" (1985, recorded 1992): One of SH's trademarks is the use of Turkish marching rhythms, here was one of the first:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xs3MaVgFo0M

"Ashura Clock" (1997): Just because I posted this in another thread, this is techno at its most epic
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T1qzfB7YEZY

"Logic Air Force" (1999): Can't really do this one justice...listen for yourself
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2MaYy2Spctg

Message Bookmarked

:)

oh yeah forgot this one:

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

'Logic Air Force' is a photon bomb to the neural cortex of my happyplace ^_^

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aCmtP7dpk4I&feature=related

whoa...definitely can shred

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NkatzRzages
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zE9zvOSTCtU

I discovered Hirasawa, like a lot of people through Paprika, which is one of the best soundtracks I've ever heard. I was delighted to discover P-Model but I dont actually own anything by them yet, not much is on amazon or ebay and what is there is too expensive so I think I'll have to do with CDJapan. Hirasawa and P-Model are poorly represented on Itunes too, I dont know why more japanese acts dont put themselves on our mp3 services.

Both these songs are from One Pattern, which is their own least favorite album but these are my favorite P-model songs. I'd love to see this concert on DVD someday.

The most widely available thing I have seen is the P-Model/Big Body comp, which takes off one track from the original P-Model album. I cant see any places to buy the individual albums.

The only real option for those of us in the US is the $300 box set with 16 discs that covers basically everything they ever recorded, obviously that's super expensive, but it works out to about $20 a disc which isnt bad (as every disc is about 70-80 minutes long). I picked it up because I'm crazy and had a lot of money to spend at the time, but it's out of print now, so really there aren't any real options that don't cost like $50-60 per album (besides the Paprika OST)

Check out this thread: Japanese New Wave listening club - new albums every Monday

I've uploaded a few of his solo albums (plus the two disc P-Model/Big Body comp) in there. His soundtrack stuff is very good but they are usually based on his solo albums, which are incredible. I dig One Pattern; probably one of their worst albums but even still it's got a few awesome tracks on it (the other one is "Drums", which foreshadows the direction he'd go in over the next two decades). Luckily most of his work is available on youtube if you're into that, including this performance (which is a song from the final P-Model album), which is incredible:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oUhBOdgtB00

I couldnt find that box set anywhere, it is always sold out, I'm not sure I'd buy it at that price. CD Japan's prices seemed reasonable for me, I'll probably buy everything from there.

Have you heard any of his prog music he did in Mandrake? I'd really like to hear that stuff, I cant even find samples of it.

The price is indeed steep, but it works out to about $20 a disc, which is actually kind of cheap for an import. I don't blame you though. His label website: http://teslakite.com/e/index_cd.htm has a lot of this for cheaper, under $30 a pop, though it only covers the last 10 years or so. I'd love to pick up some of the DVDs (though they are pricey and probably won't play on my DVD player)

I have the Mandrake stuff; haven't really heard it enough to get a good feel for it, it is kinda lo-fi and distorted, but it's good. I do think this one is actually for sale on his own site. IIRC one of the tunes is based on the riff that became "The Great Brain" on In a Model Room which is pretty neat.

http://s14.directupload.net/images/120304/rspryqt5.png

I really want that so badly (not as bad as the Ashu-On set, but still). I have a lot of the scans that came with the CD-ROM Music Industrial Wastes disc and it's fascinating, there's like a 100-page history of Hirasawa in there, with notes on every song and live performance, but it's all in Japanese so I can only admire at the ridiculous amount of band photos that it comes with. If this Dome was translated into English I'd drop the cash without a second thought!

ditto!

Thirded!

I recently discovered his "Switched-on Lotus" album which is mostly a bunch of re-done Sim City/Siren era tracks with boosted up production and more vocals; you gotta give the man credit, he really seems to get what the best parts of his own songs are. The title track (which is new) is seriously one of the most gorgeous things he ever wrote, check it out:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GgLQwE62_Q4

I wrote a long, sprawling article on this dude for PSF. Check it out!

http://www.furious.com/perfect/susumuhirasawa.html

nice one! didn't realize hirasawa does custom software/hardware. makes sense. he really has a pretty singular sound.

I made a 4-CD "best of" Hirasawa set which splits his output into four periods: the early P-Model years (79-86), the beginning of his solo career and the P-Model de-freeze (89-94), the period in the second half of the 90's where he was putting out awesome material both solo and with some form of P-Model (95-00), and his recent years of solo albums + remake projects and soundtracks (01-10). It combines for over 5 hours of listening but I can't cut anything, to me it still plays like a pretty awesome document of his entire career in fast forward. Anyone interested??

Hell yea!

Hey frogbs, can you help, where to start with this guy's soundtrack material? I just heard 'Parade' from the Paprika soundtrack and the militaristic sounding mid section gave me real 'Sing To God' vibes, I liked it's maximal sound. Thanks!

His soundtrack work draws mostly off the concurrent studio albums, sort of remixing the work or sometimes including it wholesale. Otherwise a lot of them are filled with shorter more pointed bits that aren't a lot like his other stuff, its nice but . I think the Milennium Actress one is my favorite, but again, that's essentially a remix album of Philosopher's Propeller. Have you checked out his 2006 album Byakkoya? I think that's maybe more what you're looking for, the track "Parade" is on it, and the title track is the other song from Paprika that everyone seems to remember. Check this tune out:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uzuQKDhm-ow#t=39

I never said thanks for that last post frogbs, how rude! Sorry man, Byakkoya is excellent.

So I'm making an hour long SH mix for our little internet radio show and was wondering what the absolute must have tracks are, from P Model to present day, suggestions welcome!

I didn't know you had a radio show! Where at?

I'd find that a little difficult, I couldn't even get it down to five hours when I was making the fake anthology (which I still haven't posted, but uh..I'm still working on it. He keeps releasing new stuff)

Is the idea to provide an introduction to the guy? Or show the way he's evolved over the years? Or just the best tracks full stop?

I didn't want to shill on ILX (although I might have mentioned it somewhere else), if you have a look here you can find the details, I think it might be congruent to your interests :)

https://www.facebook.com/JapanAlternativeSessions/

The Hirasawa thing, it's just a tip of the iceberg one hour mix, no context/curation. I did a YMO/Solo one the other day so I understand your pain with the format length.

very nice!! if it's just a tip of the iceberg thing with no context I think you could do a lot exploring how esoteric the guy is, while picking top-notch tunes all the way. here's a mix I tried out today that sounded really good:

1. Nice Nice Very Nice (ICE-9, 2005)
2. Venus (Water in Time and Space, 1989)
3. P-Model - Chevron (Big Body, 1993)
4. P-Model - Art Mania (In a Model Room, 1979)
5. Sekai Turbine 2 (Solar Ray, 2001)
6. P-Model - Ashura Clock (Ashura Clock single, 1997)
7. P-Model - Personal Pulse (One Pattern, 1983)
8. The Man From Narcissus Space (Technique of Relief, 1998)
9. The Man From Memories (Byakkoya, 2006)
10. Goes on Ghost (Totsu-Gen-Hen-I, 2010)
11. Ride the Blue Limbo (Blue Limbo, 2003)
12. P-Model - Different not equal Another (Potpurri, 1981)
13. Caravan (Sim City, 1995)
14. Ringing Bell (Aurora, 1994)

A lot of contrasts in sound from track to track but I think it flows well. The idea is to pick out some of the most ear-catching things he's done. First 2 tracks are very pretty, then it moves into his best technopop tunes - "Chevron" is also pretty, but then it gets more and more manic, hitting "Sekai Turbine 2" and "Ashura Clock" which are two of his fastest tracks. After that I figured I'd go with some more symphonic stuff, "Personal Pulse" I love because it foreshadowed this whole sound, going from more epic and grandiose to whimsical ("Ride the Blue Limbo" whose hook includes a big "boiiing!"). Last three tracks show him as his most insane, his most hooky, and his most achingly gorgeous, so yeah cool contrasts there. Hope this helps!

Great choices, I had a couple in mind from your picks but I knocked it together today and it sounds really good, how would you feel if I went with your order and credited you when it airs?

go ahead! and thanks! hope it manages to convert a few people!

I was under the false impression that Golden Best misses out a few tracks from P Model & Big Body, so I never bought it; but it's actually that two tracks aren't translated and one is a hidden track. I shall buy it tonight!

Heya Frogbs, I think your SH mix will be airing this Friday!

oh nice, I'll have to tune in for that

Finally listening to P-Model + Big Body.

"Nice mmm-hmmm
nice mmm-hmmm"

p model is so siqq they sound like a japanese oingo boingo

オインゴ ボインゴ

they had the most classic look during those years too

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AfbjxwHQ-Uk

those albums hold up remarkably well considering how pretty much everything else in the early 90's that sounded like that really hasn't

Taken me a while to realise in "Biiig Eye" he's singing "I'm screaming in the lens" like Singing In The Rain.
https://www.whosampled.com/sample/461050/P-Model-Biiig-Eye-Aphrodite%27s-Child-Loud%2C-Loud%2C-Loud/

I think I prefer Big Body to the selftitled album.

"2D Or Not 2D" and "Lab=01" are a lot of fun from P-Model. But Big Body has 5."Welcome to the House of 'Time's Leaking Through Equal Distance Curve' (時間等曲率漏斗館へようこそ Jikantō Kyokuritsu Rōtokan e Yōkoso, Welcome to the House of Chrono-Synclastic Infundibulum)"
, "Binary Ghost" and "Homo Gestalt"

love the way they use the sample on that track. "shouting - AAAAAAAAH!!!" one of the few times he acknowledges one of his influences.

and yes, track 5 is quite great. love "Homo Gestalt" a lot too though I can't help but notice the similarity to "Wire Self"

you might like the stuff by Kaku P-Model, which is just Hirasawa under a different name. basically, he wanted to return to the P-Model sound, but didn't want to work with other people. the track "Big Brother" is maybe the most insane track he ever did - the only thing comparable is Dan Deacon.

I lucked out and found some dude who ripped a bunch of Hirasawa DVDs to MP3, so I'm currently going through those. The Vistoron Live show is very nice and contains a number of 92-93 era tracks. Kind of bummed out that live stuff from 81-86 exists - I have a boot from the Karkador era and it's incredible, but the sound quality is atrocious! I wish they hadn't stopped the Virtual Live series at Perspective...they were just getting interesting!!

Is there any place where the MP3 rips of DVDs are available? I haven't had the money to pick up any live DVDs yet (I have bought The Method of Live 2 however, which has a live version of Sim City and Gardener King which are both breathtaking), but some of the live versions of past songs are absolutely wonderful!

In particular, some of my personal favourites are,
This version of "Clear Mountain Top" from the PHONON2550 live shows, it's an absolute crime this wasn't featured in the PHONON2550 CD.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TfP1DEJe6b0

This version of "Rocket", which looks like it's also from the PHONON2550 live shows (yet it was also not included in the CD, what a shame).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XK0wv5QpYh8

This version of Siren *SEIREN* from the Planet Roll Call live shows. The performances of the guests (particularly in the chorus) in this song are beautiful. Hirasawa's choice to overlay Delay Lama over bits of the song is a little suspect though haha, it doesn't quite work all that well in my opinion.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eOTTnNpxbcQ

This version of Lotus from PHONON2555. Unrelated to Lotus, but the Phonon 2555 Vision DVD includes a performance of Dune from Hirasawas first album, which I would love to hear, I've always been a sucker for Hirasawas early solo material.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r4-95kK8D5M

I'm also very curious about the 9th Mandala memorial card, since apparently it includes a 2017 version of Archetype Engine and a bunch of other songs, like Adios and Byakkoya. Unfortunately you had to be present at the live show to get your hands on it, but I'm hoping it'll eventually go on sale for everyone like the WORLD CELL 2015 memorial card did.

hello WIRESELF :)

you on soulseek ?

I just created an user on it, the username is WIRESELF

search for a user called "Bonzalez". should be online now, if not it'll be later tonight

I've grabbed a lot of the stuff from his website in the past, even though the prices & method of delivery has been pretty odd. Had to jump through a lot of hoops just to spend $15 on some alternate versions of Blue Limbo tracks. Wish he'd just chuck everything up in some easily accessible place but Japanese musicians tend not to do things like that :)

Haha yeah I feel you, the sites can be a bit iffy and he has some weird things restricted from the international shop, like having only AURORA3 available for purchase off of the Live Byakkoya memorials package internationally.

Thank you for the leads, it's much appreciated! I'm also glad to find that I'm not the only one who enjoys Hirasawas works to a great degree.

I know I'm probably talking to a mirror here but if you haven't heard the latest KAKU P-Model album you really should...its one of his most bonkers, and I think one of his best (obviously I don't say that lightly)

every single track on it is good but this one is my favorite right now

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3_or3uyB3CA

Cant see it on amazon uk or ebay.

Most original P-Model albums still cost a fortune but there's quite a bunch of solo stuff for £20-£30. I can do that but not too often. Happy to see Ash Crow is all the Berserk soundtracks in one.

Is it really true that Japanese music sellers are selling common stuff at scalper prices? If I went to big stores in japan, would all this stuff be so expensive?

One look at Hirasawa on CD Japan looks like an average of about $25 for a CD, not scalping but pretty high.

http://www.cdjapan.co.jp/person/700102636?s_ssid=e36c625cd73da8f416

you can get some of them on Japan iTunes but their selection is pretty spotty. ultimately you're going to have to pay $25-30 for the CDs. sadly the Ashu-on P-Model boxset is no longer available, because that was actually a pretty decent value (about $15 a disc I think, many of which had 2 albums on them)

What is this tribut album by Vidra

Actually, it's a single

pretty cool. I wonder how well the lyrics are translated.

here's an interesting cover - an 80's P-Model tune covered in the style of 90's P-Model, it works pretty well

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9s9tAmbTHIg

by the way, it's his birthday today. 66 years old

never considered that connection before, but I'm all for it :)

Listening to In a Model Room. Hirasawa was an interesting songwriter from the word "go," wasn't he?

"Sophisticated foreign language song."

The Book of Photoelectron -- the instrumental, guitar-centered new album from last year -- is ridiculously beautiful. Hirasawa is probably a greek god. Apollo or something.

* Phytoelectron

I really enjoyed it as well. Tracks 2 & 10 especially...there's that vocal yelp in the latter thats reminiscent of "Junglebed" that made me a bit emotional

The first two P-Model records have good A-sides and really great B-sides. I love this guitar solo:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DkbBNYcS-0I

And all this nervy, catchy, punky, silliness is the beginning of the road to Beacon... listening to Beacon is kind of an impossible experience, I don't think the human frame was built to process *that* many wonderful sounds and moods and melodies in the space of 45 minutes. Naughty Boys understands and plays with our expectations of rhythm and pacing in its quest to melt us into a pool of stars, Hirasawa just ... shoots a thousand laser beams?

Sunrise City is so fun.

"UP SPEED UP!!!"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-ZdViLY5i08

Somebody come explore P-Model with me so that this thread isn't just me bursting with enthusiasm while frogbs, Hirasawa's Paul of Tarsus, nods sagely along.

I've cheated a bit by listening to Beacon and now The Book of Phytoelectron so many times, but I plan to explore the rest of the catalogue chronologically and methodically, album by album, not skipping ahead, as tempting as it is. Curious whether it'll make me the first person outside Japan to do this the Frog Way.

yeah! that was how I did it - I heard the first two, thought P-Model just busted up and that was that, and then suddenly encountered this song???

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IOnSJ1WmZ5A

I actually remember thinking, no way is it the same guy. but that voice was familiar...

so I spent a long time going through it all, trying to figure out how he went from Devo-off-their-meds to the embodiment of the Pure Moods commercial. sure enough, there is a logical progression there. and two dozen really great albums too.

Oh man, that's wonderful! And yeah, NOTHING like early P-Model

I'm getting back into my P-Model / Hirasawa dive. Excited to give Potpourri a first listen soon. Landsale is fun -- it doesn't do anything revolutionary, and it doesn't veer far at all from the debut, but it is a pretty relentless succession of dorky / catchy musical elements. Great for an occasional listen.

Pointed out on another thread, but doubt anyone cared, that "Kameari Pop" is a rip off of Pere Ubu's "Caligari's Mirror".

Oh yeah, no kidding! And frogbs noted elsewhere that Landsale's opener Ohayo lifts from an Ultravox song.

It's pretty heartening to know you can start your career with heavy borrowing, but end up sounding so unique people suspect you of being extraterrestrial.

dunno how I never noticed that one before!! there's definitely something alien to all Hirasawa's stuff, it feels a bit outside the world of pop music entirely. and its not like his interviews exactly clear things up. so its very strange to hear him do actual covers, or use recognizable samples. in part because he doesn't do it often. but I'd wager there are a number of borrowed elements on those first two P-Model albums.

I did drop "Personal Pulse" into a DJ set once and someone asked me if it was Gary Numan. I hadn't made the connection but yeah, you have to assume he was big into those Numan albums at the time.

Someone in the Soft Ballet fandom was posting him today due to their collaborations! There are videos of them together. (Wow my Japanese is hopeless, I understand maybe every tenth word)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z6diW2QI6BQ

Bookmarking the thread to check out more of his material.

another one - I think "Sunshine City" might've been based off the XTC B-side "Instant Tunes"

Dunno why it's taken me until now to realize it...but Jon Anderson's Olias of Sunhillow has got to be the blueprint for Hirasawa's entire solo career. was pretty spaced out last time I heard it and thought I was actually listening to Hirasawa for a second, then began to notice he lifted quite a few melodies from the thing :)

Oh shoot, you've reminded me of my Jon Anderson Backwards project. All in time! I'm stuck on ambient Hosono and Black Sabbath at the minute. But the Anderson got off to a great start. I love "True". The test of time for me is usually: has this album taken on distinct colors in my mind, x months after I got into it? and "True" passes.

I came here to post that Timeline no Owari (from Beacon) has a gorgeous video. And that I understand what it's trying to say: if Hirasawa isn't an alien, then he must be a robot.

Or he’s just on the spectrum :)

I was making slow progress with P-Model (stalled in Potpourri), so I skipped ahead to 1989's 時空の水, the first officially solo Susumu Hirasawa album. And, it's bizarre but, he already sounds exactly like what he would become. This album is hitting the exact same pleasure + awe centers in my brain that Beacon does. I guess eight years is a long time, but still! I was not expecting this much sheer Hirasawaness this soon!

Frogbs, when exactly does he morph?

Seven listens in already. 時空の水 gets better & better. All those songs in the middle that I thought were "the lesser material" are hooking me now.

I think of Aurora from 1994 as a big turning point, it's one of his only main albums either solo or P-Model which seems markedly different from what came before. the others are obvious ones like the P-Model reboot in 92 or the debut you're listening to now. part of it is because Aurora seems to be produced with an entirely different set of software as his first three solo albums and part is he's really refined his songwriting to a more mystical and grandiose style. as opposed to his first 3 which jump around a lot, even including old P-Model songs (or songs that were originally intended for future P-Model albums)

looking back though a big part of the 'shift' that was he kind of stopped doing the goofy shit for a while, you know like the yodeling and circus music and the real hyperactive stuff. I like that stuff but I can't help but notice that coincides with the period where I think he was at his best. In retrospect that side of him started creeping back in maybe starting with "Parade". but I think he integrated that stuff a bit more naturally with the sound he'd been refining for so long. so it makes sense that Beacon has a lot in common with Jiku no Mizu, I guess he's circled back to that sound in a way.

also looking back that album has some truly weird stuff on it, particularly in the scales it uses. the chords in "Dune" are so unusual, it sounds so alien. for me the (kinda crappy, tbh) production on those first 3 are the 'standout' feature. I'd be pretty interested to hear him re-record some of those songs today.

So there's this piano on the campus of the school I'll be teaching in this fall (starting Monday actually, here we go!). I don't know much about pianos (my instrument of choice for the last few years has been a toy keyboard) but it's got a nice sound to it. It's in tune. I've made a habit of stopping by it whenever I'm on my way in or out of campus, to try and come up with a melody part to go with whatever song is in my earphones.

This works great when the song is, like, War Pigs but, this morning the song was Dune. Forget coming up with a melody part, I couldn't put two notes together. I think the key changes every seven seconds.

First listen to サイエンスの幽霊 / The Ghost in Science today. I am speechless. I am in over my head. Beauty beauty beauty beauty

Also, thank you! Your Hirasawa write-ups are the best. Seems like the wise thing to do is just press forward, then. I was thinking of exploring back into late P-Model but there'll be time for that later. These opening solo salvos of Hirasawa are too gorgeous to resist, and Aurora ("*more* more mystical and grandiose" ? what??? yes please) is just around the corner.

And by "late P-Model" I meant "late *1980s* P-Model", since the '90s unfreeze is right along my path forward. And I already know how much I like some of the tracks on Big Body.

I'm listening to The Ghost in Science for the second time straight through. I have no context for music like this. I can get real fanciful and say: when Syd Barrett's solo career fizzled out in the mid-'70s, what *really* happened is that (this happened just around 1975) part of his soul became dismoored, soared across the Atlantic, swapped shadows with Bob Dylan just as Dylan was conceiving his Rolling Thunder Revue, then got sucked into a wormhole that brought it three thousand years into the future. There this Dylan-shadowed Syd-soul fused with Mother Brain, and was processed (as all such lost souls are) into the pipe-labyrinth of The Great Machine. Since the conservation of elements applies also to time, our hero was spat back into the late 1970s, except neither in the UK or the USA this time: no, it came to Japan, where it entered the nostrils of, and summarily possessed, the frontman of a little-known prog band, called Mandrake...

Because how else can I explain THIS?

Maybe Olias of Sunhillow is how I explain it. That means I'm scrapping my plans to proceed patiently backward through Jon Anderson's life work. I'm going straight to Olias. I need to know

Rocket is one of my favorite songs from it, that said I find it a bit hard to listen to just because of how much treble is on it, clearly he's using new software for those first 3 solo albums that allows him to digitally sample but it seems like it's clipping a bunch of them on the low end, so a lot of them come off like toy instruments. Ghost in Science imo is the worst of them when it comes to that. It's still great in its own way I mean "Sekai Turbine" is still indescribably bonkers, especially paired with the video which has the "Dare to be Stupid" energy, without really being a parody of anything. "Machine Dreams" is great too...though I much prefer the recent version he does with the Tesla coil solo

funny you mention Syd...you do know what P-Model's one cover song was right? (at least their one cover that made an album...)

"Machine Dreams" is great too...though I much prefer the recent version he does with the Tesla coil solo

Sorry, what?!?!?

Obviously I'm a massive theremin fan, and have been known to fly internationally to watch bands playing solos on jet turbine engines, but solo on a Tesla Coil is something I really have to hear? Details on where to hear this, please? :D

Wait, I think I've found it?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xdHE1Hm2E70

(Hisashi used graphics similar to this, I think on ノスタルジア -ヰタ メカニカリス- during the No. 0 tour but the sounds were made by a theremin not a full on Tesla Coil)

there are definitely other videos of him doing it out there! but I'd really have to look since his stuff gets taken off YouTube a lot. there's a recorded version on the 2010 album he did of P-Model covers. I haven't heard the original in a long time since I like that version so much.

I've watched several live versions of 夢みる機械 now and every one of them has been o_0 great!!! (Tesla coils! Miked-up archery!)

(And yes, it's increasingly Hisashi was absolutely 100% as much influenced by this track as by Inagaki Taruho during his steampunk era)

I guess this is the 2010 version you're talking about

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nm7EiFsAfDA

I do like it. There's a certain epic film soundtrack quality to it. But weirdly that 'epic film soundtrack' quality sounds more cheesy than the raw charm of the original 80s mad scientist version. But the disparity between the sweeping orchestral strings and the slightly farty tesla coil-synth makes a nice contrast. And I don't dislike cheese when done well.

There are so many different presentations of this sound I'm obsessed with, and how it is 'created' live.

The staging of the 2010 version really presents it as somehow being generated by the electrical discharge of the coil:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aEcfBb4_dLA

While in later versions, the electrical discharge is just a backing video and the sound is clearly being triggered by someone with a guitar-shaped MIDI controller of some kind:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zrsUHoCl1F4

It's funny because so many Japanese fans of Imai told me to check out Hirasawa, but when I asked for examples, the only thing I was ever linked was Parade (probably because of the name). They should have pointed me at this song! Sorry for multiple Hisashi-posting here but I feel I've got to make clear what I'm hearing. The songs don't really sound alike, but the *atmosphere* is so similar. Obscure scientific terms used to obfuscate and create a sense of awe and mystery. (Imai even has 'use words that are unfathomable' as one of his instructions in the song.) The way both songs switch back and forth between machine-like narration (Imai in the B-T song) and soaring heroic chants (Sakurai's parts in the B-T song). The staging of B-T's song also feels like a tribute to Hirasawa, though they are using sparking Pantographs suspended above the stage rather than a sparking tesla coil. Someone please watch this and tell me I'm not dreaming when I say this feels like a tribute to Dreaming Machine?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zq3O9nHIrLo

Also always wondered about the meaning of 'ダイナモが可動する' - the dynamo moves, the dynamo is moveable - if this was a reference to the machine having animacy. But now I'm wondering if it's a reference to 世界タービン.

Or maybe I'm just totally overthinking this and it's just two super-geeky autistic dudes getting overexcited about science and mechanics

funny you mention Syd...you do know what P-Model's one cover song was right? (at least their one cover that made an album...)

Hot damn! That's a great cover!! It's not a straight translation, either -- Hosono does that too, taking a degree of loving license when translating English into Japanese -- his version of The Band's All La Glory is killer lyrically *and* musically. But here I am with my own derail, ha!

The point is, thanks frogbs, that was awesome. And I think is *juuust* ahead (chronologically speaking) of where I jumped ship? Looks like I may've been too hasty.

"Quit" is a frightening song.

yeah the end of that is like...uhhh

Another Game and Karkador are def worth hearing. my two favorites of the 'pre-freeze' era and you can kind of see how one might've led to the other, like they were slipped a note from the label which read "didn't you used to be kinda wacky?"

Back at work = there's now music-listening time again. I think I've played "Water in Time and Space" and "The Ghost of Science" sixteen times apiece this week (alongside steady doses of N.D.E.)

I've been listening to Siren and Technique of Relief quite a bit lately

The latter is supposed to be 'his most popular album' and it's one of those rare cares where I can absolutely concur

It shouldn't make sense to me that there are *better* Hirasawa albums than this first trilogy (played Virtual Rabbit for the first time today...twice in a row) but I *have* heard Beacon. I have a sense of how improbably vast and wormhole-ridden this cosmos of Susumu's is.

Seriously! Virtual Rabbit is so damn good! Three tremendous albums in three years, and the P-Model unfreeze just ahead. This guy's 1990s have the makings of a Hosono/Agata-tier run of absurd wonder.

P Model 93 album must be the best thing he made.

Yeah he was really on one in the 90s, not only are these albums all great but his style evolved so fast. I can think of other runs like that but not from someone who was already over a decade in. Everything since has been pretty good as well but you get the sense that he’s already perfected his sound

Well, I would argue that B-T made a similar stylistic leap a decade in, between 1987 and 1997 - but listening to their albums in order, it seems like more of a steady progression than a leap

Which I think it also the case with Hirasawa's work in that same decade. And for similar reasons - much of it feels like the explosion in technology. But also the advance of the quality and affordability of that technology. The fact that YMO were using samplers in 1981 does not mean that technology was availabe to everyone, or that it would sound as good. Many of the early adopters of this technology seem to have been inspired rather than held back by the limitations of early technology. While, as the technology becomes better quality, easier to use and more affordable - you have this explosion of albums like Siren and Sexy Stream Liner where it opens up new galazies of sound.

I really need to listen to more P-Model, I think. But perhaps that will feel like stepping backwards, compared to what I hear going on in Siren and Technique of Relief?

I wish I had listened to these albums more in order. Because I loved Water In Time And Space and the Ghost of Science when I first heard them. I was completely knocked out. But going from Siren back to Virtual Rabbit, I can hear its limitations. It feels like an artist *becoming*, rather than having arrived. While, by Sim City, there's a definite sense that Hirasawa has become fully Hirasawa

P-Model is its own thing - I think the more frantic stuff seeps into his solo work (think the title track of Technique of Relief) but otherwise their stuff aims to be a lot catchier and jerkier. it's technopop, for the most part.

This is music that makes you lose yourself; when he's really on, you almost have to remember to breathe.

frogbs OTM over the whole sky.

Tons of Virtual Rabbit and the two first P-Model unfreeze records this week, plus Byakkoya because I was curious about the record our Amphibian identified as the revival of Susumu's circus side, plus the first Kaku P-Model album because I couldn't resist finding out what an all-Susumu P-Model sounded like.

Sonicatharic paradise!

On top of everything else, I can't get over how amazing a vocalist he is.

Yeah, it wouldn't work if he wasn't such a strong singer. Also, how much he commits to the bit. Like, sometimes his songs are *so* out there, but he commits to it so strongly and with such fervour that you totally believe it, Andaman On Demand, sure, you can just email yourself to the most uncharted islands on the map! I love Online Malaysia and Day Scanner.

I do have such a soft spot for that brief flash of 'global village' style techno of the mid 90s (Loop Guru, Transglobal Underground, etc.) and this stuff is scratching that particular itch nicely! But it's very interesting hearing that kind of 'into the blender, drum'n'bass beats plus snatches of Thai or Desi singers' approach from an East Asian perspective. Not that Japan doesn't have its own troubling colonial history in Southeast Asia. But it feels more like searching for the commonalities with Japanese music via e.g. Okinawan scales and textures. Rather than 'let's dribble this Camden Market exotica over a techno beat.'

whoa

https://rateyourmusic.com/release/album/%E6%A0%B8p-model/unzip/

Wow I didn't know he was still putting out so much music?

I wish that more of the more recent material was on streaming services so that I could check it out and decide which to go searching for in record shops when I'm in Tokyo later this year.

I guess I've played Aurora 30 times these past two weeks.

final track on that has got to be one of the prettiest things I've ever heard.

amazing album, imo his first truly great solo one, "Snow Blind" in particular hits all the right buttons for me

The new Kaku P-Model is no Beacon, but it's full of the usual Susumu goodness and highly addictive. --- which sounds like the P-Model spirit alright!