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J • A • Seazer — Nuhikun - Directions to Servants
(Devoted Art Propaganda NMS 040, 1977/2021, 2LP)

by Jon Davis, Published 2022-03-02

Nuhikun - Directions to Servants Cover art

Terahara Takaaki is primarily involved in experimental theater in Japan, though many of his productions involve music which has been released on albums using the name J•A• Seazer (spelled various ways over the years). The recording at hand is a re-release of a 1972 production called 邪宗門 (Nuhikun, officially translated as Directions to Servants), and the music is a very unusual combination of psychedelic rock, Japanese traditional instruments, and theatrical vocals, though it’s very far removed from what you might think of as a “rock musical” as heard on Broadway or the East End. Much of the music is quite sparse, silence punctuated by percussion and spoken words by a variety of actors, and a listener can only wonder what might be transpiring on the stage during these sections. The “Audience Entrance” starts us out with a moody piano solo, and it’s easy to imagine the pianist improvising this simple piece as the spectators take their seats. Then we hear some odd electronic noises and a man speaking in Japanese with a weird effect on his voice. Next is “Nuhi Tojo,” the first musically oriented piece, which features a plodding piano part, a bass guitar, relatively sparse percussion, and strings (it sounds like a combination of real strings and Mellotron, but that could be just the way the sounds are treated). The cello starts doing woozy glissandos up and down the neck as the rhythm glides along. Then it all stops for a piano interlude that sounds like a mutated Bach invention. Other tracks feature a wide range of different sounds, including operatic singing in Japanese, rock riffs with dog barking (from actors), mournful oboe with percussion, more dramatic piano, huffing grunts, a circus waltz, and more. There are so many unexpected turns you don’t know what direction you’re facing. “Cinderella Maid” sounds a little like eX-Girl gone psychedelic. “Who Killed the Robin?” brings in a tuba and an oom-pah beat with a klezmer-like clarinet, though the Japanese lyrics are decidedly non-klezmer-like. “The Maid Servants Opera” has a heavy guitar riff and wailing female vocals that sometimes drop into spoken declamations. Obviously this is not an album for everyone, but if you’re up for a bit of the avant-garde and haven’t heard J•A• Seazer before, this is a good place to start. Some parts of it work well enough on their own without the stage performance, while other parts just confuse me. The quality of the recording is rather good for an album of this vintage, and definitely superior to some of the other J•A• Seazer albums I’ve heard. You can check out the trailer to get an idea of the staging for one brief section.

Filed under: Reissues, 2021 releases, 1977 recordings

Related artist(s): Terahara Takaaki (J.A. Seazer / J.A. Caeser)

 

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