Aguirre Records / Belgium / 2022
* english below
Publicado orixinalmente en pousavasos polo selo Doubtmusic, este disco documenta unha improvisación libre de 41 minutos que tivo lugar no festival Xene'yasai, na que o trío expresa a súa política radical a través do free-jazz e o noise.
A actuación de New Direction for the Art o 14 de agosto de 1971 (con Masayuki Takayangi, Kenji Mori ao saxo e Hiroshi Yamazaki á batería) evidencia a intensa colisión entre a política antisistema e a música radical de vangarda que provocou a reacción hostil por parte dunha audiencia perplexa que respondeu con berros e lanzamento de obxectos.
O seu líder, o guitarrista Masayuki Takayanagi -veterano en diferentes formacións desde finais dos anos 50 e condenado ao ostracismo pola comunidade do jazz durante a década dos 60- foi un deses inconformistas extremos que estiveron á vangarda da improvisación libre nun Xapón infestado de conflitos e violencia, inspirando e cabreando aos seus contemporáneos ao longo dos seus corenta anos de carreira.
"La Grima" acaba de ser editado por primeira vez en vinilo por Aguirre Records cunha chea de fotos inéditas e textos de Alan Cummings.
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Famed free jazz concert registration of an early New Direction for the Art performance. Recorded in 1971. Old-style Gatefold LP, with rare photographs & extensive liner notes by Alan Cummings.
The performance by Takayanagi Masayuki New Direction for the Art at the Gen’yasai festival on August 14, 1971 was an intense, bruising collision between the radical, anti-establishment politics of the period in Japan and the febrile avant-garde music that had begun to emerge a few years before. The ferocious performance that you can hear here was received with outright hostility by the audience, who responded first with catcalls and later with showers of debris that were hurled at the performers. Takayanagi though described the group’s performance to jazz magazine Swing Journal as a success, “an authentic and realistic depiction of the situation”.
The ferocity of the performance of “La Grima” at the Gen’yasai Festival in Sanrizuka on August 14, 1971 was consciously grounded by Takayanagi in a particular historical moment, ripe with conflict and violence. A month after the festival, on September 16, three policemen would die during struggles at the site. This was the context that the three-day Gen’yasai Festival existed within. The line-up reflected the radical politics of the movement, with leading free jazz musicians like Takayanagi, Abe Kaoru, and Takagi Mototeru appearing alongside radical ur-punkers Zuno Keisatsu, heavy electric blues bands like Blues Creation, and Haino Keiji’s scream-jazz unit Lost Aaraaff.