nankai trio - antarctica

Nankai TRIO: Antarctica (2025)

Hope everyone out there is having a good holiday if you celebrate, or just a good day if you don’t. On the music front, I received some lovely gifts from family, including a few killer records and the complete recording of Henry Cow I’ll eventually get to. Nothing from 2025, though (are you surprised?) so as I kick back post-Christmas with a cup of coffee, let’s talk jazz fusion. Since seeing the sublime ridiculousness of the cover art, I’ve been hooked on Nankai Trio and their debut Antarctica. The Japanese trio take the technical virtuosity of classic fusion groups like Return to Forever and inject some modern shred into their songs, and the result is one of the most enjoyable, exciting albums I’ve heard this year.

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kiyoshi sugimoto's babylonia wind album cover

Kiyoshi Sugimoto: Babylonia Wind (1972)

Would you look at that? Japanese jazz that’s NOT on Three Blind Mice or East West Records. Earlier this year saw the vinyl release of Babylonia Wind, the 1972 record from guitarist Kiyoshi Sugimoto and his quintet. Beautifully packaged as part of the Deep Jazz Reality series from Universounds, the Tokyo record shop and reissue label run by Yusuke Ogawa, it’s another hidden gem in the early 70s jazz rock revolution. I don’t know if I’m equipped to compare how this fares with a lot of what was on the rise at the time: this isn’t Miles Davis levels of fusion and jazz rock, but Sugimoto’s guitar is definitely wailing with a rock god fervor over the course of the album’s five tracks.

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go kurosawa - soft shakes

Go Kurosawa: soft shakes (2025)

I love it when I discover something with tendrils. As per usual, it started with Erik, who introduced me to the soft, joyous psychedelic haze of Kikagaku Moyo. Through them, the tendril reached to the label, Guruguru Brain, and I discovered an entire world of interesting, complex yet utterly entrancing sounds from the likes of LAIR and Minami Deutsch, among others. But still more tendrils led on, and I discovered the label was co-founded and run by Go Kurosawa, who – to circle back to the beginning – was the drummer and vocalist for Kikagaku Moyo. A few years after the band’s end, he returns with soft shakes, his solo debut. It’s a change in sound that nonetheless is imbued with everything that enchanted me about Kikagaku Moyo’s music.

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speed, glue & shinki - eve

Speed, Glue & Shinki: Eve (1971)

It’s hard to separate distinguishing whether I like something because I genuinely like it, or because of the narrative behind it, either legitimate or manufactured by an industry intent on selling every last thing. I’m sure I really dig Eve, the debut from Japanese power trio Speed, Glue & Shinki featuring the legendary psych/rock guitarist Shinki Chen – this is a great little dingy rock record. But that enjoyment comes with an asterisk because of the way it was marketed to me. Maybe I’m reading too much into a fun little slice of 70s power blues, but that’s the point of the site, right?

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