INDEX
Humor Peeking Through Anger and Seriousness
When did the concept for this album, its track order, and the lyrics come together?
Ishibashi: The lyrics were completed after all the songs were finished.
Was the concept formed by that stage?
Ishibashi: Yes. It’s the graveyard.
That image comes through, including on the album jacket. In Japan, a graveyard can represent the edge of a community, a boundary separating life and what lies beyond.
Ishibashi: Exactly. When I think about that, it makes me grin. Even at funerals, no matter how sad it is, or when a close friend passes away, there are moments that make you want to smile a little.
I understand what you mean. Sometimes there are situations where you just wonder why things have turned out this way.
Ishibashi: Yes.
Besides the alpinist you mentioned earlier, have others close to you passed away as well?
Ishibashi: Last summer, a close friend of mine who was the same age passed away from cancer. She used to make perfumes and candles, and I even created a work that paired her candles with my records. She was really sharp-tongued and only ever said harsh things. You don’t find many friends like that, and it’s very sad when someone like her is gone.
Was she also tough on your music?
Ishibashi: Yes, she often gave me tough feedback [laughs].
When your career becomes more established, people like that tend to disappear, don’t they?
Ishibashi: My career isn’t really established yet (laughs), but I’ve always been helped by people who tell me tough truths.
I felt that the lyrics reached a unique new level.
Ishibashi: I think I did write some parts with a bit of playfulness. Because I was thinking about very serious things, I also felt the urge to joke around. From there, I gradually found it easier to write.
In Antigone, there’s a line about “wetting the law.” I think it’s a pun on “cheek,” and I was really impressed by the word choice.
Ishibashi: Since the songs have more of a floating, drifting feel, I imagined the lyrics like a somewhat rough gravel road—kind of violent and coarse.
Even when you sing those rough, gravel-road-like words, you make them sound in many different ways. It makes listeners think about what you’re actually singing. Your unique singing style seems to have leveled up again.
Ishibashi: That’s good to hear. I’m just desperately trying to sing so that it fits the song—I don’t use any technical tricks.
In the lyrics of “The Model,” the word “organ” appears, but that’s the first time I’ve heard a song harmonizing with that word [laughs].
Ishibashi: I want everyone to sing it together in a big chorus.
I think this song points out a frightening situation when you really think about it: the human body becoming, or being treated as, a tool for business.
Ishibashi: Yes, that’s right. Hamaguchi-san introduced me to a music-loving person with ALS, and learning about euthanasia influenced this song a lot.
I do think there are cases where euthanasia should be accepted, but if society approves it broadly, there’s a danger that people who become ill might be seen as beings who should die. I had never seriously considered this perspective before.
There’s a frightening aspect where bedridden people might be assumed by others to have no value in living.
Ishibashi: Exactly. It’s truly sad when someone close to you is socially affirmed as someone who should die.
