NobukazuTakemura/Childisc S&D

The remix record of "Child's View" is quite good; it has remixes by Coldcut, Mad Professor and Wagon Christ. Quite jazzy stuff, with some vocals too. The original "Child's View" is very hard to find, sadly.

The Milano album is quite different to anything else he's done - very long, largely acoustic pieces, really quite beautiful in parts. Unfortunately, Finale, the companion CD isn't even the same league. Scope is more similiar in tone to the Assembler album, but I would say search this one.

All I have from Takemura is a the Meteor/Wax & Wane 12" but that's really nice. Def. not from the impenetrable school, more of a warm, stuttering glitch type deal. A bit dated but search.

i used to think the world of Takemura, but the execrable The 10th and only slightly less dire Assembler / Assembler 2 have tarnished his rep severely.

S: the slick, lively, not-too-dated Child's View, a one-world music vision in the spirit of United Future Organization. Takemura's Reich-ian aspirations find fullest flower on Child & Magic and Milano: Music for Issey Miyake Men, so seek out either of these instead of the uneven Scope and Hoshi no Koe. if the JP CDs are no longer available (or prohibitively priced), the Child's View Funfair CD isn't a bad substitute.

DESTROY! (even that's far too kind): 10th, Assembler/Assembler 2, the largely unnecessary Finale: Music for Issey Miyake Men, the uninteresting, damn-near unlistenable Water's Suite.

Aki's brilliant, bizarre Ongakushitsu aside, i haven't been too impressed with Childisc. most of the signees are Takemura imitators (sycophants?) with little personality. and even the more inventive artists, like Tanimura, turn out wildly uneven albums, at best. this may be one instance in which the inaccessibilty of a Japanese label's product is actually in the West's favor.

I like him a lot although he is very hit and miss. I was addicted to the track "Wizard In Circus" not long ago and I like the hiphop tracks he's done with menelik.

no need to S: this one, but if you should happen upon Changing Hands, Takemura's long-distance exchange with Jansen/Barbieri, do lend it an ear. maybe a bit precious (could Japan vs. Japan be anything but), yet overlooked and rather lovely.

Audio Sports 'Era of Glittering Gas'. with Yamatsuka Eye on vocals.

I heard 'scope' in a store once and liked it okay. But the live show at Bottom of the Hill in SF about 2 months ago, split between assembler solo pieces and things from 'songbook', that was tedious.

Still haven't heard Assembler, but the other two from this year are weak. I have a Pitchfork review of Songbook running soon, I think. Pretty boring album.

But Funfair I like a lot (reissue of that coming soon), also Scope and about 80% of Hoshi No Koe. His albums are way too long -- damn near every one lasts 80 minutes, and that's a big problem. But when he's on ("Kepler," "Icefall," most of Funfair, "Wax & Wane," "A Chrysalis") I think Takemura is very special.

oh yeah well I like Songbook which is why I gave it a good review, it's like Stereolab and OOIOO together at last. but yeah Assembler is kinda way too-too-IDM.

search: funfair, child & magic, milano. you're set.

I seem to be in agreement with the rest of this thread. Scope, the first Issey Miyake lp (god, the last song on this is just gorgeous), Child and Magic and Hoshi no Koe are my faves. I bought Water's Suite and found it very disappointing. Still wondering what's worth getting from this year...The early Japanese releases have brilliant artwork and prices to match.

i think "funfair" is a bit of a dud save the first track. also I STAND UP for "10th" yeh if you like nod yer head vaguely hip hoppish flowery techno you may not get on with it, and it does have a slighly wine bar fusion thing going for it but is more pleasantly mental than a lot of the new age perfumed crap mister nobu has proffered us, and features "murmur of the day" best song ever, the only comparison for that being the first song off the brown stereolab record and i don't think there can be any better recommendation than that. also "hoshi no koe" ain't as bad as upthread might have you believe (apart from the last track which is pointless) it's kinda pastoral mego gone pokemon and features "sign" which rocks like a mother i do shit body popping to it i cannot help my sorry self - i do! *electro shock*! "scope" is perhaps a tad banal and overly steve reich, but overall a nice glittering swathe of plinky plonky.

also more than worth tracking down are several of the remixes tak has done. some that immediately spring to mind:

roni size - brown paper bag
steve reich - proverb
tortoise - tnt
takako minekawa - phonoballoon song
yo la tengo - danelectro
herbert - addiction

and there's loads more. thrill jockey should really should do a compilation of this at some point, they're all up there with the best of his own work.

some more takemura releases i haven't seen mentioned yet: "animate" which was a japanese only full length cd (meaning another 80 minutes) released last year with a companion 4 track 12" ep. all tracks are named after insects.
also very nice is the sign 2cd on thrill jockey, which compiles some tracks of earlier vinyl only releases, along with a cd-rom featuring animation by cover artist katsura moshino.
and for all those who thought the recent assembler 2 cd on thrill jockey was a bit hard to swallow, i can only say one thing: you haven't heard assembler 1 yet...

as for essential takemura my vote would be:
scope
milano

i wouldn't rate any of his releases as "overlong" or "boring" - they just require very detailed listening. but then again, i'm a self-confessed takemura freak

so, does anyone else besides me actually like koota tanimura's cd typical low life? every time i put it on, i can't believe how much i like it - it seems like such crap but it does something to me.

Childisc as far as I know no longer exists, and Takemura has gone on record saying he may give up music all together. Which is sad if it's true, because he made some extraordinary records.

Nobuyasu Sakonda's 'Clockwork Hermes' is a great album, with a really amazing piece which fuses robot voice with a kind of Hungarian muzurka. I also like Asao Kikuchi's records, apart from the bits that sound like a bad case of tinnitus. Aki Tsuyoko (her prettiness tends to confirm suspicions that Takemura signs women he would otherwise be too shy to flirt with) is a kind of pop Messiaen, rather dry but magical.

Hirono Nishiyama flew the Childisc nest before the label ran out of steam, and is now to be found on Haruomi Hosono's Daisyworld label (Avex). Her 'Humming of Tiny People' album is recommended (especially if you like Noriko Tujiko) for its gentle, otherworldly, lapidary ballads, though it can dip into a kind of extraterrestrial tweeness here and there.

hmm .. i can't say i understand bob's issue with funfair, though i must point out that it treads the same warm and slithery soundfield as "icefall" (from scope). which is, as has been proven by science, the only worthwhile track on scope. i suppose if you extracted all the assembler bits from scope you'd get something like funfair.

i feel like a twat suggesting that japanese-only imports are essential items in any discography, but it's true in this case.