Akira Ishikawa, Rhythm
B-side
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Akira Ishikawa was already an established drummer when Japanese jazz began moving rapidly toward electric instruments at the end of the 1960s. After working with ensembles including Toshiyuki Miyama’s New Herd, he formed the Count Buffalos, using the group to explore jazz-rock, funk and increasingly rhythm-centered music.
The first years of the 1970s were particularly productive. Records such as Electrum, Bakishinba and African Rock moved away from conventional small-group jazz toward electric piano, distorted guitar, percussion and larger ensemble textures. Rhythm increasingly became the organizing force rather than simply the foundation underneath the soloists.
AFRICA / COUNT BUFFALOS
On African Rock, Ishikawa’s interest in African rhythmic structures becomes the central idea of the record. The ensemble combines drums and layered percussion with Hiromasa Suzuki’s electric piano, Kimio Mizutani’s guitar, marimba, horns and strings. Most of the compositions were written and arranged by Suzuki, while Ishikawa composed Animals.
What makes the album interesting is that those elements never settle into a clean jazz-funk formula. Some passages are almost ritualistic, others dense and electric; percussion can dominate one moment before giving way to flute, fuzz guitar or Rhodes. The music feels less like a stylistic fusion than a search for a different rhythmic language.
SELECTED RECORDS
African Rock — 1971
African Rock is built around movement between tension and release. Percussion is everywhere, but the record is not simply aggressive: marimba, flute and electric piano create large areas of space around the heavier grooves, while Mizutani’s guitar repeatedly pushes the music toward psychedelia.
For me, the strongest moments are those where rhythm begins to overwhelm the conventional jazz hierarchy. Bass, drums and percussion stop functioning as accompaniment and become the main event, while the horns and keyboards move through the structure around them.
LISTEN / THE PRAYER
Akira Ishikawa — drums
Hiromasa Suzuki — electric piano, arrangements
Kunimitsu Inaba — electric bass
Kimio Mizutani — electric guitar
Takehisa Suzuki — trumpet
Tadataka Nakazawa — trombone
Takeru Muraoka — tenor saxophone, alto flute
Masami Kawahara — percussion
Naomi Kawahara — percussion
Kenji Shiraishi — marimba
Alkylene Quartet — strings
Recorded: April 30 & May 6, 1971
Location: Minoruphone Studio No. 1, Tokyo
Original issue: DAN / Minoruphone, VC-5003, 1971
Akira Ishikawa was already an established drummer when Japanese jazz began moving rapidly toward electric instruments at the end of the 1960s. After working with ensembles including Toshiyuki Miyama’s New Herd, he formed the Count Buffalos, using the group to explore jazz-rock, funk and increasingly rhythm-centered music.
The first years of the 1970s were particularly productive. Records such as Electrum, Bakishinba and African Rock moved away from conventional small-group jazz toward electric piano, distorted guitar, percussion and larger ensemble textures. Rhythm increasingly became the organizing force rather than simply the foundation underneath the soloists.
AFRICA / COUNT BUFFALOS
On African Rock, Ishikawa’s interest in African rhythmic structures becomes the central idea of the record. The ensemble combines drums and layered percussion with Hiromasa Suzuki’s electric piano, Kimio Mizutani’s guitar, marimba, horns and strings. Most of the compositions were written and arranged by Suzuki, while Ishikawa composed Animals.
What makes the album interesting is that those elements never settle into a clean jazz-funk formula. Some passages are almost ritualistic, others dense and electric; percussion can dominate one moment before giving way to flute, fuzz guitar or Rhodes. The music feels less like a stylistic fusion than a search for a different rhythmic language.
SELECTED RECORDS
African Rock — 1971
African Rock is built around movement between tension and release. Percussion is everywhere, but the record is not simply aggressive: marimba, flute and electric piano create large areas of space around the heavier grooves, while Mizutani’s guitar repeatedly pushes the music toward psychedelia.
For me, the strongest moments are those where rhythm begins to overwhelm the conventional jazz hierarchy. Bass, drums and percussion stop functioning as accompaniment and become the main event, while the horns and keyboards move through the structure around them.
LISTEN / THE PRAYER
Akira Ishikawa — drums
Hiromasa Suzuki — electric piano, arrangements
Kunimitsu Inaba — electric bass
Kimio Mizutani — electric guitar
Takehisa Suzuki — trumpet
Tadataka Nakazawa — trombone
Takeru Muraoka — tenor saxophone, alto flute
Masami Kawahara — percussion
Naomi Kawahara — percussion
Kenji Shiraishi — marimba
Alkylene Quartet — strings
Recorded: April 30 & May 6, 1971
Location: Minoruphone Studio No. 1, Tokyo
Original issue: DAN / Minoruphone, VC-5003, 1971
