Keiji Haino

Keiji Haino's treatment of the guitar renders the word "play" wholly inadequate, inviting terms such as "mauling" or even "destroying" instead. Whether performing alone, joining forces with others, or directing his formidable trio Fushitsusha, he has steered Japan's intense, improvisational, noise-saturated guitar movement since the 1970s. His numerous recordings prove unpredictable and rewarding, particularly for listeners drawn to music's outer edges. Captured live without overdubs, these sessions intensify their spontaneous atmosphere as Haino unleashes shrieks and yelps while throttling the neck of his Gibson SG. Few artists rival his capacity to expand the limits of music, noise, and the guitar's role within that conversation. Launching his solo path with the austere, eerie Watashi-Dake? in 1981, he issued material at an extraordinary pace from the early 1990s onward, encompassing solo works, group projects, and partnerships with Derek Bailey, Peter Brötzmann, Boris, and additional figures. The 21st Century Hard-Y-Guide-Y Man from 1995 marked the start of his sporadic hurdy-gurdy investigations. Black Blues, issued in 2004, presented two contrasting editions—one quiet, one loud—of destructive blues interpretations. From Tima Formosa in 2010 forward, he has produced more than a dozen spontaneous collaborations with Jim O'Rourke and Oren Ambarchi, while also recording with sludge-metal trio Sumac, among them 2022's Into This Juvenile Apocalypse Our Golden Blood to Pour Let Us Never.

Drawn initially to theater, Haino turned to music during his teenage years upon encountering the Doors. He subsequently embraced early blues, notably Blind Lemon Jefferson, alongside jazz, musique concrète, traditional Japanese forms, and myriad further genres. In 1970 he assembled the improvisational jazz ensemble Lost Aaraaf, whose turbulent shows, distinguished by Haino's frantic vocal outbursts, provoked audience hostility. Japanese national broadcaster NHK barred him from its frequencies for several decades beginning in 1973. Departing Lost Aaraaf in the mid-1970s, Haino collaborated with Japanese psychedelic artist Magical Power Mako before founding Fushitsusha in 1978. Originally a duo featuring synthesizer player Tamio Shiraishi, the ensemble later expanded into a trio completed by bassist Jun Harmano and drummer Shuhei Takashima. Shaped by Krautrock and British psychedelia, the group altered its personnel repeatedly and withheld recordings until 1989, when the influential Japanese underground imprint PSF Records issued a double-live set. John Zorn's Avant label brought out the ensemble's first studio album, Allegorical Misunderstanding, in 1993, broadening its visibility and paving the way for consistent releases throughout the following decade.

Haino also grew extraordinarily productive as a solo artist. Although he had already issued one prior solo record, the cathartic, nightmarish Watashi-Dake? from 1981, he resurfaced with 1990's Nijiumu, a desolate, droning work partly rooted in medieval music. Subsequent albums appeared on PSF as well as on Zorn's Tzadik, Table of the Elements, Blast First, and numerous other experimental imprints, establishing him among noise's most pivotal figures. While he stayed best recognized for guitar, his sessions also encompassed hurdy-gurdy, percussion, and tape loops. He documented projects with esteemed experimental musicians including Loren Mazzacane Connors, Alan Licht, and Derek Bailey. Additional collaborative ventures, many enduring only a single album or limited performances, soon followed. Aihiyo, assembled in the late 1990s, delivered two collections of radically unconventional pop-song covers. Vajra, an improvisational trio uniting guitarist/folk singer Kan Mikami and drummer Toshiaki Ishizuka, ranked among his more active endeavors.

As the 21st century opened, Fushitsusha largely receded, yet Haino sustained his customary output, issuing solo albums on Alien8, Turtles' Dream, and Swordfish Records alongside further pairings with Boris, Peter Brötzmann, and Ruins drummer Tatsuya Yoshida. In 2004 he captured two distinct editions of the blues-covers collection Black Blues: an acoustic Soft Version and an electric Violent Version. A sustained, fertile partnership with Jim O'Rourke and Oren Ambarchi commenced, yielding numerous releases on Ambarchi's Black Truffle label. Haino, Ambarchi, and Stephen O'Malley likewise created the improvisational trio Nazoranai following their joint appearance during a 2006 Sunn O))) performance led by O'Malley. Additional albums emerged with Finnish electronic duo Pan Sonic and German avant-garde classical ensemble Zeitkratzer. In 2011 Fushitsusha resumed live appearances and recordings, its roster continuing to shift regularly. The ensemble delivered four albums on the Heartfast label across 2012 and 2013.

Numerous Haino recordings carry extended, poetic song and album titles. A 2016 double-LP with O'Rourke and Ambarchi, for instance, carried the name I Wonder if You Noticed "I'm Sorry" Is Such a Lovely Sound It Keeps Things from Getting Worse. In 2017 he worked with keyboardist Jozef Dumoulin and drummer Teun Verbruggen on The Miracles of Only One Thing. Further 2017 collaborations included Light Never Bright Enough (with John Butcher) and the double-LP This Dazzling, Genuine "Difference" Now Where Shall It Go? (with O'Rourke and Ambarchi). Haino joined sludge-metal group Sumac for American Dollar Bill: Keep Facing Sideways, You're Too Hideous to Look at Face On, issued by Thrill Jockey in 2018. Additional pairings with Charles Hayward, Merzbow, and a second Sumac project closed out the decade.

Who Knew That So Many Blues Should Reside Here Too..., a solo gamelan recital taped in 2007 at Osaka University of Arts, surfaced in 2020. A third Sumac collaboration, Into This Juvenile Apocalypse Our Golden Blood to Pour Let Us Never, arrived in 2022.