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Thread: Which Ruins album to get first?

  1. #26
    Quote Originally Posted by spacefreak View Post
    Symphonica in my opinion.
    Dunno
    I always thought Symphonica sounds more like Koenji then Ruins

  2. #27
    Quote Originally Posted by Udi Koomran View Post
    I always thought Symphonica sounds more like Koenji than Ruins
    But less polished. As mentioned earlier, those songs are all earlier Ruins tunes rearranged for full band - tho' no guitars. It's got Aki Kubota (Koenji) on vocals, but there's also Emi Eleonola from neo-noise pioneers Demi Semi Quaver, who puts in orgasmic yells and shrieks. Of course, Kenichi Oguchi (keys, also with Kenso) Plays on Koenji's Nivraym as well.

    More of Emi Eleonola's vocal outbursts on Hoppy Kamiyama's A Meaningful Meaningnessless, also featuring Yoshida.
    "Improvisation is not an excuse for musical laziness" - Fred Frith
    "[...] things that we never dreamed of doing in Crimson or in any band that I've been in," - Tony Levin speaking of SGM

  3. #28
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    Quote Originally Posted by Morpheus View Post
    I will second Burning Stone. Hyderomastgroningem after that. I am a bigger fan of the Masuda period, the Sasaki stuff feels a bit sterile to me.
    yea I've always thought of those two as a good primer. Masuda hit the sweet spot between noisy and technical. I think Hydero is a better album but BS has "Praha in Spring" which I've always thought of as the tune to instantly turn someone into a fan. personally I prefer the Sasaki stuff these days. by Tzomborgha they'd reached the point where they were too good for this mortal world.

    ultimately there are too many Yoshida projects to even keep track of - Koenjihyakkei probably being the best and craziest, Korekyojinn being maybe the "safest" in that's it's just a 3-man instrumental jazz-rock group, though they're only "subdued" by Yoshida's standards...they're still absolutely nuts. not only was he in a ton of bands but there are a lot of "duo" records (especially lately) that are well worth checking out. there are some nice compilations out there that may help. I have one called "Magaibutsu Sampler Vol.2: Yoshida Tatsuya Compilation" which contains 20 tracks under like 17 different names, but it's all his stuff. a lot of it doesn't even appear on any of the studio albums.
    Critter Jams "album of the week" blog: http://critterjams.wordpress.com

  4. #29
    Quote Originally Posted by JAMOOL View Post
    not only was he in a ton of bands but there are a lot of "duo" records (especially lately) that are well worth checking out.
    Although he's not exactly very fluent in English, I had a brief chat with him after a Ruins gig in Bergen in 2001 when the whole Japanoise stuff was still happening. He complained then that he was "[…] only in six bands this half year", which I understood to mean the actual ensembles - as he was additionally in Satoko Fujii's professional group and doing duets with Keiji Haino, Kazuhisa Uchihashi (Altered States, Ground Zero) and Otomo Yoshihide, plus touring a contemporary theatre and dance troupe. But from what he (attemptively) told me, there's a logical reason for this amount of activity, namely a) that he's very much in demand and b) needs a constant gig to be able to live from playing music. Paople may think whatever they must about a Ronny Stolz or Steve Nilson or Tony Levin, but Yoshida is a guy who performs anywhere between 150-250 times in a given year. That's rather rare these days.

    Especially if you're (allegedly) in the Muppet Show as well.
    "Improvisation is not an excuse for musical laziness" - Fred Frith
    "[...] things that we never dreamed of doing in Crimson or in any band that I've been in," - Tony Levin speaking of SGM

  5. #30
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    yeah even if you don't like his music you gotta respect the hustle. dude has got to be one of the hardest working drummers in the business.
    Critter Jams "album of the week" blog: http://critterjams.wordpress.com

  6. #31
    Quote Originally Posted by Scrotum Scissor View Post
    But less polished.
    Correct. Still though a complete sell out to the sympho-lympho devil compared to the "true", avant Ruins, as its title suggests.

  7. #32
    Quote Originally Posted by Zappathustra View Post
    Still though a complete sell out to the sympho-lympho devil compared to the "true", avant Ruins, as its title suggests.
    Yes.


    [both the band and not]
    "Improvisation is not an excuse for musical laziness" - Fred Frith
    "[...] things that we never dreamed of doing in Crimson or in any band that I've been in," - Tony Levin speaking of SGM

  8. #33
    So am I the only one who regards Mandala 2000 to be their highpoint ?


    Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

  9. #34
    ^I have to say I haven't heard it, but if it comes anywhere near that live recording Melt Banana did for Tzadik (Velocity), then I'd be convinced. The latter is by far my single fave release by that band.
    "Improvisation is not an excuse for musical laziness" - Fred Frith
    "[...] things that we never dreamed of doing in Crimson or in any band that I've been in," - Tony Levin speaking of SGM

  10. #35
    Probably the one that makes the biggest crater in your head...maybe not the easiest thing to predict. It was Burning Stone here. People who like them sometimes when first hearing them would gripe that they'd jump off of an idea just when it was getting started...and end up commenting later that they don't let anything get stale and that it's kind of nice to get about 20 minutes of stuff in three minutes. In my experience the Sasaki version was beyond belief live...would for sure eat green eggs and ham to see them again.

  11. #36
    Quote Originally Posted by Scrotum Scissor View Post
    All of them, basically. Start with the debut Korekyojin, then get Zephyros by the Satoko Fujii Quartet (in which you can hear his inimitable translation of jazz drumming), A Meaningful Meaningnessless [sic] by Hoppy Kamiyama, Incubation by Musica Transonic & Keiji Haino and prepare for total charge of ear and mind. Or you can get the sole album by Zubi Zuva, an acapella vocal quartet fronted by Yoshida and exclusively performing cartoon-like pieces for vox qwith little improvisation.

    re: Ruins. There were at least five different constellations of the band that I know of. The first one was lo-fi to the max and featured a lot of free improv, the best of which was Burning Stone from '92. The second one was just as raw but had better production values and a new bassist; their debut for Skin Graft Records, Refusal Fossil from '97, is generally where it's at - better and somewhat more focused than their debut for Tzadik, Hyderomastgroningem from '95 (IMO). However, I'd personally go for the third incarnation, with bassist Hisashi Sasaki and some MIDI added on Vrresto from '98; it's as wild and insane as ever, but so meticulously detailed and virtuosic that you'll hardly even believe what you're hearing there. It's also fairly easy to come by, as it was Yoshida's first Ruins release for his own Magaibutsu label (in coordination with the legendary Sonore).
    Ruins is a band I still haven't delved into for some reason (probably because I'm still scared of them).

    But I do have Hoppy Kamiyama's A Meaningful Meaningnessless, and so I can at least second your recommendation on that one. I need to dust that one off and listen again, it has been too long.


    Quote Originally Posted by Scrotum Scissor View Post
    Also there's Symphonica on Tzadik (also '98), which has fully band-arranged orchestrations of older Ruins material coming pretty close to Koenji standards. Main man besides Yoshida here is no other than Kenichi Oguchi, Kenso's keyboardist.
    Ho-lee cow! I had no idea this existed!

    If it's still available, I think I need to get this.

    Having Kenichi Oguchi on it is just too cool for school. Kenso is probably tied with Koenji for my fave group from Nippon.

    Richard, as always, you're a wellspring of great info. Thanks man.


    Edit: I forgot that Kenichi played on Nivraym as well, which is probably one reason why I liked that one so much.
    Last edited by aith01; 12-20-2018 at 01:36 AM.

  12. #37
    Burning Stone is scorching hot!!! It's better than Slayer and Yes combined! These guys are playing like they just came out of atomic mayhem, dust-off their sleeves and gabba, gabba, go.

  13. #38
    I really love the Ruins Alone album for some reason. Maybe because the production sounds fantastic. Oh, and the hyper-speed songs as well!

  14. #39
    Just looked on Bandcamp. I don’t have Burning Stone or Infect. Will need to rectify.

  15. #40
    I’ve yet to hear anything Yoshida-composed that I didn’t love.

  16. #41
    ^But how can a dedicated OutsideIn-artist like yourself condone such Muppet!??

    "Improvisation is not an excuse for musical laziness" - Fred Frith
    "[...] things that we never dreamed of doing in Crimson or in any band that I've been in," - Tony Levin speaking of SGM

  17. #42
    ^ The part from 8:20 (which is in "Becttem Pollt", a Koenji tune here played at ca. double speed) is probably one of the most insane things I ever heard played. There are several punctuated notes in a rapid tempo, placed absollutely as painstakingy tricky as could be. Completely crazy.
    "Improvisation is not an excuse for musical laziness" - Fred Frith
    "[...] things that we never dreamed of doing in Crimson or in any band that I've been in," - Tony Levin speaking of SGM

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