CENTRAL_

Nice to meet you.
My wife and me own a shop called Organ in Ohashi area of Fukuoka, where we sell chairs, ceramics, glassware, and other accessories. Although there are also brand new items, our products are mainly from 1950s era, from Europe and United States, the so-called “mid-century modern”, but we also like the craft taste of some Japanese and Asian objects. I vaguely know the concept behind my selection, but I can hardly explain. I hope I’ll find a way to organize my thoughts while writing on this blog.
When I was at university, I started playing in a band. At the beginning of the Seventies, rock was at its best. I didn’t want to merely imitate western music, I thought I had to sing my own songs in Japanese. My inspiration was the music of the American counter culture of that era, especially I loved the full and serious sound of The Band’s music. Fortunately, right after my band was formed, we released an album: we were obsessive about the arrangements, and we did a lot of rehearsals in order to create an earthy sound. But when we listened to our records, we weren’t convinced at all. Our music was just “something like…”.
Our second album was a 180 degree turn: we aimed at the arty and modern pop new music from the UK, the one that Yuji Konno named “rock mannerism”. I think that was a good opportunity to study several styles of music. But after making two albums so antithetic, one earthy and the other modern, some people with eclectic taste started to follow us, but our few fans became confused. In terms of sale, the album wasn’t a hit, and I decided to go back to Fukuoka. I was disappointed, and I took the driving license in order to get a regular job, but the world isn’t easy. I did several part-time jobs, then I was asked to work in a company that imported records: luckily I could do a job related to music. That was how my comeback to society started. After that, I took my own way, ambivalent and against the mainstream. (Mitsutoshi Takesue)