OWN INTERVIEW CONTENTS Vol.8 ATOSONE (COMMA VIOLETA / RC SLUM)
OWN (hereinafter, O): First, could you please introduce yourself, ATOSONE, and tell us your title?
ATOSONE (hereinafter referred to as A): I'm in RCSLUM RECORDINGS and COMMA VIOLETA.
Is O RC SLUM a crew or a label?
It's an A label. It's a label that branched off from Crew. And within that, there's a line called ROYALTY CLUB that specializes in releasing mix CDs. CDs aren't selling well these days, but mix CDs are selling well.
Do you personally think of RC SLUM and ROYALTY CLUB as separate entities?
With A ROYALTY CLUB, I feel like I'm offering it to people who want to trust me with the background music of their lives. RC SLUM is run for people, or rather, for rappers, while ROYALTY CLUB is run for my own selfish desires. For me, music and life are equal. For people who work, I think most people can't listen to music while they're working. But in my case, I have 24 hours a day to do as I please, so music is a part of my life.
ODo you mean you want to listen to music all the time?
A : Yes, I want to listen to it all the time. I may have said this before, but I don't like the kind of atmosphere where you can't play music. I've always lived my life trying not to be in an atmosphere where people would say, "Turn off the music."
Is that something you keep in mind?
A : No, I don't make a conscious effort to do so, and I'm not even conscious of it. I don't listen to music with the intention of listening to it. When I wake up in the morning, I go to the audio booth and turn on some music. It then fills the whole house. My wife is also a DJ, so she plays music to wake me up.
Music has become a part of your life. It's on the same level as eating, smoking, and other things in your life.
A: That's right. Music is a part of my life, so there are certain things I want to listen to when I eat, or when I smoke. I want to live my life so that music matches every situation. The other day, when the weather had turned cold and the air was clear, I was listening to BUSHMIND's "THE DAYS IN OUR STEPS" in the car with my wife and it was amazing. I guess I'm forever searching for music that matches the scenery in front of me and the people I'm with. I guess that's what ROYALTY CLUB is.
It seems like O ATOSONE selects the music artists.
A: That might be true.
Why do you want to make your life and music fit together so much?
A: Because it's lonely. But if you're in a space with music playing and a space without music playing, it's more fun with music playing.
When did you start to like music?
A: My dad is an avid reader and has about 3,000 books at home. But he doesn't listen to music at all. He likes silence. I hated that so much that I started to rebel against my dad around middle school and naturally started to like music. I never thought I'd love it for so long, or that I'd make a living from it.
Now , please tell us about COMMA VIOLETA.
A COMMA VIOLETA is a clothing brand that I run. I started it two years ago.
I know that you were a clothing store owner, but why did you choose to start your own brand?
A: Because the person I consider my parent quit making clothes. I could have started an apparel business 10 years ago if I had wanted to, but as long as he was still doing it, I decided not to do it myself.
How do you feel about starting the O brand?
A: It's been fulfilling. More people are willing to help me, and I can now use factories. This season I'm also trying making silver accessories.
O: This is just my personal impression, but the scene that ATOSONE was in was definitely a street scene. However, COMMA VIOLETA was created with a different aesthetic sense from that scene.
A: It's like a counter. Well, when I was younger, I thought the things older people were doing were lame, so I did the opposite of that, which is what I ended up with. Also, I used to take art lessons, and my teacher at the time used to say, "Art must be beautiful." Those words made a big impression on me, so I thought that if I was going to express myself, I wanted to make it as pretty as possible. That said, there are a lot of dirty people in RC SLUM (laughs).
O (laughs).
A: Well, I think I'm the same as everyone else in the sense that I'm expressing something. The band is one example, and OWN's glasses are also a form of expression. With COMMA VIOLETA, I sometimes make things by sewing or fusing thread, and recently I made denim in a factory. I feel like I'm making some pretty cool things.
What is the process for designing clothes ?
A Simply put, clothes have a front, a back, and sleeves. Should I add a collar or not, buttons or a zipper? What kind of ribbing should I use? I think about that and create a pattern in Illustrator. If you take a piece of clothing apart, you'll understand a lot. It'll make you feel like you're filleting a fish. You'll see, so that's how it works. As our funding increases in the future, I think the quality will continue to improve.
Have you always liked clothes?
A: I love her. My mum has seven sisters, and her oldest sister came back from America and ran a boutique. She was quite an eccentric and interesting person. She removed all the seats from her 11-seater Hiace, put up hangers, racks and mirrors, and travelled around selling clothes. She was also a good seamstress, and would buy a lot of clothes, alter them, and sell them. She was very fond of me, so maybe I was influenced by her. But she got mad at me about my tattoos (laughs).
What kind of clothes do you like these days?
I've always loved thermals . I haven't been buying cheap things lately. There are so-called high-end brands, you know? The quality is incredible. The stitching is beautiful, and the thread they use is simply great. I could easily beat the graphics of Louis Vuitton, and I'm confident I can make something better. But the quality of the fabric and thread is incredible. Of course, there are plenty of ugly things from Louis Vuitton, Prada, and Gucci. But, as cliche as it may sound, the reason Hermès Birkin bags continue to sell is because they're made with high-quality materials. As I've gotten older, I've come to appreciate things like the quality of Italian leather. I wrote about a red skin coat in my OWN column recently, and that was a Dolce & Gabbana coat I bought a long time ago. It was also made with Italian leather and high-quality materials. I think I've started choosing clothes based on those standards.
When it comes to clothing , I feel like I've been enjoying fashion freely since earlier than people in the street scene.
A: I don't like the standard look. If you like hip-hop, you might wear North Face, jeans, Jordans, or Force 1s. But the most important thing about clothes is that they look good on the person wearing them, so I think anything is fine as long as it suits you.
Who would you like to see wear COMMA VIOLETA clothes?
A: That may be an eternal challenge. I think it's the same with OWN, but you want people who look good in it to buy it. The high-end brands I mentioned earlier are also being bought in bulk by people who are different from their target audience or image, so I don't think there's any point in worrying about it. It's the same with music, but for us, the only thing we can do is continue to create good art. 
O I see. By the way, do you usually wear eyewear?
A: I think clear lenses are the most common. I feel embarrassed when I wear sunglasses. But when I'm in a good mood, I wear them. To put it in extreme terms, if you don't wear clothes, you'll get arrested, but if you don't wear sunglasses, you won't get arrested. So I think sunglasses have a strong element of entertainment, or luxury. When I'm in a good mood, I want to wear them.
Q: Are you conscious of the mainstream in your current activities?
A: When I was younger, I think MOSAD and BALLERS were the mainstream, but after Tokoname-kun (TOKONA-X) passed away, Hiraga (HIRAGEN) was clearly the coolest, and everyone knew that. On top of that, some people treated me well, and others the opposite. The media said that RC was a counterculture band, but I've been in Nagoya for a long time, so I know all the older people there too. So I didn't really think anything of it. Also, I think the nature of music has been changing recently.
OWhat part is that?
A: Musician or YouTuber? Musician or comedian? People who act like musicians are Yuichi (CAMPANELLA), RAMZA, and COSA. They're competing purely on their music. It's not about music videos or fashion or anything like that. Also, this might be an old-fashioned way of thinking, but these days, people release songs one at a time, and they're usually about two minutes long. But from a label's perspective, artists who release albums dramatically improve their performance. That's definitely true. If you want to be a musician, I think that's something you should value. Nowadays, it's like, you just release one song, make a music video, and upload the song to YouTube. Your only gateway is YouTube. Those people aren't musicians, they're YouTubers. Whether it's CD or vinyl, or even digital downloads are fine these days, if you want to be a musician, you should release an album. An album has to occupy the listener's hearing for about an hour. If it was just one or two minutes, or one song, I honestly think anyone could do it.
I feel like there are too many instant foods these days. They are consumed so quickly.
A: What's more, an album means that you don't release each completed song right away, but rather have a period of time to cherish them, which is also quite important. That's why we tell our artists to release albums. We have some young artists coming up with releases after this, and we want them to make albums too.
O RC SLUM has been releasing more and more music from young rappers recently.
A: You recently released a compilation album ("Sooner or Later") with a bunch of young people. It's a continuation from that. There's this guy in Kobe called hyunis1000, he's a genius. He's damn naive and shy, but his live shows are amazing. Is he 20 or 21 or something? He'll also be releasing something on RC SLUM next year. An album, of course.
You once said, "I don't want middle and high school students to listen to my CDs. I want drug addicts and intellectuals to listen to them."
A: When I'm persuading artists, I often say, "If you release an album through us, it won't sell that many copies. But if you release it through my label, it will be on the shelves of record stores, so I think it will be recognized by music lovers who go to record stores on a daily basis." It's similar to what I said at the beginning, but it will reach people whose lives are a perfect fit with music. Conversely, I don't think it will reach the demographic that only listens to popular music on YouTube or the like. But it will reach the ears of people for whom buying CDs and records is a normal part of their lives.
O I see. Is there any reason to exclude the "group that listens on YouTube"?
A: There's no clear reason, and I'm not intentionally leaving it out, but honestly, I just don't think it makes sense. It's like we can't talk about music. When I listen to BES-kun or Kazuo (MC KHAZZ) rap, I think of Boo Can or SHYNE, right? That's what I'm talking about music. I want people who enjoy that kind of talk to listen to it. Those people who listen to music on YouTube, as I mentioned earlier, won't be listening to music in five years. I think my label has lasted so long because I've targeted connoisseurs. This year marks our 13th year.
O It seems that ATOSONE's thoughts and feelings about music are what have allowed it to continue for so long. Thank you for talking to us! Finally, do you have any information you'd like to share?
I'll continue with the A label and making clothes. The quality of COMMA VIOLETA's clothes is set to continue improving. I'm also planning to open a head shop for the brand by next fall. ROYALTY CLUB will release a mix by MICHIOSHKA from EBBTIDE RECORDS at the end of December. RC SLUM will release the album by hyunis1000, which I mentioned earlier, at the end of January. Also, Mikkun (MIKUMARI) and Kazuo (MC KHAZZ) will be releasing albums soon! Look forward to them.
[INFO]
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