Azami
Azami was from the island of Yakushima. We recorded two albums with her. “Kaze No Iro” and “Irohani” It seems that there are no traditional folk songs from this island so she set out to write some on her own. Ethereal music for relaxation.
Record Company: What’s Up Music
color of the wind
This mini album “Kaze No Iro” was our first production with Azami. For this album we went to the Island with famed photographer Taisuke Yokoyama and he got some wonderful shots of her in her island environment. We also took along the Hawaiian legend Tiger Espere and he sang some chants and played the nose flute for us in the ancient Yakusugi forest where the trees are thousands of years old.
いろはに
A couple years later we recorded “Irohani”. After that we lost touch with her but I hope she is continuing to write and perform her nouveau traditional island music. Ethereal music for relaxation.
babamania
A great mixture band I was introduced to and worked with for several years before going our separate ways. A hardcore mixture band with lyrics all in clever English. Signed to Teichiku Records. Brought in Scottish Producer Gary Stout for all their recordings to complete their sound.
ep
We released this EP on our What’s Up label in cooperation with Tower Records. They would get signed to Teichiku after this album.
A Man Of Tearz
The band came up with the title song and we recorded it but I don’t think they played it live very much.
Pau Hana
I really never figured out where the vocalist Genki came up with these lyrics. I think Pau Hana means something akin to ‘time off after work is over’ in Hawaiian.
Just Come Up
Boy the label sure demanded a lot of product all the time. We didn’t mind, we had a lot in the vaults and the kept coming up with killer tunes.
Pornmuzik
The second album. Probably their highest charting fueled by the single “Take It”.
I.D.
The band stretching out a bit. Recorded in LA.
Jungle Livin'
Another EP.
ILNANA
Included the track “Wanna Rock” Which was include in FIFA Football 2003 Video Game. The last album I worked with them.
bababest [DVD]
A compilation greatest hits package.
DISKORD
The first full length album.
Take It
The Single from Pornmuzik.
Wanna Rock
Featured in FIFA Football 2003 Video Game.
Delta Throb
A fantastic three piece until after the recording was over when the two brothers on bass and drum decided to go without their singer guitarist. You know how that goes. Lol. Produced by Gary Stout.
Now or Never
The only album they completed with the original members.
ehi
A fantastic singer songwriter with an album of fantastic original songs in the west coast rock vein. Produced by Tsuyoshi Kon.
here in my song
This ended up as her only solo record since she went on to record songs with her punk band Who The Bitch.
J Slash
These young rockers searched Gary Stout out to produce their album. A hard rock combo.
Force Of Ur Rock FOUR
Their only album. “We play hard rock, damn the rest of you guys!”
Junca
Japanese J Pop artist that I got involved with through a friend.
Pineapple Princess
I got called in to the studio because they wanted som rapping. I told them I can’t sing so they went out and bought a lot of booze and I ended up rapping on this.
Ka'Au Crater Boys
The leading proponents of the Jawaiian movement in Hawaii during the later nineties.
HAWAIIAN VIBES Best Of Ka'Au Crater Boys
A greatest hits collection for the Japanese market.
Kawaihae
A Jawaiian band whose members lived in Japan for a while. Led by the radio personality Vance K. I knew Vance from the radio world where we would ask him to play our Jawaiian songs on his radio programs. He approached me one day about making an album with his band. I went to check them out on one of their gigs on the beach bars in Kamakura and was blown away by their cover of “You Don’t Write” by the Ka’au Crater Boys. I make an agreement with them on the spot.
Kawaihae
We helped Vance produce their first outing. A fine set of cover songs and some great originals. It includes the catchy local hit “Kona Skies” which even got us some airplay in Hawaii. Released through What’s Up originally. But also released by JVC with a bonus track of a slowed down version of “Millions”.
Kawaihae 2
Their sophomore effort was a continuation of the fun uplifting island Jawaiian sounds. We actually made a music video with a guest appearance by none other than an old friend, the Ozeki Konishiki for the song “Summer Again”.
Maacho
Jamaican born Maacho had been living in Hawaii since 1975, playing his very spiritual mix of roots, rock and reggae. He has opened for the many reggae acts that has passed through Hawaii over the years. After appearing on the Jawaiian compilation series “Jawaiian Breeze” he signed to Victor Entertainment in Japan for a series of albums, teaming up with Japanese musicians.
HAIL UP
Maacho’s first album containing crowd favorites “Hail Up” and “Somebody over Me”.
Heatin' Up
Album two with Maacho’s take on the B.B. King favorite “The Thrill Is Gone”, gentle love ballad “My Girl”,
A Thousand Cranes
A single cut off the first album with DJ style bonus tracks.
Don't Mess with My Music
Recorded in Hawaii with Tsuyoshi Kon in the producers chair and bass provided by the great Pino Palladino. Gone are the electronic sounds that graced his two previous releases for a more earthy live feel.
THE Mad Capsule Market's
A hard core Japanese Mixture band that Gary Stout used to produce. We set up their American tour.
Digidogheadlock (US)
We released this album independently in San Francisco and sold out our initial pressing.
Mark Cass
A tasteful Canadien singer songwriter. He used to write a lot of songs for Maacho and Sunway.
One Fell Swoop
This was his solo effort.
Mark Casswith with Monsieur Kamayatsu
No No Boy
The two of them collaborated on Monsieur Kamayatsu’s
Hit song “No No Boy”.
One Night Stand Brothers
This was a one off by Monsieur Kamayatsu featuring some of the best Japanese City Pop era musicians. Recorded in Sausalito, analog. Produced by Tsuyoshi Kon and mixed by Steve Mitchell.
One Night Stand Brothers
PALOLO
A Hawaiian three piece featuring the fantastic ukulele of Troy Fernandez.
Ukulele Cruising the best of PALOLO
A compilation greatest hits package for the Japanese market.
RUFUS THOMAS
We all know the great Rufus Thomas of “Walking The Dog fame.
You're a Part of Me -The Best of Rufus Thomas-
We got a chance to produce a song, “You’re A Part Of Me” for a Japanese commercial with Rufus. Recorded in Memphis Tennessee.
SMAP
One of the most successful Japanese boy bands.
SMAP 006 ～SEXY SIX～
We coordinated the photo shoot for the album jacket in New York.
Sunway
A Jawaiian artist from Hawaii. We produced three albums of her music. Producer Edison.
SUNWAY
Our first album with Sunway.
I'M YOUR GOOD FRIEND
A second helping but moving a little bit away from the Jawaiian vein.
exact
Our final collaboration, moving further away from island music.
THE CLARKE NOVA
We met this band kicking around San Francisco when we were looking for bands for a compilation of indie bands. So we decided to record them on an independent label.
...FINALLY
We ended up putting a couple of songs from this album on a movie soundtrack and a TV show.
Tiger Tales
An instrumental record featuring many of the ukulele players we sued on other projects to accompany Tiger Espere’s children story about ecology and Hawaii.
TIGER TALES
TWO BALL LOO
A three piece mixture rock band made up of two Americans and an Englishman. After releasing their debut album, they signed to Meldac records, and then later to Victor Entertainment. Sadly, their clever English lyrics basically went over the heads of their fans.
two ball loo
The first mini album released through Tower Records and What’s Up.
ナイス・ガイ人 Nice Guy Jin 北海道BOUNCE
A spin off recording. A comical twist of foreigners resining in Japan, sung in English and Japanese. Single.
Car Tunes
Their first album for Melac. The band was augmented by new DJ/illustraor Jay.
NO MORE
Single cut from Cartunes. Including two tracks not included in the album.
sexercise
Includes their hit “Online Love Nightmare”.
BALLOONS & LOBSTERS
Their last album on Meldac. Drummer Michio Hasegawa joins them here as a member. Includes “let Your Body Rock” and “15 Year Old”
People Magazine
Single
LET YOUR BODY ROCK!!!
Single cut from Balloons and Lobsters accompanied by a fantastic video.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=smiKWZfOze4
もこもこアフロ犬
A tie up with a Japanese toy company, but alas the toy did not take off and took the single down with it.
Unagi & Fries
A compilation og Japanese and American artists. Released through Tower Records.
UNAGI & FRIES
Wilberry
A Japanese rock band that needed us to fix up their English. In the vein of Suede.
5 Demo
In My Soul of Souls
Never Had No One Ever
Yasuko Agawa / 阿川泰子
Top Japanese Jazz singer that topped the charts in the nineties.
ECHOES
We made an album with her featuring English rock songs including “Echoes” from Pink Floyd and “Can’t Find My Way Home” from Blind Faith.
Produced by Pino Palladino. Steve Ferrone On Drums, Robbie McIntosh on guitar. Recorded at the Floyd studio on the Thames.
Yoko Nagisa / 渚ようこ
Quirky Showa Kayo singer that blended the different Japanese music eras. Gary Stout got to produce and engineer some of her records.
HEY YOU!
渚ゆうこ meets 阿久悠
ふるえて眠る子守唄
Youki Kudoh / 工藤夕貴
Japanese actor who appeared in several United States movie productions including “The Picture Bride” and “Mystery Train”.
ACTRESS
We were on our way to Hawaii to record a Jawaiian album for Youki when she decided that she also wanted to make a movie theme album.
PICTURE BRIDE
Youki’s take on Jawaiian music. Featuring Ernie Cruz Jr.
GRUNGE
The label wanted a compilation of the new sounds coming out of San Francisco in the late 90’s. Here they were but for some reason they wanted to call it Grunge, which it wasn’t. But fun music none the same.
GRUNGE 101%
GRUNGE 102%
Jack
Polydor wanted us to assemble the young indie bands coming out in America so we made two compilations.
Cactus Jack’s Armadillo Hits
Indie bands from Texas.
Captain Jack’s Shark Hits
Indie bands from The West Coast.
Jawaiian Breeze Series
I was very fortunate to have had some friends who moved to Hawaii after graduating high school. They were able to give me an insight into the music scene happening in the islands. Every few years, a new form of music appeared in Hawaii, for example, in the seventies local rock artists like Cecilio & Kapono, Country Comfort, Peter Moon and Kalapana were ever present on the airwaves. In the era before that there were the great Slack Key Masters like Gabby Pahinui, Sonny Chillingsworth and Raymond Kane.
In the late eighties Jawaiian Music arrived on the scene. This was a mixture of local Hawaiian music blended with Jamaican reggae. Starting in 1992 for three years we released a series CDs in Japan called “Jawaiian Breeze”. We licensed as many of these Jawaiian artists that we could for our compilations. Although all the artists were big name stars in Hawaii, sadly, it didn’t translate into sales in Japan. Thinking back on it now, I think the people that listened to traditional Hawaiian music weren’t interested in Reggae and the Reggae listeners didn’t want anything to do with a Hawaiian version of Reggae. Years later they made some compilation CDs that included many of the songs included in our compilations. This time they did sell.
高校卒業後にハワイに引っ越した友達が何人かいて、とても幸運だった。彼らは、島で起こっている音楽シーンについての洞察を私に与えることができたからだ。数年ごとに、新しい形式の音楽がハワイに登場している。たとえば、70 年代にはセシリオ & カポノ、カントリー コンフォート、ピーター ムーン、カラパナなどの地元のロック アーティストが活躍していた。その以前の時代には、Gabby Pahinui、Sonny Chillingsworth、Raymond Kane などの偉大な Slack Key Masters がいた。
80 年代後半、ジャワイアン・ミュージックというジャンルが、音楽シーンに登場した。これは、ジャマイカのレゲエと地元のハワイアンミュージックをブレンドした混合物。僕は1992年の初め、3年間ほど「ジャワイアンブリーズ」というシリーズ名で、CDを日本のマーケットにリリースした。何人かのジャワイアン・アーティストの曲をライセンスして、コンピレーションに乗せた。どのアーティストもハワイの大物スターだったのに、残念ながら日本での売り上げにはつながらなかった。今思うと、伝統的なハワイアン・ミュージックを聴いていた人たちはレゲエに興味がなく、レゲエを聴いていた人たちはハワイのレゲエと関わりたいとは思っていなかったのかもしれない。数年後、同じレコード会社が僕たちのコンピレーションCDからいくつかの曲をセレクトして、再度コンピレーション CD を製作し、その時はセールスされたという過去がある。
ISLANDER
We had made Jawaiian music compilations called the Jawaiian Breeze Series, in the 90’s. No-one was interested. In Japan Hawaiian music fans didn’t want reggae and reggae fans didn’t want Hawaiian ukuleles. But in the 2000’s a band called Def Tech made it big in that genre, so the label released a compilation of our compilations with a few songs added.
Mixture Madness
A compilation of Mixture artists. Released through Tower records.
Mixture Madness
Tsunami Calling Noise
A soundtrack album from the Japanese Surf Movie “Tsunami Calling”
Tsunami Calling Noise
Ukulele Beach
Another offer from another label for a collection of summer pop songs on the ukulele.
Ukulele Beach【Omnibus】
Ukulele Summit Series
Starting in the year 2000, we released a series of ukulele cover albums of Hawaiian artists for the Japanese market. The first two featured Hawaiian Ukulele players covering Bob Marley. The third album featured Beach Boys covers. The fourth were Eagles covers. Finally on the last one in the series that I worked on we had them cover Grateful Dead songs. Yea, Dead songs, go figure.
The album covers featured the great Hawaiian waterman Tiger Espere who happened to be living in Japan at the time. The photographer for the series was Tiger’s old friend, the great surf photographer Taisuke Yokoyama.
2000 年からはハワイアンのウクレレアーティストのカバーアルバムを日本に向けてシリーズ化し、リリースした。 最初の 2 枚はボブ ・マーリーのカバー。 3 枚目はビーチ ・ボーイズのカバーが含まれていた。 4枚目はイーグルスのカバー。僕が取り組んだシリーズの最後の作品はグレイトフル ・デッドの曲のカバーだ。え、ウクレレでデッドソングなんて、ありえない!!
アルバムのジャケットには、当時、日本在住だった偉大なハワイのウォーターマン、タイガー・エスペリがフィーチャーされていた。 このシリーズのカメラマンは、タイガーの旧友であり、偉大なサーフフォトグラファーの横山泰輔氏だった。
Ukulele Winter Island
This time it was a collection of songs representing winter using hot ukulele players from Hawaii, Japan and elsewhere.
Ukulele Winter Island
