Shugo Tokumaru
Who is he?
Shugo Tokumaru is a Japanese singer-songwriter. He is an indie artist that is not afraid to
create experimental music. A notable
trait in his music is his use of instruments.
He takes being a mulch-instrumentalist to a whole new level. For his recordings, Tokumaru uses “over 100
different traditional and non-traditional instruments”.
So, a little bit about Shugo Tokumaru himself. He was born and raised in Tokyo, Japan. By the time he was 5 years old, he started
learning to play the piano. Later on in
high school, Tokumaru started the electric guitar, playing only songs by The
Clash. He then started a rock band with
his childhood friends called Gellers. He
then started dabbling with multi-instrumentation since he thought the default
guitars, bass and drums configuration of a band wasn’t enough.
After graduating, Tokumaru spent 2 and a half years
traveling overseas. Mostly residing in
Los Angeles, he joined a jazz band and recorded a couple of songs. When he returned to Japan, Tokumaru recorded
a demo album and managed to give it to Trevor Sias, who is an “owner of US independent record label Music
Related”. They were so impressed with
his work that the label wanted to release the demo as is. This was the start of Tokumaru’s successful career
as a musician.
He has
since released 6 albums, many of which are available in various countries such
as Canada (Yeah!). Tokumaru’s music has
also been used in commercials for big airline companies and other companies
such as Sony. His music is even included
in a soundtrack for a Canadian movie called Year of the Carnivore. This is especially impressive considering the
fact that his music is solely in Japanese.
The Music
All of Tokumaru's music videos are pieces of artwork themselves. One of my personal favourites is "Katachi", which means shape. Just like the song's name, the music video consists of over 2000 plastic pieces that are painstakingly placed by hand to create a stop motion masterpiece. It's really mind-blowing. Check it out:
So, I'll leave this post of with one last song. It's called "Linne" and it's pretty simple song and music video. Just Tokumaru and a few other musicians walking down the streets of Japan. The song is soothing, almost like a lullaby.
Sources
http://www.shugotokumaru.com/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shugo_Tokumaru
http://www.theverge.com/2013/1/25/3914210/shugo-tokumaru-katachi-stop-motion-music-video
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shugo_Tokumaru
http://www.theverge.com/2013/1/25/3914210/shugo-tokumaru-katachi-stop-motion-music-video
