This is a fantastic, extensive column about—as you already gathered from the title—the roots of Someya Taiyo, as written by the man himself.
Learn here how he first came to love music, what his early influences were, how Lamp were formed, and how he feels about making music today. And if you happen to be hiring, there’s even his Curriculum Vitae for your consideration. I’d say he has at least “passed the audition.”
Text: Shibasaki Yuji (Japanese text)
English translation: Henkka
Lamp: Linktree
By uncovering the musical journeys of various artists, this project aims to highlight the joys of pursuing music and to reveal fascinating new sides of these artists.
This time, we dove into the musical history of Someya Taiyo, the guitarist of Lamp, a band who have continuously—since their formation in 2000—released new music, and who are currently attracting attention both within and outside Japan.
In addition, at the end of the article, we have published a playlist of songs that form his musical roots, along with track-by-track commentary from Someya himself.
Memories With “Fujio-kun” & My Mindset Cultivated by Stories About Space
I was born in a place called Musashisakai in Tokyo, and near our house, my father rented a one-room apartment in which he managed a rehearsal studio. I liked going there with him as a young child.
My dad had been playing guitar even prior to that, and it appears that in his youth he had been in a band with Yamaguchi Fujio. This was seemingly after The Dynamites had disbanded and shortly before Murahachibu were formed, but because this is something that my dad doesn’t want to discuss with me in great detail, I don’t really know much more about it either. (laughs) My mother told me bits and pieces, and then as an adult, I learned some more details from books and magazines.
According to my mom, the person on vocals—that would have been Chahbo (Shibata Kazushi)—wasn’t very serious about practicing, which my dad didn’t appreciate. So although he apparently did go with them to Tokyo for a bit, he then almost immediately quit the band and returned home.
1yo. With my father at Alfalfa Studio which he operated.
Through this connection, Yamaguchi Fujio—I used to call him “Fujio-kun”—used to take me out on trips to Zushi when I was little. I remember him playing with me, and driving me in a convertible across roads by the seashore. I believe Fujio-kun ultimately passed away without ever even knowing I had myself become a musician.
Above all else, my dad loves blues guitar, and there was always some sort of blues rock playing at home. I was not impressed with this music—it just sounded like a never-ending guitar solo, and if anything, it became a good example for me of what not to do in terms of music. (laughs)
During elementary school, my dad used to tell me bedtime stories about space. I remember loving these stories—they made me so excited. I realized a few years back how the fact that I am myself someone who always looks at the big picture is something that surely came about from me hearing all those stories about the universe.
1yo. At home with my father playing the guitar.
First “Empathic Experience” at a Choir Competition
As an elementary schooler, I never chose to listen to music of my own will. Instead, I was one of those boys who would spend every day at the park, just having fun playing soccer or baseball.
I didn’t particularly like music classes at school either. I could usually play the recorder reasonably well, but when it was time to actually perform, I would get so nervous that I’d start shaking, unable to get even the first note out of my recorder. In second grade, I also started taking piano lessons—until one day I was told there would be a recital, and I immediately quit. (laughs)
In fifth grade, I joined this thing called the Singing Committee, and I had my first ever experience holding a mic and singing in front of an audience. I think I was just singing our school song and other well-known children’s songs, but one day I realized that when I sang with a loud voice, people all the way on the other side of the gymnasium could hear me, and I just thought that was so fun. That was my first time in life thinking how it was enjoyable to perform music in front of other people.
In junior high school, I would go on to join the table tennis club. But at the same time, I was starting to listen to music, too. I began listening to a Peter, Paul and Mary CD—it was this cheap best-of album that I happened to find at home; the kind they were selling at train station kiosks at the time. I couldn’t get into any of the stuff my dad was playing back then (like Janis Joplin and Aretha Franklin), but there was something about this group’s music that could appeal even to the mind of a child. Their vocal harmonies were pretty, and I liked the songs.
In my second year of junior high school, another thing that left a strong impression on me was us winning a choir competition with “Toki no Tabibito,” a set piece of music which I had suggested we perform. For me, it was this sort of “empathic experience” through musical expression—that is to say, my feeling was, “Everyone likes the music that I like!” By the way, it took me until I was approaching my mid-twenties before I finally realized that everyone does not, in fact, like the music that I like. (laughs)
In the third year of junior high, I was the conductor of our class choir, and although I was not particularly aware of it at the time, I was gradually becoming more and more interested in music.
1yo. At the library with my father listening to records.
It was also around this time that I bought my first CD.
In the third semester of the second grade of junior high school, we held a farewell party for the third graders, and one of the teachers sang “Shimauta” by The Boom in karaoke. I thought it was such a great song that I immediately went out and bought the CD.
From thereon, I listened to a lot of J-pop for about a year. I remember buying the singles for two Mr.Children songs that were in the hit charts at the time: “CROSS ROAD” and “innocent world.” In the third year of junior high, I was an ardent listener of BOØWY and BUCK-TICK.
As I began listening to music more seriously, I came to think thoughts like, “If it was me playing, I’d do it more like this,” and I wanted to start writing songs on my own. I discussed this with my dad who suggested that I try playing the guitar, and so I started playing one that we had at home. The very first chords he taught me were A and D, and that very same day I wrote a song using just those two chords. (laughs)
High School Days Devoted to Western Music & Meeting Nagai Yusuke
Entering high school, I joined the Folk Song Association which was sort of like this light music club, and thanks to the influence of my classmates in the club, I became deeply absorbed in Western rock.
I was hooked on Nirvana at the time, and we covered all their albums, starting with Nevermind. As first-year students, we were also covering older rock and punk music, like David Bowie and the Sex Pistols. No one ever seemed to want to do the vocals, however, so it was always the one part left over. With no other choice, it would end up being me on vocals—much to the displeasure of everyone’s ears, I’m sure. (laughs)
Also, among the club members in my school year, there seemed to be this prevailing thought that anyone who listened to Japanese music was somehow “lame,” and I too was influenced by their thinking. Still, after actually listening to all sorts of different music with my own ears, there was no doubt that I much preferred foreign music. Around the time I was about to become a second-year student, I was listening to rock that was being released right around that time frame, like The Smashing Pumpkins, Weezer, Oasis, and Ben Folds Five.
At the same time, I also began enthusiastically listening to music made well before I was born; groups that captivated me with their melodies and harmonies, like The Beatles and Simon & Garfunkel.
I think that The Beatles, in particular, are at the very core of who I am as a musician—not just in terms of their music but in terms of their entire presence—and I still continue to listen to them even today. I was looking at my “Spotify Wrapped” for 2024 the other day, and sure enough, The Beatles were number one.
Simon & Garfunkel were also an important group for me. Their songs and harmonies are fantastic, of course, but I also really love Paul Simon’s lyrics. Lyrics-wise, I really like stuff like “For Emily, Whenever I May Find Her,” “America,” and “The Dangling Conversation,” and I believe he influenced the way I personally write lyrics. Joining the Folk Song Association one year after me was Nagai (Yusuke, later a member of Lamp), and he was already totally into that sort of melodious, harmonious music back then.
At the beginning of Year 3 of high school, I began to feel a growing urge to give a shot at writing pop songs on my own, and so I invited Nagai to join me in a band outside of school and the Folk Song Association.
We put up a flyer at the rehearsal studio to recruit members and we ended up playing for about a year with people who responded to the ad, but then Nagai suddenly left the band, saying, “This is boring. I quit.” I felt like there would be no point in continuing if Nagai wasn’t there, and so I quit as well, and that was the end of that band. The songs I wrote back then were definitely not something I would ever want anyone to hear. (laughs)
In my high school days, at a concert of our Folk Song Association.
Vast Amount of Input in My University Years
Entering university, I checked out the various band clubs they had on campus, but none of them really appealed to me. Thus, prior to us forming Lamp, for about the first two years of university I was not playing music at all, only listening to it.
The most important encounter I had during that time was with Yamamoto Yuki, who would later go on to write a disc guide book called Quiet Corner. He was so knowledgeable about music even back then—he introduced me to so much music, including 60s and 70s soft rock and soul, Brazilian music, and more. This was right around the time when they were reissuing a lot of well-known classic records on CD, and I benefited greatly from that trend. After school, the two of us would often stop by CD shops and record stores together.
I love foreign music from the 60s to the early 80s, and it would not be an exaggeration to say that ever since university, it has continued to be just about all I listen to. I discovered so many great works during my university days that it would be a difficult task to try and narrow them down, and these experiences became a part of who I am—it would be appropriate to say that this music is quite literally me.
If I was to list some of the artists I discovered around that time, I might start with Curtis Mayfield. I spent a lot of time listening to all his material from his debut up to his 1975 album There’s No Place Like America Today, and I still love these albums even today. Other works that are quite important to me are some of Piero Piccioni‘s titles from the 1960s and ’70s, as well as Djavan‘s works from the 70s and 80s.
At home with my father playing the mandolin. 2~3yo.
Meeting Sakakibara Kaori & Two Works That Formed the Core of Early Lamp
After starting university, I continued thinking these vague thoughts about wanting to do music in the future. However, it felt that there was something lacking when it was only just the two of us—me and Nagai.
Just then, we met (Sakakibara) Kaori through a high school friend of mine. I remember us talking right after we’d first met about the kinds of music and culture and we liked. It sounds strange thinking about it now, but even before we’d even heard her sing, I just had this intuition that if the three of us were to form a band, it would turn out well.
I remember how the first time the three of us got together in my room, we recorded ourselves on the hard drive of a multi-track recorder, doing Simon & Garfunkel’s The 59th Street Bridge Song (Feelin’ Groovy) as well as an original song I had only just finished writing.
In those days, I hardly had any interest whatsoever in Japanese music. But then, Kaori had me listen to Kazemachi Roman by Happy End as well as SONGS by Sugar Babe, and I just felt deeply moved, thinking, “Wow, even Japan once had music that was this amazing.” Those two albums could be called the core of Lamp’s early activities.
Kirinji were another band also introduced to me by Kaori. Up until that point, I knew of no still-active artists who I particularly liked, but listening to Kirinji, I just remember thinking how great they sounded, how I really liked them, and at the same time feeling a kind of “sympathy” towards their music. Whether I wanted it or not, I could not help but be conscious of their music around the time Lamp was formed.
Streaming Success & My Approach to Making Music
We released our first album (Soyokaze Apartment Room 201) through an indie label called Motel Bleu, and that release along with all the other ones that came after it all drew most heavily from the music we had listened to in university.
Up to and including our latest album, Dusk to Dawn, I would say that we have spent the last 20 years just meticulously outputting all of the music we absorbed back then. It feels that with all of the music we’ve ever released, rather than us being inspired by any new music we happened to be listening to while making each particular album, it’s more that it was just the music that had previously accumulated inside of us, just naturally emerging from within us with each release.
Cover of Soyokaze Apartment Room 201
It is for that reason that it feels so strange to me how songs like Yume Utsutsu (from our 2008 album Lamp Genso) have in recent years suddenly taken off in the way that they have. While it is of course a song that we all like, we never thought it would become popular—to us, it just felt like “another song on the album.” But then again, I also feel like maybe the song achieved the results that it did exactly because it had been made in such a natural way.
If you were to ask me if our recent success on streaming platforms has had an impact on our creative stance or on the way we make music, my answer would be no, not in the least. If anything, we have become even less conscious of things like audience response and other external circumstances.
On our American tour last year, we received lots of encouragement from young audience members, and while we are of course grateful and while it was a deeply moving experience for us, it’s not like that experience is in any way going to affect our creative work.
My Adoration for Music, and Its Intensity
My first child was born three years ago, and the other day I realized that I have not written a single new song ever since. Some part of me even feels like maybe I can’t write any more.
In order to write a song, you first have to be in the right mindset and in the right environment, and that is something I had always been strongly conscious of in the past. But now, having to look after my child day by day, it is difficult to find the emotional leeway or even to make the time needed to write something. Lately, I find myself thinking more and more about how I should approach songwriting, going forward.
At home. In the lower grades of elementary school.
I do not think that I possess any special ability as a musician—if anything, in terms of actually singing a song or playing an instrument, I was very much average even in my high school’s Folk Song Association.
However, things like creating art (even outside of music) in unique ways, or being able to perceive things from a broader perspective—those are some of my strong points. So really my talents are: being able to be in a band, being able to emphasize my good qualities, and being able to implement policies that keep me going. And while I’m not sure this is really a “talent” per se, I have always had an extremely strong attachment to doing things that are fun, even more than most people. On school trips, I was always the last one to fall asleep at night. I would think to myself, “I don’t ever want this fun night to end.” For me, Lamp itself is precisely that “fun night.”
In the course of my life, I happened to become interested in music, I simply kept at it, and today I am able to make a living doing it. Ultimately, I was able to find my place in society through music. Looking back on it all, it really does feel like a kind of a miracle.
Furthermore, looking back, one thing that has always been true both now and in the past is that I love listening to music more than I love making it. For me, the act of making music is always just an extension of the passion I get from listening to it. When I listen to music, I’m imagining scenes beyond the music; thinking about some girl I like, maybe putting my own feelings into the song and singing along, speculating about what the artist might have been feeling, thinking about what other artists sound similar, what other music sounds similar, fantasizing if I might be able to find more music that sounds like what I’m hearing… All sorts of thoughts are running through my mind.
Consequently, it’s not just about the music for me—it’s also about those sorts of accompanying layers of meaning and value that lead to my adoration of music, becoming the driving force behind my music-making. I believe that sort of intensity is crucial in order for anyone to keep doing something for an extended period of time.
I recently bought myself my first-ever upright piano. I hardly even play it, to be honest, but I still make myself sit down at the piano once a day to play even just a little bit. Before my child was born, I only ever thought about my own musical environment. But now, as a parent, I naturally find myself thinking about the kind of environment I wish to create for my child—and not only in terms of music. I now find myself doing things like unconsciously playing music I used to hear during my own childhood. When I catch myself doing these things, it always feels strange.
10 Songs That Made Someya Taiyo
Someya Taiyo’s Comment About This Playlist
When I think about what my musical roots might be, I tend to think it’s similar to those certain “smells.” It’s music that, when I listen to it, it makes me feel like I’m right back there (in the past) listening to it. It is music like that which I would describe as my “roots.”
1. Seri Yoko – “Shiroi Michi”
One of the songs from NHK TV program Minna no Uta that I especially liked. I believe it is based on the second movement of Winter from Vivaldi’s The Four Seasons, with the lyrics added. When I listen to this song, I am instantly brought back to a cold winter’s day in the living room of our house where my mother—who has now passed away—would be earnestly listening to this song. (By the way, another Minna no Uta winter song that I really liked is Kodanuki Ponpo.)
2. Peter, Paul and Mary – “Gone The Rainbow”
I think I began listening to Peter, Paul and Mary intently after starting junior high school, but this is a song I came to love much earlier, in the lower grades of elementary school (probably in the second grade). I remember wanting to be able to sing along to it so badly, I’d start and stop the CD over and over again while writing out all the lyrics in my notebook in katakana.
3. The Rolling Stones – “Ruby Tuesday”
This was my favorite Rolling Stones song in the lower grades of elementary school. I even named our pet dog Ruby. I don’t know if it’s because of the peculiar air of the song, but even now when I’m listening to it, I am brought back to early elementary school when I was obsessively playing with my kinkeshi erasers and such.
4. Bob Marley & The Wailers – “Waiting In Vain”
Bob Marley was one artist in my childhood whose music was always playing at the house. Some of the songs I remember hearing all the time include “Chant Down Babylon” (in the backing vocals during the song it sounds like they’re singing, “Taiyooo!”), “Buffalo Soldier“, and the 1975 live album Live!, but listening especially to this song again for the first time in a while, it’s like it is wrapped in this overflowing sense of kindness which I don’t feel in the other songs—it’s like I’m an infant again.
5. Jimi Hendrix – “Angel”
Jimi Hendrix was my dad’s absolute favorite musician, and so he was by far the artist I was exposed to the most throughout my childhood. Among his songs, “Angel” was one that my dad really liked to play on the guitar, so this one left an especially strong impression on me. It brings me back to the mood of my early childhood (ages 0~4) spent in Musashisakai.
6. The Beatles – “Because”
All through my early childhood and adolescence, as well as my high school days when I first began listening to Western music of my own volition, I have always been regularly listening to The Beatles my whole life. They are also the band who have been the biggest influence on me, so I do feel they are a bit different from all the other examples of my musical roots that I am listing here. I’ve chosen “Because” as it was a particular favorite of my dad’s, and out of all their songs, it’s the one that gives me the strongest sense of having listened to it in the past—maybe because of the song’s mysterious aura.
7. Michael Jackson – “I Just Can’t Stop Loving You”
Bad was released when I was in second grade of elementary school. I especially loved this song’s gentle opening and pre-chorus (the chorus itself, not so much). There are other songs on the album that I liked even better—such as Liberian Girl, Just Good Friends, Man in the Mirror, etc.—but for some reason or other, it’s this song most of all that makes me remember those days.
8. Simon & Garfunkel – “Wednesday Morning, 3 A.M.”
Around my second or third year of high school, Nagai would often sing this song with a friend of his, and that’s how I learned of this group and began listening to them, too. Unlike the seven previous songs I’ve listed, this is one that I was often listening to in my high school days, which feels quite recent compared to my other picks. And as with The Beatles, they’re someone I have continued listening to ever since, so rather than it being the roots music of my past, I picked this song with the implication that it is music which is really at the core of who I am.
9. The Smashing Pumpkins – “Galapogos”
Without a doubt, the band that I listened to the most throughout high school were The Smashing Pumpkins. But then on the other hand, I also drifted away from them for a long time after starting university, and therefore even when I listen to them now, I am once more instantly immersed in the atmosphere of my high school days. Unlike a lot of other alternative rock bands, the studio recordings of The Smashing Pumpkins weren’t just a straight extension of what they would do live, and it’s their quieter songs that are especially striking. I always got the sense that they were a band who put a lot of care into making their studio recordings. In that sense, Mellon Collie And The Infinite Sadness—which this song is included on—still stands up even today, but album-wise, for me, Siamese Dream is even better.
10. Stan Getz / Joao Gilberto – “Desafinado”
Thinking about a song which could be described as the roots of my musical activities after the formation of Lamp, I think it might be this one. It is also the song that sparked my fascination with bossa nova.
