It’s time to count my blessings. The first one, of course, is that I have this platform to share what I think is great work done by others. Then, I have to admit, I think of it as a blessing to have an audience willing to inhabit this space and share their own path to their journey here. Thank you. It’s with that in mind that I felt obligated to give back by revisiting and refocusing the spotlight on an artist that has been awfully generous with me, Shinsuke Honda, in my latest mix for LYL Radio.
Ever since I discovered his music way back when, I’ve quietly badgered Mr. Honda with requests to hear some of his music I ran into dead ends finding. Ever the kind man, Shinsuke, would send me copies of his music with nary a dollar to be exchanged. I knew that when I first wrote about him a year ago I’d have to find a way to share some of the career-spanning work he’d graciously shared with some random person halfway across the globe.
Over time I’ve tried to get him to expand on his work and to detail the ins and outs of his career. Unsurprisingly, I’ve received replies to such questions that read more like Zen koans. Hearing him play tenderly through his guitar for decades now, now I don’t fault him for trying to let his music do the talking. What’s left fascinating, at least to me, is how throughout his long career from Hachimitsupai to his latest work, 86 R-Session there’s a special sound that I believe is still entirely his.
Lovely, ambient, and breezy, just like the name of his L.A.B. Records, every album after Banka (Late Summer) never strays too far from his love of surf, sun, and summer, things inculcated in him at birth from his native Hiroshima. Living in an era where we’re starving for new guitar heroes, here’s this hero who’d rather let his guitar float along. It’s that reason I never get tired of being his champion, as I am of the same spirit.
The goal of this mix is to give you a taste of the large swell of ideas he’s quietly crafted throughout the years. Here’s me still hoping others, in due time, find there way, a way, to give him that platform to tell his story the way he’d want to.
Shinsuke Honda – Special
Shinsuke Honda (本多信介) – 日の出
Shinsuke Honda (本多信介) – Silent Sea
Shinsuke Honda (本多信介) – 渚のローズマリー
Shinsuke Honda (本多信介) – Blue Sea
Shinsuke Honda (本多信介) – 冬・渚
Shinsuke Honda (本多信介) – Morning Dew
Shinsuke Honda (本多信介) – 水のささやき
Shinsuke Honda (本多信介) – Dreamland
Shinsuke Honda (本多信介) – A Walk Of The Seaside
Shinsuke Honda (本多信介) – たそがれ
Shinsuke Honda (本多信介) – 朝