MOUNTAIN OF ONE/DIP IN THE POOL INTERVIEW

British ‘‘Balearic’’ prog rockers Mountain of One returned after a 13 year hiatus with a record even more ambitious and promising than their 2009 debut that stirred the waters and made the the darlings of the scene. For their new album Stars Planet Dust Me, they collaborated with Japanese pop sensation Dip in The Pool among others. Their collaboration ‘‘Soft Landing’’ was also released as Japan only 7inch. We chatted with Miyako Koda and Mo Morris from the bands about their collaboration.

How did you guys meet and how did this collaboration came about?

Miyako: A  collaboration request came via their Japanese friend.

Mo: We have an old friend of mine Josh Wheeler, who has represented our business and music in Japan for many years. We have always had a nice following there and our first album "collected works" was released with a record company in Japan and it did well.

I was asking Josh who would be perfect for a Japanese collaboration and release, and Dip in the Pool was top of the list. Just seemed like a perfect fit for us both.

What is the influence of Japan on your life/music?

Mo: I’ve only been 4 times, and always fall in love with the place. I adore just walking miles and miles every day, taking in the sites, the food and the culture. I'm not sure there's another city like Tokyo for that. It's always felt exotic, yet intimate but inviting.

And I think you can hear that its music culture, which for sure has synergies with some of the AMO1 material.

How was the exchange of different musical ideas between you work?

Miyako: That was some interesting work. We have never produced a track in this style. So that was pretty fresh to us.

Mo: We had a rough backing track and vibe, then our friend Pablo (Unkle / Toydrum) worked up with some maximal synth work, we then sent it over to DITP and 2 weeks later we had a beautiful song back from them. It was all pretty effortless and spontaneous.

You started your career as a model. How did that start?

Miyako: At first I applied for a cover model of “Hanatsubaki” magazine published monthly by SHISEIDO. I passed that audition, and I’ve been doing this job since then.

Did you ever meet Bryan Ferry?

Miyako: Oh yes I did. As a model I was on the page of a fashion magazine called ‘Anan’ with him. It’s just after a great hit of ‘Avalon’ by Roxy Music.

You worked with Rei Kawabuko in 1983 how was that experience?

Miyako: This also happened in some plan on the magazine ‘Anan’. I had a chance to meet and wear dresses made by Rei Kawakubo, Yohji Yamamoto, Issey Miyake, Kansai Yamamoto and more. They’re all worldwide successful Japanese designers. It was like a kind of dream.

How did you two guys get together and form a dip in the pool

Miyako: There’s one guy who at the time wanted to make a kind of conceptual pop band, he invited us as a members separately. So we started as part of his new band. But this guy became too busy to continue the band. So we decided to start ‘Dip in the Pool’  as a duo.

Your debut was released with Rough Trade how did you manage such a widespread release with big EU label? How was the experience of working with Seigen ono on this album?

Miyako: We made that album with Masahide Sakuma (ex-Plastics member who already had a release through Rough Trade ) and Seigen Ono. They just started their new studio in Tokyo then.They had a short promotion trip to EU. During that time they could make/got? a deal with Geoff Travis who is a founder of RT.

Your sound in the beginning was a lot like crepuscule label from Belgium. Did you listen to this music a lot at the time? DIP

Miyako: Yes. We love many indie label in the 80's. Very interesting music but not main stream.

Why was one of your best ever releases (on retinae) so limitedly released (only in Hong Kong)? DIP

Miyako: The truth is we released the album “Retinae” in 1989. Then we went to Hong Kong to promote that album. WEA Hong Kong had made just 50 copies of 12” vinyl with On Retinae for Radio Stations and media.

You have changed many musical styles over the years and have done many covers of other artists (Enola Gay)! . On your latest album you cover Larry Heard. You always liked house music?

Miyako: We are not big fans of house music. Over 120bpm is too fast for us:) But “What about this love” is very special. The most beautiful house song ever!

You had not released music in many years after a groundbreaking debut. How all this time affected your music writing and style of the songs on your new album

Mo: There was soon after the debut another release called "Institute of Joy '' which was much more a live band produced album, very rock in places, very psych. This was still over 10 years ago. I dont think our taste or North Star has changed since the sound of the debut, so Zeben and I decided to go back to our roots with it. We were also limited as it was written remotely between Bali > London during the Covid lockdown, over skype and a programme called Audiomovers, believe it or not. That limitation I think worked to our advantage and made the music a lot more stripped back and bold, no fiddling which we were guilty of on the 2nd album.

You also had a big gap of almost 20 years between your 1997 album and your return brown eyes in 2011. What did you focus on all this time? DIP

Miyako: We moved to the north part of Japan and raised our daughter there :)

Your first album was released during the peak of the whole balearic revival where forums like DJ history shaped much of the music scene and it managed to stir the waters. You just released your new album in a totally different environment and moment in time. How did you manage to keep your sound relevant and up to date in an era where many quality music releases are struggling to make an impact.

Mo: Yes things have changed drastically in such a short time, (if you call 10 years a short time). Streaming has exploded and sadly seems to be incredibly important for any new artist's success, but everythings stacked against the artist with the streaming services, not the best launch pad for a (literally) hungry young creative. I think and hope that it will balance out over time and find its natural, fair balance. It's all still relatively new and the industry and the artists are still trying to find their bearings I guess. Reference to our sound being relevant still, I personally have never chased a progressive sound, always more a quality, or a rebirth/renaissance sound but with new eccentricities and approaches.

Let's be honest, pretty much everything has been done before several times over in the creative world.

I've never shied away from the fact I don't classically play an instrument, but this is Zebens background, so our process is I always go to Zeb with a bunch of records or sounds I love, This can be a simple key change Im feeling or just the general pallete of the song. That's kind of a starting point for us, but we will always end up somewhere completely different, and that is the truly fun part for me.

The journey and not the destination. The rest of it, I could take or leave.

I couldn't care less about any sort of fame or artistic respect anymore. My priorities have shifted a lot since my daughter Bayou was born. I love our music and some of my peers do, that's enough for me. If a bunch of other people do, that's a bonus. My references don't really change. but they are quite far reaching, I've always had a natural instinct of sniffing out what looks and sounds fresh and relevant during that certain creative / production period. It's just a little gift, not something I have been trained to do, I don't think that is possible....

You either have taste or you don't.

More on the album here.