Hajime Tachibana

6-10-08 Hajime Tachibana

CD BAMBI EASTWORLD JPN TOCT-6269

1991 12 TRKS with Towa Tei, CD-only release?

CD BEAUTY & HAPPY MIDI/SCHOOL JPN 35MD-1027

1987 13 TRKS

CD H ALFA JPN ALCA-5074

1982 11 TRKS / in YEN BOX 1, kami sleeve

CD HM ALFA JPN ALCA-5084

1983 10 TRKS / in YEN BOX 1, kami sleeve

CD5 IN THE 90's ALFA JPN ALCA-319

1992 4 TRK CD Single CD5, remixes

CD LOW POWER FOR LIFE JPN FLCF-3675

1997 9 TRKS Special 10" package, CD-only release?

CD LOW POWERS FOR LIFE JPN FLCF-3701

1997 14 TRKS

CD MR. TECHIE & MISS KIPPLE ALFA JPN ALCA-5135

1984 10 TRKS / in YEN BOX 2, kami sleeve

CD MUSIC SAVE ME (MIDI BEST ALBUM) MIDI/SCHOOL JPN MDC8-1116

1990 19 TRK Collection

LP NICE TO MEET YOU, SORRY TO PART… (Collection) YEN/ALFA JPN YLR-28025

1985 12 TRK Collection, insert

CD TAIYO-SUN MIDI/SCHOOL JPN 35MD-1006

1985 9 TRKS (LP was a picture disc!)

CD THE END BOUNCE JPN BOUNCE-0041

2002 32 TRKS CD-only release?

I was sent a promo LP of “H” by a record exporting company in Japan. It changed my life! And I’ve met at least one other person who said that “H” changed his life.

Tachibana was a member of The Plastics, the seminal Japanese new wave technopop band. But his early solo albums do not really have the pop sensibility of The Plastics. Tachibana was the guitarist of The Plastics.

“Mr. Techie & Miss Kipple” (1984) was one of the first albums to extensively utilize the ‘sampler’. My guess would be that Mark Mothersbaugh of Devo gave Tachibana his ‘James Brown sample’ that was used in his “Replicant J.B.” masterpiece. But my favorite tracks on that album are the two versions of “Dapanpis” – it suited my interest in ‘lounge music’ in ’84.

I met and interviewed Tachibana in Tokyo in ’97. He spoke near-perfect English. He couldn’t believe that a western journalist (i.e. me) was ‘familiar’ with his work, so I whistled the “Lunchtime Dapanpis” to him.

I lost track of him from roughly ’87 – ’92; I saw either a review or advertisement for “Bambi” in a Japanese magazine (Music Life?) about 1993 or so – about the time I was getting so into Pizzicato Five. I started going to Japan in ’94.

The last full-length by Tachibana “The End” came out in ’02, after being advertised in “Dictionary” (Japanese magazine) much earlier. It’s an album composed on cell-phone ringtones / notes. Very minimalist. It’s nice that he can keep even his ardent fans guessing, in the new century.