Hikashu are a legendary prog/avant-pop band fronted by Koichi Makigami. They’ve been around since 1978 (35 years!!) and were influential in the 80s as part of the new wave boom in Japan. Although they achieved mainstream success as a ‘new wave pop’ band and signed with major label EMI Records, since inception they have always pushed the boundaries of music with new ideas and sounds.
Have a peek here for their official biography in English.

I had the chance to see them at last year’s Fuji Rock Festival. Hikashu are good friends with チャラン・ポ・ランタン (Charan-Po-Rantan) and Charan-Po-Rantan have performed on stage as support singers for Hikashu… numerous times… including at Fuji Rock.
Here they are together during a show at Daikanyama Unit:

note: Momo and Koharu don’t appear until the 4:21 mark.

So if you like the quirkiness of Charan-Po-Rantan, the improvisation of Zoobombs and the jaw-dropping musical skill of NATSUMEN then Hikashu might be right up your alley.

Hikashu play in Toronto on May 14 @ the Garrison (1197 Dundas St W)
WHAT?!! That’s just three days before NMFT5 show #1 at the Rivoli (May 17)!!!!
I am going to be ridiculously busy prepping for our own tour & doing interviews but I am going to do my best to make it to the Garrison on the 14th.
Online tickets to NMFT5 (May 17) have all sold out! (Thank you guys!!!!) So I’ll try to bring a few printed tickets from my own limited stash to sell (maybe give a few away) at the Hikashu show.

Hikashu are a great band!
If you only have time and money for one show in May… see NMFT 5 on the weekend!
If you only have time and money for two shows… see both NMFT5 shows on the weekend (Fri & Sat!)
If you have time and money for three shows or NMFT5 is already sold out or if you think NMFT is plain bollocks… then GO SEE HIKASHU!!!!!

And hold the press!!
Hikashu will also be performing in Ottawa May 15 @ the National Arts Centre
and May 17 @ the Festival des Musiques du Création and May 18 @ Festival International de Musique Actuelle de Victoriaville.

May 14, 2013 – The Garrison, Toronto www.garrisontoronto.com
May 15, 2013 – National Arts Centre, AB Series, Ottawa abseries.squarespace.com
May 17, 2013 – Festival des Musiques du Création, Jonquière www.sagamie.org
May 18, 2013 – Festival International de Musique Actuelle de Victoriaville, Victoriaville fimav.qc.ca

and

Vancouver last year and you can check out the footage he documented on his page on vimeo.

He’s an extremely busy guy but still managed to take the time to create a trailer for NMFT 5 (and he did it for free!)

Show some love for Rob by giving his vid the thumbs up and buy him a beer if you see him at the Toronto shows in May.
And please help us promote the tour by spreading the promo vid on Facebook, twitter, and anywhere people who might be interested in the tour might lurk.

Thanks in advance!
and props to Rob for another great promo vid!!

Since mouse on the keys are headlining the tour I wanted to design a t-shirt focussed on them and their love of architecture.
I visualized Tokyo’s buildings forming a piano and searched the net for images/graphics that came close to what I had in mind.
A designer on Threadless created a T-shirt with a piano skyline. I decided I’d take this general design but make the skyline look like Tokyo’s and add a mouse scurrying along top to manifest: mouse on the keys & Tokyo’s architecture.

I suck at graphic design so I asked my friend Jess to breathe life into my creative vision. Unfortunately we weren’t quite on the same page.

A professional designer in Vancouver then had a go at it and created a poster based on my idea.
He nailed the Tokyo skyline using famous skyscrapers in Western Shinjuku… however, the buildings did not form a piano keyboard which was the crucial part of the design. Instead, he separated the keyboard from the skyline. It looks great but it’s even further away from my vision compared to Jess’ attempt.

So I took the Tokyo buildings from the Vancouver poster, inverted the colours, created a keyboard out of them, and added a mouse.
Et voila:

Right now my friend Sheldon is working on making this into a T-shirt.
He’s already cleaned up my design a little bit and vectorized it.

The back’s not done yet. I want to keep it simple with the NMFT vol 5 logo, the tour dates, the bands and the NMFT url.
Sheldon doesn’t know Japanese at all and doesn’t have any Japanese fonts so I had to create something on Photoshop for him to play around with:

Sheldon’s pretty busy and I’m not sure how he intends to do something stylish with the back.
I have confidence in him, but there’s no harm in asking people here to lend a hand in designing the back of the shirt.

So if you have some free time and would like to help design the back of the shirt with the following:

1. NMFT vol 5
2. tour dates
3. bands
4. url

that would help me out a lot.
Hell, if you think you can improve on the front design with the piano skyline, go ahead with that too.

Also, to make the T-shirt design economical, please use just red, white and black as the colors.

Thanks in advance!

Kotaro’s sister Hikaru plays bass in deroppy doroppy. They both live at home with their parents and their house is a 30 min drive from Narita Airport but waaaaaay out in the boonies in the middle of a small forest.

The house is almost impossible to find even with GPS and a map and the closer you get to the house the more narrow and treacherous the roads get. Oftentimes guests who come to Kura Fes take a train to Narita Airport but rely on Kotaro’s dad to pick them up at the airport for a drive to the Matsuda estate. Kotaro’s dad must make 8 or more return trips to and from Narita Airport (30 min drive each way x 8 = 8 hrs!!) in one day every single time Kotaro throws a Kura Fes.

The shed itself is somewhat dilapidated and big enough to hold at most 30 people. So with up to eight bands participating there usually isn’t enough room to fit everyone in the shed. Here are a couple photos that show what the inside of the shed is like in between sets when it’s more or less empty:

Kotaro’s mom is famous for making tremendously delicious curry. She spends hours on end making both traditional Japanese style curry as well as Thai green curry in volumes enough to feed about 40 people throughout the day/night. Even though both versions are vegetarian I would have to say Mrs Matsuda’s Thai green curry may be the best damn curry I’ve eaten anywhere… for sure the best curry eaten at a music festival.

Thai green curry on left, Japanese on right… and Ajima from matashita89 in right corner playing with kittens.

Tani-さん from otori getting his Thai green curry on.

I couldn’t see otori’s last show so I was glad I met Tani before he left for Kyoto.

Here’s Toshi of ランランランズ　playing a comedic acoustic set during one of the breaks between band performances in the Kura.

The “むかつく” irritated as f*ck expression on matashita89 Ajima’s face is priceless. I guess she’s not a fan of ランランランズ

Here was the schedule for Kura Fes vol 20:

And here’s some video footage of the bands:

I was late for the start of Kura FES and グーミ delayed their set as much as possible just for my sake. I had to get picked up from the airport by Kotaro’s dad (along with the band サーティーン）and we made it just in time for goomi’s last song… one of my favorites: ”50年”

ahme put on an incredibly tight, impressively technical set with a lot of emotion. Unfortunately I didn’t get good footage of them from my vantage point in the uber-cramped storehouse.

1000 pounds’ emo-tinged punk got the crowd moving:

あいつのアフォーダンス (Aitsu no Affordance) were good when I saw them the night before at Shinjuku Nine Spices, but at Kura FES they absolutely KILLED it!!!

Unfortunately, I had to leave Kura FES early in order to return to Tokyo for NATSUMEN who were playing at Shibuya o-nest.
But before I left I got a photo with Shinmen from Happy!Mari who had just arrived at Kura FES. Both Tobita (グーミ) and I were proudly wearing Happy!Mari T-shirts.

Kotaro’s dad drove me back to Narita Airport… and picked up someone else who was on his way to Kura FES. lol.

A music festival in a tiny shed inside a forest in the middle of nowhere with a small group of close-knit bands and friends playing loud, soulful music while drinking ice cold beer and eating delicious curry makes for a magical atmosphere that is UNBEATABLE. It was easily one of the best music events I’ve ever been to!

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From Narita airport I booked it by train as fast as I could to Shibuya o-nest where BP. were holding their record release show. NATSUMEN and ATATA were the opening bands and my main reason for going was definitely to watch NATSUMEN.

ATATA performed first. I would describe their sound as a fusion of electronica and funk metal. I can respect them for having been around for ~20 years and sticking to their core sound but unfortunately their style of music despite being loud and energetic doesn’t quite mesh with my tastes.

NATSUMEN batted 2nd and hit it out of the park with everyone in attendance in a state of nirvana and awe. These guys are the funkiest, most badass band on the planet and their music would be pure bliss even at 150 dB.
I couldn’t take any video but this was their setlist for the night:

1. Whole Lotta Summer
2. newsummerboy
3. No Reason up to the Death
4. new song (off the upcoming album)
5. Semi (off the upcoming album)
6. Natsu no Mujina

Everyone bugged AxSxE about when the new album would be released but he was equivocal. The album was fully recorded well before they came to Canada for NMFT3 (Oct 2011) but AxSxE is unhappy with the mixing/mastering and wants it absolutely perfect before the new album/CD is pressed.

Kura FES was such a fresh, fun and exciting experience and watching NATSUMEN was a perfect way to cap off the night.

After NATSUMEN, I watched a bit of BP., chilled a bit with the NATSUMEN massive, caught up with Yoshida of Zazen Boys and then met up with my brother, and my friends Sharon and Ryotaro to have a late dinner at Tonchang.

Mariko Goto (ex-ミドリ) actually took these pics of me and AxSxE. AxSxE was about to tell me something big when Mariko said “No! You can’t tell him yet!” I don’t know what the big secret is but I hope it’s something along the lines of a ミドリ reunion. I doubt it but would love for that to be the case.

We need a Tonchang in Toronto!

戰車倶楽部
Sensha Kurabu (Tank Club) is a 4-pc band from Saitama that plays psychedelic rock with a touch of prog. Apparently they are JoJO’s Bizzare Adventure fanatics since the 2nd guitarist was wearing a Killer Queen T-shirt and they had a Killer Queen figure displayed at the front of the stage.
I was a bit late for the start of the show and missed the first half of their set but the 2-3 songs I did see them perform showed plenty of technical chops and raw power akin to another band from Saitama: Rin Toshite Shigure.

The following clip is from a different show:

(I actually do have a short clip of my own from the show but haven’t uploaded it yet)

Happy!Mari
These guys were the best new band I saw my entire trip. The first time I heard about Happy!Mari was when グーミ invited them to play at an アングラポップたち event (?vol 11) some time in 2010. It was one of those nights where I went to multiple shows so I never saw Happy!Mari play back then but during the uchiage (afterparty) Kobata Ryogo of goomi kept telling me how awesome Happy!Mari are and that they represent the future of Underground Pop. So obviously I checked out whatever clips they had on Youtube at the time:

Hmm… mellow… whiny… emo.. not really my cup of tea. So despite Ryogo showering the band with all manner of praise, I didn’t make it a priority to see Happy!Mari play live.
However, I’d bump into Happy!Mari’s singer Yoshifumi Shinmen a lot at shows and we became friends. I promised I’d check out his band but would always show up late just missing them whenever they played. At Fuji Rock, the most awkward moment was when Kotaro (of Deroppy Doroppy) and Shinmen (Happy!Mari) were lined up behind me waiting to get into an onsen. I didn’t feel like getting naked with these guys so I jetted to a different onsen with my friends Ikuko (Merpeoples) and Lana. hahaha.

So on Dec 21, 2012 I finally got to see Happy!Mari play live and they blew my f*cking mind! What the hell?!! How come nobody told me they were so freaking good?!
Oh wait, Ryogo did 2 years ago! BUT, the fact is Happy!Mari have completely changed their sound to one that is heavier, more technical, more aggressive and dancier.

The best song they played was the first one, which I unfortunately didn’t film since I was too busy picking my jaw up from the ground.
But here are clips of “Giant Song” (the ending is SICK!)

and “Berlin 1979″

There are better looking clips of these songs here and here but the audio is fuzzier.

I was expecting slow, whiny emo but Happy!Mari took me by surprise and tore me a new a-shole. These clips don’t do the band justice and they’re a lot more badass watching the performances in person.

Rintaro (drummer of aquarifa) stopped by just to watch Happy!Mari and then bolted soon after. He also thinks Happy!Mari are a great, f*cking band and is inviting them to play at his birthday party event “Rintaro Night” on Jan 11 @ Shimokita ERA.

Happy!Mari are also in the final four of a battle of the bands competition held by Space Shower TV.
Coincidentally, along with their best friends:

デロッピードロッピー
Deroppy Doroppy is a 3-pc band from Chiba with brother & sister Matsuda Kotaro & Hikaru on drums and bass and Tominaga Mayuko on Gt/Vo.
They sound like a garage version of a Chatmonchy-Mass of the Fermenting Dregs hybrid. Their music is very raw and the singing is far from pitch perfect but I like them. Since they’re best friends of goomi, I’ve come to know them quite well and I’m biased in wanting to support them.
Kotaro and Hikaru’s family live in the middle of nowhere, in a rustic house within a forest about 30 min drive away from Narita airport.
I mention this because Kotaro curates his own music festival called 蔵フェス (Kura Fes) which he holds inside his family’s garage.. in the middle of nowhere, Japan.
Kura Fes is one of the best music experiences you can have bar none and I’ll explain more in the next post.

Here’s a clip of Deroppy Doroppy from アングラポップたち vol.15

As mentioned, both Deroppy Doroppy and Happy!Mari are finalists in the Space Shower TV contest and they had some fun trash talking each other during emcee breaks.

Shinmen (Happy!Mari): “So we made it to the finals of a Space Shower TV band tournament and the finals are held at Shibuya WWW on January 14. Some other band called Deroppy.. something or another also made the cut but you only need to watch us.”

Mayuko (Deroppy Doroppy): “So we’re in the finals for Space Shower TV… and so is Happy!Mari… but I heard their singer died or something.”

hahaha! Hopefully one of these two bands manages to win the competition and we’ll find out in another 8 days if Underground Pop can score a victory.

あいつのアフォーダンス
Aitsu no Affordance are a 3-pc band from the northern prefecture of Iwate. The band members translate their name to “Your Affordance” but it’s probably closer to “dude over there’s affordance” since the word “aitsu” has very crass/rude connotations. For a band with only three members they manage to create a powerfully HUGE sound with chaotically lovely guitarwork. They were pretty good at アングラポップたち but they absolutely KILLED IT during Kura Fes the next day so just wait until the next post to sample some video footage.

グーミ
This is indie music at it’s finest. goomi will never make it big in the mainstream market but in my mind their music stands heads and shoulders above 99% of the crap that’s heard on the radio.

Here’s a brand new song (played live for the first time so it’s still rough around the edges)

And an electrifying performance of “Suncatcher” where Ryogo sings the latter portion of the song hanging upside down from the ceiling:

This show restored my faith that even though the quality of music has seemed to nosedive in recent years throughout the world, there’s still lots of great bands that are new and unknown waiting to be discovered, especially in Japan.

タニさん (Takawa Tani) was one of the founding members of otori but unfortunately he’s leaving the band to return to his hometown of Kyoto.
His last performance with otori was on Dec 31, 2012 @ Akiba Goodman.
I really wanted to go this show but had to leave Japan on the 30th, so big thanks to hayashinshin for posting the above video on Youtube!

タニさん! Best of luck with your new band and all your endeavors!

My first time watching OUTATBERO was almost exactly a year ago when they played with VELTPUNCH @ Kyoto Metro on Dec 19. OUTATBERO’s music is difficult to describe but they take the softer melancholic sound of Radiohead, mix in the technical prowess of Zazen Boys and occasionally crescendo with the chaotic power of Rin Toshite Shigure.
I didn’t take any footage but here’s a youtube clip if you’re curious as to how they sound:

uri gagarn is the emo/post-punk band that cp fronted before he started group_inou. Although I’ve seen group_inou plenty of times it was my first opportunity to see uri gagarn perform live.
The highlight of the set was easily when they played “Resistor”

The live version is even more intense and I wish I had taken video footage. I thought Shimokita GARDEN was one of those places where they strictly prohibit filming but when I saw a couple other people take out digicams I decided to at least film uri gagarn when they played a new song:

uri gagarn was supposed to finish before Chiaki Sato of Akai Koen started her set at nearby Tag Cafe but Chiaki went on ahead of schedule!
I only caught the last song “MAT BLUE” which was the song Maisa composed for the collaboration between Akai Koen and NATSUMEN. This simple acoustic version actually sounded a lot better than the original.
Naoちゃん, Akai Koen’s drummer, made a guest appearance playing keyboards for this song.

Although I only made it for the last song, Nakaさん reviewed Chaiaki’s performance in his blog.

Setlist:

1. ナルコレプシー
2. ナンバーシックス
3. Let It Be （The Beatles）
4. MAT BLUE （keyboard: Utagawa Nao）

WHAT?!!! She sang “Narcolepsy” !!!!
In order for me to listen to Akai Koen’s music before inviting them onto NMFT4′s roster, their old manager gave me an unreleased demo which is 1000x better than any of Akai Koen’s official CD releases.
One of the songs on this demo is “ナルコレプシー” It’s a very simple track, but one of my favorites.
Number Six is also one of my fave songs so now I’m kinda pissed I missed out.

If you don’t already know, tricot and Akai Koen are rivals but very close friends with each other.
The members of tricot (minus Komakiさん) came out to watch and support Chiaki at Tag Cafe.
(In fact Chiaki was a special guest performer at tricot’s show earlier this month at Shibuya WWW)

tricot are too busy in May for NMFT5 but I talked to Ikkyu about October 2013 where I’ll try my best to bring Akai Koen and tricot together. That would be badass but still just in the planning stages and nowhere near official since Akai Koen might be too busy in October.

That’s AK’s bassist Hikari covering her face with bear mittens. Naoちゃん was away when we took this photo.

After Chiaki’s set I headed over to a house near Sangenjaya where チーナ and friends were having an okonomiyaki party.
I came pretty late so some people had left but one of the guests that stuck around was Sensei of Tokyo Karankoron. I thought it was going to be awkward because, just like tricot, Tokyo Karan Koron was one of the bands I invited to NMFT4 but didn’t end up putting on the final roster. Actually, the worst part is that I never responded to the emails Sensei sent me (I corresponded with their manager instead).

But Sensei was really nice and told me that was all in the past.
Right now Tokyo Karan Koron is signed to Avex Trax and are becoming pretty huge. They are going to hold a one-man show at Akasaka Blitz next year. Unfortunately, their sound has changed and they are much poppier than ever before. What I liked about them was the quirkier, noisy, unpredictably chaotic side they included in their brand of underground pop but they’ve trimmed that away for mainstream appeal.

Sensei also performs as a solo artist and lots of people tell me her solo performances are well worth checking out.

The okonomiyaki tasted fantastic and so did the chawanmushi loaded with seafood.

Sensei brought a Laputa (Castle in the Sky) themed Karuta card game.

I only knew about the more traditional and complicated version of Karuta from watching the anime Chihayafuru:

But instead they played a simplified version where all you had to do was look for the card corresponding to the first hiragana letter of the poem read by the narrator. I didn’t play but everyone else had a lot of fun:

Sensei has the cutest Kansai-ben and accent.

So I was worried since the Zankyo Christmas party, concert at Shimokita Garden/Tag Cafe, and チーナ’s okonomiyaki party all overlapped but I managed to make all three!

There wasn’t much going around live-music wise that I was interested in so I thought I’d check out fuyusuruneko with low expectations. Fuyuneko were playing at Shibuya 乙 (Kinoto) and they were the 2nd band up.
The fact that they use Canadian band Death From Above 1979′s “Romantic Rights” for their stage entrance music caught my ear and I gave them props for that.

Overall fuyuneko’s music didn’t veer off much from my expectations of an all-girl band playing emo-tinged alt-rock. But they were much better musicians than I expected and they showed glimpses of angular melodies/rhythm and rawness/dissonance that gave their music some edge. I also like the fact both guitarist Kyon and bassist Ichiru can sing lead, alone or in tandem.

So I enjoyed fuyusuruneko’s set a lot more than I thought I would. They’re an extremely new/young band who are reasonably skilled for their age and have potential to approach the success of a band like tricot in a couple years. Especially if they can be creative with music in ways that stray from the standard girl rock bands like SCANDAL, Stereopony etc.
The other reason I’m being quite supportive of this band is because they told me they came and watched Next Music from Tokyo vol 3 in January @ Shindaita FEVER.

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2012.12.19 木村カエラ (Kimura Kaela) / toe / stim / Shigekazu Aida / BRAZILLIANSIZE / Frontier Backyard @ Ebisu LIQUIDROOM

I am going to be honest and admit that I used to like Kimura Kaera’s music quite a bit but I hadn’t been to one of her shows in 3 years. My main mission tonight was to talk to toe’s manager about taking part in NMFT5 or in future tours. To do this I didn’t even have to watch the show since at LIQUIDROOM there is free access to the upstairs floor where bands sell merchandise.
However, I did want to see toe play live and it would be nostalgic watching Kimura Kaela perform again. (note: I did see Kimura Kaela this summer at Rock in Japan but from really far away while transiting between Zazen Boys and Akai Koen’s performances.)
Unfortunately, tickets were already sold out and I didn’t buy tickets in advance.
Oh well. So I headed upstairs and managed to find members of toe who directed me to their manager.
My right-hand man, Geoff, had emailed them about NMFT5 and toe’s manager had some interest in coming to Canada especially since they are touring the US next year. However, they would need time to think about it, could not commit to anything and would send Geoff a response later on.
Mission completed.
I was on my way out of Ebisu LIQUIDROOM when I ran into Kenji Kakizawa of NATSUMEN. It turns out he was playing trumpet for Shigekazu Aida tonight. When he found out I didn’t have tickets for the show he talked Kimura Kaela’s manager into putting me on the guest list. Kimura kaela’s manager also asked me to consider another band he manages called レムチャップ for a future NMFT tour. I actually looked into レムチャップ earlier this year because they played at Eternal Rock City. They’re a bit too poppy like ねごと for my tastes but I told him I’d keep an eye out for them.
Surprisingly, toe were the first band to play and they only had time for 3 songs?!
The final song was “Goodbye” where Kimura Kaela joined toe onstage to provide vocals.

(note: this clip is with Asako Toki from the CUT dvd. I didn’t take any video footage from tonight’s show)
Most of the audience came primarily to watch Kimura Kaela so it was great to see almost the entire crowd cheer and give a ton of appreciation for her drummer’s band.
In fact, all the bands tonight consisted of bands Kimura Kaela’s support musicians normally play in.

Nakamura Keisaku has two “main” bands: kowloon and stim. But he also has side project bands like WUJA BIN BIN and Hotel New Tokyo. This is on top of being the keyboard player for toe, sgt. and of course, Kimura Kaela.
I’ve met and hung out with Keisaku before at sgt’s shows but I never knew he had such a great sense of humor. His banter during the emcee breaks had the crowd in stitches and when performing during Kimura Kaela’s set he jumped up onto one of the amps and started dancing. Totally out of character from the somewhat quiet Nakamura-san I’m used to seeing.

At the show I ran into Akashi Koji of sgt and his wife. We spent most of the time in the lobby chatting and drinking since we didn’t have a huge interest in watching the other bands outside of toe, stim and Kimura Kaela.

At the end of the show they gave away some sort of present to all the attendees. I have no idea what it is but they look like mini tissue boxes:

Although I don’t know most of Kaela’s newer material, she put on an energetic and entertaining show and I’m glad I had the opportunity to see her live again.

Last month at the Neutral Nation music festival, as soon as I arrived I headed to the main stage to watch envy who were great but on the outdoor tent stage, jizue were playing and at least half a dozen people (Jessica, Ymane aka substance, Yukako Shiba of chiina, sgt’s manager Kitazawa, my friend and show organizer Haruna… to name a few) highly recommended this band.
I had come across jizue’s music in the past on youtube and didn’t pay it much attention but since so many people had great things to say about this band, especially their live performance, I decided to leave envy’s set partway and check out jizue. I’m glad I did. The tent stage was PACKED and I could only watch from the periphery near the back. I couldn’t actually see the band at all, but the sound alone was INTENSE. Not loud and distortion heavy but clean yet fiercely powerful with more impact than what I had just experienced watching envy. Current youtube videos of jizue don’t do them justice and apparently it’s just recently this year that their live performance dramatically improved. I talked with the band about coming to Canada and if things don’t work out with Mouse on the Keys or haisuinonasa, jizue would be a more than adequate replacement. However, I’ve only seen them play two songs in which I didn’t even have a view of the band so I’d like to see an entire set by them before making any kind of commitment. That’s why I was choked that I wouldn’t be able to see them play with tricot tonight.

BTW, I still haven’t heard back from tricot about NMFT5 so they’re obviously miffed about being dropped unceremoniously from NMFT4′s roster earlier this year. I’ll try to approach them with the offer again but it would have been ideal to talk to them in person (mainly the manager) at the show in Shiga.

Anyhow, getting to Shiga U-Stone for tricot/jizue was impossible so I went to Kichijoji WARP to watch ハラフロムヘル (harafromhell) instead. One of Maisa (Akai Koen)’s favorite bands, Bell Boy, also played tonight.

As always, harafromhell were solid but not as outstanding as when I first saw them. I guess I was disappointed it was the third show in a row where they didn’t play my favorite song: “東京昆虫博物館.” I have yet to see it played live in person or even on Youtube! However, this band plays with so much passion and energy every time they hit the stage it’s practically impossible for me not to root for their success. It was also nice to see their old bassplayer, AGO, come to the show and support the band from the audience.
Bell Boy are a fairly new band with a very emotionally intense guitar/vocalist. Their bassplayer is exceptionally good and although they primarily play garage-punk they’re a bit more technical than the average punk band.
はこモーフ also performed tonight. They’re very similar to Chatmonchy and I’ll leave it at that. The singer also plays in another band called Zippers with the guitarist from thai kick murph.

I was feeling tired/jetlagged so I left the show early but stopped by Nakamoto and challenged myself by eating their spiciest level of ramen: the infamous 北極ラーメン (North Pole ramen).

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2012.12.15 I met up with a fan of NMFT from Toronto who is staying in Tokyo for a year. His name is Hirokazu and like me is of Japanese descent but born and raised in Canada. He’s a huge fan of Akai Koen so it sucks that Akai Koen have been on indefinite hiatus since September and won’t be playing shows again for the next few months.
We watched a show curated by Hipland Music entitled HighApps vol.9.

But before that we checked out Zankyo Records.

Hirokazu, Tabata and I spent over an hour talking about bands. Then it was nearly time for the show so we had a quick bite to eat at *cough* TGIFridays *phlegm* and booted it to Shibuya WWW in time for Kinoko Teikoku who were the first band up.

Kinoko Teikoku’s setlist:

1. 退屈しのぎ
2. new song
3. new song
4. ミュージシャン
5. 夜が明けたら

Hirokazu was enamored by Kinoko Teikoku’s performance. I enjoyed it too but the set was too short (only 5 songs!) and the tone was excessively dark, earnest and brooding.
They didn’t play any of their more melodic, up-tempo songs like “WHIRLPOOL” or “国道スロープ”
Also, recently they seemed to have stopped playing “足首” which is easily the most awe-inspiring song in their discography so I’ll make sure they play it if/when they come to Canada. A-chan (lead Guitar) normally so loquacious you can’t get her to shut up didn’t even say a word the entire set. However, Chiaki’s beautifully haunting vocals alone are worth the price of admission and when they go into beast-mode with their face-melting wall of noise, the two in combination is priceless.

It’s just my assumption but Kinoko Teikoku may have purposely played a set darker and more serious than usual to contrast themselves from the three shiny, happy bands who were to follow.

パスピエ are a 5-pc band with female singer that has a cute, nasally voice like Yuki. The band is actually very skilled, particularly the bassplayer. Fans of soutaiseiriron seem to gravitate to this band as well.
I checked out some of their music on Youtube prior to the show and it seemed “fluffy” but they’re actually edgier than I expected.
They seem to have a decent fanbase that was well represented at today’s audience and the crowd got a lot livelier compared to Kinoko Teikoku. Having said that, Hirokazu and I snuck out halfway to sit down and drink some of Sapporo’s finest.

If you don’t count Perfume, BiS was my first exposure to watching an idol group perform live. Although, according to friends Ryotaro and Niwata, BiS are more of an anti-idol group whose appeal crosses over to the indie hipster crowd.
Verdict: They were surprisingly entertaining. Actually, the crowd reacting, choreographed dancing, crowdsurfing, throwing their shirts off as a display of affection etc was an even greater spectacle than what transpired on stage. It was one big, silly dance party with four plain-looking girls lip-synching on stage and a legion of predominantly male fans going berserk down below.
I totally comprehend the appeal of idol groups and their music towards the “otaku” demographic and even the general public as a whole but it’s disheartening to see the lack of appreciation directed towards artists and bands that put considerably more effort into honing their skill and talent as true musicians.

Even though BiS are tongue-in-cheek in their”idolness” with a more DIY, down to earth character than their AKB and Kpop peers, I can’t really appreciate a group that doesn’t write any of their own music and lip synchs on stage. Idol groups are essentially back-up dancers pretending to sing and getting paid to look pretty and I don’t see how that should merit any of my time and attention when there are hard-working bands making music with much greater substance.

Sebastian X were the main act. They are incredibly skilled and polished as musicians. The music is festive and cheery to an almost absurd degree and they crank up the volume LOUD. Manatsu has an inhumanly powerful voice with great range for someone of such diminutive stature. They put on an intense show but all of their songs fall into three categories: “genki” “more genki” and “full-on maximum genki” Most of the crowd didn’t mind and thoroughly enjoyed the performance. Hirokazu liked Sebastian X quite a lot too but I would have preferred less non-stop jiggy and some more variety in tone/mood.

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2012.12.16 sgt held a one-man show at Shimokitazawa ERA early in the afternoon with wooderd chiarie as the opening act. This is one of the primary shows I was looking forward to on this trip. Narui Mikiko (sgt. violin) and I even made a promise on Facebook that she would stagedive/crowdsurf and I would be the one to catch her and protect her from falling. Another reason I promised to go to this show was to meet Kiyota Atsushi of Mouse on The Keys and discuss their participation in NMFT vol5.
It’s unfortunate timing that otori were also playing at the same time at Sound Studio Dom in Koenji because it was my last chance to see otori before their drummer quits and returns to Kyoto. I contemplated missing the beginning of sgt’s set (they’d be playing for 2+ hours) and watching a bit of otori but decided against it.
wooderd chiarie play mellow post-rock-ish music with vocals. They are a top-notch band but their style of music doesn’t quite fit my tastes. I kept looking at my watch, thinking if I should sneak out to Koenji in time for otori but stayed put.
I’m glad I didn’t because missing even a second of sgt’s powerfully sublime performance would have been the gravest sin. They started off with “cosgoda” followed by “ライマンアルファの森” and played 8 songs in total. Makamura Keisaku (kowloon/toe/wuja binbin/hotel new tokyo) played keyboards, Yuichiro (Natsumen) joined peridically on sax and Kim from uhnellys lent his emcee skills for a rare performance of “Zweiter Weltkrieg.” Again the highlight for me was the last song during which they played my favorite: “銀河を壊して発電所を創れ.” This is also when Mikiko decided to put down her violin and crowd surf:

Of course I couldn’t catch her and continue filming. I wish someone could have documented her awesome crowdsurfing antics on film for posterity.

Here are some more clips of sgt (click on title for hyperlink)

setlist:
1. cosgoda
2. ライマンアルファの森
3. 囚人達のジレンマゲーム
4. 再生と密室
5. ? (forgot the name of this song)
6. きみは夢をみている夢がきみをみている
7. Zweiter Weltkrieg
8. 銀河を壊して発電所を創れ

They played one song for an encore and I suck because I forget which song it was (it’s an obscure one… at least that’s my excuse).

sgt KILLED IT. Absolutely breathtaking performance that ranks as one of the best shows I’ve seen in my life. I was standing right up front and sgt played for over 2 hours and it went by so quickly that I would have liked two hours more.

Kiyota Atsushi of Mouse on The Keys never did show up for sgt’s live but apparently he would show up later during the uchiage. I stayed at the uchiage until 6:30pm when it was time to catch harafromhell a short walk away at Shimokita Daisy Bar.

You would think after sgt, harafromhell would be majorly anticlimactic but they carried the torch magnificently with an ass-kicking set. They basically played the exact same set as at Kichijoji WARP but when they announced they had 3 songs left and proceeded to play アパート銀河, followed by the song they always play last: れない。 I KNEW they were going to make my day and play my favorite song: 東京昆虫博物館

I love Takemaru’s drumming. It’s a little sloppy but incredibly powerful and fast with a ton of character like andymori’s original drummer Goto Hiroki. He went all out playing Renai and for him to follow with an even more exhausting 東京昆虫博物館 took stamina and guts.
Up until this point, the shows had been decent but watching sgt and harafromhell today reminded me how awesome watching shows in Japan can be and why I want to bring such great bands and atmosphere to Canada.

The rest of my schedule looks like this:

15 kinoko teikoku / Sebastian X @ Shibuya WWW
16 sgt @ Shimokita ERA 1500-1800h
16 harafromhell @ Shimokita DAISY BAR 1800
17 gekitetsu one-man @ UNIT
18 fuyusuru neko @ Shibuya Club Z Kinoto
19 Kimura kaela / toe @ Liquidroom
20 uri gagarn / kudanz / outatbero
21 goomi / deroppi doroppi @ Shinjuku 9spices
22 Natsumen / BP ? ATATA @ Shibuya o-nest 1830/1900 Y3000/3500
22 Tengu Invaders / H Mountains @ Shimokita REG
23 haisuinonasa @ Shimokita ERA 1800/1830 Y2500/3000
23 Shimokita Fes curated by Love Ningen
24 chiina / salovers / fukurouzu @ Shimokita GARDEN
25 kinoko teikoku / Young Sounds @ Shindaita FEVER (sold out)
26 goomi @ Shinjuku Motion
26 harafromhell @ Shinjuku Red Cloth
27 rin toshite shigure @ Budokan
27 hinto / cinema staff @ La Mama
28 O’valencia @ FEVER
28 kuruucrew @ Shimokita THREE

I’m not sure I’m going to all these shows and I’m hoping some better ones pop up during my stay.
It’s too bad I have to leave on the 30th since some of the best shows this month occur on the 30th and 31st.

otori’s drummer is leaving or already has left the band so I’m not sure what’s going on with their shows this month.

Alright I gotta go. Heading to Shibuya to meet with Hirokazu, shop at Zankyo, eat dinner and watch きのこ帝国. Sebastian X and some idol group called BiS are also playing.
This will be my first ever show watching an idol group. I feel somewhat tainted.
I guess if kinoko go on before BiS we could just leave early.