Taku Sugimoto - Flagments of Paradise (1997)

A very early Taku Sugimoto (杉本拓) album (although, come to think of it, his first album actually predates this one by 9 more years): the unfortunately titled 'Flagments of Paradise'. Before you go sending this one off to engrish.com, give the guy a break. It has been corrected to 'Fragments of Paradise' on the obi and on the spine. Anyway. This album is from before Sugimoto turned all austere and hyper-minimalist and, well, inaudible on us. It even features some smatterings of quite straightforward viola, harmonica and piano playing, decadent frills the contemporary Taku would probably look down upon with distaste. The main element here though is electric guitar, played by Sugimoto himself and Hisao Mashida (増田久夫). Comparing this one to his later work, Dan Warburton mentioned its 'florid lyricism', 'with its Loren Connors-like melancholy strains'. So there you go. If you're ready to move on to his mid-period work, look at this older post. Maybe I'll post some hardcore latter-day Taku at some point to complete the picture.
'Flagments' was released in 1997 on Creativeman Disc / Test. Contains a few guest appearances by, to only name the most 'famous' one, Tetuzi (his weird way of spelling Tetsuji) Akiyama (秋山徹次).
Scans included for your supreme pleasure.
320kbps.
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