Kikagaku Moyo "Masana Temples"

Country: Japan
Genre(s): Psychedelic
Label: Guruguru Brain
Format: CD, digital, vinyl
Release date:  October 5, 2018
Tracklist: 
1. Entrance (2:26)
2. Dripping Sun (7:50)
3. Nazo Nazo (3:07)
4. Fluffy Kosmisch (3:40)
5. Majupose (4:01)
6. Nana (3:13)
7. Orange Peel (4:27)
8. Amayadori (1:35)
9. Gatherings (6:40)
10. Blanket Song (3:11)

Total Time 40:10

Line-up: 
Tomo Katsurada: Guitar, Vocal
Ryu Kurosawa: Sitar, Key
Daoud Popal: Guitar
Kotsuguy: Bass
Go Kurosawa: Drums, Vocal

Description/Reviews: 

With Masana Temples, the band wanted to challenge their own concepts of what psychedelic music could be. Elements of both the attentive folk and wild-eyed rocking sides of the band are still intact throughout, but they’re sharper and more defined.

Media/Samples 
Bandcamp

Links:
Web page
Facebook
Progarchives

Kikagaku Moyo "Forest of Lost Children"

Country: Japan
Sub Genre: Psychedelic, Space Rock
Label:  Beyond Beyond is Beyond
Format: CD, digital, vinyl, cassette
Release date: May 20, 2014
Tracklist: 

1. Semicircle 03:15
2. Kodama 04:20
3. Smoke and Mirrors 07:16
4. Streets of Calcutta 03:55
5. Hem 03:51
6. White Moon 08:24

Line-up: 
Tomo Katsurada - Vocal, Guitar
Daoud Popal - Guitar
Ryu Kurosawa - Sitar
Kotsu Guy - Bass
Go Kurosawa - Drums, Voice

Description/Reviews: 

Ostensibly a psych record, “Forest of Lost Children” weighs heavily to the progressive side which makes the attention, and the record, ultimately refreshing. As good as records are from outfits endlessly influenced by overdone usual suspects, it’s energizing that Kikagaku Moyo have generated such fervor with an album that leans heavily to worldly and folky prog. That said, they still light it up when they want to as on the rhythmic gallop of “Hem,” but there’s an airiness and nimbleness running through the heat as much as the mellower places that makes it a breath of fresh air. “Smoke and Mirrors” is equally laid back, smokey and fiery. So is “Street of Calcutta” in a whole other way that shows their wide influences as much as it adds even more dynamics to the record. Rather than showcasing their extremes using the trite and true method of loud/soft/loud/soft, Kikagaku Moyo bleed it all across, on single cuts or in the sequencing of the tracks.

  Read the full review at mratavist.com

Media/Samples 
Bandcamp

Links:
Web page
Facebook
ProgArchives

Kikagaku Moyo "Mammatus Clouds"

Country: Japan
Sub Genre: Psychedelic, Space Rock
Label:  Sky Lantern Records (digital, cassette), Captcha Records (USA, vinyl), Cardinal Fuzz (UK/EU, vinyl & CD)
Format: CD, digital, vinyl, cassette
Release dates: April 4, 2014 (digital), April 30, 2014 (cassette), July 2014 (UK/EU, vinyl & CD), September 2, 2014 (USA, vinyl)
Tracklist: 

1. Pond (27:50)

2. Never Know (16:49)

3. There Is No Other Place (3:18)

Line-up: 
Tomo Katsurada - Vocal, Guitar
Daoud Popal - Guitar
Ryu Kurosawa - Sitar
Kotsu Guy - Bass
Go Kurosawa - Drums, Voice

Description/Reviews: 

Mammatus clouds are crazy-weird udder formations that appear during storms and 幾何学模様 (Kikagaku Moyo) translates as geometric patterns, something these “free music” aficionados claim to see flashing across their eyelids during mammoth jam sessions. The band’s recent Forest Of Lost Children is, naturally therefore, beyond intense, so it’s pleasant to hark back to more meditative times here. There are only three tracks during Mammatus Clouds’ patient running time and they’re all quite different.
The entire A-side is dedicated to “Pond”, a 27-minute sitar-fired super-jam that gently wends its way from ebbing cosmic shimmer to pulsing ritual and Eastern drone. Locking on with 10 minutes to go, the track launches into fuel-injected wormhole exploration only to exit in the tranquil third eye of some psychedelic storm. You’re ultimately jarred from this reverie by rapturous applause to close, serving to underline the one-take epicness of what went before.
On the flip, sitar player Ryu bends and bubbles his strings for 16 minutes on “Never Know”, an acidic hiss creeping into the mix that fills the ears with serpentine suggestion before descending into white noise and unintelligible muttering. Side B then closes with “There Is No Other Place” – much more than the 3-minute tag-on it may first appear. That mumbling vocal grows in stature, a gothic gloom developing amidst the Birds Of Maya-style static. Rampant pedal abuse follows to sandblast the ears and the strutting rocker it becomes a real face-melter.(sicmagazine.net)

Media/Samples 
Bandcamp

Links:
Web page
Facebook
ProgArchives