new wave

Dave Stewart & Barbara Gaskin: Up From The Dark (1986)

2018/05/08

I think the right phrase for this one is: “all my Christmases came at once”. Never before had I thought I’d be able to bring up someone from my very, very early blog past, in this latest version of it, in a way that made perfect sense. Dave Stewart & Barbara Gaskin’s Up From the…
Romie Singh: Masters (1986)

2018/05/01

Romie Singh’s Masters is more than just one killer 12” dub plate surrounded by lord knows what. Masters is a wonderful reminder of the bit of delightful weirdness that Romie was able to capture in a bottle, some months in Hamburg, in 1986. Masters was an early collection of proto-future Pop from someone who managed…
Fashion: Fabrique (1982)

2017/10/27

One of the ultimate statements in sleaze. Some Discog commenter put it better than I ever would: “If cocaine were music, this album would be the result.” Helmed by German post-disco mastermind Zeus B. Held and a post-punk quartet from Birmingham, England, Fashion, Fabrique brought them together to create something that vastly outstretched their original influences. Fabrique saw them…
南佳孝, 観, 太田建: 882 Studio (1985)

2017/10/24

These are the kinds of records that just mean the world to me. They’re the ones so full of potential, yet profoundly this…close to being lost in the cracks of history. What you’ll hear in 882 Studio is a very short and sweet compilation by three artists from the Japanese label Fitzbeat, a label mostly…
Syoko: Soil (1986)

2017/04/28

Everytime I put on Syoko’s Soil I have to do a double-take. Seriously? The music coming out of my headphones right now was made by the same person who created the My Neighbor Totoro soundtrack and Kichijoutennyo. Sonically, I can see the connection to the latter but stretching the conceit to his countless Miyazaki soundtracks seems to question his elasticity…
Melon: Do You Like Japan? (1982)

2017/02/10

assively influenced by American R&B, Do You Like Japan? holds that rare thing for us as listeners: it’s a question posed in the title. Was ex-Plastics frontman Toshio Nakanishi asking us if we liked Japan or was he asking himself that same question? The answer would be hard to tell after you listen to the album. Created after his breakup…
Krisma: Clandestine Anticipation (1982)

2014/07/31

Fascination. That’s the main word I can use to describe the reason I’ve devoted my time in shedding light on Christina Moser and Maurizio Arcieri of Chrisma/Krisma. Most artists you can follow a trajectory pointing you how they get to a destination. However, Krisma from their beginning as a disco duo to this point as…