Kicking off with the home-recording duo “WOO,” and later featuring pop art pioneers ED RUSCHA and SALAMANDA—the botanical soundscape project 〈MUSIC TO WATCH SEEDS GROW BY〉, No. 11, is generating a lot of buzz! Focusing on the Cape gooseberry’s (known as “grape groundcherry” in Japan)—a plant that is sometimes cherished and other times treated as a ...Read more (Original Japanese text by Akie)weed depending on its location and who is growing it, and which goes by various names in different countries—this project highlights its high adaptability, allowing it to grow virtually anywhere. Field recordings of the plant’s surroundings are kept to a minimum, resulting in an electro-acoustic sound that faithfully captures its vitality. A superb sound design in which acoustic instruments delicately harmonize with synthesizers that unfold in a minimalist, leisurely manner—the rich use of timbres evokes the multifaceted nature of the grape-gooseberry. (Original Japanese text by Akie)

FOREST JAMS—a treasure trove of musical discoveries brimming with passion for music, known for reissuing works by artists like Osamu Kitajima and Nami Hōdatsu—has now released on vinyl a hidden gem of Japanese electronic music that was originally released exclusively on CD! This is the third album from MASTER MIND (H.GARDEN), a duo consisting of Hi ...Read more (Original Japanese text by Akie)roshi Ogawa and Hisaki Kurosawa, who explore a wide range of genres from techno to electronic jazz and ambient. Utilizing primarily AKAI samplers, they meticulously express the four seasons through beautiful sound design that reflects the natural world and minimalist compositions. Though beatless, it features the lively movement of bass inherited from techno production, as well as a three-dimensional depth created by mixing techniques and a lyrical beauty that resonates with each listener’s emotions—making it a release that record diggers have long hoped to see on vinyl. Don’t miss this opportunity. (Original Japanese text by Akie)

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『Curated by Brian d'Souza (aka Auntie Flo), Plants Can Dance is a forthcoming new compilation bringing together a global community of artists, exploring the creative possibilities of biosonification - transforming signals from plants, ecosystems and the natural world into sound. Out June 26th, the project marks the culminati ...Read moreon of several years of d'Souza’s work across music, ecology and technology. The album arrives at a time when more artists are turning toward nature as both subject and collaborator, such as Brian Eno’s Earth Percent, which formally recognises “Nature” as an artist. Plants Can Dance sits within a wider cultural shift, which is redefining the relationship between sound and the living world. The project builds on several years of work by d'Souza, whose Plants Can Dance events have taken place across the UK, Europe, India and Africa, appearing in institutions including the V&A, Tate and the Design Museum. What began as a series of intimate gatherings has since evolved into a global platform, reflecting a growing appetite for work that reconnects music with the natural world. The compilation features contributions from leading practitioners including Modern Biology (Tarun Nayar) in collaboration with saxophonist Zekarias Musele Thompson, OMMA (Olga Maximovam founder of Playtronica), Jason Singh, Dr Helen Anahita Wilson, Justin Wiggan in collaboration with celebrated Norwegian jazz musician Arve Henriksen, Lamine Touré, Bit Marten and Balam, alongside new work from d'Souza himself. Using a range of tools - from commercially available devices to bespoke modular systems - artists translate electrical activity, environmental data and organic processes into musical material. The processes behind each piece differ - from interpreting plant biodata to translating wind patterns into compositional structures - and the results are as varied as they are compelling. The record spans ambient, jazz, electronica and modern classical, yet all pieces are unified by a shared intent: to reimagine music as a space of collaboration between human and more-than-human worlds. At the core of Plants Can Dance is a question about how we define music, and how we choose to listen. Traditional musical forms, with their fixed tempos and predictable structures, give way here to something more fluid and less easily controlled. The listener is invited to surrender expectation and engage with sound as an evolving environment rather than a linear narrative. In this context, the compositions function as what d'Souza describes as “acoustic ecologies” - sonic systems shaped by biological, environmental and elemental forces unfolding in real time. Accompanying the release is a printed zine offering reflections from each artist, and deeper insight into the ideas and debates surrounding this practice. Rather than presenting definitive answers, Plants Can Dance positions itself as an artistic exploration grounded in curiosity, experimentation and critical thought. Ultimately, Plants Can Dance is less concerned with proving whether plants “make music” than with changing how we listen. By inviting audiences to engage with sound shaped by non-humans, it opens up new ways of perceiving the environments we inhabit - not as passive backdrops, but as active, dynamic participants in a shared ecological network. In doing so, it offers a quietly radical proposition: that by listening differently, we might begin to relate to the natural world differently too.』

A session between Ariel Kalma and Jeremiah Chiu & Marta Sofia Honer. Kalma is a French synthesizer artist working in ambient / new age, carrying on the "Fourth World" idea proposed by Jon Hassell; he has been self-releasing DIY records since the '70s, and in recent years a great many of his works have been unearthed and reissued — starting with the ...Read more (Original Japanese text by Saito) RVNG INTL. compilation — bringing him wider recognition. Chiu & Honer are the duo behind International Anthem's bestseller Recordings From The Åland Islands. The project began when they were invited onto BBC Radio 3's special collaboration program "Late Junction": Ariel and Chiu & Marta each made their own material, then exchanged sound files, collaging and editing them into this finished work. INTERNATIONAL ANTHEM keeps the great releases coming. (Original Japanese text by Saito)

Bells, bowls, ceramics, chimes, cymbals. All manner of percussion and gongs. Metal and wooden keyboards, synthesizers, voices, and even the rustling of bamboo, eucalyptus, and bundles of palm leaves — every kind of sounding object, all bound together by the masterful sound design of Carlos Niño. Recorded at a planetarium in New York, a live venue i ...Read more (Original Japanese text by Adachi)n North Carolina, a studio in Portugal, and at their respective homes. An expanded ensemble, including pieces shaped by layering multiple sessions and collaborations. Niño has always drawn legends into his orbit: alongside familiar faces like Surya Botofasina, Nate Mercereau, André 3000, and Sam Gendel, this time we get legends Idris Ackamoor and Laraaji, plus Marshall Allen — the 100-year-old avant-garde sax legend and central figure of the Sun Ra Arkestra — appearing here on record for the first time (?). Reaching deep both inside and outside, this is the current state of a wholly singular world of celebratory, breathing, serene spiritual〜improvisational〜ambient jazz / cosmic modern new age. Vast gentleness, nourishing sound — exactly what's needed right now. (Original Japanese text by Adachi)

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『Open the doors of perception with 'Alchemy of Being,' a deep ambient exploration inspired by Jungian analysis, olfactory meditations and psycho-nautic navigations.

Dublab resident, LA-based DJ and producer Dor Wand invites us to practice ‘deactivation through music:’ a softening art he describes ...Read moreas guiding energy down gently, so the body can rest, the heart can open, and the mind can return to stillness. The album creates a space where movement turns inward, where rhythm becomes breath, and where sound holds us as we land.

A mix of mellow synths, live harp and tuned percussion, the album oscillates softly between tension and relaxation, a harmonizing journey that gradually brings together mind and body, inhale and exhale, a unifying yogic tool for heightened self-understanding.

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The collaboration with L.A. synth player/multi-artist E Ruscha V is interesting in that his cosmic synths/vintage keyboards and modulars match Fabiano's guitar perfectly, and the difference from the collaboration with Sam Gendel is interesting. It is a nice collaboration with a Balearic New Age label color with a hint of Brazilian flavor.

...Read more (Original Japanese text by Shhhhh)
The clear harmony of Shoro and the affinity after ambient are wonderful, a sound image that only Fabiano could create.

The title "Aquáticos" is a Portuguese word that can be translated as "a collection of water" or "things related to water. The title "Aquáticos" is a Portuguese word that can be translated as "a collection of water" or "things related to water. Close your eyes and listen to it. (Original Japanese text by Shhhhh)

Released in 1978 as the second release from Vanity Records—an indie label that epitomized the post-punk era in Osaka—Crystallization is a grand musical epic conceived by a 19-year-old musical genius known as SAB, “crystallized” onto magnetic tape using electronic music equipment. It is a classic of “pre-New Age” music that emerged before the term “ ...Read moreNew Age” and its associated culture became widespread in Japan. Although he was supported by two musicians during the recording sessions, the album is largely a so-called “home-recorded” work, produced through multitrack recordings by SAB himself. Crystallization, SAB’s only solo release, features arrangements and instrumentation that hint at influences from Brian Eno, the Obscure label artists, and Popol Vuh; however, he simultaneously sought to distance himself from these influences. As a result, it has earned the status of “a masterpiece that belongs to no particular lineage of synth music” (Note). It has become a new classic for audiences of the 2020s. Furthermore, amid recent trends such as the New Age revival and the rediscovery of Japanese ambient music, its musical value has grown even more brilliant with the passage of time. The illustration of agate on the album artwork was inspired by the writings of philosopher Roger Caillois and drawn by Marino Ruuni (wife of Seigo Matsuoka).

*Note) Review of Crystallization by Miki Tayama, published in the November 2023 issue of Record Collectors magazine in the special feature “Japan’s New Classic Albums 1970–89.”

YU SU, who has been making his comeback to SHORT SPAN with an album of his own new age innovation sound, has been making his way through such alternative hotspots as TECHNICOLOUR and PINCHY & FRIENDS! The album includes "A Jewel (ft. Dip In The Pool)," a voice experiment created as a duet with Masuyako Koda, "Foundry" (sample 2), a left-field minim ...Read more (Original Japanese text by Akie)al low techno track that has also been cut as a single, and "Cul De Sac," an ambient dub track with a hint of oriental mystique. In addition to songs written for the live performance at MUTEK in 2025, the album includes songs created from the new perspective on production and connections gained from the move to London! Listen to a sample of all the songs from the track list. (Original Japanese text by Akie)

A collaboration project between LIEVEN MARTENS MOANA and EM RECORDS, who are about to come to Japan, and a new album by Levon, who constructed the soundtrack to the entire FINIS AFRICAE album. The album is finally released. Based on field recordings, material from the album, and electronics, Levon uses both tape and analog techniques as well as dig ...Read more (Original Japanese text by Saito)ital processes to create a meticulous and scenic sound world, and the more you listen to it, the more you will be drawn into its mysterious charm. The more you listen to the music, the more you will be drawn into the mysterious charm of this world. Please try it with headphones or in a good sound environment. In addition to Finis Africae and his son, each piece is dedicated to Toru Takemitsu, Joji Yuasa, and American contemporary music pioneer Charles Ives. (Original Japanese text by Saito)

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『Synthesist and composer Emily A. Sprague bridges intuitive sonic structures and expressive songwriting, yielding expansive terrains that are immediate and immersive. From early experimentation with guitar and keyboard as a teen, Sprague went on to form indie band Florist in the early 2010s, gaining a devoted audience, before exp ...Read moreanding to environmental / ambient compositions under her own name in 2017. Her releases include several albums across both projects, most recently Florist’s Jellywish and Cloud Time in 2025, and now, the Double Moon EP.“Double Moon” traces psychic and tangible landscapes as parallel realms. Through incantatory repetition and diaphanous spills, Sprague cues an initiatic path with modular intricacy and lyrical foresight, featuring V Haddad’s translucid vocals. Through instinctual precision, “Double Moon” reveals sensorial breadth through visceral, scenic composition. Marked by patched gradients, frosted angles, and warm, melodic ripples, each sound revolves around the next, simultaneously appearing and vanishing across a gripping sonic arc. This track moves in iridescent subtlety—night’s color drawn across the sky, illuminating the silhouettes it renders possible.Middle track, “Dusk (How to Fly),” true to its title, is a subtle and stirring experiment that evokes the day’s denouement, alongside an ephemeral sweep of sublimity, and the near possibility of flight. Transfixing in its reflective drift and glowing imagery, the track melds gently synthesized threads with a slow acoustic rush—a melody drifting in boundless directions. Guided by Sprague’s distinctive vocal cascade and epistolary threads, a lilting sequence weaves effortlessly from essential memory to vast emotional aperture, asking: How could we be here any other way? How do we feel anything at all?“Double Moon (Andras Dub)” lends a brightened overlay to Sprague’s original composition, Australian producer Andrew Wilson, aka Andras and one half of Wilson Tanner, transforming the original track’s texture through low, radiant rhythms. Each bar springs and scatters to utter newn

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「Ways To The Deep Meadow」というタイトルは、LA MONTE YOUNGやVELVET UNDERGROUNDとのコラボレーションでも知られm詩人、神秘主義者、シャーマンでもあるアンガス・マクえライズが書いた詩「Universal Solar Calendar」にインスパイアされたもの。人工知能をめぐるアイデアを探求していた時期に制作されたというSIDE-1は、物理学や仏教、コンピューターとサイバネティクスの文化に関する書籍にふれた思索が背後にある。SIDE2は、Janine Rook’の「Made In Dreams」という絵画の個展や、ファミリー・フォアジング・キッチンの創設者であるヴィックス・ヒル・ライダーが脚本と監督を務めた自然環境にまつわるドキュメンタリー「Wild Edge」のために制作された音源。 (サイトウ)

Following the passing of Jacobus Derwort, the other founding member of CHI and CHI FACTORY, the CHI FACTORY was put on ice and the solo project Son Of Chi was born. Featuring Omar Ka, singer and poet of the Fula Band, hailing from the Fulani people who roam the Sahel region along the southern rim of the Sahara in West Africa. A dreamlike, imaginary sound world woven together with field recordings. (Original Japanese text by Saito)

Andro grew up in quite an environment: he's the grandson of Temur Tsiklauri, a national singer and actor of Georgia, and his father is David Dephy, an acclaimed poet and novelist active in NYC as well. He's also known for the story that fragments of his music were included in the radio signal beamed from the UK's Goonhilly Earth Station toward K2-1 ...Read more (Original Japanese text by Saito)8b, the exoplanet 124 light-years from Earth that has drawn attention for signs of extraterrestrial life. Refined polyrhythms, tribal textures, cosmic and meditative — a contemporary new age that hints at mysterious mathematical structures, psychedelic healing that burrows into the depths, positive deep ambient. Out on Los Angeles' Pinchy & friends, a label on a roll with strong releases from Alex Kassian, Jaz, Yu Su, RüF Dug and more. (Original Japanese text by Saito)

This is the fifth album by LA-based producer/pianist JOHN CARROLL KIRBY, who made a big splash on his first Japan tour in May this year. The album was produced with Canadian artist Yu Su as a production partner, and expresses more electronic elements and melancholy than his previous albums. The theme of this album is "intuitive dance," which is a c ...Read more (Original Japanese text by AYAM)hange from the jazz and new age style of the past albums. Don't miss the music video for the preceding single A1 "Dawn of New Day" featuring ambient music pioneer LARAAJI (Mecha Smile). Please listen to the tracklist as well. highly recommended! (Original Japanese text by AYAM)

μ-Ziq、MINOR SCIENCE、NICK LEÓN、STEPHEN VITIELLOなどもラインナップ。ニューエイジ・アンビエント起点に幅広く前衛電子音楽・実験音楽を革新してきた重要レーベル〈BALMAT〉屈指の名作として名高い『See-Through』(2022)が待望のリプレス！アナログシンセユニットSOFT METALSの片翼PATRICIA WOLFが手がけたカタログ3番。センチメンタルに溶解したシンセサイザー音楽「Woodland Encounter」に始まり、LO-FIシンセドローン「Recalibration」や、自由なストロークを繰り返すインストフォーク「Psychic Sweeping」など。フィールドレコーディング音源やVSTシンセサイザー、アコースティックギターまで、多種インスツルメントを駆使し、聴き手に内省的に働きかける名曲揃い。この機会に是非。 (Akie)

楽曲制作に加え、ロンドンで日本の書籍、陶器、レコードを扱う”Caravan”を経営するヴィンテージマニアDJ HIMITSU。ROMÉO POIRIERといった現行電子音楽家を抱える要所〈SWIMS〉からアルバムをリリース！動物たちの自然体な鳴き声が木霊する音空間に軽やかにトライバルパーカッションがスキップする「Kaminari」や、鋭いエッジの電子音を差し込みながらゆったり闊歩するダウンテンポ「Sad Vacation」など。第四世界のヴァイブからチルスペースまで想起する、リスニングとダンスどちらにもフィットする至福のエキゾチカ作品に。トラックリストから全曲試聴可能です。 (Akie)

M. SAGEやMATTHEWDAVIDなども参加しているオレゴン州ポートランドのサイケデリック・アンビエントフロンティア〈MOON GLYPH〉にカムバック！現実には存在し得ない異種が組み替えられた架空生物からインスピレーション。精神世界と俗世、ドラマとパロディ、そして商業音楽とサブスクに眠るアンビエント、その架空生物概念と重ねて考察アウトプットしたコンセプチュアルな一枚。ひたすらに優しく美しく作り上げたメロディとムード、そこに加工した素材や淡白なポエトリーリーディング、アコースティック楽器などをコラージュ、リアルなサウンドインスツルメントを用いながら現実離れしたデザインに。 (Akie)

Resonant Bodies「共振する身体」。二枚組、18曲のコンセプチュアルなフル・アルバムが到着しました。混沌から、正の波動が立ち現れてくるような冒頭から素晴らしいサウンドが展開されていきます。ドローン、音響、メロディ、精神と身体への音の作用。
「ある身体が振動して音を発し、それが別の身体に届いて振動し、新しい音を発生させ、さらに別の身体を振動させて別の音を発生させる...。無限に広がる身体のオーケストラが、それぞれの音の振動を掛け合わせ、「Resonant Bodies」のシンフォニーを創り出すと想像してください。共鳴はコミュニケーションの原理であり、音は人と人との絆や相互関係を構築するものです。「Resonant Bodies」の作品は、全体の一部であると同時に、全体を生み出 ...Read more (サイトウ)すものでもあるのです。他の作品とは異なり、「Resonant Bodies」を完成させるのにかかった約2年の間、作品は徐々に完成し、前のレイヤーで発生した振動によって小さな音の粒子が加えられ、不完全で同期した音のオブジェクトが出来上がったのです。"コミュニケーション"」。 (サイトウ)

Originally released on YEN RECORDS, and also issued overseas by Windham Hill Records.