Audiopile Review: You may remember Naoki Zushi from our recent-ish write-up of his excellent album ‘IV’. He’s perhaps best known as a member of Japanoise legends Hijokaidan, but has surprising links to the lofi indie pop scene, specifically Nagisa Ni Te. As a solo artist, he produces truly epic psyche rock, a style that everyone in Japan’s underground seems able to agree upon. First released in 1998, ‘Phenomenal Luciferin’ is an ambitious piece of work, even by Zushi’s large-scale standards. It opens with a completely unexpected piece of pure city pop before settling into the more expansive mode fans of ‘IV’ would expect. But rather than blown-out jamming, we get contemplative chamber-psyche and delicate, abstract instrumentals that sound like the ghost of Erik Satie recording for ECM. This is an album where Zushi’s pop AND experimental leanings rise to the surface. There’s a lightness of touch that makes it a marvellous entry point for newcomers. But, make no mistake, this is an epic album, which contains multitudes. It’s a portal into a universe of spiritual yearning and awestruck wonder that rock music rarely provides us with nowadays. It’s a major achievement. And it’s a phenomenal introduction to an artist who represents an exceptional amount of what western music heads have come to love about that quintessentially Japanese take on rock, pop, and the avant-garde.

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The long-awaited LP reissue of “Phenomenal Luciferin”, a 1998 solo album by Naoki Zushi that has been rediscovered from a modern new-age perspective in recent years, is now available on Sad Disco with the full support of Org Records and the artist!! The latest mastering from the original mixed DAT master instead of using the CD master from 1998! This is the extremely hard-to-find second solo work by Naoki Zushi, released in 1998 on the Shinji Shibayama-led Org Records label. In contrast to the previous album “Paradise,” which was recorded in only three days, “Phenomenal Luciferin,” which featured three guests, Shinji Shibayama, Naoki’s brother Masaki Zushi, and Kiyoshi Hashimoto, was recorded over a period of eight years, from 1990 to 1998. As with the recording of the same name, it pursues the concept of “Pre-Meditative Music” and is deeply imbued with an awareness of the spiritual world.