Killer Bong - Osaka Dub

...and I've saved the best for last. The awesomely named Killer Bong is another local Osaka DJ and beat maker and he has some awesome music to back up his awesome name. Killer reminds me alot of early DJ Krush with a similarly sparse, minimal ambient sound. This is dark and grimy down-tempo, trippy instrumental hip-hop/dub at its best. There's not alot of info around on Killer Bong (His utterly perplexing website won't help any either.) but what I do know is that he released his first album back in 2003 on the Osaka hip-hop label Black Smoker Records created by local Hip-hop unit Think Tank. (K-Bomb, Baba, Jube, D.N.A., DJ Yazi, Wadake and Chi3-Chee.). Most recently he hooked up with the legendery vocalist Suzuki Damo (Best known for his work with Krautrock band Can on their albums "Tago Mago" and "Ege Bamyasi") to release a collaboration of improvised music. It's just come out so I won't be uploading yet but it is fairly limited release so I won't make you wait too long.

"Osaka Dub" is the first in his series of "Dub" CD-R albums released in 2005 which also include "Tokyo Dub" and "Moscow Dub". Not sure what the significance of the cities is as none of the albums are live recordings or seem to figure into the albums in any way. "Osaka Dub" is probably my favourite of his releases but pretty much eveything he's done is gold and despite being fairly elusive is well worth the trouble of tracking down.

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Official?

Baiyon - PixelJunk Eden (Original Soundtrack)

Baiyon is Kyoto DJ and graphic designer Kuramitsu Tomohisa. Back in 2008 he collaborated with local Kyoto game developer Q-games to create a game that used Baiyon's stripped down minimal, electro house music (Think of a more chilled out Plastikman) and his distinctive and stylish graphic design as its source of inspiration. The result was the rather unique and addictive PixelJunk Eden. But while Baiyon has been around for quite some time contributing music, sound design and art to various projects and exhibitions over the years his musical output has been fairly limited. Thankfully Q-games were savy enough to actually release the games soundtrack on CD. The game did alot to raise Baiyon's international profile so hopefully you'll be seeing more from him in the future.

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LIVE LOG: Yamamoto Seiichi (Namba Bears 25-2-2011)

It's my birthday tomorrow! Yay me! I was lucky enough to get a digital camera which has some fairly decent audio and video capture which means... I finally have a way of documenting my live show addiction. So may I introduce the all new "LIVE LOG". A regular section where I upload shitty video of some of my recent gigging highlights.

First up is one of the Boredoms own Yamamoto Seiichi's many side projects/concept pieces. "Suimin" is a 3 hour, ambient, audio/visual experience. The audience were told to bring sleeping bags and pillows to watch the ceiling projected video pieces and their accompanying ambient soundscapes. I wasn't totally sure going in if I was going to end up bored out of mind but I came out pretty impressed. The audience were encouraged to relax and sleep if they felt like it so it made for a very informal and laidback experience. The more meditive experience was a nice change of pace from the usual noise and chaos I'm used to seeing at Bears. Worth checking out if you're seeking a more introspective experience.