K Yoshimatsu - Fossil Cocoon: The Music of K. Yoshimatsu

Remarkably restrained six song compilation documenting the near-superhuman output of Japanese artist Koshiro Yoshimatsu, who contributed in some way or another - be that writer, performer, producer or other - to around 40 albums between the period of 1980-1985, all of which were released by cult Japanese imprint, DD. Records. By anyone's standards, that evidences a perpetually inspired and prolific artist, but what it doesn't highlight on its own is how broad Yoshimatsu's interests were. This is where Fossil Cocoon does the heavy lifting, condensing all of this activity down into a succinct but wide-ranging expression of the varying musical paths Yoshimatsu was compelled to wander down. Categorising the music as a whole isn't simple, though you might broadly understand it as post-punk in the same way we do acts like The Same, Flaming Tunes or Dex Filles, music that had adopted the autodidactic, self-determining tenets of punk but none of its reductive formalism. The songs featured here are uniformly long (also perhaps explaining the short tracklisting) and unconventionally structured, perhaps with most aesthetic connection to the krautrock of Sensations Fix or the experimental electronic composition of the Mills College set, albeit I'd imagine without any of their academic background. In the context of Japanese music, there's an obvious conceptual affinity with Vanity, though noticeably far less aggressive sounding, while both Mariah and the guitar playing of Naoki Zushi feel like relevant touchstones. Which, in a roundabout sort of way, is a concession to its outsider status, the sound of going your own way as much as you desire. More volumes instantly required, please.