Zazen Boys, favourite novels and old recordings.

Photographer Daisuke Yokota shares five links of what he’s reading, watching, thinking about and loving right now.

1. ‘Uta no nakayama’, by Miyazono Senju
I don’t really know enough about this to explain it in any detail, but I do find myself listening to it over and over again. There’s something amazingly strange about the combination of an incredible performance and an extremely bad recording.

2. ‘Asobi’, by Zazen Boys
When I’m working on a project, I tend to listen to one band or musician on repeat. I was trying to remember what music I’d been doing that with lately and when I looked back at my iTunes Most Played list I discovered that this is my number 1 song right now.

3. ‘Password is Zero’, by Morning Musume
This is a Japanese girl group that I’ve been into lately. I enjoy their commitment and enthusiasm.

4. Ōtarō Maijō
Maijo is a Japanese novelist I really like. I’ve learned a lot from reading him – like how to handle time and incorporate elements of mystery in my own work. From him I’ve learned a certain type of (visual) language that was shared amongst his contemporaries.

5. Hiroko Oyamada
Ana (The Hole) is my favourite novel right now, and Hiroko Oyamada is the novelist I’m most interested in at the moment. She’s able to transform everyday life with the subtlest shifts in perspective and by hiding or emphasizing plot details. The thing about her is that she’s not trying to create some dream world or build a fictional universe. She’s writing about reality, but reality as actually experienced through an individual’s skewed perspective.

Artwork by Katsushika Hokusai, Untitled Series of Small Flowers, 1834