It was just reported on the official Der Eisenrost fb page, that Chu Ishikawa the internationally renowned industrial music legend died on the 21st of December. While he was mostly known for his soundtracks, Ishikawa, born in 1966, was actually a key player in Japan’s industrial and experimental music scene. Back in the mid-80s he was part of the short-lived Zeitlich Vergelter, an “alternative metal percussion unit” which, besides some compilation appearances, only released one 7″ single, but is considered by many to be Japan’s first industrial band. He resurfaced as a solo musician writing soundtrack for Shinya Tsukamoto‘s first feature film, the extreme visionary masterpiece Tetsuo in 1988. The revolutionary film was released the following year and it quickly became a huge cult hit worldwide not in small part thanks to its perfectly fitting noisy and apocalyptic soundtrack. Since then Tsukamoto became a very successful director and Ishikawa scored almost all of his subsequent movies, along with a couple of other films including two by another cult director Takashi Miike.

Shorty after Tetsuo he formed a new band called Der Eisenrost that released an album on its own (Armored Weapon in 1995), worked on the soundtrack of a game called Phantom Crash and Tsukamoto’s Tokyo Fist and remained an active live act, performing its latest show on 2016.07.23 at Tokyo’s Earthdom, alongside Ruins Alone, The Sodom Project and Bacteria. The announcement states that he’s been struggling with an illness for a while, but was planning ahead for 2018. He was 51 years old.