The Flower Travellin’ Band: Made In Japan (1972) / We Are Here (2008)

The Flower Travellin’ Band: Made In Japan (1972) / We Are Here (2008)

True to their name, the Flower Travellin’ Band were some free and open spirits. The cover of their debut Anywhere showed the band on motorcycles, naked as the truth; the record itself found them reupholstering four Western blues and rock classics. Their followup was Satori, considered a masterpiece of lysergic hard rock. Their commitment to the holy, heavy-psych freakout — as well as their tendency to write English lyrics — won them a number of Western admirers, and a chance encounter with a traveling Canadian rock/fusion act in Osaka led to the whole band moving to Toronto for a spell. The result was the focused, deceptively-titled Made In Japan. After FTB returned home, they coughed out a live/studio hash (Make Up) before their producer, and then the band, moved to other projects. Singer Joe Yamanaka turned to reggae, fronting the Wailers for a time. In 2007, musician and author Julian Cope published Japrocksampler, a beloved, dreadfully-titled survey of Japan’s rock scene. FTB graced the jacket by way of the Anywhere cover; the next year, the band released We Are Here. Produced by bassist Jun Kobayashi’s son Ben in Toronto, the record was a conscious attempt to avoid nostalgia. In practice, that meant sounding like a fusion funk act, although Hideki Ishima gets to show off his sitarla, a hollow-bodied electric guitar of his own invention. Tour dates followed (including their American live debut), but Yamanaka’s death from lung cancer shut the lid on further efforts.