Live in Japan (Fred Frith album)

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Live in Japan
Live album by
Fred Frith
Released1982 (1982)
RecordedJuly 1981
VenueTokyo, Osaka, Fukuoka, Maebashi
Genre
Length68:34
LabelRecommended (Japan)
ProducerFred Frith
Fred Frith chronology
Speechless
(1981) 		Live in Japan
(1982) 		Voice of America
(1982)

Live in Japan, subtitled "The Guitars on the Table Approach", is a 1982

LP records in a black corrugated box containing posters, artwork and booklets in English and Japanese. It was also released as two single LPs, entitled Live in Japan, Vol. 1 and Live in Japan, Vol. 2. The single LP cover art was taken from the inner double LP gatefold
cover.

Background

On Live in Japan Frith continued his pioneering guitar work he began on his landmark

double-neck guitar created by a friend Charles Fletcher, and a battered violin. The guitars were laid flat on a table and "played" by plucking, scraping and beating the strings with a variety of found objects.[5] Frith also wore a WW II pilot's throat microphone to amplify his periodic vocal utterances. The same microphone had been used by Frith during some of the Massacre
concerts held earlier in 1981.

On "Fukuoka 1" Frith scrubs his guitar strings with brushes, while on "Fukuoka 2" he wedges chopsticks between the strings and hits them so they oscillate back and forth, producing sounds that slowly decay. In "Maebashi 1" Frith pulls a chain through the strings; he also loops a wire through several strings, then, holding the wire upright, he plays it with a violin bow.[6]

Reception

Professional ratings
Review scores
SourceRating
AllMusic[7][8]
Clouds and Clocksmixed[1]

Reviewing the Fred Records remastered edition, Beppe Colli wrote in Clouds and Clocks that he was pleased to see Live in Japan, long out-of-print, reissued on CD, and sounding just as "great" and "fresh" as the original LPs.[1] He said that here Frith sounds "quite orchestral and polyphonic, with strong contrasts in both timbre and volume".[1] Colli did complain, however, that while the digitizing process worked well, the resulting CD sounds "a bit too 'modern', and in a way, 'false'". He felt that his Live in Japan LP records "sounded more 'alive'".[1]

Nicole V. Gagné wrote in her 1990 book, Sonic Transports: New Frontiers in Our Music that Frith "unearthes extraordinary vistas of sound" on Live in Japan.[5] She called his solos "spectacular",[4] but added that his "guitars on the table approach" can be "rough sledding for newcomers, because they can't readily identify what it is they're hearing".[5]

Track listing

All tracks by Fred Frith.

Concert venues

Single LP release covers
  • Live in Japan, Vol. 1
    Live in Japan, Vol. 1
  • Live in Japan, Vol. 2
    Live in Japan, Vol. 2

Recorded live in Japan at:

  • Nichifutsu Kaikan, Tokyo, 11 July 1981
  • Mainichi Kokusai Salon, Osaka, 17 July 1981
  • 80s Factory, Fukuoka, 20 July 1981
  • Kawai Hall, Maebashi, 22 July 1981

Personnel

  • Fred Frith
    • 1961 Burns Black Bison guitar
    • 1974 Charles Fletcher custom-made double-neck guitar (one fretted, one fretless)
    • anonymous "wrecked" violin
    • piano
    • WW II pilot's throat microphone
    • HH electronic SM200 stereo mixer
    • amplifier with HH digital effects unit

Production

CD releases

Live in Japan was reissued on CD on

master tapes were unobtainable.[1][9]

See also

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f Colli, Beppe (8 November 2008). "Live in Japan". Clouds and Clocks. Retrieved 30 April 2012.
  2. ^ a b "FRITH, FRED: Live in Japan". ReR Megacorp. Archived from the original on 15 July 2011. Retrieved 13 October 2010.
  3. AllMusic
    . Retrieved 20 June 2011.
  4. ^ a b Gagné 1990, p. 107.
  5. ^ a b c Gagné 1990, p. 105.
  6. ^ Gagné 1990, p. 108.
  7. AllMusic
    . Retrieved 11 February 2018.
  8. AllMusic
    . Retrieved 11 February 2018.
  9. ^ "A list of upcoming releases". Fred Records. Archived from the original on 3 April 2007. Retrieved 2 April 2007.

Works cited

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