Ian (F) Martin

@ianfmartin.bsky.social

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Writer and indie music scene person, based in Tokyo. Author of Quit Your Band! Musical Notes from the Japanese Underground (Awai Books, 2016) / バンドやめようぜ！ (Ele-king books, 2017) and owner of Call And Response Records.

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I had a dream the other night that I had to sing Waterloo Sunset live but rehearsals kept getting interrupted and I couldn’t remember the words. It made me anxious that I was going to be Kinks-shamed.

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Ian (F) Martin

Thanks so much to everyone who came to the Much Agadoo About Nothing release party! It was mint and skill. If you couldn't make it and fancy a cassette, you can change your life irrevocably here → rizladeutsch.bandcamp.com/album/much-a...

Much Agadoo About Nothing, by RIZLA DEUTSCH!rizladeutsch.bandcamp.com 15 track album

Much Agadoo About Nothing is now an unavoidable reality in the pop scene. It’s rough round the edges, certainly out of time, but it’s busy in how it struggles to make sense of it’s own confused psychic era. I’m not a musician, but I take my trash seriously: rizladeutsch.bandcamp.com/album/much-a...

Much Agadoo About Nothing, by RIZLA DEUTSCH!rizladeutsch.bandcamp.com 15 track album

The man at my local Daily Yamazaki always dances to the tune of the credit card machine when I’m buying my home trip supplies. That’s how I know he’s my bro.

Been trying a thing at work where I avoid being negative in meetings, but it just means I'm silent and everyone thinks I'm not contributing. Guys, I am! I'm contributing every second I'm not saying stuff that makes you cry!

Tony Blair is like with the hammer and every problem looking like a nail, except with selling out every principle he ever affected to have to placate far right thugs. The hopeless impossibility of a better world is the only thing he and miserable, soul-dead ghouls like him have left to believe in.

I used to write a blog about all the Japanese underground and indie music I discover through my busy life as a brilliant but unpopular organiser in the local scene here, but I stopped because the internet became bad. Now it's a photocopied annual zine: call-and-response.bandcamp.com/merch/last-y...

Last Year's Sounds (2023) from Call And Response Recordscall-and-response.bandcamp.com Last Year's Sounds (2023) from Call And Response Records

Man, I’m so good at organising events. No one knows, but I’m amazing at it.

That lovely run of three albums Clearlake made in the early 2000s had a big impact on me at the time. I've recently discovered Jason Pegg's solo stuff and what a gift to learn that the past isn't really the past yet. His new one, "Portrait", is lovely.

Victoria Starmer looks like she was the singer in Norwegian indiepop band who had a huge following on music blogs circa 2006 but only got a grudgingly positive 7.3 on Pitchfork.

Wes Streeting looks like a baby gammon, and centrist politics' gain has likely been the sport of darts' loss.

Great work Bristol for electing your first Green MP, and well done North East Somerset and Hanham for expelling Rees Mogg. My people doing God's work back in the old place.

I promise I'll go back to hating Starmer and his mockery of a Labour party on Monday, but I just LOVE watching Tories lose.

Llongyfarchiadau i Plaid Cymru!

Made the mistake of going outside just now and that's a mistake I'll be trying not to repeat until October.

On this day, when we celebrate the founding document of my musical taste: www.youtube.com/watch?v=SFQP...

Independencewww.youtube.com Provided to YouTube by Virtual Label LLCIndependence · This HeatDeceit℗ This HeatReleased on: 1981-07-03Lyricist: This HeatComposer: Charles BullenComposer: ...

DJ set from last night's Indie Camp at Koenji Substore — all 2000s~ indie, as per event rules.

Ele-king asked me to write a few words about Steve Albini. For me, that really meant writing about the way he shaped the musical world I inhabit without me even noticing his hand at work until the pieces al started to fall together and I realised he was everywhere: www.ele-king.net/columns/0114...

Columns スティーヴ・アルビニが密かに私の世界を変えた理由 | ele-kingwww.ele-king.net 自分でも気付かぬうちに、スティーヴ・アルビニは私の人生を変えていた。彼の特定の作品との出会いによって啓示を受け、人生の中にそれ以前と以後という明確な境界線が引かれたということでは全くない。それよりも

Dear Lord, what have we done?

Mester @ianfmartin.bsky.social has made an upsetting flyer for the CASSETTE RELEASE CELEBRATION of our new Rizla Deutsch album Much Agadoo About Nothing. July 13th has been deemed Agadoomsday. There will be a 1984 Memorial Telethon. Koenji Uptown Records the place. Attack warning's for bloody real!

This isn't supposed to be out for another couple of hours or so, but I'm sleepy so decided to kick off the release a bit early rather than wait till I wake up – which let's face it could be at any time.

ON SALE NOW! Cyber Cherry「Fake California Forcefield」 New album with 10 lovely songs. CD and download available here: call-and-response.bandcamp.com/album/fake-c...

Fake California Forcefield, by Cyber Cherrycall-and-response.bandcamp.com 10 track album

Dial it down with this sticky nonsense, Tokyo. Just back off OK?

Gonna have to go outside for an extended period of time at some point today. If you don't hear from me for a while, send a rescue party with like ice cream or something.

I see that the summer in Tokyo has already reached the point where, even on a cloudy day, my skin feels like it's on fire just from contact with the air.

Heading back from Gifu, Nagoya and Hamamatsu with treasure. Feel honestly a little violated for the prices I paid for these, but I guess someone somewhere knows how much they can squeeze me for with the right product.

When the physical goods arrive from the factory: one of the most exciting moments of a new release, and also the moment where you spot all the mistakes. I think this one might actually be OK though.

Cyber Cherry’s new CD just arrived from the factory! On sale next Wednesday, or if you want to enjoy it without any of us getting any money from it, I think it’s already available to listen on Spotify etc.

Proud of myself this week. Finally finished writing the reviews for my next "Last Year's Sounds" zine, rounding up all the Japanese indie/underground music that crossed my radar from 2023. Been chipping away at it in gaps between work for months now and it's up to 10,000 words on around 50 releases.

Fuckin' hell, not James Chance as well. Slow down with all this shit.

I cannot fucking stand Jeff Buckley and Grace is a very bad album.

Alright folks let ‘er rip with all your music hot takes and hated songs, I want to hear em

Those Iranians need to start selling drugs around Shibuya again to give the cops something else to fret over instead of just people doing normal stuff.

Effective 2024-10-01: Street drinking will be prohibited from 18:00 to 5:00.

Ban on nighttime drinking around Shibuya Station passed by wardwww.japantimes.co.jp The ordinance, an extension of measures at Halloween and New Year, comes into effect Oct. 1 and carries no penalties.

The other week I interviewed John Cale about his new album and stuff. It's up in English here (Japanese on the previous page): www.ele-king.net/interviews/0...

interview with John Cale 新作、図書館、ヴェルヴェッツ、そしてポップとアヴァンギャルドの現在 | ジョン・ケイル、インタヴュー | ele-kingwww.ele-king.net John Cale POPtical Illusion Double Six／ビート Art Rock BEATINK.COM Amazon Tower HMV disk union 　ジョン・