Mikio Masuda - Part 4

Hey there. Back again to close out our look into Mikio Masuda's catalog. The final 4 albums for today are an improvement over what we heard towards the tail end of our last post. Going to keep this one quick so we can move on. 

First up is the 1986 release on the JVC label, Dear Friends. The copy I have here is the reissue with some extra tracks. Mickey is strictly on the piano and is joined by bassist Hideo Kawahara, percussionist Tatsuji Yokoyama and drummer Shingo Okudaira. 

This one has a Latin vibe on quite a few tunes and highlights here for me would be "Istanbul" and "Everyday Everynight" and the closing tune "Impromptu In Blue."

The following year in 1987, and using the same personnel, Mickey released another album on the JVC label titled Smokin' Night. Nothing Earth shattering here but another acoustic straight ahead album with some Latin vibes to it at times. Highlights for me are "Mbalishu" which features some nice back and forth from Yokoyama and Okudaira, as well as "Blue Island" and the closing tune, "Chase." Not a bad album by any means. 

Mickey released an acoustic trio album in 1990 titled Autumn Leaves that I haven't been able to locate. Anyone out there with a copy - please share.

The next release I have of Mickey's was 10 years later in 1997, again on the JVC label. Titled Black Daffodils and featuring Ron Carter on bass and Lewis Nash on drums, Mickey plays a handful of covers that are honestly nice to hear from him. He plays quite nicely on "There Is No Greater Love" and Sonny Rollins classic "Oleo." Another nice album on the backend of Mickey's career. 

The final album I have here is again on JVC and released in 1998. Joining Mickey on Blue Dumplings we again have Ron Carter on bass with Grady Tate on drums, this time around. More of the same of what we heard on Black Daffodils. Highlights here for me are the original title track along with "It Could Happen To You." Very easy going, straight ahead stuff here. Another well rounded album to close out Mickey's catalog. 

Enjoy!

Mikio Masuda - Part 3

Back today for our next installment for Mikio Masuda. We've entered the 80s which is where I typically lose interest but Mickey has some redeemable music from the decade - and some that's not of much interest. 

First up we have an album that alluded me for a long time. I finally broke down and bought and ripped the vinyl. Noticed yesterday that 1980's Silver Shadow is now on streaming which I may have overlooked all this time. Either way, this is another one I really dig. My rip ended up having some quality issues so I found another version to share here. Joining Mickey we have Toshiyuki Honda on alto sax and flute, personal favorite Shunzo Ohno on trumpet and Takayuki Kato on guitar. Mickey used 2 different bassists, Osamu Kawakami and Kenji Takamizu, with percussionist Masato Kawase and drummer Louis de Andrade. All originals here outside of Joe Henderson tune "Inner Urge."

First up we have "My Delight" and to be honest, the beginning of the track made me wonder how this album was going to turn out. It and the following title track both start off sounding very 1980s. "All About You" is a quick ballad before we get to the best parts of this album, starting with "Goody-Goody." The best tune here might be "Sonic Barrier" which has a great tempo and features some of Mickey's best playing on the album. After another slow one in "Little Waltz" we have the Henderson tune "Inner Urge" which features great playing from Ohno and Mickey on synthesizer. We close this one with "Blue Sky" which has a smooth, beachy vibe to it. 

Next for us is the 1981 release on the Zen label, Mickey Finn. Lending Mickey support this time around we again have guitarist Takayuki Kato, bassist Tatsuhiko Hizawa, percussionist Tatsuji Yokoyama and drummer Kazuyoshi Harada. 

All originals from Masuda here and while this one is starting to sound a bit more 1980s, it isn't entirely uninteresting yet. This one starts off with a nice tempo in the title track followed by another relatively uptempo tune in "Skippin' High." Next and last highlight for me would be the tune "Sunrise" which sounds more like what we heard on the late 70s albums. 

Mickey's next release came the following year in 1982 on the Invitation label. And that is about all I have to say for Chi Chi. I've included it hear for completeness but this is a low effort, easy listening album, in my opinion. A couple of tracks have a pulse but for the most part this is forgettable music. 

The same can basically be said for his next release 2 years later with Mariko Hiraga. Twilight features vocals throughout from both Mariko and Mickey. I'll be honest, I couldn't finish this one. I will include the instrumentals I made although they turned out just OK. Just not for me.

See you next time for our final post on Mikio Masuda. Enjoy!

Mikio Masuda - Part 2

Back again with our next look into Mikio Masuda's catalog. 

First album for today was released in 1979 on the Electric Bird label. Corazon pays homage to the Carole King song first featured on her Fantasy album, I do believe. Corazon also have an accent over the o but my keyboard hates me today. Joining Mickey we have Anthony Jackson on bass, Sammy Figueroa on percussion with Bernard Purdie on drums. We also have a strings section led by David Mathews; for a full list of the names please check the discogs link above.

This one starts off with great tempo and a Latin vibe in the title track. Mickey's synthesizer is fantastic before switching over to his Rhodes. The full strings section adds a nice element to it, as well. This track does feature some limited vocals in Spanish. The 2 other covers are also highlights. First is the Robert Lamm tune "Another Rainy Day In New York City" which also features limited vocals. The other is the Sadao Watanabe tune "Samba Em Praia." We also have another great rendition of "Let's Get Together" before closing with another nice Masuda tune in "Love Talkin'." I've included an instrumentals for the title track and ARDINYC although the vocals are pretty minimal on both.

Later that year, Masuda released another album on Electric Bird titled, Goin' Away. This record features a long list of musicians so please refer to the link for the full list. This one is a little hit or miss and is mostly originals with exception of 2 songs. We start off with the title track which features great play from Masuda on the clav, followed by the Latin-inspired "Spanish Fantasy." Other highlights for me would be "Funky Surf" despite the somewhat corny vocals and "See-Saw Song." There are vocals on a handful of the tunes here so I included an instrumental version separately. 

I don't like to backtrack but the previous year in 1978 Masuda performed live on Tokyo radio station NHK FM. I have an entire series of live performances from this station around this time and I'll share the rest eventually. For today we'll stick to the Masuda performance which is the first, and in my opinion, the best of the group. While I don't have any details about personnel, there's some great musicianship going on here. The set opens with Terumasa Hino tune "Black Daffodils" which features a flautist and trombonist. Masuda tune "Prayer" that we heard on Trace is next and features Mickey playing beautifully on the acoustic piano and a saxophonist lending support. 

Next, we get ourselves another version of "Let's Get Together" which features great saxophone play. It's hard to guess who might be the player, but we did see Takao Uematsu on Trace, so perhaps it's him. Whoever it is, they play wonderfully. Next we have "Mickey's Samba" and "Moon Stone" with the flautist and trombonist lending support again. The saxophonist returns for a nice version of "Funky Wave" and I notice a percussionist for the first time. Maybe my favorite of the set with Masuda sounding fantastic on the Rhodes. We close with another tune from Trace in "Add Some" which includes the saxophonist and trombonist. That wraps up a nice live set. I look forward to sharing the others. 

Enjoy!

Mikio Masuda - Part 1

One of my favorite artists from the last couple of years is Osaka-born keyboardist, Mikio Masuda. I'm nearly 100% certain my first time hearing him was on Kohsuke Mine's excellent album Sunshower, although it could have been Takao Uematsu's also very enjoyable Straight Ahead album. Either way, Mickey plays an excellent piano and has quite a few quality albums that we'll cover here. As the 80s went on, he began to lose me (like most others) and he eventually returned to a more acoustic sound in the 90s. But I enjoy nearly all of his albums throughout the 70s. I'll share everything I have regardless of era and let you make the call. 

The first album we'll look at is from 1974 and released on the East Wind label. Trace features a group of mostly familiar faces. Joining Masuda on piano we have Terumasa Hino on flugelhorn, Takao Uematsu on sax and Hideo Miyata on flute, although each player only appears on 1 track a piece. We also have Tsutomo Okada on bass and Motohiko Hino on drums. 

All originals from within the group on this one. It's also the closest to acoustic straight ahead jazz that we'll hear compared to the rest of the decade. Personal favorites for me are "Hard Luck" which features Masuda playing at a feverish pace and "Prayer" where Uematsu shines, as well as Masuda. Not a bad album whatsoever but I tend to prefer the remainder of what we'll hear throughout the 70s. 

Next up for us is one of my favorite albums of the lot. Released in 1976 and also on East Wind, Mickey's Mouth takes a turn towards fusion and jazz-funk. Masuda employs the Rhodes, clavinet, organ and synthesizer with Masayoshi Saitoh on guitar and Osamu Kawakami on bass. We also have Guilherme Franco on percussion with Jess Kurata on drums. Joining for one tune is our friend Kohsuke Mine on soprano sax. 

All originals again from within the group and this one starts off with great energy with the Saitoh tune "What's Happening." Next we have Masuda's signature song in "Let's Get Together" - a tune we'll hear various renditions of as we go. This version happens to be my favorite and the bass line from Kawakami is perfect to me. Kawakami tune "Hello Jess" is next and has a bit of a rock vibe to it. Saitoh's guitar and Masuda's organ play off of each other quite nicely. Mine makes his appearance on Masuda tune "I Saw The Light" which might be the best track on the album. Another great bass line from Kawakami and Mine's soprano is on point as always. We close with another Masuda tune in "Airplane" and it again has a rock vibe to it with Saitoh's guitar and Masuda's synthesizer doing the heavy lifting. Excellent album start to finish. 

Masuda's next album came in 1978 and was released via the Better Days label. This time around, joining Mickey on Moon Stone we have 2 guitarists, Kazumi Watanabe and Kazumasa Akiyama. We also have bassist Motohiko Hamase and drummer Hideo Yamaki. 

This one starts with the great rhythm of "Mickey's Samba" which features great play on the organ from Masuda. "Funky Wave" and the title track follow and are a touch slower but feature great work on the synthesizer and Rhodes. "Space Coaster" is up next and while I love the tempo, the guitar playing is a bit too fast for my preference. The 2nd half of the tune more than makes up for it, though. Next we have another rendition of "Let's Get Together" and the guitar playing totally redeems itself. This version is a little bouncier that what we heard on Mickey's Mouth and might be the best track on the album. "Vibration #1" is next and is a duo tune with drummer Yamaki with Masuda strictly on the clav. We close with the forgettable "Keep On Loving" which has vocals from Akiyama and is a mostly generic sounding tune. I didn't include an instrumental since the tune overall isn't much to write home about.

Enjoy!

2 more from Yoshio Otomo

After really enjoying Moon Ray I decided to see what else I could drum up from saxophonist Yoshio Otomo. Turns out, Moon Ray is the middle of a trio of late-70s  albums with Otomo as leader. We'll take a look at the other 2 today.

First up, we have a quartet album released on the Frasco label in 1976. Joining Yoshio on Oh! Friends we have Junichiro Oguchi on piano, Kosugi Satoshi on bass and Fumio Watanabe on drums. Mostly straight ahead stuff like we heard on Moon Ray. We start off with 2 great originals from the group: "Have A Nice Dream" from Otomo and "Pleiades" from Oguchi. A couple of covers follow in a Otomo solo version of Duke Ellington classic "In A Sentimental Mood" and "You're My Everything." This one closes with an excellent ballad from Otomo in "Quiet Blue" which might be the best tune of the album.

In 1978, Otomo released another quartet album on the Seven Seas label titled As A Child. Joining him this time around are Toshiyuki Sekine on piano, Satoshi Kosugi on bass with Akiyoshi Yoshino on drums. All originals from Otomo here aside from the closing Stevie Wonder tune, "All In Love Is Fair." This one starts of beautifully with the title track, featuring great play from Otomo and Sekine. "In A Spring Waltz" is also a very nice track with Otomo on soprano and if memory serves, I believe we've only heard him on alto until now. Otomo returns to the alto for the briskly paced "Sentimental Steps" before the group slows things back down to close with a very nice rendition of the Stevie tune mentioned above. 

Have a great weekend. I'm working on a few new series of posts, including: Mikio Masuda, Masaru Imada and Tsuyoshi Yamamoto, amongst others - so stay tuned.

Hiroshi Fukumura - Part 2

Back again today with 2 more from trombonist Hiroshi Fukumura. 

Released in 1981 on the Insights label, Nice Day features all originals from Fukumura. Joining him we have Shuya Sato on alto and soprano saxes, Naoki Kitajima on keyboards, Hiroki Miyano on guitar, Nobuyoshi Ino on bass with Akira Doi on drums. Ino has been featured on a ton of stuff we've covered. Doi we also heard towards the tail end of Isao Suzuki's catalog.

Relatively short tunes on this one - all around 6 minutes or less, so not a ton of improvisation. But a pleasant album of light fusion and easy jazz-funk, regardless. About how you'd expect 1981 to sound. I personally dig the opening track "Racing Around" and "Soft Breath Of Air" but my favorite tune on the album is definitely the closing, "Lion's Step." Super funky with a perfect tempo, in my opinion. 

Next we find ourselves in 1985 for the NYC recorded, Hot Shot. Looks to be a supporting cast of session musicians - feel free to research as you wish via the Discogs link. All originals again from Fukumura which is nice - but being a mid-80s album, you never know what you're going to get. It does start off quite nice with "Heel Strike" and "Ocean Magic" somewhat reminds me of "Sly" by Herbie Hancock. Beyond that this one doesn't move the needle too much for me. For the sake of thoroughness, I'd thought I'd include it.

Enjoy!

Hiroshi Fukumura

Hey there. I have a lot planned over the next few weeks, and for today I'd like to take a quick look at trombonist Hiroshi Fukumura. We've heard him play on a few different occasions; primarily during his time with Native Son, and also on the Sadao Watanabe record Pamoja. He went on to appear on quite a few other Watanabe albums in the second half of the 70s. He released a handful of albums as leader that are all worth a listen, in my opinion. 

First for us is the 1973 Three Blind Mice release, Hiroshi Fukumura Quintet, later re-released in 1977 as Morning Flight. Joining Hiroshi, we have fellow trombonist and personal favorite, Shigeharu Mukai. On piano we have Hiroshi Tamura, with Tsutomu Okada on bass and Shinji Mori on drums. Okada we heard on Mine's Out Of Chaos, among others, and Mori we heard on Oran-utan and All Right! from Isao Suzuki. 

This one starts out with a nice Mukai composition that would eventually become the title of the album. Fukumura composition "Imagination, Opus 1" follows and slows the tempo down a bit. Three covers to close but they're all quite nice. "Winter Song" from John Surman is followed by "Cousin Mary" from little known saxophonist John Coltrane. Interesting to hear this one without a saxophone. Next is the fantastic Henry Mancini tune "Soldier In The Rain" which closes this one out quite nicely. Top to bottom, a great album.

Next up we travel to 1978 for the Flying Disk release with saxophonist Sadao Watanabe, Hunt Up Wind. What originally lead me to Fukumura and this release specifically, is that it was arranged (aside from track 5) by keyboardist Hiromasa Suzuki, one of the first names in Japanese jazz whose music really stuck with me. Probably ought to dedicate a post to him at some point.

Joining Fukumura and Watanabe, we have Don Grusin on keys, Chuck Rainey on bass, Cornell Dupree on guitar, Paulinho Da Costa on percussion with the funky Harvey Mason on drums. 

The time that has passed is evident right out of the gate with this one. The opening title track has a more jazz-funk vibe to it than what we heard on Morning Flight. Unfortunately the 2nd and 3rd tunes don't really do it for me - one is a little too smooth for me and the other has a somewhat generic island sound to it. Michael Franks tune "Mr. Blue" begins to the right the ship followed by "Pogo" which is a funky, bluesy tune from Watanabe. But the real reason I come back to this album is the Fukumura original "White Clouds" which has a fantastic groove to it. Dave Grusin (older brother to Don) tune "Captain Caribe" is a nice uptempo, bouncy track before we close with "To Say Goodbye," a ballad that again closes the album very nicely.

I have a couple more to share - I will try to finish them up tomorrow. Enjoy!

Yoshio Otomo - Moon Ray (1977)

Good morning. I've been digging through a few different artists' catalogs and have some deep dive posts on the way. I'm not quite ready to start any of them but in the meantime here is a nice little album I found along the way. While listening through fan-favorite Tsuyoshi Yamamoto's catalog, I found he played piano on this album from saxophonist Yoshio Otomo. Released on Three Blind Mice in 1977, Moon Ray pays homage to the Artie Shaw tune of the same name. 

Yoshio strictly employs the alto sax on this one and is joined by Tamio Kawabata on bass who we encountered during our look at Native Son. We also have drummer "Jess" Kurata who appears on a Mickey Masuda album we will explore soon enough. Rounding out the quartet is the previously mentioned pianist Yamamoto who has a splendid catalog - if you're unfamiliar, we will soon cover his work, as well. 

Mostly straight forward, acoustic stuff on this one - and Otomo has a beautiful sound on alto. Very tasteful throughout. Mostly covers on this one aside from one Otomo original in "Love Comes Quietly" which is a very nice ballad that features great playing from both Otomo and Yamamoto. I also really dig the tune prior to this one in "If I Should Lose You" which has a bit more pace to it. This one closes with another tune with a nice pace to it in Oliver Nelson's "Shufflin."

Enjoy!

Teruhiko Kataoka - Love Walking (1977)

Back today with a quick one I really enjoy. In my pursuit of Fumio Karashima albums and appearances, I came across this album from trombonist Teruhiko Kataoka from 1977. Love Walking is a nice little album released on Whynot, featuring Karashima on piano, George Ohtsuka on drums and Kiyoto Fujiwara on bass. Tracks 3 and 5 also featuring an additional trombonist in Osamu Shiomura, who you may remember from our post on Arakawa Band.

Looking a little closer at Kataoka's catalog, this looks to be his only release as leader. He spent much of his playing career with Toshiyuki Miyama and The New Herd. Admittedly I'm not very familiar with their catalog but I have heard some of their albums with Chikara Ueda - which are pretty great. 

This one starts off with a great title track - a tune from fellow New Herdsman, Kozaburo Yamaki. Next is a pretty nice rendition of "You Don't Know What Love Is" followed by a nice Shiomura tune in "Isolation." Final two tunes on this one are the ballad "Emily" followed by another Shiomura tune in "Whirl Wind" - my personal favorite along with the title track. Oddly enough, no originals from Kataoka. 

Enjoy!