kuwayama - kijima / 00.10.17 ( 7inch by 20 city New Zealand / Japan )

kuwayama kiyoharu : cello
kijima rina : violin
recorded at construction field of the expressway Nagoya City Japan

Cover by Kuwayama Kiyoharu

Midnight at a construction site in Naogoya, Japan, large and particularly loud fan vent whirling, Kuwayama Kiyoharu and Kijima Rina hit record and begin to play. Kuwayama uses a cello and Kijima a violin. Its an eerie setting to be recording, and the improvisations that flow from their instruments carry this beautifully. Setting seems to be a fairly important part of their recording technique as their full length cd, available on GG Records (www.lethe-voice.com/gg), was recorded in a large Warehouse. The space around them in those recordings is also very clear. Some truely fabulous stuff from this improv duo. Kijima Rina has a number of solo tapes out, Kuwayama Kiyoharu is very active in a number of groups in Nagoya. Together they organise the annual week-long Lethe-Voice Festival in Nagoya which brings together a diverse collection of Japanese and international sound makers. Kuwayama's solo work also featured on the split 7" with Toy.Bizarre (20C-5) under the name Lethe.
KUWAYAMA-KIJIMA - 00/10/17D 00/10/17E (7" by 20city)
This was a difficult one: I thought I could tell at what speed I should play this, because I was sure I would hear it from the instruments: cello and violin. Not so, another glitch in my ego. So I decided to play it at 45 rpm, because it sounded best to me. These two japanese impro musicians have been working together for quite while now, and one can hear this. It is almost impossible to tell where one starts and the other stops and vice versa. Another interesting aspect of their collaboration is the fact that they play on the starngest locations. In this case it's the construction site of an expressway, creating a permanent hum in the background, with people occasionally walking around. The combination of 'real' instruments with this background noise is fascinating, because the duo sometimes works with this noise and sometimes against it, creating an exciting tension throughout the record. Well done again. (MR) vital weekly