Solo piano album from Tori Kudo of Worst Noise/Guys N Dolls/Maher Shalal Hash Baz et al. Tori’s style relates to both free jazz and classical composition, albeit elevating ‘errors’ to the status of creative prima materia. Some of his playing here sounds a little bit like Muhal Richard Abrams’ early AACM recordings, that same slightly off sense of melancholy, a quality which the boxy nature of the recording gives further emphasis to, giving the performance a nice alone-in-a-room ambience. Kudo plays fairly gently, chasing fortuitous ghostly ideas up and down the keyboard, now stuck on a simple repeating melody, now spreading out into elegiac waves of stumbling exegesis. The title comes from a piano performance piece (not sure if it’s the one on the CD) where Kudo played the piano while a dancer danced in and out of a cut-out frame.

Much-in-demand release of some eye-opening early live footage from the ‘classic’ and most punk-primitive incarnation of Tori Kudo’s idiot-avant orchestra and Japanese underground legends Maher Shalal Hash Baz circa 1987. Trading on mis-interpretations and amplifications of the more feral aspects of musical outsiders like Mayo Thompson, Syd Barrett, The Raincoats and Albert Ayler, Maher Shalal Has Baz created some of the warmest and most melancholic post-punk avant garde music ever articulated by non-musicians. This 75 minute film documents the group when they featured the late Masami Shinoda on alto sax, a central player in the whole Maher mythos who Kudo still describes as one of only two full-time members of the group. Also features another key member, Hiro Nakazaki, on euphonium, Hirofumi Mitani on bass, Kanji Nakao on drums and Takuya Nishimura on guitar and bass. Maher’s music is fragile but very physical and getting to grips with the dynamic up-close and in the flesh adds a whole new dimension to your appreciation of the depth and rigour of Kudo’s beautiful, a-musical vision. And Shinoda’s playing is a real joy. Highly recommended.

Alongside Keiji Haino’s Fushitsusha, Jutok Kaneko’s death-decadent Kousokuya ruled the Tokyo underground of the 80s and 90s with a lead fist. Kaneko can mangle six strings better than anyone this side of Neil Young and Tony Iommi. 1st is a long-overdue reissue of Kousokuya’s ultra-rare debut LP, originally self-released in 1991 in an edition of only 200 copies. It features the classic original line-up of guitarist Kaneko, female bassist/vocalist ‘Mick’ and drummer Ikuro Takahashi (of Fushitsusha et al). Hands down one of the most formally flattening records to come out of whole Japanese scene. Highest recommendation.

Kousokuya, led by renowned guitar monster Jutok Kaneko, were a massive presence on the Tokyo underground throughout the 80s and 90s. Their debut LP, originally self-released in a tiny run in 1991and since reissued on CD by PSF, plotted galaxies of heavy gravity like nothing this side of Neil Young’s Weld and Black Sabbath’s Masters Of Reality. Kaneko’s guitar playing is brutally blunt, working staggered rhythms into huge, tottering constructions that crash to earth with all the ferocious inevitability of dead stars. Vocalist Mick’s high despairing vocals and ten-nods-behind-the-beat bass style reinforce the profoundly desperate, nihilistic air while drummer Ikuro Takahashi (Fushitsusha et al) sets single megaton blasts in the background. Live Gyakuryu Kokuu is a killer retrospective of this mammoth outfit, two long tracks recorded the same year as their debut album that work forms from ominous black gulfs like nothing else this side of Fushitsusha. Highest recommendation.