Kazuki Tomokawa

Some of the best records I probably never get to hear. But I do my best to neglect the prediction. Bubbachup at Motel de Moka made a real nice entry a while ago about the best albums in 2008.

I will listen more to Dennis González & Faruq Z. Bey with Northwoods Improvisers Septet and Fire on Fire in the future. But the one that really got me on fire was the album Blue Water, Red Water [青い水赤い水] by Kazuki Tomokawa.

I bought five albums very cheap from P.S.F Records (send and received within less than a week) among them the awesome “Blue water, red water”. His voice is described as screaming, and I would ad haunting, yet story telling. Although some people might know him, he is rather unfamiliar in the western countries. I hope this will change.

Kazuki Tomokawa has been productive over the last decades and has release several albums. He is a folk singer, and the main thing – to me – is his voice and temperament. It’s sometimes brutal, sometimes intense.
Only one out the five bought albums has an English title. It makes it more exotic and hardly available, but also very compelling and inspiring. I believe Scandinavian listeners might be more familiar with some of the works of Kazuki Tomokawa. I still got a lot to learn about him, and there are several hours of listening to this Japanese singer songwriter. But it isn’t half as weird as it sounds.

His website is in Japanese only – http://www.interq.or.jp/www-user/kurenai/

Wikipedia has a better view of his releases than discogs – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kazuki_Tomokawa

There is a really nice introduction at the blog Sonic Asymmetry, although the blogpost is mostly written as a review of the album “Erise no me”.

And you might be lucky to download full albums at Time has told me.

I can also recommend the fine review of Blue Water, Red Water at Brainwashed which – as always – includes some one minute snippets.