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Magical Power Mako - Hapmoniym
Japan 1972-1975

Hapmoniym was created between 1972 and 1975 in Mako's private studio, while he was working on his second album Super Record.

4 hours 42 minutes and 14 seconds of musical madness from this japanese underground legend. Ranging from Psychedelic Folk,Krautrock,Free Improv and electronic experiments

The material that makes up Hapmoniym 1972-1975 was recorded while Mako was working on his second masterpiece for Polydor, "Super Record". Often compared to krautrock pioneers Faust, this collecton is an incredible assemblage of sound experiments, collage pieces, tape manipulations and astral folk-psychedelia so epic and so out, one might be so bold to state that Hapmoniym as a whole even surpasses the density and innovation of the mighty Faust Tapes. And he was only a wee sixteen years old on the earliest of these recordings! Keiji Haino fans take note as he appears on disc one, on possibly his most spaced out psychedelic trip ever.


MAGICAL POWER MAKO BIO by Julian Cope

This self-styled visionary and musical hermit has been releasing albums since the mid-70s. But the variety and here-there-and-everywhere approach of his attitude to record releases makes it difficult to grasp just who Magical Power Mako is, and what he does best. MakoÕs career began auspiciously enough with thunderous applause for his first three LPs, but the slow nature of his recording techniques soon contributed to record company impatience with this often brilliant artist. Viewed by many as a legend and by others as a chancer, thereÕs no doubt that the extraordinarily varied quality of Magical Power MakoÕs during the Ô90s contributed dramatically to compromising the publicÕs long-term perception of this charming artist.
Born Makoto Kurita around 1955, Mako grew up in the seaside resort of Izu Shuzenji, a sea coastal town similar to Brighton or Torquay. Throughout his childhood, he was an outsider who wrote much music and played piano and guitar while still in primary school. At junior high school, he decided to make a more concerted effort to realise his musical vision, and would return home after school to write songs every day. His house was situated in the mountains and looked down at the townÕs hot springs. Mako became fascinated then obsessed by an octagonal hotel built near the hot springs. Visible from his bedroom, Mako believed that someone was observing him from the hotelÕs 3rd floor. This sense of being observed spurred him further into musical activities and, at age fourteen, he began to record with a reel-to-reel, ping ponging the tracks back and forth in order to build up sound. The summer holidays of 1970 were spent in long recording sessions making his own LP. When it was finished, Mako wrote on the reel-to-reel tape box: ÔSummer 1970, things a 14-year-old boy thinks aboutÕ. The tape commenced with a song (ÔI Bought An Extraordinarily Big Eye In The Town One Day For A Good Bargain PriceÕ).

ÒOne day, I bought an extremely big eye in the town, very cheaply,
When I saw the world through the eye,
Extremely small people were making noise,
Making a fuss about winning or losing,
What pathetic people who only have small eyes,
And they think the universe is the end of this world,
Not knowing that there is another world,
One Day I bought an extraordinarily big eye for a cheap bargain price.Ó

The tape contained the song ÔOpen The Morning WindowÕ from the first LP. In this track, the lyric is about a human with a switch device for changing ways of thinking. He recorded enough songs for two LPs whilst still at junior high school. Then, Mako decided school was a dead end, and moved to Tokyo in the spring of 1971. While working in a steel factory and/or at the local pub, he formed a band named Genge with his brother. From September Õ71, the band played at a mini-theatre Jan Jan, in TokyoÕs Shibuya district. His name began to count for something by April 1972, when he played his first major appearance at JIYU KUKAN(ÔFreedom SpaceÕ). This so-called Ômodern musicÕ event took place at Nigata, in the north of Honshu. This event saw the flowering of a friendship with Keiji Heino (Two songs on the first LP (ÔRestraint, FreedomÕ and his high school song ÔLook Up The SkyÕ) featured his friend Keiji Haino.). From May 1972, Mako began to broadcast music for documentaries and radio dramas for NHK. In February 1973, Mako and Keiji Haino played live on a daytime chat TV programme entitled HIRU NO PUREZENTO (ÔLunchtime presentÕ), and many viewers complained. In March 1973, Mako appeared on the NHK TV programme ONGAKU TO WATASHI (ÔMusic & IÕ), where he met composer Toru Takemitsu (b. 1930), then already in his mid-forties. Mako later took part in the recording of the music for TakemitsuÕs THE FOREST OF FOSSILS. MakoÕs relationship with Takemitsu blossomed, and in 1974, Mako took part in the music production for TakemitsuÕs HIMIKO, a musical piece named after the first queen of Japan. His friendship with Takemitsu also saw him invited to participate in NHK-TVÕs HERITAGE FOR THE FUTURE. It seems that TakemitsuÕs recommendation to Polydor secured MakoÕs first LP release. From the summer of 1973, he took up residence in a house belonging to the US Army, located in Fussa, Greater Tokyo. Mako began to record in this house, multi-tracking instrumental tracks endlessly. So many tapes were recorded that would not see the light of day for over twenty years, allowing new listeners to discover his old music. Even before the first LP, Mako recorded with Keiji Haino at the Fussa house.

Julian Cope

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review from allmusic:
Magical Power Mako's discography consists of a heap of sonic interrogations, but as far as question marks go, Hapmoniym adds the largest amount of them to the pile. This five-CD box set is presented as the first of three such sets to be released. The material was recorded between 1972 and 1975 and first came out as a very limited edition in 1993. Each of the five discs contains one track of music ranging between 43 and 65 minutes in duration. Each track is its own album, with separate pieces all dumped onto the same index track, forcing you to listen to each disc in one sitting and consider it as a single, unbreakable entity. The range of music covered through the whole set is colossal, encompassing psychedelic folk, Krautrock, free improvisation, electronic music, and tape experiments. Each piece takes the form of a collage where the best and the worst (in ideas, performances, and sound quality) collide in a way that strongly evokes Faust's modus operandi. The music itself also shares similarities with Faust, but Mako's universe is nothing but his own, and Hapmoniym, if it has to be compared to another album, must be compared to his own 1975 sophomore effort Super Record. Another point of reference would be Mike Oldfield's Tubular Bells (a snippet of which happens to find its way into the fifth piece). Hard-grooving episodes alternate with meditative drones, bongo freak-outs, Greek and Japanese folk tunes, a slide whistle solo, electronic music that sounds inspired by Arne Nordheim, delirious fuzz guitar, and an unexpected medieval-sounding song. Hapmoniym (whose title, when written in uppercase letters, spells out the word Harmonium in Greek characters) is a monument to creativity, self-indulgence, and the occasional necessity of self-indulgence to foster superhuman creativity. ~ Fran�ois Couture, All Music Guide