Listening Project Chapter 2: T-SQUARE

Unlike CASIOPEA, I had never listened to T-Square before I started this project. When I saw the size of T-Square's formidable discography, I knew I would be in for a ride.

78 albums (!!!) later, I am finally done.

Funnily enough, the 78th album (a double live album) released literally YESTERDAY, the day I finished everything else! I thought I was done, and then saw by chance on T-Square's main Spotify page that they had just released a new album. So I started it right away, and finished it this morning. Now I am TRULY done (at least until the next album comes out). Out of those 78 albums, I saved 109 songs.

T-Square is a Japanese jazz fusion band much like Casiopea, with the same keys/guitar/bass/drums but with the important addition of a saxophonist. While the alto saxophone (and EWI) is a signature part of T-Square's sound, the first like...40 albums are essentially solo alto saxophone with rhythm section accompaniment. With apologies to my saxophonist friends, I do not like the alto saxophone enough to listen to it play all the melodies and solos for 40 straight albums.

The band's writing is consistently excellent from their first album in 1978 to the one from yesterday, but I found myself often wishing that the great melodies were played by a horn section rather than one saxophone. The other downside of this saxophone-oriented music is that it gave no room for the other 4 members, all fabulous musicians, to shine. This becomes particularly evident in later albums where you do start to hear guitar and keyboard solos, which are always excellent and make you wonder why the band waited so long to give them even a melody, let alone a solo.

All that being said, this band has made some incredible music that I really love, and I am so thrilled to have gone on this journey.

My favorite T-Square albums:

• 夏の惑星 (Natsu no wakusei) (1994)

• 宝島 (Takarajima) (w/Munich Symphony) (1995)

• Wordless Anthology II (1999)

• 33 (2007)

• Wings (2012)

• Crème de la Crème (2020)

Honorable mentions:

• Truth (1987)

• New-S (1991)

• Impressive (1992)

• Brasil (2001)

• Groove Globe (2004)

• Nine Stories (2011)

• City Coaster (2018)

Previous Chapter (Casiopea)

Listening Project Chapter 1: CASIOPEA

CASIOPEA is a 4-piece Japanese jazz fusion band that is one of the giants of the genre. They are one of my favorite bands of all time, and they were who I decided to start my listening project with. Because although I had already listened (and re-listened) to a few Casiopea albums, that is but a drop in the bucket that is their full discography of well over 50 (!) albums. This band has been extremely prolific since they released their first album in 1979.

After listening to EVERY Casiopea album in order, and most of them for the first time, my love for this band has only increased. I had a lot of emotions when I finished the very last song: first sadness that there were no more Casiopea songs to discover, then happiness and relief that I had finished the library, and finally a feeling of being hugely enriched. This is the feeling that has persisted. It was a wonderful journey, and it made me so excited to continue this project and ultimately see it all the way through.

If you decide to check out Casiopea, the first track that you should check out is “Take Me”, from the album Mint Jams (1982). This was my favorite Casiopea track before I started this project and it is still my favorite. It is a jewel of a song that perfectly encapsulates the magic that is Japanese jazz fusion.

My favorite Casiopea albums:

• The Party (1990)

• Answers (1994)

• 20th (2000)

• Living On a Feeling ~ Casiopea Night Selection (2009)

• Make Up City (1980)

• Mint Jams (1982)

Honorable mentions:

• Asian Dreamer (1994)

• Places (2003)

• Full Colors (1991)

• Casiopea (1979)

Listening Project Introduction | Next Chapter (T-Square)

The Tiffany Johns Listening Project

Finding new music to love is hard.

In an era where an impossible amount of music is at your fingertips via Spotify and other streaming services, it feels harder than ever to find music that you really love. The weeds you must wade through to find a gem are thick and stretch beyond the horizon. I spend quite a lot of time and energy trying to wade through these weeds, but it’s slow going. It’s very rare that I find even one song that I really like, let alone an entire artist.

In January 2023, I began using Spotify’s fleet of discovery tools every day, in a much more dedicated effort to find new music to love. Over the course of that year I did indeed find some amazing music and artists that I never would have come across otherwise, and I added a lot to my library. However, I eventually got to the point where any of the discovery tools kept showing me the same songs they had already shown me before, so I moved on.

About a year later, in early 2024, I had the idea to dive more into artists I already know in a methodical manner, rather than attempting to discover new songs and artists by chance or via an algorithm. I realized that even my favorite artists have a lot of music I’ve never listened to; in fact, I can only think of two artists whose entire library I had listened to before I started this project: Moonchild and Dirty Loops. Along with this, I have massive holes in my knowledge of more popular music (in case you weren’t already aware, I was a turbo nerd in high school) and have intended to fix that for a long time.

So, with all that in mind, I decided to start an ambitious listening project that would take years to complete. I went to Spotify and added the entire discography of every artist I like or want to discover into a few colossal listening playlists sorted by genre. Each of these playlists has thousands of songs, and a couple of them reached the Spotify playlist limit (9,999 songs) so I had to start a second playlist for that genre. These playlists include my favorite artists, artists who have a few songs I really like but I never explored further, artists that I feel like I should know based on the genres I listen to, and artists that I feel like I should know as a Millennial.

I will make a post for each artist when I finish their library, giving general thoughts and my favorite albums. I will also be buying physical copies of the albums I really love - support artists directly! I will also be doing a summary post when I finish each genre, and years in the future maybe an overall summary of the project when I finish them all. All of these will be linked at the bottom of this post.

One final note: I’m writing this after having already finished one artist and nearly finished another. I’ll detail this more in the individual artist posts, but I feel that it’s important to also state here that I have already felt incredibly enriched from this project, and I would absolutely recommend it to anyone.

Here are my favorite albums from the artists I’ve discovered (*= I knew the album beforehand):

• Casiopea - Make Up City (1980)*

• Casiopea - Mint Jams (1982)*

• Casiopea - The Party (1990)

• Casiopea - Answers (1994)

• Casiopea - 20th (2000)

• Casiopea - Living on a Feeling ~ Casiopea Night Selection (2009)

• Jimsaku - Dispensation (1996)

• T-Square - 夏の惑星 (Natsu no wakusei) (1994)

• T-Square w/Munich Symphony - 宝島 (Takarajima) (1995)

• T-Square - Wordless Anthology II (1999)

• T-Square - 33 (2007)

• T-Square - Wings (2012)

• T-Square - Crème de la Crème (2020)

Chapters:

• Chapter 1: Casiopea

• Chapter 2: T-Square