Mosaic Music Series SHUGO TOKUMARU (Japan)

Japanese experimental pop darling Shugo Tokumaru returns to Mosaic backed by a five-piece band, with his latest album Toss.

Born 1980 in Tokyo, Shugo Tokumaru grew up listening to Japanese pop and Beatles cassettes. He started taking piano lessons at the age of five and was ready to quit at 12. He taught himself to play the guitar and started playing in a punk band with his childhood friends while in high school. At one point he realised some of the material he wrote was not just “right” for the band and decided to record all by himself.

His demo caught the attention of a small independent label in New York and thirteen years and six albums later, Tokumaru has become a critically acclaimed gifted singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist known for producing every single sound on his records. Except now on his latest, Toss, he has put together an album made up of sounds from other musicians. “Maybe listeners won’t notice any difference,” Tokumaru shared with The Japan Times, “but for me, that created a major change.”

http://www.shugotokumaru.com/
http://www.shugotokumarumusic.bandcamp.com/
www.facebook.com/shugotokumaru