Mick Karn RIP

Sad news today that Mick Karn has lost his battle with cancer at the age of 52. Best known for pioneering fretless bass playing as the 70s became the 80s, some might say he bears considerable influence... and responsibility for this, as he spawned many dubious imitators.

He came to prominence playing bass in Japan, and his talent flourished more on each of their albums, culminating on Tin Drum, where his atmospheric bass playing formed the framework for such tracks as Ghosts, Canton and Visions of China.

After a falling out with David Sylvian over his girlfriend Yuka Fuji, the band split. Karn worked with ex-Bauhaus singer Peter Murphy in their project Dalis Car, and other projects including solo work, before regrouping with his ex-Japan bandmates for Rain Tree Crow. In my mind, this was his finest work, taking the atmospheric leanings of Tin Drum to the logical next step on tracks like Every Colour You Are.

For the remainder of his life he worked with a variety of artists, but mainly solo before his untimely passing. As I write this I'm listening to Sons of Pioneers off Tin Drum, as fine an example as any of his bass playing, and one of the few Japan tracks he was given a co-writing credit for.

Album Review: Rain Tree Crow

This was a short-lived ‘group’ who released one album in 1991. It was to have been released under the Japan name but David Sylvian insisted on using the name Rain Tree Crow. Although the name itself isn’t great, it’s kind of appropriate that the Japan name wasn’t used as the music is more of a departure from the old group. The rest of the band were put out about this and didn’t speak to Sylvian for several years.

Sylvian dominated this particular “project” which was very much in keeping with his solo work. The cover photograph of a blasted landscape suits the mood of this nocturnal album. The first track, Big Wheels in Shanty Town however is a complete misstep, sounding very much like the band were jumping on the ‘world music’ bandwagon. A vast improvement is the 2nd track, Every Colour You Are, which is, like a lot of the best tracks on this album, brooding, mope-along mood music. Sylvian is in fine voice here and on other tracks such as Pocketful of Change and Blackwater.

The rest of the album is dominated largely by instrumentals, where the band “faffs” about in a sort of AOR, atmospheric way, and it works well. The titles are fantasically pretentious (New Moon at Deer Fallow, A Reassuringly Dull Sunday), not to mention some of the ‘credits’ – treated piano, Steve Jansen and Mick Karn on wine glasses (I kid you not!) on the track I Drink to Forget. There are also moody vocal interludes (Rain Tree Crow, Boat’s for Burning), the second of these featuring the brooding quiet threat “strike the match, stand well back, this boat’s for burning.” Overall the album is a triumph, and in my opinion, better than any of Japan’s previous work.