Haruomi Hosono

underrated masterpiece of early-80s outside ymo productions: mari iijima's rosé, produced by sakamoto in 1983. it's pure, unadulterated, exuberant city pop / boogie (of the kind that's not necessarily to every ymo fan's taste) but the chord sequences and arrangements are so good

Yeah Rosé is a good album.

back to hosono, i love this live tv footage from 1983 of him performing w/ seiko matsuda, briefly demonstrating his linn drum, mc-8 and prophet 5 setup

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lumt37Fz0ok

I don't think Medicine Comp is his best album, but it's the one I come back to most often I think. It just "fits" into so many listening situations.

I'm currently fascinated by his late-90s/early-00s "electronica" period - where he moved to laptop production and basically sounded as contemporary as any other glitch producers. Obviously there's the Sketch Show albums, but there's a whole string of collabs/compilations I don't really know anything about. I adore his super glitched-out Coldcut remix, shame that one isn't more widely available.

yea everything gets pretty messy after Medicine Comp. I remember there was one called Good Sport which was like a 90's version of Coincidental Music. should really revisit that one since I recall it being quite good. it was a soundtrack he did to some sporting event.

both Sketch Show albums are wonderful but I really like Loophole. its got such a vivid "staring at the stars on a warm day" sort of feeling to it. I actually think Takahashi is more responsible for the sound & songwriting but Harry's trademarks are totally there.

one more thing - I decided to try to track down some of the Kankyo Ongaku artists and found this (quite good!) LP for very cheap. lo and behold, look who's credited as producer.

https://www.discogs.com/release/1251889-Interior-Interior

yeah that interior album is definitely worth a listen, originally released on hosono and takahashi's yen records imprint in 1982. i especially love the first track "technobose"

inoyama land's danzindan-pojidon is another good hosono produced instrumental/ambient album from that period (also published on yen records)

also testpattern's après-midi, another hosono produced yen record's release from the same period, is wonderful, a bit more straight-up techno-pop but certainly with some hosono-esque ambient elements

as an aside, i never checked until now but resellers are really having a laugh with some of the prices of this stuff on discogs huh

(ugh please disregard the errant apostrophe in yen records above)

Those two Yen box sets (Yen Box 1&2) are pretty essential as a way to plot a path through the YMO Extended Universe, they take in both the Kankyu Ongaku stuff through the more pop and new wavey albums.

I really like the Interior album. The Windham Hill reissue (which has a slightly different track list) was quite cheap, at least up until recently.

My Swing Slow arrived today. It took 3 days to get from Tokyo to Glasgow (5700 miles). Recently mail has been taking longer than that to get from Ediburgh to Glasgow (50 miles).

Anyway, that is by the by.

No obi on the Swing Slow but packaging, sleeve quality and vinyl pressing are exemplary. I've seen a few grumblings over the fact that it has been remixed but i'm enjoying it just as much in this (subtle new) mix as the original.

Edinburgh!

lol @ this Twitter thread. guess the "4th member" of YMO is not Matsutake but rather the dude who handed Hosono a tainted joint

How A Single Bad Drug Trip Led to Japanese Technopop 🧵

In the early 1970s, bassist Haruomi Hosono of the band Happy End was jamming with his friends at a Tokyo studio, when someone passed around a joint. Hosono thought it would be very cool to take a double-sized hit. pic.twitter.com/sFXTEsulCI

— W. David Marx (@wdavidmarx) February 9, 2022

I wish Marxy would write a book about them, then another about the era in general, he's more than capable.

Wtf, I love this kid

Harry Styles saying “Haruomi Hosono” on the Today Show pic.twitter.com/EV7tQIOJ4p

— Light In The Attic (@lightintheattic) May 19, 2022

after getting to know the original a bit better I've started to realize that Hochono House is a hell of an accomplishment

the original has this indescribable vibe - there's something extraordinarily chill and comforting about it. you feel like you were in the room where it was recorded. it's become a cult classic for that reason. a lotta people write things about it like "I don't know why this album is special but it just is". I think it actually fits in that confusing thread I made about debut albums last week.

anyway, the new version changes up pretty much everything - it's all re-recorded and most of the songs are done in a very different way - but somehow that vibe is still there. so it winds up being the rare remix album that works basically the same as the original. idk if I've ever heard anyone quite pull that off before.

good post. hochono house is really something special. it deepened my love for hosono house and is of a piece with it, but is totally it's own special thing

yeh good post frogbs

ha! Hochono House in reverse order of Hosono House, starting with a new version of the final track from Hosono and working its way back to the opener? that's great. :) it also creates ideal conditions to listen to Hosono House and Hochono house on repeat - it'll take you all the way to the final track, make you feel psychedelic and then bring you back to the beginning again

it hits you with that "Yellow Mario" right away

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VZhDXBXw0mQ

I’ve never spent much time with Hosono House before. Man, Choo Choo Gatagoto sounds like a dead ringer for Van Dyke Parks’ cover of Toussaint’s Ocapella from Discover America – from the groove to the languid vocal to (almost) the melody. Wild.

(And I know they worked together on the relatively contemporaneous Happy End, it still just doesn’t 100% register until I hear this)

not familiar with much else but Hosono House rules

It does. And honestly, it's weird that it wasn't produced by VDP because, well, it sounds exactly like the Japanese version of him. And the Happy End album doesn't really?

he did do an interview about this:

TODD BURNS

With Happy End, you ended up recording an album in America. Can you talk about that experience? Was that the first time you had been to America?

HARUOMI HOSONO

Right. It was 1973, or perhaps 1972. I don’t exactly recall when. In LA, California, there is a famous studio called Sunset Sound where we recorded Happy End’s third album. I don’t know how we got there. Someone arranged it for us, I guess. Suddenly Van Dyke Parks visited the studio. He’s a great musician. He was with Lowell George, the guitarist from group Little Feat. They came in, and we got caught up in their pace. That was a really new experience for us. For example, their recording method was very western. It was very layered, let’s say. We learned that method. Before that our style was flat, like Japanese picture scrolls. We hadn’t thought about depth. We learned that from Parks.

TODD BURNS

Van Dyke Parks, you’ve spoken about his impact on you and in meeting him. It seems like he is quite a character.

HARUOMI HOSONO

He was really a crazy man. He was high when we first met. I wanted to stay away from him. I didn’t like him. He first gave a speech in the middle of the studio, like a monologue. It was about the Japanese emperor. We were so puzzled – who is this guy? That was about when we first met. I met him again when he was sober. He was nice. We are still friends. I like him a lot.

finally got the Swing Slow reissue. it's an excellent album and I love that it too seems to have been given a new life by the YouTube algorithm. it's kind of the ultimate Hosono album. it's folky, it's electronic, it's gorgeous, it's kind of minimal, it's vintage yet cutting edge, it has weird unexpected dance breakdowns, and it's steeped largely in (and covers songs from) a genre that the vast majority of his audience wasn't around for. and it's really confounding, so many little "why did you do it this way" moments. and it has an ambient interlude that's so pretty it hurts.

bonus tracks are great too! check this out, maybe the creepiest thing I've ever heard him do. no way this is from '96, right?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BmF6WASwPcw

also includes another, much slower cover of "Caravan", which sounds less electronic but still as mechanical. also something unsettling about that one...

the vinyl version is so beautifully done and is maybe the best sounding record i bought last year. has become one of my very favourite hosono releases.

the reissues last year of Omni Sight Seeing & Medicine Comp also sound incredible, kinda restored my faith in the idea that a well-done pressing can blow away even a well-encoded MP3

curious why people don't seem to like the remix though (at least based on random Discogs comments) - I feel like most of the differences are subtle and the 'upgrade' to the beats makes it sound a bit less 90's which I think is probably a good thing. it's got sort of a 3-D sound to it but not in a hollowed out way. I think it's really good.

i just read those discogs comments and wholeheartedly disagree. the remixing is very subtle and yes does indeed, 'upgrade' the beats, especially during that incredible percussion part of disappeared.

I'm a late arrival but YMO and Hosono have hit me over the last year or so. They simultaneously scratch and create an itch.
Anyway I looked in the NTS archives bcz why not and there's a 15 hour Hosono day from 2017 that I haven't seen mentioned here, so that's what I've been doing while/instead of working this week.

One for frogbs

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KUB9yqPmgJA

Oh wow that is interesting!! so as you probably know I absolutely love the Nokto de la Galaskia Fervojo soundtrack and have always wondered whether Harry is actually playing piano on it or if it's Miharu Koshi. I've actually never seen him play piano before. I'm still not sure if it's him, his playing here seems stilted a bit though maybe he's just putting a spin on it. There isn't much video of Koshi playing either but the little bits I found she certainly seems more nimble, so I assume it's probably her on that album, and then Hosono on the Coincidental Music version?

It says in the info something like this was the first time he played solo piano on TV and he was nervous, he's certainly picking up and putting down the beat a lot.

And this was '85 when Coincidental Music came out, so I guess it was him. No idea about Koshi playing on the soundtrack version.

N.D.E. at last.

https://lightintheattic.net/releases/9402-n-d-e?mc_cid=62a27bbcea&mc_eid=982f43dfd8

Hell yeah, love that this era of Hosono is getting some attention. Wonder if a reissue of Love, Peace, and Trance is in the cards???

Well he’s by far my favorite member of 1D now

Harry Styles came to visit Hosono House.

ハリー・スタイルズさんが、ホソノハウスに遊びに来てくれました。#HarryStyles #HaruomiHosono #ハリースタイルズ #細野晴臣 #HarrysHouse #HosonoHouse pic.twitter.com/B38anvQgTx

— 細野晴臣_info (@hosonoharuomi_) March 29, 2023

oh my!

have never been jealous of harry styles before but

harry is good now, i take back calling his music boring. it is boring, but that doesnt matter, hes one of us.

Harry's House is a reference to Hosono House, is it not? Styles also said the album was inspired by city-pop, though I don't really hear it

Did they play that otamatone?

SORRY TO BUMP THIS THREAD RIGHT NOW BUT

the production on this is insane. Hosono would probably be universally recognized as an electrofunk god if he was like...25% less weird

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LsPXl-OxW28

yes i love that one!

someone got Pacific Breeze 3? it's pretty great!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FAhF7c0IxGI

finally found it!! it's a famous Punjabi song and there are a zillion versions out there, for a while I thought the one Hosono sampled/colored over was just a recording lost to time

oh and here's a fun Hosono fact

today, tomorrow, and the next day will be the:

40th anniversary of Naughty Boys
50th anniversary of Hosono House
30th anniversary of Technodon

reissue time again...

https://rushhourmusic.bandcamp.com/merch/haruomi-hosono-n-d-e-2-lp

just ordered a copy, hopefully it sounds as great as the Medicine Comp reissue does. nice to see some attention paid to Hosono's ponytail phase. kinda wonder if/when those Monad albums are ever gonna get reissued. two years ago there were open preorders for them but I guess they never actually got made. you'd think Bon Voyage and Tropical Dandy would get reissued too since the demand for those seems pretty high right now. but who knows what goes on in the minds of these obscure labels.