A decade and a half prior to that, I'd spent a year working and travelling in Australia. I started in Perth and then went anti-clockwise around the continent, again in retrospect barely scratching the surface, but having a life changing experience and meeting some incredible people along the way. As I was travelling anti-clockwise, at the same time my future wife was travelling clockwise around Australia. I didn't meet her for another decade but we've often wondered and smiled at the what ifs and coincidences.
Music was, unsurprisingly, a staple of my travels and I didn't go anywhere without my Walkman and a bunch of cassettes. One of my C90s for my Oz tour had Associates' Sulk on side A and a homemade Japan compilation on side B. Looking at the selection, I think it's reasonable to assume that at the time I recorded this (circa 1989) my collection was limited to a vinyl copy of Assemblage and a few singles, including an Old Gold 12". One featured a version of Life In Tokyo that I'd previously only heard on my brother's cassette version of Assemblage, which had a whole side of bonus tracks. For this playlist, I've swapped the single edit of Gentleman Take Polaroids from the Cantonese Boy 2x 7" for the full length album version because... why not?!
1) All Tomorrow's Parties (12" Version By Steve Nye) (1983)
2) Quiet Life (Album Version) (1979)
3) Gentlemen Take Polaroids (Album Version) (1980)
4) European Son (12" Extended Version) (1981)
5) Life In Tokyo (12" Version) (1979)
6) Suburban Berlin (1978)
7) Nightporter (Remixed By Steve Nye) (1982)
8) Alien (Album Version) (1979)
9) I Second That Emotion (Single Version) (1980)
I still love Japan (the band that is)...my mate Paul and i always keep a look out for any Sylvian activity which seems to be less and less of late. Paul got the 3 CD version of Quiet Life recently and whilst most of the mixes on CD 2 appear in your mix here there is a 'Live at the Budokan' set which he describes as like a bad bootleg. Simon Napier Bell has some interesting recollections of managing the band like when they supported Blue Oyster Cult and being bombarded with urine....
ReplyDeleteI've got a bad bootleg of a Budokan show too, the Sons of Pioneers tour in 1982. A great setlist and performances but the quality is variable. I subsequently got all of the Japan albums on CD and that mix of Life In Tokyo popped up on the budget price In Vogue compilation in the mid-1990s. Oddly enough, I didn't feel motivated to get the Rain Tree Crow album even though I originally bought the Blackwater 7" back in 1991 and quite liked it. I nearly got to see David Sylvian in concert in Bristol in the late 1980s - must have been the Colston Hall or the Hippodrome, but it was cancelled. Would have been quite an experience, I imagine.
ReplyDeleteThat might have been the gig where supposedly Steve Jansen couldn't play drums because of an incident with a cheese grater or some such nonsense. I was lucky enough to see Sylvian in 87/88 at Hammy Odeon and we had his girlfriend sat two to our left and Mica Paris two to our right.
ReplyDeleteI think the last time i saw him was at the Colston hall in 2003(?) round about Blemish time and it was literally him and two other guys on laptops..it wasn't the most exciting gig which was a shame as it wasn't far off the nine horses project which was excellent.