Adroit jazz guitar, prog rock fantasia, and Japanese environmental music all rest comfortably behind Leo Takami\’s Next Door. The follow up to the acclaimed Felis Catus & Silence, Next Door finds Takami ruminating on passagesof time, seasons, consciousness. Through music, Leo contemplates daily events and finds beauty in ordinary moments. He also seems to be questioning the value of being stuck in the world, allowing his mind to wander towards something beyond it. His music is earnest, deeply personal and introspective, and is sort of akin to Rousseaus Reveries of the Solitary Walker or Kenji Miyazawas Night on the Galactic Railroad. On As If Listening Takami takes inspiration from a Van Gogh art show organized chronologically, articulating the sense of enlightened resignation that is intrinsic in the act of creativity. Beyond is a dream of otherworldly nostalgia, a watercolor of past lives. His music is a hazy cinema of memory, the soundtrack to a cherished memory that may have never really happened, but still radiates in the mind like the sun on an unusually warm winter day. TRACKLISTING A1. Letter A2. As if Listening A3. Beyond A4. Winter Day B1. Road with Cypress & Star B2. Spring Snow B3. Next Door B4. Family Tree