“It is my duty to continuously answer expectations”

Following his solo project T.M. Revolution, and band abingdon boys school, Takanori Nishikawa is releasing his first album under his own name SINGularity, set to release on 6th March 2019. This is the third of 4 parts we are covering in this interview.

Potential haphazardness

What image do you have for your solo project here onwards?

People normaly look at where they’ll be in 10 years but, I think it is fine I’ll just do it haphazardly. Once you pile up a certain number of years in your career, people will grow to have an image of you doing a certain kind of thing, and it’ll be hard to escape that image that you are known for. How I’ll grow from here onwards, I want to believe in my potential to be able to find it.

Perhaps you will be able to sprout another seed that will grow?

I can ascertain what the writers see in me through their eyes and their ears. That’s the real fun part.

A natural feeling right?

From the beginning, I had some stress in that I wasn’t able to do that with T.M.R. and the band (abingdon boys school). T.M.R. has his own’s strength, the band has their’s. I am not denying what I have done until now but I feel that this solo project can help give a positive influence to those two as well. I want to do that, and I’m doing it in a way that I feel must be done. That’s why I feel that from the beginning I’ve been doing this to “separate myself from T.M.R.!!”

And not just doing something different just for the sake of it.

Yes yes. I have yet to reach that point. It feels as if I have a license to drive different kind of cars. Driving the car I’m used to the most is good but, it’s fine to try other different cars once in a while too you know? When you do that, the view is different, the seat height is different, the handle height is different too. To adapt myself to these fine little details, I may find a different part of myself. To be flexible, being able to adapt to all these things has been really fun for me.

I want to be the me that can always
answer expectations

Did you always had this idea that “if I worked with these writers, I may be able to pull this off, or pull that off”, from the very start?

First of all, I need to find if there’s anyone who wants to do it (create music) with me. I need to become the me that make everyone go “I want to write music for this guy”!

For example, in this album there’s two songs by Hiroyuki Sawano. You even worked with him for his [nZk] project. It’s about understanding each other’s urge to create things together, right?

Yes, Sawano actually said “I want this kind of music” to me and I was really glad. I feel there is some meaning in being a stimulus to the creators. There’s also a newly recorded song that was made from a competition. However, I haven’t took part in a competition in years, could even say I have zero experience too. I started working on this album reconsidering what I should sing.

It’s thanks to that, the newly recorded songs have an entirely different from T.M.Revolution and it’s very outstanding.

I worked with Kousuke Oshima, a recent collaborator of mine for Elegy of Prisoner. I feel it turned out really good. It has a very classical opera sound image. It’s actually remade from a song originally made for the Kyoto Symphony Orchestra.

I felt the song HERO by abingdon boys school’s Hiroshi Shibasaki was really outstanding.

It really is. I wrote the lyrics and Shiba-chan wrote the song, and it felt entirely differently than an a.b.s. song. Actually this song was sent to me a really long time ago by Shiba-chan. I really liked it and thought “I want to use this one day so I’ll keep it for myself”, so I left it aside. So it actually took us 3 years for to bring it to life.

UNBROKEN (featuring Hotei Tomoyasu) has a really signature Hotei style riff at full force with you on vocals. That felt really refreshing.

I feel like it is as if while I was singing, you could actually hear Mr Hotei’s voice through it. (laughs) I was glad when they said “I want you to sing at this key”. I actually sang 1-1.5 notes higher than my normal range. I was actually singing at such a high note until the chorus that I was almost going to faint.

No one can sing it unless its you right, Mr. Nishikawa.

It wasn’t just Mr. Hotei that said it but (Fear, and Loathing in) Las Vegas said that too. They said “We can’t sing it but if it’s you, it’s possible”. But when they said that, I really didn’t want to say “I’m sorry but I can’t do it”. I have a sense of duty to be the me that can always answer expectations.

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Source: Natalie