DAVID SYLVIAN - Krishna Blue

David Sylvian’s late solo career (Every Colour You Are, Krishna Blue, The Good Son, The Banality of Evil, Snow White In Appalachia) In 1991, a decade after their breakup, David Sylvian found a more complete closure with his ex-Japan bandmates when they decided to convene in the studio under a new guise, Rain Tree Crow. The group’s sole album suggests the direction Japan could have gone had they continued on together, with earthy instrumentals and gauzy balladry like “Every Colour You Are.” Sylvian and his brother Jansen also continue to play together in Nine Horses, their trio with German producer Burnt Friedman who helped bring a neo-soul energy to “The Banality of Evil” and their sole full-length, 2005’s Snow Borne Sorrow. Sylvian has released a lot of material over the past two decades, but it has arrived sporadically and with a seeming intent to move away from traditional songwriting. This impulse began simply enough with Dead Bees on a Cake, an album reflective of the push and pull between his spiritual and earthly desires. “Krishna Blue,” for example, expresses this musically with Indian percussion and acoustic guitar representing Sylvian’s dual interests. The breathy spoken-word interlude from his then-wife singer Ingrid Chavez further complicates matters. On 2003’s Blemish, one of the first releases on his own Samadhisound label, Sylvian sets himself completely free. That album, a musical excoriation of his mental state following the end of his marriage, includes tracks like “The Good Son” that put his own dark croon against the improvised guitar of Derek Bailey. Six years later, on Manafon, Sylvian’s lyrics and music would become even more abstract. After his collaborators (including British jazz titans Evan Parker and John Tilbury, as well as turntablist Otomo Yoshihide) improvised, he took their recordings and quickly wrote and recorded lyrics to them, winding up with abstract wonders like “Snow White In Appalachia,” a song about a woman breaking free from a bad domestic situation set to a creaking, droning tune. Manafon would be one of the last times Sylvian would commit his voice to a piece of music. The work he has done since has explored buzzing blasts of ambient sound, minimalist compositions utilizing shortwave radio samples and crinkling electronic noise, and various flavors of dissonance and resonance. Even as his work has taken on a more idiosyncratic, mystical tone, his creative mind remains agile and curious and brilliant as ever.

DAVID SYLVIAN - Red Guitar

David Sylvian’s early solo career (Forbidden Colours, Red Guitar, River Man, Orpheus, Brightness Falls) David Sylvian’s solo career got off to an auspicious start with the help of former Yellow Magic Orchestra member Ryuichi Sakamoto. Sakamoto had written the musical theme for Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence, a World War II film in which he starred opposite David Bowie, and he needed vocals and lyrics for it. What Sakamoto and Sylvian created together was an instant classic, with Sylvian playing beautifully off of Sakamoto’s Satie-inspired melody with lyrics of spiritual and romantic yearning. The track solidified Sylvian’s position in the world of British pop music. From that same MOJO interview, he said, “It opened a door. I thought, ‘OK, I’m ready,’ and I started writing Brilliant Trees.” As he began composing that solo album, he hewed closer to a pop aesthetic, beginning with “Red Guitar,” an upbeat tune featuring Sakamoto on piano. ut as the first chapter of his solo career continued, he balanced out his more easily accessible work with experimental compositions. Sometimes that dichotomy was as blatant as with his second full-length Gone To Earth, a double LP that put slow-moving, rapturous pop songs like “River Man” on one disc and a set of ambient instrumentals on the second. Sylvian combined the two elements on follow-up Secrets of the Beehive where even the sea shanty-like “Orpheus” is cut through with droning strings and graceful synth tones. Throughout the ’80s Sylvian cultivated creative relationships with a flock of other forward-thinking artists, including former Can bassist Holger Czukay, Be-Bop Deluxe leader Bill Nelson, and jazz musicians Kenny Wheeler and David Torn. King Crimson guitarist Robert Fripp even asked Sylvian to join his band. When that offer was rejected, they instead collaborated on The First Day, an album of loud, funk-infused rock that includes the Hendrix-inspired “Brightness Falls.”