Jan Linton

Jan Linton is a singer, musician and producer from Warrington, England, who helped internationalise the music scene in Tokyo, Japan.

Biography

Jan Linton studied violin from the age of four, moving briefly onto piano, before discovering pop music and electric guitar as a teenager. When he was 17 years old, his first synthesizer exploded, leading him to try bass guitar instead.

After graduating from Birmingham University, he left for Japan in January 1990 after encouragement from P-Model's Tatsuya Kikuchi then subsequently Susumu Hirasawa, and secured a recording agreement from King Records after just three days. The project combined electronics with Asian pop and a world music flavour, including a performance by violinist and Chinese Kokyū player Masatsugu Shinozaki (who performed on the soundtrack to "The Last Emperor"). A change in A/R management delayed Linton's first CD, "Oinaru Sekai (TrueNirvana)"; it was finally released at the end of 1992 from Polystar records. The producer also worked with the Japanese boy band SMAP,with the result that the album swung between electro-pop and Asian World Music. The album was sung in ten languages, including Japanese, with a cover version of Kimi ni Mune Kyun by YMO.