In the spirit of the season, I wanted to share my favorite releases of the year. Not exhaustive, just some personal highlights. Happy new year!
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Tag: trip hop
[Mix for NTS Radio] Getting Warmer Episode 52: Yoko Kanno Special
My newest mix for NTS Radio is an hourlong Yoko Kanno special. If you’re unfamiliar, Kanno is a Japanese composer, arranger, and musician. best known for her extensive work soundtracking anime films and series, though she’s also scored a number of video games and live-action films. Some of her noteworthy anime scores include Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex, Cowboy Bebop, Macross Plus, Turn A Gundam, The Vision of Escaflowne, Darker than Black, Wolf’s Rain, and Terror in Resonance. My entrypoint to her work, as I suspect is the case for many, was the terrific theme for the Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex series, “Inner Universe,” which is sung in Russian, English, and Latin by Japanese-Russian singer Origa, who is a regular collaborator of Kanno’s. Since then it’s been a joy to dig through her enormous discography, so I’ve compiled a few of my favorite moments here, ranging from opiated trip hop and jazz to sweeping cinematic modern classical to devastating choral pieces and churning dystopic breakbeat. I hope you like it! You can download an mp3 version here.
Tracklist: 1. Yoko Kanno – Blue Tone 2. Yoko Kanno – Stamina Rose 3. Yoko Kanno – Pulse 4. Yoko Kanno – 縮緬エアー 5. Yoko Kanno – Chorale 6. Yoko Kanno – Go DA DA 7. Yoko Kanno – She Is 8. Yoko Kanno – Some Other Time 9. Yoko Kanno – Bang Bang Banquet 10. Yoko Kanno – Aqua 11. Yoko Kanno – Orphan 12. Yoko Kanno – On The Earth 13. Yoko Kanno – A Sai En 14. Yoko Kanno – This EDEN 15. Yoko Kanno – Ephemera 16. Yoko Kanno – Bells For Her 17. Yoko Kanno – The Clone 18. Yoko Kanno – Torch Song 19. Yoko Kanno – Siberian Doll House 20. Yoko Kanno – Inner Universe
Goddess In The Morning – Goddess In The Morning, 1996
There’s a significant chance you’ve already heard half of this record, as I’ve regularly been using it in mixes for the past year and a half. And with good reason! Aside from being objectively beautiful from start to finish, it feels particularly aesthetically situated to resonate well with listeners right now, so I wouldn’t be surprised if this prompts a reissue. (Do it!)
It’s a mysterious record–the only release from the eponymous duo Goddess In The Morning, comprised of Akino Arai and Yula Yayoi. Akino has left a pretty dense paper trail, credited on 95 different releases for vocals, writing, arrangement, and production, notably as a regular contributor to Yoko Kanno scores. Yula is a little harder to trace, with a handful of releases that I’ve had limited success in tracking down. I’d particularly love to hear her 1999 record Summer Aura on the basis of its cover art and release year alone, if anybody has a copy they’d be willing to share. (She also shows up as a vocalist on Seigén Ono‘s behemoth 20-disc Saidera Paradiso, and fittingly, Ono is credited with mastering Goddess, which seems particularly cool in light of how divergent the record is from Ono’s wheelhouse.)
Goddess In The Morning is a wild ride in the truest sense, ranging from hazy trip hop on “Ucraine” to the Celtic folk-inspired prog “Saga” to the Virginia Astley-esque pastoral closer “14.” Across them all are (what I assume to be) Yula and Akino’s heavily layered vocals (effectively musical catnip for me), processed into intricate electronic landscapes that feel both spacious and heavily polished to a reflective chrome sheen. I’m not gonna try to sell this too much harder, because if it’s for you, it’s very obviously for you, but I do hope you love this, as it keeps worming its way nearer (and dearer!) to my heart.
[Mix for NTS Radio] Getting Warmer Episode 49: Classic Kpop Special
My newest episode of Getting Warmer for NTS Radio is a classic K-pop special I made with very special co-host Bread Face. It’s mostly from the 90s, with a few early aughts tracks. Until recently I had been under the (false!) impression that K-pop was mostly limited to dance-oriented bubblegum synth pop, but I’ve been loving delving into all of its sub-genres: included here are moments of hip hop, trip hop, r&b, and even some ska influences. We had so much fun putting this together (my first time bringing a guest onto NTS!), so I hope you enjoy it. If you do, you can download an mp3 version here. Thanks as always for listening 
Tracklist: 1. Fin.K.L – 당신은 모르실꺼야 (You’ll Never Know) 2. 베이비복스 (Baby VOX) – Get Up 3. 엄정화 (Uhm Jung Hwa) – 초대 (Invitation) 4. 宋光植 (S.E.S.) – Feeling 5. 제이 (J) – 가사 첨부 (Time Out) 6. 영턱스클럽 (Young Turks Club) – 타인 (Ta In) 7. 지누션 (Jinusean) – How Deep Is Your Love 8. 룰라 (Roo’ra) – 날개 잃은 천사 (Angel Without Wings) 9. 宋光植 (S.E.S.) – Dreams Come True 10. 박지윤 (Park Jiyoon) – 아무것도 몰라요 (I Don’t Know) 11. 영턱스클럽 (Young Turks Club) – 정 (Jung) 12. 드렁큰 타이거 (Drunken Tiger) – 난 널 원해 (I Want You) 13. 宋光植 (S.E.S.) – Be Natural 14. 박지윤 (Park Jiyoon) – 박지윤 – (Coming Of Age Ceremony) 15. 타샤니 (Tashannie) – 경고 (Caution) 16. 이정현 (Lee Jung Hyun) – 와 (Wa)
[Mix for NTS Radio] Getting Warmer Episode 36
Here’s my newest episode of Getting Warmer for NTS Radio, also marking my show being three years old! I tried to get slightly out of my wheelhouse with this one and be a little braver about mixing genres and moods, but it still feels very airy and spacey and summery to me. I hope you like it. Mp3 download is here if you’d like it. Flyer image by Eric Epstein.
Tracklist: 1. Sandy Salisbury – Come Softly 2. MJ Lallo – Before Brazil 3. Goddess in the Morning – Ucraine 4. UCC Harlo – Ceres 5. Yumi Murata – TOKIの音 6. CFCF – Closed Space 7. Enno Velthuys – In the Royal Woods 8. Annie Haslam – If I Loved You 9. Kissing the Pink – How Can I Live 10. Mouth Music – Hoireann O 11. Matt Bianco – Half A Minute 12. Masashi Kitamura + Phonogenix – ヴァリエイション・III 13. All In One – Rich Man, Poor Man 14. Sth Notional – Yawn Yawn Yawn 15. Björk – Come To Me
Harold Budd & Hector Zazou – Glyph, 1995
An underloved record from two masters. Trip hop feels like a radical genre departure for both Budd and Zazou, and yet it instantly makes sense upon first listen. Both leave their stylistic fingerprints all over Glyph–Budd’s melancholia, Zazou’s sinister sensibility–weaving haunted ambient jazz into fizzed out drum loops. Trumpet arrangements by Mark Isham, guitar by Barbara Gogan (with whom Zazou also collaborated on a very good trip hop full-length that I’ll be posting at some point), and poetry recitations by Budd. Attains startling heights of opiated beauty (“Reflected in the Eye of a Dragonfly,” featuring a wash of pedal steel guitar courtesy of BJ Cole; sinuous grooves on “Pandas in Tandem” and “As Fast As I Could Look Away She Was Still There”). Does exactly what good trip hop is supposed to do, and then some.
Arto Lindsay – Noon Chill, 1997
Arto Lindsay made a name for himself as a founding father of the New York no wave scene with his project DNA. He went on to work with the Lounge Lizards, Ambitious Lovers, and the Golden Palominos before producing a slew of solo records. Though American, Lindsay’s parents were missionaries and he spent his teenage years in Brazil at the height of the tropicália movement. This Brazilian influence emerged more and more throughout his 40 year long career, spawning a trilogy of records dense with Brazilian sound: O Corpo Sutil (1996), Mundo Civilizado (1996), and finally, Noon Chill. Lindsay has also done production work for Caetano Veloso, Tom Zé, Gal Costa, Vinicius Cantuária, and Carlinhos Brown, to name a few. (Side note: he’s also responsible for the weirdest/best cover ever of Prince’s “Erotic City.”)
Noon Chill sounds like a well-intentioned poolside afternoon gone on a codeine bender. Most of the songs are bossa nova at heart, but they continuously slip down dark, trip-hoppy rabbit holes and spiral off into ominous drum and bass riffs. It’s like Tanto Tempo‘s sinister older brother. Combined with Lindsay’s trademark disinterested vocals and lyrics like “I do love your lack of all expression/I find it not at all distressing,” you can’t help but see Noon Chill through heavy eyelids.