Japanese singer-songwriter and folk artist, Ichiko Aoba, recently released a live recording version of her latest album, “Windswept Adan”. Recorded at the beautiful Bunkamura Orchard Hall in Tokyo, the recording spans across the entire record, and features 2 encore tracks “amuletum” and “Seabed Eden”.
Released on her own label, Hermine, Ichiko Aoba has published 6 albums to date and was featured on Nintendo’s 2019 Legend of Zelda: Link’s Awakening while working on various theatre productions in Japan.
An explorer of minimal and acoustic ambient sounds, Ichiko Aoba is slowly gathering a fanbase, selling out shows as she embarks on a big tour across Europe.
Her approach towards songwriting can somewhat be immediately sensed in her work, storytelling-like both in her singing and compositions. In an interview, she says
“I started writing the plot for Windswept Adan before the music. … set in the remote reaches of the ocean south of Japan, on a pair of fictional islands inhabited by a tribe of inbred families. . . . A young girl from the tribe is sent to Adan by her grandmother in the hope of preserving their bloodline while escaping the cycle of intermarriage. . . . The island has no words, but instead, the inhabitants exchanged shells. The story plot began from, “there were no words on that island.”
Listen to the live recording below.
