Kikagaku Moyo have announced details of their upcoming 4th LP, Masana Temples, and shared the first track taken from it, ‘Gatherings’. The LP sees the whole band relocate from Japan to Europe and will be released on 5th October when they also undertaken an extensive tour.
The shifting dimensions of ‘Masana Temples’, are informed by various experiences the band had with travelling through life together, ranging from the months spent on tour to making a pilgrimage to Lisbon to record the album with jazz musician Bruno Pernadas. The band sought out Pernadas both out of admiration for his music and in an intentional move to work with a producer who came from a wildly different background. With ‘Masana Temples’, the band wanted to challenge their own concepts of what psychedelic music could be. Elements of both the attentive folk and wild-eyed rocking sides of the band are still intact throughout, but they’re sharper and more defined. More than the literal interpretation of being on a journey, the album’s always changing sonic panorama reflects the spiritual connection of the band moving through this all together. Life for a traveling band is a series of constant metamorphoses, with languages, cultures, climates and vibes changing with each new town. The only constant for Kikagaku Moyo throughout their travels were the five band members always together moving through it all, but each of them taking everything in from very different perspectives. Inspecting the harmonies and disparities between these perspectives, the group reflects the emotional impact of their nomadic paths. The music is the product of time spent in motion and all of the bending mindsets that come with it.
When asked about ‘Gatherings’, vocalist/drummer Go Kurosawa said that “Gatherings is the oldest song on this record. With this song, we’re expressing our journey in the world. We’ve gathered everyone in the band’s ideas in this song along with the ideas and influences of the places we’ve visited throughout our travels.”
