Aube

Akifumi Nakajima (1959–2013), an industrial designer by trade, began recording as Aube in 1991, building each release from a single manipulated source rather than conventional instrumentation: water (Hydrophobia, 1991), fluorescent and glow lamps (Luminous, 1993), the sounds of his own body — heartbeat, lungs, blood vessels (Cardiac Strain, 1997) — and, at a label’s request, the pages of a Bible rubbed together (Pages From the Book, 1998). He ran his own label, G.R.O.S.S. Records, releasing his own work and others’ in partnership with distributors across Asia, North America, and Europe.

Nakajima was one of the Japanese noise scene’s most prolific collaborators. In 1992 he joined C.C.C.C.’s Hiroshi Hasegawa and Fumio Kosakai for a single session in Tokyo as the one-off trio Club Skull, released as The Origins Of… (1993, G.R.O.S.S.); he and Hasegawa recorded again as Ginkakuji, and with Masonna’s Maso Yamazaki added, as Gokurakuji. He and Yamazaki also recorded together as Kinkakuji. With Monde Bruits’s Shohei Iwasaki he recorded as Sian; with Pain Jerk’s Kohei Gomi as Meiji Jingu (and, joined by Gomi, Solmania’s Masahiko Ohno, and Toshiji Mikawa of Incapacitants, as the four-way Atsuta Jingu); and with Ohno alone as Ise Jingu. Nakajima died of a pneumothorax in Kyoto in 2013.