As we gear up for the next Japanese vinyl release from chOOn!! (arriving July 1st, 2022), we thought we’d share some of our favourite all-Japanese music guest mixes we’ve made for other platforms. ‘chOOn!! in Japan’ 🇯🇵🔥

chOOn!! in Japan

ch00n!! (10/4/21)

Mains Courantes with chOOn!!

October 14th, 2021 // Mains CourantesTracklist

Part 1
Music by:
Khotin, Superpitcher , Slow Attack Ensemble,
Blackmail, S. channel, Radiante pourpre, Dj Spinelli, Faraï, Isabelle Mayereau and some dubplates
Guest Mix // tracklist part 2
ヘンリー川原 // In My Relationship with You, I Think
about Myself on the Bed (Panpot Version)
キングコングパラダイス // フジヤマ 平野文 // Funky Dreamer
Genji Sawai // Za
松前公高 // Hamisete/What Do You Say? Blue Papillon // Blue Papillon
喜納友子 // Tie Island (No Man's Island Dub Mix) 金沢明子 // 津軽あいや節 (Resort Mix)
Hoodoo Fushimi // もちつき
Tadahiko Yokogawa // 硬い人
Ecstasy Boys // Moon Dance (Club Ecstasy Mayuri Mix) トロイメライ // ...もっと深く
Light In Darkness // Sao
Midori // 宇宙の手

Dubpulse - Mains Courantes invite Choon (Octobre 2021)

Ryu (@manda863210851) is part of a small circle of Tokyo collectors and DJs dedicated to exploring the sonic properties of a variety of private and unusual objets sonores. The dexterity of his selections reflects the idiosyncratic approach to digging he developed during his performances in small galleries and performance spaces around Tokyo. His guest mix is rich and immersive - slowly unwinding drones are punctuated by sharp, repetitive percussion events and buffeting swirls of electronics. There’s a kaleidoscopic nature at play that conjures hallucinatory effects manipulating your perception of time and aural perspective. The shifting dynamics are sonically unpredictable - the overall effect is deliriously disorientating. Ryu occupies the calm centre of the storm, deploying perfectly judged tonalities, rhythms and gorgeous melodies.

Originally aired LIVE on Noods Radio on 13/01/22 - Tracklist available here - noodsradio.com/shows/choon-w-ryusuke-watanab-13th-january-22

chOOn!! with Ryusuke Watanabe [Guest Mix]

A recent and essential addition to the world of reissue labels, Ultimo Tango (@ultimotango) distinguishes itself with a focus on lesser known histories offering a space for visionary genre-crossing music once thought lost to the folds of time. The Milan-based DJ duo have quickly garnered a reputation as revered collectors whose selections shirk easy genre classifications. The rewarding confluence of these elements occurs in their guest mix which brings together the duo’s stylistic threads in a rich tapestry of percussive paroxysms. Assembling music primarily collected from rare Japanese anime and manga image albums and soundtracks of the late 1980s/90s. It’s a collection of many moods; a microcosm of the rare but revelatory moments where Ultimo Tango’s subterranean world meets the light.

Originally aired LIVE on Noods Radio on 06/02/22 - Tracklist available here - noodsradio.com/shows/choon-w-ultimo-tango-6th-february-22

chOOn!! with Ultimo Tango [Guest Mix]

FOND/SOUND (@user-808693342) is a music blog, online archive and radio show who oversee the direct issue of mostly unheard (and sometimes incredibly rare) material from Japan, Italy, Brazil and many other locales, circulating rarities to the rest of the world from their base in Oak Park, IL. F/S’s shares and mixes condense complex musical histories and inside, balmy varieties of balearic, new age, fourth world and ambient sounds emanate from every corner, often artefacts retrieved on personal trips. Their collector and F/S’s founder, Diego Olivas, details accounts that brim with intimate anecdotes. There is plenty of sustenance here for those about to take a voyage of discovery; and enough to more than satisfy more ardent connoisseurs and specialists - helping give often overlooked music a lasting identity.

Originally aired LIVE on Noods Radio on 06/03/22 - Tracklist available here - noodsradio.com/shows/choon-w-fond-sound-6th-march-22

chOOn!! with FOND/SOUND [Guest Mix]

This month’s show on @noodsradio features a very special guest mix selection - this time from esteemed Japan-based balearic producer ind_fris (@ind_fris).

The past 5 years have seen a slew of ind_fris releases germinating from his own label Scaffolder Recordings based in Okazaki, Aichi. Resuscitating his earliest releases into his latest project, they underline just how far he has come while staying true to the initial impulses that inspired his formative explorations in dance music. 

The sonic world inhabited by ind_fris is on full display in his guest mix. It moves from spacious ambient environments into dense thickets of cosmic pop, distended voices, mangled samples and magical instrumentation played by musicians neck-deep in a lagoon, gargling water, blowing glass bottles and playing flutes while dipping under the surface. 

Originally aired LIVE on Noods Radio on 18/09/22 - Tracklist available here - noodsradio.com/shows/choon-w-ind-fris-18th-september-22

chOOn!! with ind_fris [Guest Mix]

For this month's show on @noodsradio, we are delighted to share a guest mix from up-and-coming Japanese composer Plantar (@user-885020248). 

Plantar's guest mix is a dazzling riot of textures and tones, showcasing an irreverence towards sources and scattergun approach that the best mixtapes contain – that genre-blender mindset of everything being up for grabs sonically and lyrically, applied to a whole swathe of influences, from Ravel to Japanese ultrapop to bossanova to AOR and yacht rock to Cornelius to dulcet minimalism. Whatever the formula, this combination of sublime juxtapositions and mosaic identity is only the start of Plantar’s odyssey.

Originally aired LIVE on Noods Radio on 13/11/22 - Tracklist available here - https://noodsradio.com/shows/choon-w-plantar-13th-november-22

chOOn!! with Plantar [Guest Mix]

For this month's show on @noodsradio, we are delighted to showcase another very special guest mix selection, this time from Tokyo based producer Mermaid (@mermaidong). His guest mix knits together a complex mesh of spiralling melodic fragments, delirious rhythmic fluctuations and skittering mosaics. A frenzied delight from start to finish.

Originally aired LIVE on Noods Radio on 15/12/23 - Tracklist available here - https://noodsradio.com/shows/choon-w-mermaid-15th-december-23

chOOn!! with Mermaid [Guest Mix]

For this month's show on @noodsradio, we are delighted to share a guest mix from Japanese composer Jesus Weekend. Her guest mix is a cosmic torrent brimming with refracted processionals, keening astral synths, wave-whittled outcrops and pendulous harmonies.

Originally aired LIVE on Noods Radio on 25/02/24 - Tracklist available here - https://noodsradio.com/shows/choon-w-jesus-weekend-25th-february-24

chOOn!! with Jesus Weekend [Guest Mix]

For this month's show on @noodsradio, we are delighted to share a guest mix from experimental reissue label An’archives (@user-250085008). The carefully curated French imprint has cultivated a very smart line in hand-picked archive material from across Japan. The fragments of this deep syncretism collected here are spellbinding.

Originally aired LIVE on Noods Radio on 21/04/24 - Tracklist available here - https://noodsradio.com/shows/choon-w-an-archives-21st-april-24

chOOn!! with An'archives [Guest Mix]

For this month's show on @noodsradio, we are delighted to share a guest mix from elusive Japanese rock phantoms HAPPY. Their guest mix captures the sound of an inner world hurling through a meticulously explored, if hazily defined, outer space - reinforcing the demented concentration of the group’s abilities.

Originally aired LIVE on Noods Radio on 19/05/24 - Tracklist available here - https://noodsradio.com/shows/choon-w-happy-19th-may-24

chOOn!! with HAPPY [Guest Mix]

chOOn!! (4/4/20)

We welcome our fifth guest mix selection - this time from cosmic guitarist and 'Japanese B-Musicologist' extraordinaire, @dustin-wong (@thrilljockey).

Dustin's guest mix takes us on a musical journey through Japan - visiting synthesised environments and minimal interior spaces built of airy architectures and gaseous textures before delving into a humid metropolis of interlocking geometric rhythms. Always serene and spacious - the mood, however, is enigmatic, not strictly soothing.

We are also celebrating the impending release of our second reissue (June 1st) - Toshioki Matsumura’s A Visual Brain: 1986-1993.

For two decades, Toshi recorded soundtracks as a member of Visual Brains, a pioneering video-art collective based in Tokyo. This set of prime archival selections is a seamless mix of the organic and inorganic, the recent past and distant future. A Visual Brain is both damaged steel pan dub and hi-tech new wave balladry, damply ambient synth-pop and Reichian magnificence. Minimalist tropes wrapped in candy striped technicolor. Available on Vinyl via @lightintheatticrecords and Digital via the chOOn!! Bandcamp (www.toshiokimatsumura.bandcamp.com).

Originally aired LIVE on Glasgow's Subcity Radio on 30/04/20 - Tracklist available here - www.subcity.org/shows/choon/52c34

chOOn!! with Dustin Wong [Guest Mix]

Guest Mix for Galaxy My Dear on Portland’s @xrayfm.

This guest mix continues my current fascination with Japanese odd-waves (FYI: our forthcoming reissue of Japanese experimental video-art scores will land on June 1st). Focusing heavily on Okinawan proto-electro - hypnotic, non-standard boogie - sub-tropical steel-tone pulses - brain-bombing percussive environments and floating pentatonic synth. An automated Japanese Maximalism.

I’ve been a huge fan and long time listener to this show, so it was an honour to be invited on. @jasonurick regularly offers up a kaleidoscopic vision of chOOnage taken to its outer limits - always essential listening.

Originally aired LIVE on Portland's XRAY.fm on 19/5/20 - Tracklist available here - xray.fm/broadcasts/34534

chOOn!! (Galaxy My Dear, XRAY.fm 19/5/20)

Today we welcome our sixth guest mix selection - this time from @norio-sato - DJ, rare music curator and owner of one of Japan's, hell, the world's greatest record shops, Rare Groove in Osaka.

Norio’s mixes are as curious and unique as the items he stocks at Rare Groove. His guest mix takes us on a wide-ranging survey of Japanese electronic experimentation turning up pieces influenced by ambient and environmental music, sci-fi cityscapes and new age ideas that project the aesthetic into digital realms. A luminous whirl of drum machines, traditional melodies and synthesiser fantasias.

We are also celebrating the impending release of our second reissue (June 1st) - Toshioki Matsumura’s A Visual Brain: 1986-1993.

For two decades, Toshi recorded soundtracks as a member of Visual Brains, a pioneering video-art collective based in Tokyo. This set of prime archival selections is a seamless mix of the organic and inorganic, the recent past and distant future. A Visual Brain is both damaged steel pan dub and hi-tech new wave balladry, damply ambient synth-pop and Reichian magnificence. Minimalist tropes wrapped in candy striped technicolor. Available on Vinyl via @lightintheatticrecords and Digital via the chOOn!! Bandcamp (www.toshiokimatsumura.bandcamp.com).

Originally aired LIVE on Glasgow's Subcity Radio on 28/05/20 - Tracklist available here - www.subcity.org/shows/choon/ef271

chOOn!! with Norio Sato [Guest Mix]

Today we welcome our our seventh guest mix selection - this time from Sanshiro Matsushita aka DJ Sanshiro (@toughguy_346) - Tokyo based DJ, rare vinyl collector and proprietor of the legendary Deep Dance Music Page.

Much like the rare musical antiquities he displays on his blog, Sanshiro’s mixes slide from the effervescent towards the unhinged. His guest mix creates a collage of evocative fragments drawn from deranged pop and Japanese experimental sound design, luring you into hallucinatory emotions through symphonic synthesis and cinematic echoes. Mind expansion by means of hypnotic repetitions, polished minimalism and avant pop.

We are also celebrating the recent release of our second reissue (landed June 1st) - Toshioki Matsumura’s A Visual Brain: 1986-1993.

For two decades, Toshi recorded soundtracks as a member of Visual Brains, a pioneering video-art collective based in Tokyo. This set of prime archival selections is a seamless mix of the organic and inorganic, the recent past and distant future. A Visual Brain is both damaged steel pan dub and hi-tech new wave balladry, damply ambient synth-pop and Reichian magnificence. Minimalist tropes wrapped in candy striped technicolor. Available on Vinyl via @lightintheatticrecords and Digital via the chOOn!! Bandcamp (www.toshiokimatsumura.bandcamp.com).

Originally aired LIVE on Glasgow's Subcity Radio on 28/05/20 - Tracklist available here and on request - www.subcity.org/shows/choon/1df6a

chOOn!! with DJ Sanshiro [Guest Mix]

Today, we welcome our eleventh guest mix selection on @subcityradio - this time from Japanese New Age music guru and obscure Anime soundtrack specialist Tsunaki Kadowaki.

Tsunaki is a Tottori-based collector, writer and new age music enthusiast. He works at Meditations record store in Kyoto - arguably the best spot for vinyl in Japan and recently published New Age Music Disc Guide, a book of 600 new age and ambient album recommendations. The guide provides a comprehensive overview of new age music, covering releases from the ‘70s all the way up to the genre’s recent revival. For now, it’s only been published in Japanese, but thanks to the album artworks that beautifully adorn each page, it’s still an absolutely essential document for devotees of the genre.

Tsunaki’s guest mix is titled Japanese Obscure Anime Music for Experimental Music Freaks and it does just that - assembling music primarily collected from rare Japanese anime and manga image albums and soundtracks of the late 1980s/90s. It’s a collection of many moods; mysterious and intricate, delirious and luxurious. Revisiting the halcyon days of such movements is always interesting – the amateur enthusiast hasn’t yet been banned, or bartered out of existence; distribution is among friends. Rough edges remain, are encouraged. Odd characters linger on the circumference engaged in extracurricular experiments and unlikely crosscurrents.

For enthusiasts, this is a seductive prospect of both escape and compensation, insight and freakout. A unique collection of sounds that leaves you wanting more.

Originally aired LIVE on Glasgow's Subcity Radio on 17/01/21 - Tracklist available here - https://www.subcity.org/shows/choon/4183f

chOOn!! with Tsunaki Kadowaki [Guest Mix]

This week, we welcome our twelfth guest mix selection on @subcityradio - this time from the enigmatic collector behind the legendary Japanese ambient and environmental music YouTube channel, Should Be Asleep (https://www.youtube.com/user/WestCoastEaglesFan).

For many years, Should Be Asleep has been engaged in an idiosyncratic exploration of Japanese interior design - percussive timbres, unusual drones and intricate rhythms; sounds that have recently exercised such a grip on the imaginations of amateur enthusiasts and curators alike. Functioning as a social hub of sorts for kankyō ongaku environmental music and its many offshoots, this rarefied collection stands as one the most cohesive and impressive archives of its kind freely available online.

This guest mix assembles a collection of music and field recordings in tribute to Kamikōchi (a valley/national park in the Japanese Alps) in the summertime, thrusting the listener into hyperreal yet phantasmal realms with its fusion of synthetic and organic elements. There’s a self-effacing preciousness to the ambient works that’s felt in their simplicity and spaciousness; uniquely strange and beautiful tracks that feel pastoral and mystical all at once. A meticulously crafted collection of musical tints, dulcet minimalism, melancholic shimmer and crystalline purity that tiptoes gently backwards in time, time travelling to an untroubled place of serene beauty.

Originally aired LIVE on Glasgow's Subcity Radio on 14/02/21 - Tracklist available here - https://www.subcity.org/shows/choon/3e992

chOOn!! with Should Be Asleep [Guest Mix]

chOOn!! began life as a notoriously wild radio show invested in niche musical subcultures. Now a newly formed reissue label, chOOn!! champions obscure and forgotten sounds with a string of top quality vinyl reissues.

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Rooted in an impulse both ancient and original - subtle, hypnotic percussions and natural rituals confronting the digital future.................................

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E-mail: choon.subcity@gmail.com