Kodokushi (The Lonely Death) is a song that I wrote about the phenomenon of elders dying alone in Japan. Due to its low birth rate, Japan is one of the fastest aging countries in the world. There are not enough young people to take care of the old. Kodokushi is a symptom of the breakdown of the traditional family structure and the consequences of Japan's post-war socioeconomic model.

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I decided to write about this because it particularly struck me as tragic. For people who grew up during the post-war economic miracle, having a lifetime comittment to a job was necessary. Now, due to economic stagnation, many of those people have lost their jobs and now live out the rest of their lives alone in suburban danchis (appartment complexes). I was inspired by reading accounts from both the elderly and the people whose full time jobs are to clean up after lonely deaths. 

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This song was written and produced entirely by me in Garageband. Due to technical problems, the microphone I used was the one attached to my earbuds. I applied my experience with jazz theory in order to write something that fit the mood but was not too melodramatic. Now, while I am a guitarist, I have never claimed I was a singer. My approach for this was to basically do melodic spoken word. I am attaching an instrumental copy of my song so that if anybody can sing and wants to the song justice, they can.

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