Stones Taro: Club Sounds from the Depths of the Sea

Now based in Kyoto, Japan, Stones Taro has a long-held affinity with the ocean. The producer/DJ was born in Wakayama, home to some of Japan’s most sacred sites and beautiful beaches, and it was here that Taro grew enchanted with the warm sea breeze and sound of the ocean crashing against the city’s easterly coast. Musically, Taro was largely inspired by UK dance music, becoming active in the local Kyoto scene in 2015 with his classic take on acid-scorched techno, house, grime and jungle.

However, despite a series of well-received EPs released on some of the UK’s hottest underground labels, Taro found he was struggling to find his unique voice. In search of a clear concept, the producer found sanctuary in his former environment - the sounds and smell of the sea. Hence, the creation of his debut LP, Dwellers of the Seabed - a seamless union of undulating soundscapes and punchy techno, for which Stones Taro relied on Ableton Live’s native effects to help imbibe the music with a sense of aquatic authenticity.

What music did you listen to while growing up in Wakayama, Japan?

I’m a huge fan of Japanese electronic music and have been deeply inspired by many Japanese artists. While I appreciate bands like Yellow Magic Orchestra, I find that I’m more drawn to the sounds of Soichi Terada and Rei Harakami. In fact, I’ve been lucky enough to collaborate with Terada a few times and his music always pushes me creatively. In Japan, there was a boom in electronic beat live performance around the early 2010s, which is when I started going to dance clubs and became interested in making beats myself.

Is that what drew you to ‘90s dance music?

My journey into house, UK garage and jungle began around 2015 thanks to some friends I met at clubs in Kyoto and Osaka. A legendary Japanese electronic music producer from Kansai called Technoman opened my eyes to the incredible world of ‘90s house, especially the Strictly Rhythm label. Given my previous love for Warp Records in my hardcore punk days, it was only natural that I would gravitate towards these genres once I’d started clubbing.

Does Kyoto have its own electronic music scene?

Absolutely. Kyoto has a vibrant and unique music scene and many universities that contribute to building a community of young music creators. My label, NC4K, regularly hosts events at a nightclub in Kyoto called West Harlem; it’s a venue that attracts many talented up-and-coming DJs and producers. While the UK bass and garage scene is still relatively small here, it’s something that I’m passionate about growing.

Did you visit the UK at some point to experience the UK club scene?

I had the opportunity to tour the UK for the first time in October 2023 and performed at some incredible venues including Carpet Shop in South London, Wire in Leeds and Next Door Records in West London. The sound quality at these venues is truly exceptional. I also attended a SUBDUB sound system party, which was a mind-blowing experience that completely redefined my understanding of low-end frequencies. With a sound system like that, sub basslines were as clearly perceptible as synths, drums and vocals, and having never experienced a real sound system it was a real shock for me to experience the sub-bass appearing right in front of me. Since then, I’ve been more conscious of putting sub-bass sounds below 45 Hz in my tracks.

Are any aspects of your music that you would say are defined by Japanese culture?

That’s an interesting question because my music hasn’t been labeled as being particularly Japanese. In fact, my heavy reliance on sub-bass is quite unique in the Japanese electronic music scene.

That said, I think my tracks, which are not too dark or poppy, might be influenced by Japanese electronica. Ultimately though, my heart never leaves jungle and UK garage and house and I believe there’s still room for change within these styles and want to express that in my productions.

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As mentioned, your music has been strongly aligned to club music but your debut LP, Dwellers of the Seabed, is not strictly speaking a club record….

It was quite challenging for me to create a cohesive album that moved across genres. I’d wanted to make an album for years, but never reached the stage where I felt my tracks were album-worthy in terms of my production style. It’s been a longstanding struggle, so to resolve it I decided to establish a clear concept upfront and make music based on that. To make the concept behind Dwellers of the Seabed a reality I spent a lot of time learning about the sea. By reading books and visual dictionaries, I tried to create music that expressed the thematic images I’d created in my head. 

You recorded Dwellers of the Seabed in just three months, which is pretty fast for a modern production…

While my beat-making techniques can be replicated by external plugins in other DAWs, Live stands out for having a single default Drum Rack device that’s intuitive to use and has a low CPU load. That allows me to create stress- free and rapid beat arrangements and I think that’s very important for producers like me who don’t have a high-spec computer. Wouldn’t it be a tragedy if great creative ideas could not be fully realized simply due to the power of a machine?

In more specific terms, how did Drum Rack help streamline your workflow?

Almost all of the drum sounds were meticulously adjusted and arranged that way. After selecting samples for the kick, snare and hi-hats and assembling the basic beats, I adjusted parameters like Transpose and ADSR to make them sound more danceable. For example, I would delay the attack of a hi-hat or kick to soften the beat or apply a slow LFO slightly to the pitch on hi-hats to create subtle variations. I basically arranged the pitch of each sample within Drum Rack to ensure that the ensemble of percussion instruments would make a beat that sounded beautiful.

You’re also a fan of Ableton’s Spectral Resonator…

For the track "Sand Testing", I used the Spectral Resonator’s granulator sound on a pad in the latter part of the break section. By slowly extending the Spectral Resonator’s decay while decreasing the transpose parameter, I was able to create a sound that’s akin to lots of small stars falling. I felt that this resulted in a really stimulating and impressive effect and it’s a trick I’d like to use extensively on future productions.

You grew up in Wakayama, which is on Japan’s easterly coast. Was the sea something you missed and therefore a solution to your conceptual ideology?

Right now the sea is very far away from me in Kyoto so, yes, I did miss the sound of the waves and the sea breeze. It was only when I grew up that I realized how wonderful that was and I wanted to express that, so the title track has some interesting samples - the sound of water in particular. I got the whale and bubble sounds from a Japanese web shop that sells sound effects for movies and dramas, then I used a combination of whale calls, bubbling sounds and electronic glitches to create the underwater atmospheres.

The track "Harvest" features recordings of your two-year-old daughter. Was that planned?

At the time, my daughter was practising her chattering just before bedtime every night and the ‘babbling’ sounded so lovely that I secretly recorded it with a Tascam audio recorder. From that moment, I planned to use this wonderful babbling in my own songs. It has no meaning, but it has a linguistic groove and when I put delay and reverb on the recording and overlaid it with the intro to "Harvest" I felt moved but also found that it fitted the concept of an undersea culture or different language. Of course, when she grows up, I will give her a share of the proceeds! 

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Text and interview: Danny Turner