Discography

> Please click on the above logo to order this CD within the UK or for shipping from the UK to Europe, US and the rest of the world (except Japan) for £10.99 plus shipping. Alternatively, please click the Amazon logo to order this CD from Japan (make sure you click on the "Help in English" button at the top right-hand corner of the Amazon Japan page). You will be charged 3,281 Yen including shipping to the UK, which works out at about £16.   HMV Japan and Tower Records Japan are also accepting orders for "So Am I." Click here for HMV Click here for Tower Records

So Am I

(release date 20 July 2004) Hendrixx Records JSCD-0002

1. Cellar Full Of Noise
2. Student Susan
3. Enough
4. Middle Of The Night
5. The Band Played On
6. Old Samurai
7. Shimmy
8. Shining Siren
9. Seagull
10. Komachi
11. I Never Turn
12. There For Me
13. The Band Played On (Reprise)
14. Sweet Dreams

Produced by Pete Brown and Saiichi Sugiyama

"Sugiyama's music manages to combine the blues feeling and catchy melodies...in a nutshell, it is classy songwriter stuff in the bloodline of the 70's (particularly British) rock and popular music." Record Collectors, August 2004

Following directly on from 2002 collaboration with Pete Brown on the Japanese “Sunshine of Your Love” project, the work commenced on the recording for Saiichi's second solo album, "So Am I" in the spring of 2003. The sessions at Chapel Studios in Lincolnshire and also Fortress, Livingston, and Mark Angelo’s Studios in London were co-produced by Pete Brown and Saiichi. The band consisted of Zoot Money (keys and vocals), Clem Clempson (rhythm guitar), David Hadley-Ray (bass), and Simon Edgoose (drums), with Pete on percussion and backing vocals. The resultant album is essentially about songs. The 14 tracks on the album show Saiichi expanding beyond the blues guitarist mode to embrace his Beatle and West Coast influences and give a nod to American R&B and Japanese ballads. The release has so far been for Japan only, but the CD's can be purchased through Amazon.co.jp by clicking the links above. "So Am I" is also available on mail order from Tower Jp and HMV Japan. The opener, “A Cellar Full Of Noise,” is a blues rock cacophony of vocals by Saiichi, Jim Stapley of the up and coming London rock band Dekko, and the amazing Rietta Austin as well as twin lead guitar by Ben Matthews of Thunder and Saiichi; not to mention some neat blues harp by John O’Leary of the original Savoy Brown Blues Band. “Student Susan” is essentially a Mersey Beat number with Pete Brown’s lyrics based on his real life encounter with a former girlfriend of the Beatles in his Liverpool days in 1964. There are also some blues guitar moments, notably one fiery blues instrumental featuring Saiichi, Clem, and Zoot playing lead in turn. Saiichi and Pete flew out to Tokyo in May 2003 to capture harmony vocals by Mark Horiuchi, the former member of the legendary early '70s Japanese acoustic rock group GARO, who had a formative influence on Saiichi. Mark sang on five tracks, and the acoustic track “Seagull” in particular captures the magic of the CSNY era, Mark playing his signature acoustic lead guitar over the open tuning guitar texture laid down by Saiichi. The title “So Am I” has a reference to the centerpiece of the album, the epic 8-minute “Old Samurai.”

b&w photo: Shu Tomioka colourisation: Paul Olsen

The tracks were engineered by Ben Matthews, the guitarist of Thunder, and were jointly produced by Pete and Saiichi.

Saiichi played his Gibson Les Paul through a Marshall Bluesbreaker amp for most of the tracks, although his Firebird and Stratocaster were also well used, sometimes through a Champ or a Pignose amp.

A 1960’s Rickenbacker 325 from Phil Harris’ hire company was used on the rhythm part on “Student Susan” and was played through a TV front Fender Princeton.

In “Komachi,” you can hear Saiichi breaking a string mid-solo and carrying on. The solo turned out to be a “keeper” and it was left in.

Saiichi’s acoustic parts were played mostly on his Martin D-45 and Gibson J-160, although a D-28 and 000-28 were also used. The nylon string parts were played on a hired Ramirez and Saiichi’s Juan M Alvarez.

On “Shimmy,” Clem played his well-known Gold Top Les Paul through a Bluesbreaker amp.

Mark’s lead guitar on Seagull was played on a 1968 Martin D-28.

cChina Doll (promo only single)

 (12 July 2004) Cedar Mountain Music CMM-PRO103

1. China Doll

Produced by Saiichi Sugiyama

Saiichi re-recorded a new version of "China Doll," originally released on his 1994 "Saiichi Sugiyama" album for submission to Radio 2's "Sold on Song" contest at Les Lambert's studio in London. The new version has a catchy riff played on Saiichi's Martin acoustic guitar and features additional lyrics. This single is for promotion only and not for sale...BUT, there is a small quantity of these singles available through the prize draw on this website. Click on the CD image to hear a sample.

 

 

click here to visit Robin's website where you can purchase this album

Live Terapy / the robin bibi band

(released 2003) BBCD0003 (double CD set)

CD TWO
7. Got My Mojo Working

Saiichi joined his friend Robin Bibi during the encore at one of Robin's gigs in Brentford. The performance was recorded and featured on his 2003 live album.

Please click the Amazon logo to purchase this CD. The CD costs 2,400 yen which works out at £12. The postage from Japan is £4-50 for a single copy. It will be reduced to £2-50 for a copy if three copies are ordered at the same time. When you get to the Amazon page, be sure to click on the "Help in English" button at the top right-hand corner of the page. (Note the five star rating given to this CD by Amazon!)

Sunshine of Your Love

(released December 2002) Hendrixx Records FUCA-1001 Distributed by Universal Japan

1 White Room / Saiichi Sugiyama Band with Pete Brown
2 Crossroads / Mugen Byblos
3 Outside Woman Blues / Club HENDRIXX
4 Presence of The Lord / Kantaro Uchida
5 Sunshine of Your Love / Saiichi Sugiyama Band with Pete Brown
6 Four Until Late / Toshiro Mauda
7 Strange Brew / Mugen Byblos
8 Had to Cry Today / Club HENDRIXX
9 Politician / Saiichi Sugiyama Band with Pete Brown
10 Dance The Night Away / Mugen Byblos
11 Can't Find My Way Home
12 Crossroads / Saiichi Sugiyama with Pete Brown
13 White Room / Mugen Byblos
14 Legend Guitar Hero / Club Hendrixx

Executive Producer : Jeff Sato
Tracks 1, 5, 9, and 12 Produced by Pete Brown and Saiichi Sugiyama

photo: Shu Tomioka

Having played a couple of gigs with Pete Brown as special guest, Saiichi and his band went into the studio with Pete to cut some Cream tracks for the Japanese Hendrixx label. The tracks recorded at Jacobs Studios in Farnham, Surrey, were Politician, White Room, and Sunshine of Your Love featuring Pete on vocals and Malcolm Bruce on keyboards plus the powerhouse rhythm section of Darby Todd (drums) and David Hadley (bass).

A further track, an acoustic version of Crossroads, was also recorded at KD's studios in Chiswick with Pete singing backing vocals and playing Indian drums.

The tracks were engineered by Ben Matthews, the guitarist of Thunder, and were jointly produced by Pete and Saiichi.

Saiichi used his Gibson Les Paul for the introduction to White Room and the solo on Sunshine of Your Love. The solo on White Room was played with his SG through a Marshall stack. The rhythm tracks were played with his Firebird and Stratocaster through a Marshall Bluesbreaker amp.


The release has so far been for Japan only, but the CD's can be purchased through Amazon Japan by clicking the link above.

Saiichi Sugiyama

(released November 1994) Blue Water Records SHS 7039

1 Somewhere Down The Road
2 Magic Wand
3 China Doll
4 Pretty Tanya
5 Who's Been Talking
6 Hold On
7 What's Going On?
8 Sweet Little Angel
9 Never Turn Back
10 Crosscut Saw
11 T Ain't Nobody's Bizness

Produced by Saiichi Sugiyama / Executive Producer: Gordon Sutherland

The eleven tracks on Saiichi's first album, simply titled with his name, were recorded in two separate sessions. The seven original songs were recorded with Saiichi's touring band members at Rockfield Studios in Monmouth, Wales (built by Dave Edmonds) in April 1994, while Stone Roses were recording their second album in the studio next door. The remaining blues tracks came out of Saiichi jamming with guest musicians such as Zoot Money, and The Cutting Crew rhythm section at Jacobs Studios in Farnham, Surrey later in 1994.

Much of the material on many of the tracks was recorded live in the studio. Saiichi's guitar solos on Somewhere Down the Road, China Doll, What's Going On, as well as all of the solos on the blues tracks are first takes. The basic tracks were overdubbed at Jacobs where amongst other things, percussion, horn sections, backing vocals, guitar parts through two rotating Lesley speakers, and voices of Japanese crickets (!) were added. The sessions were engineered by Phil Ault who worked on, among other sessions, Free's Heartbreaker album at Island Studios. Saiichi was able to draw on Phil's experience of recording Paul Kossoff's amazing guitar sound on that album.

overdubbing China Doll rhythm guitar parts through double Lesley cabinets - at the SSL control room at Jacobs in the summer of 1994. Photo by Ray Collins

Saiichi used his black and pewter Stratocasters, built for him by J. Black of Fender Custom Shop (serial numbers 001 and 002), throughout the recording sessions, complemented by a 1949 Martin 000-28 kindly loaned by Keith Henderson. On his band tracks, Saiichi played his Strats through his Pete Cornish routing system incorporating two Soldano SLO-100 heads in stereo and Marshall 4x12 cabinets loaded with EVM-12L speakers. On the blues tracks (and for the slide part in Pretty Tanya), Saiichi played the Strats through his old faithful TV front Tweed Princeton Amp that he bought in the summer of 1978, on his trip from Tokyo to California during his school holiday. Some of the acoustic parts were recorded through Fairchild valve compressors.

Photos: Les Lambert

The tracks were mixed at Master Rock Studios in Kilburn (of the Suede fame) and mastered at George Martin's Air Studios in Hampstead to take advantage of the digital EQ facility available there. The cover design was by Bogdon Zarkowski, who has been responsible for, among other high calibre work, Eric Clapton's tour programs over the years. CDs were pressed by Nimbus with help from Paul Reily of Demon Records, Elvis Costello's label.

The CD was finally launched on November 30, 1994, Saiichi's birthday, at the Paradise Bar in Kensal Green with Zoot Money and Boz Burrell in attendance among others.

After some eight years, Saiichi is delighted to hear that many people who bought the CDs then are still listening to them. Sam Kelly, who was nominated as the best blues drummer in London, told Saiichi that China Doll is one of his favourite songs. A very limited number of copies of this album are still available at Saiichi's gigs.

Ampaholics: The Vintage Collection-Vol 1

(released 1999) catalogue number unknown

In 1999, Saiichi was invited to play on Ampaholics' vintage collection CD project. Ampaholics is a Guildford based vintage guitar amp dealer specialising in the '60s British amps, such as Marshall and Vox. The CD project was to provide, as it were, a sampler for the sound of various well-known vintage amps such as Marshall JTM45, JTM100, Vox AC30 etc. Along with two other guitarists, Saiichi played short bluesy pieces and open chords on Ampaholics' '59 Strat through various tasty vintage amps.

It is an excellent reference point for the sounds of the '60s, and the wonderful full-colour 20 page booklet with pictures and commentaries on all of the 17 vintage British amps alone is worth the £10 cost of the CD. The CD received an excellent review from Guitar World magazine.

The Ampaholics Vintage Collection is available from www.ampaholics.org.uk.

There were three guitarists credited on this album and the following is a track-by-track listing of what Saiichi played:

1 Vox AC 10 (second chord sequence and the vibrato section)
2 Vox AC 15 (almost all except for the vibrato section and some short snippets by other guitarists)
3 Vox AC 15 Twin (all)
4 Vox AC 30 (first open chord sequence and the tremolo section only)
5 Vox AC 30 Super Twin (first chord sequence only)
6 Vox AC 30 Top Boost (all except the first finger-picking sequence on the brilliant channel)
7 Vox AC 100 (all except the second finger picked "funky" sequence)
8 Vox Supreme (sections on the reverb channel only)
9 Marshall 45W (1963) (all except the Rock'n'roll riff piece)
10 Marshall JTM45 (all except the fast Rock'n'roll riff piece)
11 Marshall BluesBreaker (all except for the last phrase with the feedback)
12 Marshall JTM45 / 100w (the first Little Wing type chord sequence and all of the "full volume" section except the last rhythm part, which was played by Paul Goodhand-Tate)
13 Marshall JMP 50 Plexi (all)
14 Marshall JMP 50 Plexi PA (all)
15 Marshall JMP50 (all except the rhythm and lead guitar pieces on the "middle-pickup position")
16 Watkins Dominator (all except the Hendrix style rhythm part and what follows)
17 Selmar Zodiac 30 (all except the "tremolo" section)

Roadhouse Live At BB's Blues Club

(to be released May 2002) catalogue number TBA

1 Tellin' Lies
2 Help Me
3 Sure Enuff
4 Backstreets
5 Old Time Friend
6 Preacher Man
7 Stormy Monday
8 Rock Me Baby

Saiichi appeared as a guest guitarist with the South London based band, Roadhouse, at the ex-Fleetwood Mac bass player, Bob Brunning's blues club at the Colourhouse Theatre on 17 March 2002 and the performance of the night is released as a live album. Saiichi plays on the track Preacher Man, Roadhouse's singer/guitarist and Saiichi's friend, Gary Boner's number on lost faith. As to the availability of the album, please refer to Roadhouse's website.

Roadhouse