Motohiko Hamase - #Notes of Forestry

• Posted on 3 September 2020
• 0

Motohiko Hamase - bass / Satsuki Shibano - piano / Yasunori Yamaguchi - percussion / Akila Takahashi & Motohiko Hamase - synthesizer manipulation

recorded: Studio farm; Tokyo, Japan

Wacoal Art Center/NEWSIC Records 1988 - reissue: WRWTFWW Records 2020

My only complaint about this record is that it isn't longer. Motohiko Hamase is a jazz bass player. He played with many of the top Japanese jazz musicians in the 1970s & 80s, but was also interested in creating whole new forms of music. This album falls into the latter category, but is clearly performed by masterfully skilled musicians. To me, it falls perfectly in between the music of Steve Reich from about a decade earlier and the more experimental, electronic music of Nobukazu Takemura a decade after this. With some Joni Mitchell-esque, electric brhøøm bass effects sprinkled throughout.