During the first half of 2023, the Japanese-New Zealand composer, pianist, producer and DJ Mark de Clive-Lowe spent four months travelling through Japan on a deeply personal journey. The reason for this extended foray to the Land of the Rising Sun was to retrace a series of moments from the twenty years his late New Zealand-born father, Robin de Clive-Lowe, spent living and working in Japan between 1953 and 1973. Along the way, Mark found his memories of, as he put it, "an overbearingly strict, conservative man," melting away as he discovered another side of Robin. "A young man so open-hearted, open-minded and open-spirited, with a zest for life and unbridled sense of adventure."

Along the way, he made a series of field recordings in locations he found particularly touching, "Daishoin Temple in Miyajima, the shores of Lake Biwa, overgrown paths in the depths of a Kyoto park where he once lived, forest breezes and birds in the Japanese Alps’ Kamikochi." For Mark, his experience wasn't just profoundly healing; it also served as the coda to the remarkable album that followed, 'past present (tone poems across time)", out now through Impressive Collective / BBE.

Prior to departing for Japan, Mark spent several days recording in Los Angeles’ Pomona City at "The Breath" studios, surrounded by Ken Barrientos’ exquisite collection of analog synthesisers and keyboards. Sketching out harmony ideas and layered sounds, Mark found a new level of freedom within his process. Rather than leading with explicit compositional ideas, the textures he summoned up on those synthesisers defined the arrangement, dynamics and instrumental narrative of the pieces. Moving beyond thought, he was able to play, explore and let the music unfold on its own terms.
As he observed in the album's extensive liner notes, "From the beginning it felt personal and liberating, each musical vignette like a poem with its own wordless truth. This is unlike any album I’ve created before, a collection of short tone poems suspended in sonic space, largely free of overt rhythmic dictation or traditional form. Harmony is the heart as fragments of melody and the sonic signatures of synths ebb and flow with their own intent. I hesitate to call it ambient or jazz, but both those words are connected to this music in their own ways. As it was being created, I didn’t preconceive any purpose for the music, simply proceeding with trust in the process and outcome — but it wouldn’t be long until it would all make complete sense."

After returning from his journey through Japan, Mark added his favourite field recordings into his intuitive compositions. In the process, something locked in. Reaching out across seventy years of time, he felt connected with his father in ways that would have never seemed possible to his younger self. In that moment, the circle of healing and understanding felt complete.

From the luxurious, enfolding synthesiser pads and birdcall recordings of 'embrace', to the whimsical childlike melodies of 'present past' and the wormy lead lines that run through 'reflection', "past present (tone poems across time)" opens like a waking dream, or a memory of a memory, shifting through a series of atmospheres and moods that feel as subtle as the changes in daylight over the course of a late spring/early summer's day. There's a sense of a cycle of feelings at work here in the music and titles like 'acceptance', 'forgiveness' and 'compassion', culminating in the watery, naturalistic soundworld Mark bathes in across the album closer, 'Gratitude'.

"past present (tone poems across time)" is unlike anything Mark has released before, but I don't believe he could have arrived here without working through all the musical phases he's explored over the last quarter of a century, either. If you'd like to dig further into his journey while creating the album, you can read the extensive liner notes he wrote here. Apart from that, carve out some space in your day, chuck the album on below, and let yourself vibe.

"past present (tone poems across time)" is out now in digital and vinyl formats via Impressive Collective / BBE. (Order here).