Masabumi Kikuchi - 1974 - East Wind

Masabumi Kikuchi

1974

East Wind

01. East Wind 19:5

02. Green Dance 24:54

Bass – Juni Booth

Drums – Eric Gravatt

Piano – Masabumi Kikuchi

Saxophone – Kohsuke Mine

Trumpet – Terumasa Hino

July 3, 1974, Victor Studio Tokyo

A brilliant set from Japanese pianist Masabumi Kikuchi – two long, leaping, loping tracks that almost feel like some of McCoy Tyner's best work! Kikuchi plays acoustic piano, and the group's a quartet with Terumasa Hino on trumpet, Koshuke Mine on tenor, Eric Gravatt on drums, and Juni Booth playing some really wonderful bass. Booth's bass leads the tracks with a soulful quality that you don't always hear on Kikuchi's other work – really giving the record a strongly-rooted vibe, while the musicians are still free to really open up and explore. The album's tracks, "East Wind" and "Green Dance", are both excellent examples of the soulful freedoms allowed in the Japanese scene of the 70s – side-long numbers that are different both from contemporary performances on both the US and European scenes of the period.