In a Model Room

In a Model Room
Studio album by P-Model
Released August 25, 1979 (1979-08-25)
Recorded Tokyo, 1979
Studio Sunrise Studio (Recording & Mixing)
Freedom Studio
Electro Sound
Genre
Length 33:28
Language Japanese, English
Label Warner-Pioneer
Producer
P-Model chronology
Air on the Wiring
(1978)		 In a Model Room
(1979)		 Landsale
(1980)
Singles from In a Model Room
  1. "Art Mania" c/w "Sunshine City"
    Released: July 25, 1979 K-17W
  2. "Kameari Pop" c/w "Health Angel"
    Released: December 25, 1979 K-23W

In a Model Room is the debut album of Japanese band P-Model. In 2007 Rolling Stone Japan ranked it at number 52 in its list of the 100 Greatest Japanese Rock Albums of All Time and Snoozer ranked it at number 125 in its list of the 150 Greatest Albums of Japanese Rock’n’Roll.[1] Susumu Hirasawa re-recorded the album (except for "Sophisticated") in the style of the P-Model live shows of 1979 as Virtual Live-1 [P-Model Live at Roppongi S-Ken Studio 1979]. Polysics covered "The Great Brain" for the 2007 album Karate House and have performed "Art Mania" live. Covers of "Art Mania" by Vocaloids are included in dedicated Vocaloid New Wave cover albums.

Background

By 1978, Susumu Hirasawa, guitarist and vocalist of Mandrake, one of the few Japanese progressive metal bands at the time, was unsatisfied with the style the band worked in, thinking that progressive rock had lost its social link and became just entertainment.[2] By then, Mandrake's had only achieved reception by a niche live show audience for national progressive rock and bit parts on synthesizer-heavy works by Akiro "Kamio" Arishima, Hirasawa's superior at Yamaha who made instrumental music heavily influenced by Wendy Carlos. Hirasawa had discovered punk rock groups like Sex Pistols, 999 and Métal Urbain; and Mandrake discovered the Nylon 100% café bar/live house, where they were introduced to New Wave music and visuals. Feeling that it was the advent of a new era, Hirasawa and keyboardist Yasumi Tanaka started writing songs in the punk/new wave style, and cut their waist-length hair short, alongside drummer Sadatoshi Tainaka.[3]

Mandrake had turned into a half-hearted band and, after declining an offer from the director of Victor Music Industries, Hirasawa decided to "abort" Mandrake, characterizing it as the defeat of alchemy to commercialism. To that end, the band's final live performance at the Shibuya Jean-Jean, meant to be the symbolic burial of Mandrake's aborted body, was a two-part show that lasted three hours: The first two and a half were the last performances of the progressive rock songs, done inside a large picture frame hung on stage. After the first part ended, the lights went out and Katsuhiko Akiyama (keyboardist of the Emerson, Lake & Palmer-influenced trio Abikyōkan and Mandrake's only fan) came out of the frame dressed in a white coat and holding a fetus that glowed red, green and blue. The frame was dismantled and Susumu's older brother Yūichi, while running on a treadmill wearing a white coat, counted to four in English. With that, the band played electropunk songs, ending Mandrake.[4]

On New Year's Day 1979, the members of the band held a meeting in a house in Kameari[5] to decide how they would reform: Bassist Tohru Akutu, still attached to progressive rock, decided to depart from the band, going on to work on various projects with the members of Shingetsu; Akiyama was later chosen to take his spot. The instruments which emitted a pretentious grandeur (most of them painted in dignified colors like purple, gold and burgundy) were either repainted in bright colors (like yellow, light blue and pink) or sold off to buy ones more adequate for what the band wanted to do (some of the new ones were also painted in bright colors). It was decided that the band's name would be changed to something that evoked the new development of a mass-produced industrial good, a fake product model.[4]

Composition and Production

Most of the songs on the album were created by Mandrake late in the group's existence, which allowed for a quick debut release (7 months and 24 days after the band's formation). The songs show a tendency for complex compositions and unusual time signatures: "The Great Brain", a song that alternates between sections on 7
4 and 5
4, is a reworking of a section of "Deranged Door", a song from Mandrake's first lineup.[6] The figure of "Art Mania" is a modification of a phrase from the 1952 Poly e Seus Modernistas song "Turista" (based on a 1963 cover by The Atlantics); "White Cigarettes" contains a quotation of "The Streets of Cairo, or the Poor Little Country Maid". The lyrics reflect on the sociopolitical issues of Japan at the time, during the Japanese post-war economic miracle, and were influenced in part by Nineteen Eighty-Four; unlike other technopop band of the time, which sung mostly English lyrics, P-Model had one song written in that language and all others had lyrics in Japanese,[6] due to Hirasawa's lack of skill in the language. In a Model Room was produced by Masahide Sakuma, keyboardist of the new wave band Plastics, who agreed to do so on the strength of the album's first track.[7] Sakuma, who had never produced an album outside of his band before, later became a renowned session producer. The instrumentation is a mix of standard punk with electronic devices for particularly mechanical tones: A Roland CR-78 drum machine does simultaneous counterpoint beats to a standard drum kit, the Maxi-Korg 800DV synthesizer was used for a unique blipping noise, dubbed by the music press as a "musical stapler",[8][9] and as a vocoder[10] for "Art Blind". P-Model came to argue with Warner-Pioneer, Sakuma and engineer Makoto Furukawa daily over the Yamaha YC-10 combo organ: The band chose it for a clicking noise made when a key is pressed, the production wanted to take it out of the mix and constantly told P-Model to rent an expensive keyboard, which they refused adamantly.[11] P-Model would alter the equalization settings Furukawa used to remove the clicking noise every time he looked away from the mixing console until he stopped noticing it.[12]

Track listing

All songs written and composed by Susumu Hirasawa, except where noted. 

No. TitleLyricsMusic Length
1. "Art Mania" (美術館で会った人だろ Bijutsukan de Atta Hito Daro, Surely I Met You at the Art Museum[13])   3:09
2. "Health Angel" (ヘルス・エンジェル Herusu Engeru)Yasumi TanakaTanaka 2:32
3. "Roomrunner" (ルームランナー Rūmurannā, Treadmill)TanakaTanaka 2:32
4. "Sophisticated" (ソフィスティケイテッド Sofisutikeiteddo)   4:26
5. "For Kids" (子供たちどうも Kodomotachi Dōmo)Yūichi Hirasawa  3:31
6. "Kameari Pop"     3:56
7. "Sunshine City" (サンシャイン・シティー Sanshain Shitī)Y. HirasawaTanaka 2:03
8. "The Great Brain" (偉大なる頭脳 Idainaru Zunō) Fumiyasu Abe (uncredited), S. Hirasawa 2:03
9. "White Cigarettes" (ホワイト・シガレット Howaito Shigaretto)   3:15
10. "Pinky Trick" (MOMO色トリック MOMO Iro Torikku)   3:18
11. "Art Blind" (アート・ブラインド Āto Buraindo)   2:39

The group also planned to include 2 other songs on the album: The Hirasawa piece "Alien" (異邦人 Ihōjin), created as a Mandrake song, which was left off the album due to complications with releasing the clear pink vinyl edition and/or issues with getting a suitable arrangement (the song was recorded twice during the album's sessions and more than one arrangement was performed by the band live), it was later rerecorded, with new parts by Tanaka, for Landsale; and the Tanaka piece "White Shoes" (ホワイト・シューズ Howaito Shūzu), which was later used as BGM for the end credits of the Photon-1 video.

Personnel

P-Model - Production, Arrangements
Staff

Release history

Date Label(s) Format Catalog Notes
August 25, 1979 Warner-Pioneer LP K-10017W First limited print run was pressed on clear pink vinyl.[14] The center labels refer to the sides of the record as "Models".
CS LKF-5029
January 25, 1992 Warner Music Japan CD WPCL-603 Released (alongside Landsale and Potpourri) a month before the release of P-Model.
May 10, 2002
July 4, 2014		 Chaos Union, Teslakite CHTE-0005 Remastered by Hirasawa. Part of Disc 1 of the Ashu-on [Sound Subspecies] in the solar system box set, alongside Landsale. The demo and "White Shoes" are on Disc 13 (CHTE-0017).[15] Re-released with new packaging by Kiyoshi Inagaki.
October 20, 2003 Warner Music Japan, sky station, SS RECORDINGS SS-101 Packaged in a paper sleeve to replicate the original LP packaging. Includes new liner notes by music industry writer Dai Onojima.

References

  1. ↑ Marx, W. David (November 9, 2007). "100 Greatest Japanese Rock Albums". Néojaponisme.
  2. ↑ "RocketBaby's interview w/Susumu Hirasawa". RocketBaby. Neo Cosmic Industries. Retrieved 3 March 2001.
  3. ↑ http://twilog.org/hirasawa/date-130417
  4. 1 2 Hirasawa, Susumu; Nakano, Yasuhiro; Matsumoto, Masayuki (1997). 錯乱の扉 2 [deranged door 2] (booklet). Marquee. · unreleased materials volume two (liner notes) (in Japanese). Mandrake. Chaos Union, TESLAKITE. 2006. CHTE-0036. · A Young Person's Guide to Mandrake 1973-1978 (booklet). Mecano. 2006.
  5. ↑ https://twitter.com/hirasawa/status/530714246339108865
  6. 1 2 Reed, Nick (June 2013). "Dreaming Machine". Perfect Sound Forever. Retrieved 19 August 2015.
  7. ↑ Sakuma, Masahide (February 25, 2009). "30th anniv.". Masahide Sakuma [homepage] (in Japanese).
  8. ↑ "KEYBOARD FILE No.23: 1st KEYBOARD – 平沢 進(P-MODEL)とKORG 800DV". KB Special (in Japanese) (Rittor Music). November 1992.
  9. ↑ Sawada, Daisuke (March 19, 2009). "TECHNO POP IN 80's & 00's". TOWER RECORDS ONLINE (in Japanese). Tower Records. Retrieved 19 August 2015.
  10. ↑ "INSTRUMENTS CHECK: P-MODEL". Rock Steady (in Japanese) (Steady Publications) 32: 57. July 1980.
  11. ↑ HIRASAWA SUSUMU 激烈インタビュー 「DAWの変遷」そしてライブでの表現について [Susumu Hirasawa Intense Interview — "Transitions of DAW" and its Expressions in a Live Stage]. TALBO Secret FACTORY (in Japanese). Ikebe Gakki. Retrieved 21 April 2015.
  12. ↑ https://twitter.com/hirasawa/status/363875183766937600
  13. ↑ "美術館で会った人だろ / Bijutsukan de Atta Hito Daro / Surely I Met You at the Art Museum". Hirasawa Lyrics.
  14. ↑ "IN A MODEL ROOM ピンク盤". 平沢博物苑 (in Japanese). Retrieved 11 November 2014.
  15. ↑ "DISC13". Ashu-on. Chaos Union.

External links

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