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In a Model Room
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In a Model Room
In a Model Room is the debut album of Japanese band P-Model. It was an electronic pop album, released in 1979 under the label, Warner Bros.
By 1978, Susumu Hirasawa, guitarist and vocalist of Mandrake, one of the few Japanese progressive metal bands at the time, was unsatisfied with the style the band worked in, feeling that progressive rock had lost its social relevance and became solely for entertainment. By then, Mandrake's only achievements were a devoted but extremely niche following by fans of Japanese progressive rock fans (who, by Hirasawa's estimate, totaled at only a few hundred people), and bit parts on releases by an all-synth band they'd befriended.
Around this time, the punk rock/new wave movements started in the west; experiencing these new forms of presenting concepts and visuals through music via promotional videos; most of the band went through a drastic change in outlook towards music, and started to write songs and gradually change their look accordingly.
Mandrake had turned into a half-hearted band and, after declining an offer to sign with Victor Music Industries, Hirasawa decided to "abort" Mandrake, characterizing it as the defeat to commercialism. The band's final live performance was a three-hour show at the Shibuya Jean-Jean, meant to be the symbolic burial of Mandrake's aborted body.
On New Year's Day 1979, the members of the band held a meeting to decide how they would reform. Bassist Tohru Akutu, still attached to progressive rock, decided to depart from the band. The instruments which "emitted a pretentious grandeur" (most of them painted in dignified colors like purple, gold and burgundy) were either repainted in bright colors (like yellow, light blue and pink) or sold off to buy ones more adequate for what the band envisioned. It was decided that their name would be changed to something that evoked the new development of a mass-produced industrial good.
Most of the songs on the album were created by Mandrake late in the group's existence, which allowed for a quick debut release. The songs show a tendency for complex compositions and unusual time signatures. The lyrics reflect on the sociopolitical issues of Japan at the time, during the Japanese post-war economic miracle, and were influenced in part by Nineteen Eighty-Four.
In a Model Room was produced by Masahide Sakuma, keyboardist of the new wave band Plastics with studio experience from being in the progressive rock band Yonin-Bayashi, who agreed to do so on the strength of the album's first track. Described by Hirasawa as "an honest man who acted with a life-sized air of cleanliness", Sakuma was swiftly trusted by the band, who were cautious with making their debut. Producing for the first time outside of his band, Sakuma went on to become a renowned session producer.
The instrumentation is a mix of standard punk with electronic devices for mechanical tones: A Roland CR-68 drum machine does simultaneous beats alongside a standard drum kit; the Maxi-Korg 800DV synthesizer was used for a unique blipping noise, dubbed by the music press as a "musical stapler". P-Model came to argue with Warner-Pioneer, Sakuma and engineer Makoto Furukawa daily over their instruments: The band picked them because they felt a rough sound was crucial to their theme, the production thought it all sounded bad. Ultimately, P-Model compromised on most aspects of the recording.
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In a Model Room
In a Model Room is the debut album of Japanese band P-Model. It was an electronic pop album, released in 1979 under the label, Warner Bros.
By 1978, Susumu Hirasawa, guitarist and vocalist of Mandrake, one of the few Japanese progressive metal bands at the time, was unsatisfied with the style the band worked in, feeling that progressive rock had lost its social relevance and became solely for entertainment. By then, Mandrake's only achievements were a devoted but extremely niche following by fans of Japanese progressive rock fans (who, by Hirasawa's estimate, totaled at only a few hundred people), and bit parts on releases by an all-synth band they'd befriended.
Around this time, the punk rock/new wave movements started in the west; experiencing these new forms of presenting concepts and visuals through music via promotional videos; most of the band went through a drastic change in outlook towards music, and started to write songs and gradually change their look accordingly.
Mandrake had turned into a half-hearted band and, after declining an offer to sign with Victor Music Industries, Hirasawa decided to "abort" Mandrake, characterizing it as the defeat to commercialism. The band's final live performance was a three-hour show at the Shibuya Jean-Jean, meant to be the symbolic burial of Mandrake's aborted body.
On New Year's Day 1979, the members of the band held a meeting to decide how they would reform. Bassist Tohru Akutu, still attached to progressive rock, decided to depart from the band. The instruments which "emitted a pretentious grandeur" (most of them painted in dignified colors like purple, gold and burgundy) were either repainted in bright colors (like yellow, light blue and pink) or sold off to buy ones more adequate for what the band envisioned. It was decided that their name would be changed to something that evoked the new development of a mass-produced industrial good.
Most of the songs on the album were created by Mandrake late in the group's existence, which allowed for a quick debut release. The songs show a tendency for complex compositions and unusual time signatures. The lyrics reflect on the sociopolitical issues of Japan at the time, during the Japanese post-war economic miracle, and were influenced in part by Nineteen Eighty-Four.
In a Model Room was produced by Masahide Sakuma, keyboardist of the new wave band Plastics with studio experience from being in the progressive rock band Yonin-Bayashi, who agreed to do so on the strength of the album's first track. Described by Hirasawa as "an honest man who acted with a life-sized air of cleanliness", Sakuma was swiftly trusted by the band, who were cautious with making their debut. Producing for the first time outside of his band, Sakuma went on to become a renowned session producer.
The instrumentation is a mix of standard punk with electronic devices for mechanical tones: A Roland CR-68 drum machine does simultaneous beats alongside a standard drum kit; the Maxi-Korg 800DV synthesizer was used for a unique blipping noise, dubbed by the music press as a "musical stapler". P-Model came to argue with Warner-Pioneer, Sakuma and engineer Makoto Furukawa daily over their instruments: The band picked them because they felt a rough sound was crucial to their theme, the production thought it all sounded bad. Ultimately, P-Model compromised on most aspects of the recording.