Shigeharu Mukai - 1979 - Hip Cruiser

Shigeharu Mukai

1979 

Hip Cruiser

01. Nimuro Neina 5:31

02. Hip Cruiser 5:59

03. Coral Eyes 9:24

04. Once I Loved 4:20

05. The Way 5:38

06. V-1 Funk 4:47

07. Manipura 5:35

Clavinet – Toshiyuki Daitoku

Drums, Percussion – Ryojiroh Furusawa

Drums – Hideo Yamaki

Electric Bass – Shin-Ichi Manabe

Electric Guitar – Shinji Hashimoto

Electric Guitar, Soloist – Kazumi Watanabe

Electric Piano [Elepian] – Kazuhide Moto-Oka

Percussion – Kazuhiro Mishima, Kazuo Yoshida, Tatsuji Yokoyama

Tenor Saxophone – Takao Uematsu

Trombone – Shigeharu Mukai

Voice – Vera Maria

An excellent batch of lost Japanese fusion from the 70s -- headed up by trombonist Shigeharu Mukai, and featuring some great instrumentation that includes Brazilian percussion, tenor sax, and plenty of sweet electric keyboards! The sound here is totally great -- a soulful fusion groove to rival the best American work of the generation -- but quite possibly even better, as the whole thing has that impeccable production style that made so many of the Japanese fusion albums of the time so great. And while you might think that a trombone is an unlikely instrument to be leading a sweet electric set -- guess again, because Shige really makes the whole thing work!