A veteran of the blues talks about his path, unsuspected love, his master, and why the best way to live life is with difficulty.

Hometown: Monbetsu, Hokkaido
Years in Tokyo: 24
Job: Musician
Genre: Blues

10ten Magazine: When did you start playing music? And when did you decide to make music your profession?

YUGO: I can’t remember a certain age that I became attracted to music but it was just a part of me. I guess I am sort of a hybrid, a combination of an intellectual, anarchist father and a mother that sang in the choir. Music sort of came to me naturally, but I wouldn’t say that our family was very musical. My first instruments were the guitar and then on to the mandolin. I started playing with the guitar because my uncle had left his laying around the house. I didn’t get much support from my parents, but only from my brother, a harmonica player who moved to Tokyo about the same time that I did at age 18. I used the excuse of studying at university as my reason to leave Monbetsu, but really, I wanted to play music. I had decided early on, at twelve years old that I wanted to be a professional musician. Coincidently, I started smoking at the same time.

Where are you from?

I grew up in the town of Monbetsu, in Hokkaido. It’s a small town that is famous for crab and it’s close proximity to Russia. My great-great grandfather had been a samurai in Shikoku that had gone to the Great North as part of the group of settlers that were promised free land by the Meiji government to settle Hokkaido. He was a gambler and a tonden hei (militiamen farmer). Monbetsu is like no other place in Japan, there were always Russian traders sailor and local fisherman, and in very small pockets of the area you can find Ainu people. Much like the Native Americans of the United States, used to have their own language and customs some of the Ainu still maintain their traditions, but most have assimilated with the mainland Japanese.

Tell us about your master…

I met him when I was 15 years old. He was a harmonica player, ranked number two in the world at the time and living in Monbetsu off of his retirement pension. I met him when he was looking for a student and I studied with him until I left for Tokyo. At that time I didn’t consider him my master, but thought of him as just a ‘much older friend’. One of the reasons I admired him was his dedication to living the life of a ‘real musician’; he had quit his job earlier in life to pursue music. He wasn’t rich by material standards, but lived his life with integrity. He passed away soon after I had moved to Tokyo and he left me with three lessons, things he didn’t explicitly tell me, but I learned from seeing his life:

1. A musician has to be able to do everything for themselves; to not rely on anyone else. They must control every aspect of their craft. At the same time, if you are a one-man band, you’ll always be on the bottom rung of the industry, a gypsy of sorts.
2. You must love what you do, live for your music.
3. You can’t follow the same path as your master. And as much as I respected him, he was sort of an example of how not to live.

The path your master lined out sounds very solitary, or perhaps a more positive way to describe it would be independent, is this why you are so fond of pirates?

A true musician is all alone, fighting 100 enemies; pirates live for
themselves, and everything else is ‘just konbu’ (seaweed). They don’t care about others, but just ignore them.

Are pirates like samurai?

Probably more like the Green Berets. One fights for a 100. (laughs)

The pirate life also sounds a bit selfish. Would you say that you are selfish?

That’s what my wife says, sometimes. (laughs)

But doesn’t the individualistic pirate way of life go against the basic Japanese idea of harmony?

Harmony can be the greatest enemy of Art. I think music is a way of expressing our feelings and spirit, basically, you either find a way to show yourself or you die. But seriously, as a pirate, I am a country and also a history. When I meet other people I respect them as their own countries with their own histories. If you can recognize that, you won’t have problem with other people. The best way to live easily is with difficulty. I’ve been doing what I want to do for ½ of my life. That may be why I seem young.

You’re a bluesman, how did you find yourself attracted to this kind of music?

Probably in some ways through my father. He was an English teacher and when I was about nine or ten he sat me down to watch the American mini-series, Roots; the story of African slaves in the U.S. had a strong impact on me. He also talked a lot about the civil rights movement. I think from that early exposure to the black American experience I naturally gravitated towards the blues. There is a certain feeling of a sustained struggle that you can feel in the blues, and I guess that appeals to my belief that the musical journey must be a difficult one, full of challenges.

It sounds like from your point of view, a ‘real musician’ is one that will have to continually suffer through unending hardships. What do you think of bands that achieve commercial success and become wealthy celebrities, perhaps a group like the Rolling Stones?

I don’t know if I think like that, but there was a time that I was really fond of the Rolling Stones. In their earlier work you can see and feel their wild struggle and push to get better and challenge themselves. However, once they ‘made it’ they seem to have stopped changing and bettering themselves. Musicians must always be pushing their limits. When life is too easy, there is no reason to improve. If so, we lose the meaning of life as creators.

You had mentioned that you feel at home in New Orleans, and the American South…

That’s right. I spent time touring both in New York and New Orleans. In New York there were much more career opportunities—with shows every night and people actively scouting new talent. But in New Orleans, the music, the atmosphere, the people, and the food had much more soul and felt more authentic. All over the tourist areas of New Orleans you can hear any kind of music, but once you get to the backstreets, away from Bourbon Street, you can find ‘real music’. At places like Esplanade Avenue, the Maple Leaf Bar on Oak Street, and Frenchmen Street, I heard ancient sounding Cajun bands, it was like they were singing and playing in a different language. And I loved the gumbo in New Orleans—reminded my of a Japanese rice soup.

Around that time I was getting tired of life in the big city, so the slow, easy going mood in the South, and the spirit of valuing freedom in the states really comforted me. That experience has become a very important part of me, even now.

Mostly you play as a Travelling One Man Band, but you also form a duo with your wife, what’s it like being married to a musician?

I never thought that I’d get married. There is this image that musicians are out of touch with marriage, but when I met my wife the chemistry was powerful. She’s a jazz singer and djembe player and she sings in a salsa band now, too. We met at “What the Dicken’s” in Ebisu. Honestly, I don’t often see female performers who are both beautiful and talented—she is both.

Ah, so is that why she is able to get you to do the housework?

Ha, ha. She’s quite headstrong. But I guess thirty-six was a lucky year for me. I had just returned from the U.S., and I met her. And yes, I do some of the housework but that’s only because of our schedules. She’s pretty busy.

What kind of things do you argue about?

Mostly about musical and creative differences. We’ve got different opinions about which musicians we think are truly great. I prefer more innovative work while she is a bit more classic in her tastes. I always say, ‘use your brain’ when it comes to music.

Wait, you don’t tell your wife to ‘use your brain’ do you?

No, no, I say that to the other musicians around me. I don’t say that to my wife, because I know what would happen to me if I said that to her. I ain’t no fool.

Any important milestones or memorable performances you can share with us?

When I was living in the states I was able to visit the grave of (one of the greatest blues artists of all time) Robert Johnson in Morgan City, Mississippi. It was raining a little and chilly. I sat in front of his grave with my guitar my arms, and as soon as I started singing, the clouds in the sky started moving and the light came down on me and the grave. And when I finished singing, the clouds were back again, and started raining… I felt like it was some kind of message from Robert.

As for performances, in Japan, for the most part, I play in Tokyo, but a few years back I was invited to play at a friend’s wedding in Shimane. The people in the countryside reacted so strongly to my music, it was as if they were hungry for entertainment and everyone danced wildly and I was really taken aback by their passion and energy.

Playing mostly in Tokyo, what’s your take on the Tokyo scene?

Being a musician in Japan is, as well as any other cities in the world — hard, and to be honest I’ve never cared about the Tokyo scene. There is no scene here, so somebody needs to create it. I try to play my guitar everyday, and perform on the weekends at places that don’t have a cover charge, and ask around for money.

How do you feel when you are on stage?

I’m just trying to do my best and hope to entertain the crowd. I hope that people can feel something from my music.

Can you give us 10 words that describe Cyberblues?

BLUES
ART
ENTERTAINMENT
INVENTION
JUNKYARD
LONELINESS
FREEDOM
LOVE
MY MASTER
STUPIDITY

Interview: Cylinda Marquart
Edit & Translate: Ikumi Mochida, Natsuki Yamada and Cylinda Marquart
Photography: Ikumi Mochida