I'm not going to pretend that most people will enjoy this album or even consider it music. As anyone living in America knows, there are a shitload of closed-minded people wandering around these days. So fuck 'em. This one's for me.

Koenjihyakkei Live at Camp Goodman (Skin Graft)

Koenjihyakkei plays something that might be called manic operatic prog jazz rock. If you dig the minimalism of Melt-Banana, imagine if Frank Zappa got hold of those tunes and expanded the sound for his "orchestra". Oh, and there are some seriously trippy vocals that wind along the same twisty lines as the music. Are they sung in English? Japanese? I dunno. Even Wikipedia has no idea. But they sound awesome.

The leader of this band of mutants is Yoshido Tatsuya, perhaps better known for his work with Ruins. He accumulates band members who suit his needs and then proceeds to get weird. The title of this set is correct; these songs were played live. But due to covid, there was no live audience (just a streaming one). And like Josh Caterer's two audience-free live covid albums, the results are utterly stunning.

Like I said, most people would consider listening to this to be worthy of an assault charge. That's cool. I just love the way it moves. There are so many wonderful ideas bouncing around and even occasionally immolating each other. Absolutely skin-tinging.