Although Sachiko Miwa is a relative unknown, she's left a big impression in some key circles. Her latest CD, "Beautiful Place," has started cropping up in several "employee recommendation" sections throughout the massive record store scene in Tokyo, and a recent show at Tokyo's legendary UFO Club saw the place packed tight...on a Sunday night, no less. Before that show, Miwa-san sat down with Jrawk to discuss Autumn, organic composing, and "Ma."

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(Note: "Ma" is a difficult concept to explain in the context of Western thought, but it's somewhat similar to a "pregnant pause," whereby a presence, or tension, is created by the absence of something. "Ma" does not fit comfortably within this example, but imagine this: if you hear the sound of someone's heartbeat slowing as they calm down, a kind of tension is created where you wait for the next beat, unsure of how long it will take. "Ma" is almost always considered a positive concept.)


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JR: What kind of influences do you have? Your bass player is formerly of Nagisa Ni Te. There's some superficial similarities between your music and NNT, but I'm detecting some influences from early 80s Britpop.

SM: Ah! I love The Stone Roses, Julian Cope, New Order, things like that.

JR: What kind of Japanese artists do you like?

SM: Katsurei. They started off in Nagoya, but they moved to Tokyo. They've been around for years, I've been really into them lately. When I was in High School, I was heavily into Shonen Knife, Free Kitten and Nirvana, alternative rock, things like that.

JR: What's the scene like in Kyushu?

SM: I'm not really part of the scene, as such. It can feel a bit isolated, bands will have a circle of friends that they'll play with all the time, and I don't really have anything like that.

JR: When you started playing, did you start off imitating your favorites, or did you simply let the music happen?

SM: When I started in High School, my friends and I just wanted to have fun, so we covered stuff like Shonen Knife, Free Kitten, etc. That lasted about a year, then I was in a band called Loop 01. That lasted about four years, and after that, I decided to go solo.

Loop 01 was very eccentric! (laughs) We sounded a bit like Shonen Knife sometimes, and sometimes it was a bit similar to a Kyushu band called Velocityute. Fast punk, we were pretty heavily influenced by them. There was an American band called Fat Day that Velocityute supported, we liked them too. But Velocityute left the biggest impression.

JR: There's a big difference between that sound and your solo work! Was the difference an intentional departure?

"Untitled" (Debut)

SM: Well, the songs I'm doing now are much more recent. There was quite a gap between then and the first CD. After Loop 01 disbanded, I was playing solo, but I still had a kind of group mentality. I was still playing electric, but that instrument tends to work better in a group context, and I wanted to play alone. Eventually, the former style receded, and I slowly worked my way to the sound I have now.

JR: The sound you have now is quite striking: I hear some similarities with the C86 bedroom pop bands from the UK, like Felt and The Revolving Paint Dream.

SM: The first CD was recorded in my kitchen (laughs.) I did two songs on "Beautiful Place" in my kitchen too. Maybe that's why.

JR: Your English lyrics are quite abstract, and seem to have a sense of fear, or sometimes inferiority.

SM: I'm not totally comfortable with singing English. I'm a bit self conscious about it, but I like the way the sound of English has a kind of echo to it in the songs.

With the Japanese lyrics, I have a more solid meaning in mind, but with English, I'm working more from the sound of the words than trying to get a specific idea across. I don't really have a message. But I love singing, and when I write a song, it's going to be based on things that are important to me, so some meaning probably comes through. That meaning isn't a goal, though.

JR: It's interesting to hear you say that, since there's a very strong aesthetic that comes from the combination of the lyrics and the lightness of the music. It's as if you're happy in melancholy.

SM: That could be true! (laughs) That's not the first time I've been told that, actually.

JR: I particularly get that vibe from "見たらほら" ("Look Here," track 8 on "Beautiful Place.")

SM: When I wrote that, it was at a time that both my husband and I were pretty depressed. I thought "OK, there's no sense in this continuing," and I wrote that song as a way of getting out of it. Writing songs always cheers me up. We lived in this house, and I can still remember the setting sun coming through the window, and how the sky looked.

I'm not the kind of person who finds some kind of nobility in despair. It's a part of life, of course, and music can reflect it, but it shouldn't be the basis. There needs to be a way out of it, something that gives hope. I've always been like this, and my music is a part of that.

JR: Is that why you've continued to play? It gives you a way out?

SM: Well, it doesn't happen very often! (laughs) That song was an isolated incident.

I don't write music with a preset idea. I don't go in with anything planned out. I just play, and the songs grow organically from that. It's up to me to create the melody, but I like the feel of bass and drums.

I can feel "ma" in what we do together. Rather than getting energy from speed, I prefer a more deliberate pace. There's a tension, a sense of "ma" in the space between the beats. It's not so busy, the spaces contain a lot of feeling. The atmosphere that creates is something I really enjoy.

"Beautiful Place"

JR: Speaking of atmosphere, I have a kind of strange question: what's your favorite season?

SM: (Answers immediately) Autumn!

JR: I thought so! Your overall aesthetic seems very Autumnal. At first blush the sound of "Beautiful Place" seems chilly, but there's definitely a warmth inside the chill. The artwork is comprised of fall colors. In the band shot, you're even wearing a muffler.

SM: I like the chill, the way the heat of Summer falls into the cooler temperatures. I like the sense of "natsukashi" (NOTE: "natsukashi" is Japanese for a kind of vague but powerful nostalgia. The feeling one gets when seeing the first Fall leaves, or the smell of a Christmas tree, might inspire "natsukashi.")

JR: Do you write while working with the band?

SM: Not really, I'll generally have something worked out, and they'll add what they think works. I give them free reign, I like how they play.

One of the things I get out of playing music...or at least I hope to get from it...is that it will inspire creativity in others. Musically, of course, but I mean inspire in a general sense: painting, drawing, etc.

The band came together this way. I had a demo tape I had given to (drummer Shigeki) Kitamura-san, we were friends before we played together. He played it while he was driving and imagined himself playing drums. We tried that, and we liked how that worked out, so we asked (former Nagisa Ni Te bass player Takayuki) Tashiro-san to join up. We had all seen each other in bands before, we all knew each other, and we all have a kind of basic faith in the others' approach. It's a very comfortable way of working.

JR: It's interesting that you approach it that way, since some tracks seem very carefully structured. "Watched The Sun" has a what seems to be a very conscious build to a strong peak.

SM: It really does just grow naturally. I don't think too hard when coming up with a song. It's not necessarily easy to get to the finished product, but I don't push. It's like unearthing a castle that has been buried in sand: you don't tear it out, you slowly brush the sand away, piece by piece, revealing bit by bit, until you've got a finished piece.. I trust the band implicitly, they provide a kind of security, and the music comes from that secure relationship.

There are some times that I imagine bass and drums when initially writing a song, and what they ultimately contribute might not match it, but I've always liked what they've chosen to do.

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YouTube has an audio only sample for "Same," the opening track of "Beautiful Place."

"Beautiful Place" is available at Amazon Japan.