Geinoh Yamashirogumi - Ecophony Rinne LP

Label: Time Capsule

One of the most innovative and ambitious albums ever made, Ecophony Rinne by Geinoh Yamashirogumi is a sonic masterpiece featuring more than 200 musicians that pushed the limits of what music and sound could achieve. This edition presents the work beyond the audible realm - the world’s first Hypersonic Effect Audio Enhanced, half-speed mastered vinyl cut at Abbey Road Studios. Includes an 8-page insert, limited initial pressing obi, and hype sticker.

Before Akira, there was Ecophony Rinne. Originally released in 1986, the album is a four-part symphony of “ecological music” that merges ancient traditions with technological innovation, transforming the way we experience sound.

Half-speed mastered at Abbey Road by Miles Showell, Time Capsule’s analogue reissue is the first vinyl edition to reproduce composer Tsutomu Ōhashi’s groundbreaking Hypersonic Effect theory. Frequencies beyond the limits of human hearing are cut directly into the vinyl, capturing the full emotional spectrum of this extraordinary work.

Founded by polymath Tsutomu Ōhashi, also known as Shoji Yamashiro, Geinoh Yamashirogumi was a shapeshifting collective of more than a hundred members drawn from multiple disciplines. Rejecting traditional professional musicianship, Ōhashi encouraged neuroscientists, psychologists, doctors, journalists, engineers, and students to engage in artistic expression and explore ethnomusicological traditions spanning global cultures, Eastern spirituality, and Western classical forms.

Ecophony Rinne represents the pinnacle of this vision - an expansive orchestral suite created with more than 200 performers that channels Ōhashi’s ideas about humanity’s relationship with nature and fundamental questions of life, death, and rebirth.

Pipe-organ synthesizers built from sampled Tibetan horns sit alongside field recordings from Central African forests. Buddhist mantras circle dummy-head microphones, Javanese Jegog percussion ensembles pulse like living ecosystems, and the acoustics of temples, caves, and landscapes resonate throughout the mix. By weaving together culture, nature, and technology, the album vibrates with the polyphony of life on Earth.

The work was also technologically groundbreaking. Observing the difference between vinyl and CD reproductions - where digital formats limited the sound spectrum - Ōhashi developed his Hypersonic Effect theory, suggesting that ultra-high frequencies above 20 kHz can influence human perception even if they are inaudible. Listening to Ecophony Rinne thus becomes both a physical and psychological experience.

Following the album’s release, Ōhashi was invited by director Katsuhiro Ōtomo to create the soundtrack for Akira, the work for which Geinoh Yamashirogumi later became most widely known. Emerging once again into the spotlight, Ecophony Rinne stands as the transcendental blueprint behind that achievement, now reissued in its most complete hypersonic form on vinyl.

Rather than merely describe nature, Ecophony Rinne embodies it. Rather than simply reflect culture, it helps define it. Rather than explore technology, it transforms it. As a work of art, it remains as vital and visionary as ever.