Ayatake Ezaki’s solo debut album “Hajimari no Yoru”

The pursuit of personal music for one person, to be listened to by one person alone

I thought “Hajimari no Yoru” was a very simple but rich and dense work at first listen. It is laced with beat music, lullabies, jazz, nursery rhymes, ambient, and various other musical elements, but overall it is full of “tenderness. I thought that was very typical of you.

Ezaki: Thank you very much. If I were to talk about In Praise of Shadows in the context of music, I would say that in a world where music that is enjoyed by a large group of people is completely commonplace, shouldn’t there be music written by one musician for one person and listened to by just one person?　That’s what I wanted to express. I think the original experience of music is rather personal. For example, lullabies are “one-to-one music” sung by one person for one person. When you are in your mother’s womb, you are listening to various kinds of music by yourself.

Ezaki: Ever since I was a child, I often seemed to say, “I like dark music” (laughs). I don’t know if “dark” is the right word, but I like songs that are a bit lyrical and beautiful. I think that tendency was already firmly established by the time I was in elementary school. For this solo, I was going to make it only with music from those roots of mine. Having said that, almost all of the music that I have passed through in the past 30 years has been included. I think that is due to the friends I have made around me. I may have never encountered music in contexts other than jazz, such as hip-hop or beat music. I have never listened to them at all.

I thought that the composition, in which the audience is enveloped by light again after passing through the darkness, might represent our shared experience of our world as it welcomes the new world after the Corona disaster.

Ezaki: I hadn’t thought of it from that perspective at all, but it certainly can be listened to in that way. I really like spending time alone at night. The city becomes very quiet, and I feel like I can spend time with the earth and myself. In the daytime, I can’t help but feel the presence of others, such as the sound of cars or the voices of my neighbors, but at night I don’t feel the presence of others so much. I feel more precious when I feel that the moon is rising rapidly. Well, the Corona Disaster was so long that I felt lonely (laughs).

You mentioned that you and Kan Inoue studied the sound production of existing artists at WONK.

Esaki: Again, I had a lot of specific references out there, and I did various trials with the engineer, Masaru Sasaki. For example, I was listening to Erased Tapes Records artists a lot, and we talked about Ryuichi Sakamoto, Flying Lotus, the predecessors of J hip-hop, and the context of that area, and we also talked about children’s songs (laughs), so the references were very varied. So the references were very diverse.

I wonder why there is a kind of “nostalgia” mixed in the sounds and tones, rather than the melody.

Ezaki: It’s a mystery, isn’t it? Technically speaking, for example, there are scratch noises from analog records mixed into the song “Mail,” and there are also many soundscapes or sounds of the city. These things are connected to our memories and evoke feelings of nostalgia. I think that the nostalgic, happy, and sad feelings that are evoked by listening to music are something that only humans can do. Although we have some tricks up our sleeves, I think it is like magic to be able to notice them in the first place.

The Counter Spirit Hidden in the Unexpected Guest Selection

Many guests with close ties to the project, such as Kakuto Mami, Matsumaru Ki, and Teshima Aoi, have participated in this project.

Ezaki: For example, when I worked with Aoi Teshima on a commercial project a while back, I thought she had a wonderful voice. Of course, I was a big fan of hers even before that, so I wrote the song “Kyou no Sora ni Maru Tsuki” (Today’s Sky is a Round Moon), hoping that Teshima-san would sing one of the songs on this album. I thought it would be fun to work with Sweet William, who participated in the track making for “Mail,” and Kenji Kihara and mei ehara, who participated in “Asahi no Warmth,” and I thought, “It would be fun to make something together. I thought it would be interesting if we made something together,” so I asked them to work with me more like a collaborative effort.

The same goes for Qi Matsumaru. I knew that he was a great saxophone player, so I imagined what it would be like if he played the saxophone, and we started by creating a track that would be the base of the music. The same goes for Mr. Kakudo.

Ezaki: One thing that was important to me this time was that I didn’t work with people I work with on a daily basis. I have worked in a variety of scenes, so it might have been possible to invite people with whom I already have a close relationship, but this time I wanted to counter that and express what I have not shown in those scenes, so I asked mainly people who I thought would be a good match. So I asked mainly people I thought would be a good match for that.

I see. I did think that the choice of people was somewhat unexpected.

Ezaki: That’s right. For example, when someone releases a solo album, you can imagine the lineup, but this time I didn’t want to follow in the footsteps of that.

By the way, what’s the origin of the name of the song “Hugage,” in which Kakudo participated?

Ezaki: I borrowed it from the name of an astronomer named Hoei Nojiri. Actually, I was working with Shito-san, a wonderful “storyteller” and “rapper” who I was very happy to work with on this project, but it was a little difficult to give form to this “Hajimari no Yoru”. But in the process, there were many words that Shito spun for me. The title of the song, including the others, was inspired by Mr. Shito. The titles of the songs, including the others, were greatly influenced by Shito-san. I would be happy if we could work together again somewhere.

I feel that this album is strongly influenced by “lullabies” and “nursery rhymes,” as is the case with “Hoei” and “Kyou no Sora ni Maru Tsuki” for which the picture book author Ryoji Arai wrote the lyrics.

Ezaki: When I was in a junior orchestra, I once accompanied a Japanese shoka medley. It was titled “The Four Seasons of My Homeland,” and included a variety of shoka and folk songs, so it was an original experience for me. Besides, it was a kind of “return to the classics. After the Great Kanto Earthquake, Tanizaki moved from Tokyo to Kyoto, and it seems that his return to the classics in In Praise of Shadows was also out of a sense of concern for Tokyo, which had lost some of its “Edo spirit” due to the earthquake. In order for me to return to the classics in the same way as Tanizaki, I had to include children’s songs and lullabies as the mainstay of my work.

“The Night of the Beginning” ends with A New Day Begins.

The artwork is also very impressive, isn’t it?

Ezaki: We asked Yugo Sato, a brilliant creator of the same generation, to do the art direction. He uses a technique called “photogramming,” in which objects are placed directly on photographic paper and exposed to light without the use of a camera. (Laughs.) I also like photography, and I do a lot of things with cameras as a hobby, but it is an art form that deals with light. It is an art form that deals with light, and I thought it would be perfect for the concept of this album. I was also pleased to see that it is a technique pioneered by Man Ray and Moholy-Nagy.

The sphere floating vaguely in the air is in sync with the title of the song, “A round moon in today’s sky”, isn’t it?

Ezaki: Actually, we had several ideas for the jacket photo, but this one was the most pop and easy to understand. As you say, it looks like the moon floating in the night sky, or like …… gradually climbing up, or like the sun going down. I like the fact that it can be interpreted in various ways depending on how you look at it.

The lyrics of the last song, “Asahi no Nukumori,” written by Kenji Kihara, are also impressive. ＜I like how the line “Repeat this time, repeat this time, repeat this feeling, feel every day without changing” changes to “Look back at this time, look back at this feeling, a new day begins” at the end of the song. Every day that repeats itself is also a “new day” for this moment.

Ezaki: Indeed, that is quite an exquisite balance. The song is a repetitive accompaniment, so it has a looped sense of everyday life. Anyway, I asked Mr. Kihara to depict only everyday scenes. I think he did a good job of expressing the happiness and subtleties of emotion that are found in everyday life, without making the message too big.

I think that the “New Day” can also be taken as the beginning of a new day in After Corona, in the sense that it is a metaphor for the Corona disaster I mentioned earlier. When I think about it that way, the title “The Night of the Beginning” is also very meaningful.

Ezaki: It certainly feels like a song of hope. I wrote it with the image of a song that is played during the end roll of a movie, but it is also interesting in the sense that it can be seen as the opening of a sequel. I’m going to use it from now on.

What I want to aim for in the next 10 years is to become a “film musician”

I am honored (laughs). I heard that this album was also mixed with Dolby Atmos.

Ezaki: For songs with simple instrumentation, I tried to create a sense of realism, as if the music were being performed right in front of you. On the other hand, for songs with a lot of notes, such as “Rays of No Boldness” and “Warmth of the Morning Sun,” I wanted to present a kind of attraction-like acoustic fun by scattering those sounds throughout the space. The Dolby Atmos mix is quite entertaining in that sense.

Do you plan to continue making solo works in the future?

Ezaki: I am already in the mode of wanting to create new works. Specifically, I want to release a collection of piano pieces. This time I wrote a lot of songs that are not intended to be enjoyed by everyone, but I have a great desire to create more works for a limited target, like for a specific person, environment, or time. Of course, I have taken on corporate commercials in the past, but I would like to make works that are more intimate and dedicated to something. Perhaps I am more suited to that kind of work. In that sense, film soundtracks and other theatrical accompaniment is at the top of what I want to do. Over the next 10 years or so, I would like to work in that area, so that I don’t mind people saying, “He is a film musician, isn’t he?

Besides, there were many moments when I rediscovered the advantages of the band. Soloists have to make all the judgments on their own, don’t they? It is natural, but I also rediscovered the joy of listening to the opinions of various musicians as I went along. I realized how blessed I had been to have been placed in such a good environment, and that I had taken it for granted so much that I had not realized how much I had been blessed. I would like to continue to make good works while going back and forth between solo and band.