Shin Sasakubo grew up listening to blasts of dynamite scar the slopes of Mount Buko and echo across his small town every day at half past noon.
But it wasn't until the guitarist returned from Peru, where he studied Andean music, that he understood the significance of what was happening to the pyramid-shaped mountain considered a sacred symbol of the mountain-ringed basin in Saitama Prefecture known as Chichibu, some 70 km northwest of Tokyo.
"For us children the explosions were like bells signaling lunchtime," he said. "Little did I know back then that we were witnessing the execution of an object of worship."