Kaneko Jutok & Kikukawa Takahisa - Wedged Night (2005)

While I would like to try to use this blog primarily for my own rips, rather than just leeching off the hard work of others (and having a blog that's interchangeable with all the other ones out there), I will also post some mp3s I picked up myself on some other blog from time to time, especially if the sounds in question are not available on 27 other sites, or if for whatever reason I think they deserve more attention. So here goes: a vinyl rip (I don't do those myself) of a great Japanese 'free rock' LP recorded in 2002, and released in 2005 by bijou label Siwa (but, like almost all of their releases, long out of print). And while I think of it: is anyone ever going to rip that Kan Mikami LP they did in 2009??

Listen up: my personal habit is, when romanizing Japanese names, to put the first name first, rather than the surname first, as is the habit in Japan. That's the way I have always done it on this blog as well. So I will speak of Kazuki Tomokawa, Kan Mikami, Keiji Haino, Toshimaru Nakamura, and not the other way around - unless the person in question systematically sticks to the traditional order himself (for instance: Yoshihide Ōtomo looks weird, and countless people on the interwebs in fact seem convinced that Ōtomo (oh yeah, I also like to mark long vowels with a macron) is his first name. It's not.).
Jutoku Kaneko (金子寿徳: Kane-ko Ju-toku), legendary guitarist behind Kousokuya (光束夜; -ou- is another way to transliterate -ō-, so pronounce it Kō-soku-ya, 'night of luminous flux') who sadly died at the age of 49 in 2007, preferred the transliteration Kaneko Jutok, so let's grant him that.
I don't know what Takahisa Kikukawa (菊川貴央), the drummer in 水晶の舟 (usually written Suishou no Fune, 'crystal boat', but the same thing goes for the -ou- in 'Suishou'), prefers, but for the sake of symmetry I'll put his last name first as well.

Two more remarks about Jutoku's name, for those who are interested in that kind of thing.
First off, what happened to the -u at the end of 'Jutoku'? You can read a very academic explanation on wiki, but long story short: i and u are hardly pronounced at all in certain word environments, so occasionally you'll see this reflected in the way people spell their names in rōmaji. Extreme example: Stomu Yamashta, actually Tsutomu Yamashita (山下勉, but more often in katakana: ツトム ヤマシタ).
Secondly: occasionally you'll find 寿得 instead of 寿徳 for 'Jutoku' (not on this album cover though, as you can see, nor on the flyer). Strange, because the dictionary I'm checking at the moment lists the pronunciation Jutoku for 寿徳 (along with 5 other possibilities, try it!), but only 'Toshie' for 寿得. So I don't know why the latter is used, since apparently it can't be read as 'Jutoku'. End of second remark.
One remark about the album title: the cover gives the Japanese title 楔夜, the characters for 'wedge' and 'night'. If you have paid attention very well, you will recognize the latter as the -ya in Kousokuya. I'm assuming this title is pronounced 'Kusabi Yoru', but have no clue what it's supposed to mean.
And finally, one remark about the track title 'Kirin'. It means 'giraffe' in Japanese (but I think it can also simply be a personal name, so I'm not sure what's intended here). They'll usually spell it キリン, in katakana, first of all because that's normal practice for animals, but also because the kanji are way too difficult: 麒麟. Just look at those babies.

Konnichi wa. Watashi wa kirin desu.

Do you see how I managed to write an entire post without saying anything about the music? There's other things in life, kids. Language, for instance, is also interesting. Have you looked up the name of this blog yet? I like to imagine the troops of Indoeuropeanists stranding on this blog and blinking in incomprehension. Makes me chuckle, don't know about you. To tell you the truth, the kind of ramblings I post here (like the above), are the sort of information I always wished I'd find online when looking up my favourite music. So I guess I'm hoping there are other kids out there who will be pleased to be thus enlightened. But for the ungrateful rest of you I'll just quote the blurb in full:
'Jutok Kaneko should be familiar to some as the man behind the long running deep psychedelic 'rock' outfit Kousokuya. Takahisa Kikukawa spent some time with Ché-Shizu, UZU and has recently been performing with Suishou no Fune. Both in Kousokuya and in Kaneko's solo work the line between composition and improvisation is a very blurry one so it's only in the loosest of terms that we say side one of this album is an "improvisation" and side two consists of a couple of "songs". The LP is issued in a one off limited run of 500 and comes in an appropriately black and black on black silkscreened cover with two screened inserts.'
Or in other words: if you liked the Vajra (and I'm hoping at least some of the 600+ of you who downloaded it did - and maybe even went ahead and actually bought it?), you'll probably like this.
So there.
192kbps.