Shintaro Sakamoto at Liquidroom, July 14th 2021

 

Years ago, when I was new to Japan, I remember seeing this display at the Shibuya Tower Records that held my attention. The cover of one of the albums being advertised was a faded black and white picture of a man wearing a dark suede sports jacket. His detached expression and the wide-eyed naked mannequin in front of him added to the quirkiness. It was definitely intriguing.

Some time after that an even more intriguing one, this time as a full-on new release, depicted on its cover the artist as a skeleton playing a steel guitar. I didn’t explore his music even then. It wasn’t until a friend of mine recommended the artist’s former band, Yura Yura Teikoku that I finally caught up. Their garage psychedelic brand of music was right up my alley. 

Little did I know that for his solo output Shintaro Sakamoto went the complete opposite direction. He ditched the fuzz pedal and replaced it with a cleaner sound akin to yacht rock or AOR, (hence the covers!). The music was not less fascinating. This new found smoothness revealed a highly skilled songwriter with a tuned ear for the unexpected moment. Unusual vocal effects, flutes and Hawaiian sounding steel guitars were part of his arsenal. The combination worked. His three full length albums released so far are highly recommended. The multilayered production and overall vibe of his records always reminds me of Marvin Gaye’s seminal album What’s Going On.

In the past few years he played a couple of shows annually in Tokyo and even opened a Yo La Tengo gig at the O-East. I tried several times to get tickets to no avail. The cliche “hottest ticket in town” certainly applies to him. This year he’s headlining the Field of Heaven stage at Fuji Rock on the first day of the festival. I guess that’s why a warm-up show was announced at Liquidroom to also celebrate the 10th anniversary of his label Zelone Records and the venue’s 17th anniversary. 

This, being his first show since the pandemic hit, seemed like an impossibility. I applied in the ticket lottery and miraculously got one. Now the question was whether the show was going to take place or not. The number of covid-19 cases increased dramatically and the government declared a state of emergency effectively banning spectators at the stadiums during the Olympics. This all happened a week prior to the scheduled show. Nonetheless it went on and it was amazing. 

Entering the venue I realized it was my first time there since I saw Denzel Curry back in January of 2019. Unlike then, the whole floor was a grid made of several squares in which people were supposed to stand in and keep social distancing. I thought it was a great idea and it worked nicely throughout the show. To limit the venue’s capacity to a smaller number, there were two sets of one hour each. I was at the first set.

Everyone was beaming with anticipation when -promptly at 5:30- the curtains blocking the view of the stage opened to reveal the four-piece band. They opened the show with a double live premiere. The A and B side of a single released at the end of last year: The Feeling of Love and Obscure Nightclub, the latter is one of my favorite of his songs and it sounded great live. The high pitch canon harmony vocals in this one and in some of the similar structured songs were handled by Aya, the bass player . She didn’t only excel with her vocal support, the grooves she laid on bass throughout the set were essential and tastefully done. 

One example was the backup vocals and infectious bassline of Purging The Demons, their third song on the set and the first of the show’s overview of Sakamoto’s back catalogue. Celebrating its 10th anniversary, his first album, How to Live With a Phantom, was the most represented with 4 songs. Starting with In a Phantom Mood, one of the most memorable songs performed that evening. Driven by the steady güiro backbeat provided by Tetsu Nishiuchi. He added all kinds of colors to these live renditions of meticulously studio crafted songs. It was fun to see the call and response that his percussion choices contributed to You Can Be a Robot, Too as well as his saxophone work, at one point playing two instruments simultaneously Rahsaan Roland Kirk style.

Sakamoto himself shined as an instrumentalist. On his solo records you barely get a taste of his guitar chops, but live he definitely strikes the balance between the smoothness of his soloist output and the rawness present in his work with his former band. The extended freak-outs in some of his songs managed to bridge psychedelia with free jazz, like he did along with Nishiuchi on sax in Mask on Mask. To me it was that added element of an ethereal atmosphere built over a study groove that was key to this presentation. 

Even at a couple of minutes over the one hour mark, this show easily stood as one of the most spellbinding I’ve seen from a Japanese headliner. Those psychedelic jams definitely added a layer of spontaneity to the thoroughly conceived studio creations. The show closed with another live premiere, this time the A side of the second single released last year: By Swallow Season. Like most great artists he left the audience hungry for more. What a great way to mark the first rock concert in over 16 months. Shintaro Sakamoto definitely deserves to be the “hottest ticket in town”. 

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