I wonder if that was TOWA TEI’s mental landscape for 2020. Natural Calamity’s Shunji Mori plays the guitar in NOMADOLOGIE, and Tomohiko Gondo, who also works with you in METAFIVE, also plays the flugelhorn in the track. TOWA: We made this song as a trio, me, Gon-sama, and Mori-sama. It sounds almost improvisational, but both of them instantly understood the kind of sound I had in my mind it’s a pretty unique song. The album is full of uplifting beats since the beginning, so it was surprising to hear NOMADOLOGIE at the end.

TOWA: According to Dai Onojima, who officially interviewed me for the release of the album, most of the music released in 2020 by club artists was ambient music. I understand that feeling well, and I also felt a little synchronicity.

Nonetheless, I’ve released beat-less music in the past: Raga Musgo from Future Listening! (TOWA’s debut album, released in 1994) happens to be the case, but I was 16 years old at the time, and I was overdubbing instruments on two cassettes the only music I could manage to make was ambient or minimal. TOWA: The thing is, since I started my career as a DJ, I’ve been making repeat music the whole time. I didn’t want to make a whole album of ambient music, so I ended up making all the tracks about records and DJing: for example, RINGWEAR, which is the imprint of the disc on the aging record jacket. I love record jackets with visible ringwear. The lyrics of the fourth song, MAGIC, also include the words “my yellow magic.” It’s the same with NOMADOLOGIE at this point, everyone is probably just listening to records at home. TOWA: The first LP I’ve ever bought was YMO’s Solid State Survivor.

Towa tei future listening