Ep. 18 – Childisc Outbursts

Sound Contours

A small label run by Nobukazu Takemura in Kyoto from 1994 to 2007, Childisc was subtly groundbreaking. Takemura was at the cutting edge: beyond just granular synthesis, his output randomizers affected melody, his glitches (the sounds of ordered processes going awry) became pleasant listening, MIDI noise was incorporated into music, and the voices of robots -- hidden like kodama in a personal computer -- were friendly and cute, rather than isolating and threatening. Though he deserves his own episode, Takemura put out most of his best work on Childisc and honed a singular aesthetic there, curating the work of lesser known yet likeminded artists from around Japan and pairing it with his own. Childisc was about mystery and wonder -- a pairing of experimentalism and whimsy, where cute or kawaii voices and melodies were peppered with challenging bursts of blips and bloops. Electronic noises were slyly recontextualized as atmospheric music or percussion instruments; trip-hop and breezy, Brazil-inflected beats were joined by cheap Casio keyboards played with childlike playfulness; and ambient landscapes would skitter along without necessarily arriving at a horizon... Tracklist: Lullatone - If I Had a Harp I Would Play it Every Day, Asao Kikuchi - What Must They Be Saying?, Yabemilk - Caprice Salad, Slowly Minute - Happy Birth and Sweet Blue, Nobukzau Takemura - Sign, Hyu - Hyper Function, Kiyoshi Izumi - Tengwar, Suppa Micro Pamchopp - A Secret Sense of Panic, Nobukzau Takemura - Cons, Aki Tsuyuko - A Happy Day, Child’s View - grill, Arrow Tour - Fever and Heater, Hirono Nishiyama - ????, Arche Type - Ciao Ciao Bambina, Asao Kikuchi - Fireworks, Nobukazu Takemura - The Cradle of the Light, Slowly Minute - The Song of The Sun In Autumn’s Holiday, Kiyoshi Izumi - Zephyr, Koota Tanimura - Meet Me In The Next Living, Gutevolk - Mizuno Soko (Live Version), Nobukzau Takemura - Conical Flask, Nobukzau Takemura - Chrysalis Part 2, Eiji Mitomi - Centaurea, Hyu - Egg Plane, Nobukzau Takemura - Mahou No Hiroba, Nobukzau Takemura - Lost Treasure (4th Version), Kiyoshi Izumi - Graflicker, Slowly Minute - Whisper Magic (2003 Slowly Minute Mix), Nobukzau Takemura - Anemometer, Eiji Mitomi - Rainbow, Sako - Sheep Negotiation