Posts Tagged Japan
Shonen Knife | S/t
Shonen Knife Day. They got a new record out. I don’t have it yet. Next paycheck. But time marches on, and with so many horrible things in the world, there’s this band. It’s maybe kinda dumb that there is a Shonen Knife Day. I didn’t say that. Did you say that? I’m glad there’s an excuse to write about them just now, myself. And listen to the album. I’m gonna listen to the album, then write about it, that’s the order of things that I will be doing. Then maybe I’ll listen to it again but that doesn’t concern you.
This is not strictly a real album released by the band. It compiles their first two albums from the early eighties on Zero Records, Burning Farm and Yama-no Attchan and also includes tracks from the Zero comp Aura Music. Apparently these tracks are on the reissue of Burning Farm as well as the K Records cassette so maybe this is too much information. I’ve never bothered getting these other more official versions, but I’ve heard them and they just don’t seem as good to me. I mean the sound quality’s probably better, but I just love how this thing is sequenced. It really feels like one long album; it’s the definitive early history imo. It’s not like breaking up the two albums restores some kind of distinct conceptual arcs, they are just collections of songs they had at the time. And the level of songwriting and recording had yet to progress so it all matches. (They have a technically have a demo album before all this but that is really raw and not that great to listen to.)
The members of the band themselves may disagree but the recordings as they appear on this release are perfect. (They even re-recorded Dali’s Sunflower, I love that one in particular. Maybe there’s a guest on it they can’t credit?) It’s not exactly an Albini-type puritan affair of strictly live recordings, there’s some studio experimentation and sound effects thrown in here and there, but it accurately records (unless it doesn’t, I wasn’t there) what the band was at the time, which is what any band starting out should strive for. Altho I admit when I first heard it I was shocked at the difference in sound from the very modern Rock Animals and polished surf-punk of Let’s Knife, it grew on me pretty fast. It’s like instant nostalgia for something I never experienced before, there’s just a weird mood to it. Right from the version of Watchin’ Girl that sounds like the tape is changing speeds. It’s just as good as the later version but for different, unexplainable reasons. And I could be remembering this wrong, but I think it’s the first album I heard that’s all in Japanese. I remember falling in love with the sound of the language. It has a certain unique rhythm. Supposedly they prefer singing in English because all of their influences do, but before they learned English, they found it way to make their native language fit naturally in this early punk/pop soundscape. (Unusual song topics may have helped.)
Plenty has been written on Shonen Knife’s song topics, but what about that early soundscape? Ramones and Buzzcocks are the obvious precursors whose influence is carried on more or less to today. But here there’s the trebly, minimalist sound of the late-70s girl post-punk like Delta 5, Kleenex/LiLiPUT, maybe even The Slits. There’s an unmistakable reggae vibe to several of the songs which they really never went back to. In their book Shonen Knife Land they each have a top 20 albums list and the closest thing mentioned is a Beat Happening’s You Turn Me On, which is really not that close! That was from departed bassist Michie’s list and I talked about her contribution to the band before. But Naoko tries a lot of weird stuff too on this record: the cartoon industrial of A Day at the Factory, the tribal jam of Burning Farm, the melancholic Bye Bye—obvious album closer that ends Yamo-no Attchan, but the tacked-on Parrot Polynesia with its upbeat island vibe is an even better way to sign off. Seems totally planned.)
A whole generation of SK fans now is probably not familiar with the old stuff and/or just listens to streams and doesn’t care so much about the feel of an album. You are objectively wrong, first of all, that whole system is on it’s way to crashing and burning and does not care about you. Second—there is no second, this is their best early album and you need to listen to all of it.
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ZZZ’s | Invidia
So at the ZZZ’s show the other day I thought I was buying a pre-Prescription demo, but it’s a whole new EP with zero press, so…why not get the jump on everyone else for a change? It’s like old timez.
I never got around to reviewing Prescription…other people reviewed it right? RIGHT?! Holy shit. I think maybe it was only reviewed by blogs that deleted themselves. Stop it with that. This is important.
ZZZ’s are fuckin’ COOL. At some point, many bands’ greatest fear became “trying to look cool” and they in fact did not achieve it. So many boring shows and ugly records, who cares? You can take anything too far, including not taking things Too Far. What is the point if it’s not far enough?
I think the most I’ve said about this band was that their 2nd release, Magnetica, was not as good as the first one. (Which the band retweeted. Not a great start for me.) I’m not sure I take it back or that this new one is better, but I get where they are coming from now. They’re calling all of their releases demos so far, and the physical releases (this one is my first) are very uniquely packaged but self-made CDRs. They seem to be showing off different aspects of what they do. Live it’s pretty seamless; they start with minimalistic, trance-inducing grooves and end with early-Sonic Youth noise-churn guitar freakouts. When they get into a groove it’s like Industrial without the machines which is like Krautrock without the light-heartedness which is like…something.
I just thought of them as a noise rock band, more fashionable than most perhaps. But only Prescription fits that. They are describing themselves now as “Post-punk/No Wave”. I’ve always thought of those terms more describing an era of music more than a style or genre, but it seems to be the thing to do lately. Most of the bands doing this don’t do much for me, tho. It’s usually too slavishly copying the sounds of those bands, but ZZZ’s get into more of the spirit. That’s what Magnetica was about. They abandoned the hooks and did the No Wave uptempo chaotic thing. This new one is “Post”. Which is really pre-descent into permanent self-parody Goth. Yes. But don’t let that frighten you, my friend. Let that free you. Come with me.
For a while now, capital-G Goth has just been about dressing up and going on cruises and group trips to Disneyland. No thanks. ZZZ’s are not about that. ZZZ’s are cool. Old School Cool. They are essentially the musical equivalent of this picture of Meiko Kaji. The backward accusing glance, vaguely threatening, maybe not so vague, the mysterious corridor; lotta black. Monochromatic. Reverberant. Plus the drummer even wears a big hat. (For most of their performance. It’s eventually flung off via the inevitable thrashing, but there’s a slow build. It’s all about tension.) I think the g-word is still a good descriptor but you can’t blame people from avoiding association with such a campy sub-culture if they’re not about it. But all-black dresses with gauzy sleeves and ankhs is kinda goth. It can be said.
So, I like this record a lot. It could be the soundtrack to a horror movie that takes place entirely in a dark, wet basement. Where nothing violent happens. It’s psychological horror. Horror isn’t the right word. It’s slow, it’s spooky…it’s goth…goth is the right word, I’m sorry. But I’m not sorry.
I think an unfair comparison might be that they are the goth eX-Girl. Really I’m sure that’s a good comparison, but someone might think it’s unfair, “just because they are a trio of Japanese girls”. Well, they also deal in noisy atonal guitar parts, unique song structures, weird 3-part harmonies, tribal drumming (whole songs go by with nary a snare hit), indecipherable lyrics sung in counterpoint, prominent distorted bass; that’s everything about both these bands. But it’s possible they never heard eX-Girl. The feeling is totally different.
I especially like the bass player’s sound. I took a peek at her pedal set-up (relax) and I should have taken a picture (please) but she seems to be running it through a harmonizer and then through distortion. I forget exactly, but they were modern pedals. It’s a pretty unique setup as far as I know. Funny that J-bands are always accused of copying the sound of a particular genre, but missing the underlying point of it. I actually find the hit-or-miss ratio pretty similar with that of Western bands.
I’m also tempted to compare them to Sleater-Kinney and even more, Cake Like, esp. for the counterpoint thing, which I love. But those bands are further off the mark. The former is earnest and the latter ironic; this band is neither. They are not speaking personal/political truths or taking a clever reactionary stance against other bands. It’s more about constructing a fiction. Gothic fiction, I guess. Give it a chance. It’s not about like, vampires. I’m not sure what’s it’s about except maybe depression, angst, dread, that kinda gothic. Plus they do a lot of the ‘one of them is deadpanning it and the other one is agitated’ thing, but they’re singing about the same experience. Perhaps different forms of PSTD.
The real piece on here is 26/27, which you can easily hear if you google “ZZZ’s Invidia”, but I’m not sure I should post it here. You can hear the whole thing. Yet they haven’t put record on bandcamp or for sale anywhere. This review is totally promotional! Should I get paid for this? I did not get the thing for free. Whatever, just get it when it goes up if you care about that kind of thing. I hope you care about that kind of thing. I care about that kind of thing. I’m just writing this to tell you, the people that care about these things, who are the people that I care about, that this is one of those things you should care about. Are we clear on that? Fine.
So the only really intelligible words in this song are “Boom/Crash/Bam/Bang/What a day/Oh, what a day”. There’s more but I don’t feel print and/or guessing does it justice. I’m assuring you it’s a compelling work but I’m starting to think I might be sounding like a crazy person. Well, I’m not gonna let that bother me. This band might be crazy. Did I mention the guitarist seems to be playing only with her middle finger? I didn’t. She does? I think she does. Maybe she was giving me the finger. They started following me on twitter. I’m a little afraid tbh. It’s a good feeling. I want that in a band.
Anyway, It’s a fine way to end the EP, but then there’s a very anticlimatic instrumental. It’s got a pretty cool ambiance to to it actually. There’s like some drills and a TV in the background, with the skeletal guitar skittering around and the toms thudding. Actually it’s a nice coda. When they put all these pieces together into a full-length it should be Very Cool. %
V/A | Female Fronted Heavy Metal: 1976-1989
So I wrote a few reviews of internet mixtapes some of which after they weren’t available for download anymore. Who knows why I do things? Well, here is a massive multi-volume offering that as of this writing you can actually hear for yourself.
I argue this project is actually more essential than the one that inspired it: Kangnave’s Reference of Female Fronted Punk. (Also amazingly still available, but get on it quick if you haven’t.) Punk is hardly gender-balanced performer-wise, but much more so than Metal, and besides, there’s nothing conceptually about Punk to exclude women, where Metal is commonly seen as realm of the Manly Man and/or the Womanly Man. Often the female voice, when present, is in the form of a backup singer who isn’t even in the band. Recently, we’ve seen Female-led Metal bands like Arch Enemy become hugely successful (in Europe), but it’s important to remember they’ve existed almost since the birth of the genre.
Over a period of a few years (2010-13) the Female Fronted Heavy Metal blogspot added volume after volume to the series, reaching 15 in all. It seems safe to say the project is complete. I’m not sure if it’s fully exhausted every single example because I’m not prepared to do dig further than guy has (it was a guy), but looking for full albums by some of these bands I really like will be work enough for me.
I’m tempted to run down all my favorites but I’ll be here all night. And what’s the point? You’ll find a lot to like yourself, if what you like is Metal. I’m mostly interested in the Japanese bands, I think none of which I had heard of before. Guy’s crawling all-Japanese message boards to find these. There’s even a Korean band. (Only a handful of the American bands were familiar to me: Leather, Bitch, Crisis, 45 Grave, Warlock/Doro, Girlschool, and of course, Heart.) I have mostly gone for stuff from the 90s and later in my general Metal listening (except for the big obvious bands), but the genre gets murky or extreme (if you go for the latter, highly recommend the Hymns to the Dead Goddess podcast). A lot of this old stuff is pretty good. If you’re a fan of the Fenriz mixes, or you’re just…old, you know there’s a lot of good, obscure stuff from the era. (There may even be some overlap.) But some of these bands are really forgotten. Some of the people in these bands probably forgot. This is a public service right here.
The sound quality is decent until disc 8. It’s not all lo-fi after that, but there’s some deep, deep cuts. Vinyl and cassette rips, some warped, some live bootlegs of bands probably formerly only rumored to have existed. Rehearsal tapes? There really should be a book.
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Shonen Knife | Overdrive
So I was listening to this record thinking about how it moves past the usual heavy Ramones influence when the news came about the passing of Tommy Ramone. Just a bummer that has to be acknowledged. But this album starts off with the theme of overcoming bad luck, jinxes and the like. Coincidence? Yes. But what can you do with a Bad Luck Song? The Bad Luck Song might be my good luck song, and so on. Relative bummers continue on this album, with the next track Black Crow and later Robots From Hell. These songs might be a surprise if you haven’t been paying that close attention. That could be some people, right? It’s 2014, perfect time to jump on the SK train. Seriously, why not. You could’ve get hooked on the cute stuff, of which there’s plenty, but they’ve also got some regular good Rock songs. About Rock stuff. Darkness, yeah. And of course, cats, food, shopping and tennis. It’s a very typical Shonen Knife record. I don’t have to praise or defend it too much, because it seems like everyone knows what SK is about and likes them. People must exist that do not like them, but they don’t seem to say anything about it. It almost bothers me. Which is why I’m glad they’ve got some non-cute stuff on this one. This is my favorite one since, I dunno…the last several have had some standout tracks but the rest is forgettable. This one is maybe not a new top tenner, but it’s solid.
Slight disappointment in the fine print (great font, btw) is that the songs sung by Ritsuko and Etsuko (Ramen Rock and Green Tea, respectively) have no shared songwriting credit. Thought the new girls were contributing the lyrics at lyrics at least. They seem a little different then the usual Naoko songs, simpler. She just writes with them in mind apparently. And differently than the last album, Pop Tune. (Which I did not review but talked about how those songs went down live). Things are more stripped down, straight up Rock here, but not simply the typical Ramones worship, but other 70s Rock. No real specific influence comes through anymore; the last few years with a stable line-up seems to have ended a bit of an identity crisis for the band. %
Amazon has the mp3 & CD, of course. Or get it direct from Good Charamel Or get the Purple/Green version on vinyl from Damnably
Shonen Knife | Top 10 Michie Songs
Happy Shonen Knife Day. It’s great that Shonen Knife has kept going for 30+ years and that is all due to main member and primary songwriter Naoko Yamano. Obvs. But for new fans of the band, and for those who don’t read liner notes, it may have been possible that the contributions of former member Michie Nakatani has been overlooked. She’s the George Harrison of the group. Not only because she only had a few songs per album, but she was also important as a player. Although not exactly a prodigy as a bass player or a singer, the group is structured so that the bass is almaboost equal to the guitar. (She also sometimes played keyboard.)
So she was a big part of most of the songs, but some more than others. Thus shall these songs be named “the Michie Songs”.
I trust you, reader. I know if you give a shit you can find whatever album. I’m also tired of putting a bunch of links that no one clicks on. So I’m just going to put one big Amazon link HERE
And heeere’s the top songs that are pretty much all Michie (written and sung):
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Banana Fish
Shonen Knife are famously thought of as being a mostly Ramones-punk band which has in turn inspired other similar bands, but early songs show influences from other girl post-punk bands of the late 70s/early 80s. (Find out more that here.) This song however, comes out of nowhere. As far as I know it has no influence and has influenced no one. Also, the lyrics, unlike Naoko’s which are mostly wonderfully devoid of metaphor, are based partly on the story within a story by J.D. Salinger about a guy that’s kills himself because people are horrible. (That’s what you get with Michie songs. There’s a hidden darkness and ironic self-awareness. Sometimes. -
Catnip Dream
This is the song has some interesting things going on. The chorus has been described as 15/8 but it sounds like alternating bars of 7/4 and 8/4 to me. The harmonized guitar is great and Michie plays the mellotron. And it’s about drugs. Cats talking drugs, right? Ok. There was supposedly another Michie song that was more explicitly about pot that got banned, but I have never been able to find out more about it. Maybe it was just a rumor. This song does seem very free of judgement of the “cat” in question, who unlike most “cats” takes “puffs” of this substance. He is even called “very smart”. Hmm. No, wait, there some cat sounds. Only about cats. -
Animal Song
The is another one that sounds very happy and bouncy but is also weirdly creepy. The refrain “what is this?” perfectly captures the feeling of the listener. There’s a version all in English on the Get the Wow EP. But the lyrics are basically nonsense. She may have been messing with Naoko from the very beginning. Pure speculation. -
Devil House
Altho never mentioned by name, this song retells the plot of the Rocky Horror Picture Show. At least the first half of it. A lesser songwriter would have tried to take you through the whole thing. I like the original Japanese version a little better, but you’d never believe it was literally scene by scene. There’s that generic horror movie soundtrack intro just to throw you offfff…ahg! I just spent an hour trying to look up what that is. Wasn’t it used in a Bugs Bunny cartoon? I can’t find anyone that even mentions that this song contains contains an exact quote of another song, but a million that think it kinda sounds like a Buzzcocks song. Right, the Buzzcocks song that quotes the Bugs Bunny Haunted House episode. One reviewer said that like 20 years ago, it’s not that close. Please leave a comment if you know what I’m talking about. -
Butterfly Boy
Yeah, Thurston Moore plays some guitar on this one. It’s easy to forget because he’s pretty subdued in the final mix. The solo is Michie on keys. It’s sounds a little like she’s saying “Butt Fly”, so what, grow up. -
Fish Eyes
If this song isn’t about eyelid surgery…there’s not really an if. But framed in a Kafkaesque fantasy about literally waking up with giant fish-like eyes and the ensuing internal torment, of course. The kind of Kafkaesque parable of modern angst you expect from…Shonen Knife. I like the old locomotive rhythm. And there’s a nice bridge. -
Johnny, Johnny, Johnny
I used to like how this song came after the Very Metal “Cobra vs. Mongoose”; it’s just gratuitously cheery. But it’s also a pretty good song on it’s own. It’s just so goofy it’s genius. Even if you were fully accepting the whole Shonen Knife package when you put this record on, when you get to this song it’s like you can’t believe what you’re listening to. Shonen Knife is still good and all, but with two writers pushing each other like this it reached amazing levels or ridiculousness in the best way possible. Naoko’s really playing with that guitar line, bending it around like that. But I’m going on. -
Another Day
This is the first attempt at a serious ballad. It must have been someone at the label’s idea to have some serious songs. I believe it was Page Porrazzo who thought he was Phil Spector with this group. Some people must hate it, but I thought it came out great. It’s not that far off from early ballad(ish) song “Bye Bye”, just alittlelot more straight lyrically, and almost guitar at all. I remember when I first heard this song and feeling very nostalgic, which is the intention of the song of course. I used to feel a lot more nostalgic about stuff when I was younger. It’s weird. Anyway, I like how certain words like “bottle” and “shadows” kinda fall out of her mouth, she has this same way with pronunciation in Japanese too, some syllables are almost spit out or rushed, or she picks words with certain combinations of consonants that are odd. Maybe it’s an Osakan thing, but Naoko doesn’t do the same thing at all. -
Ice Cream City
This song is another one that has a version on the Get the Wow EP. I guess the label was still hoping to sell some copies of that when it put out the Birds and the B-Sides comp, which has this live version. There’s nothing wrong with the live version I’m just telling you that’s how it went down. (The comp was also not approved by the band according the their book Shonen Knife Land but that’s a little off topic.) The original Japanese version of this one is not as good because Michie could not quite pronounce “city” correctly yet. Some mispronunciations you can ignore, but that one’s pretty tough. I’m not trying to laugh at them. The English lyrics are pretty good: funny-weird and abstract, not anything dark here. Except the Soft Serve King is “melting with happiness”. He gonna die. Too far? Well maybe the whole thing is hallucination someone is having while they during a heatstroke on the beach. Makes sense. -
The Perfect World
Judging by the lack of availability of this song on youtube, I would say it’s one of the least popular Shonen Knife songs. Which is a shame because it’s one of my favorite but it also makes sense because it in no way resembles anything like a Shonen Knife song. This is an unabashed love song. There’s not even any other subject matter that you can pretend it’s about. And it’s not even the “yay, I’m in love, I’m happy” type of thing which itself is barely mentioned (closest to that is their cover of “Top of the World”), no, this song is languid, even sultry. This is not just a song about love, but sex:
Over my head, really
Never felt like this before, maybe
Can’t say the reason clearly
the rhythm beats meAnd this is from the 1997 album Brand New Knife, which looks like this. It features Michie on droning mellotron and an eye-rolling solo from Naoko who does not know what to do in this situation. It’s not a bad or mocking solo, but you can sense the awkwardness. (Naoko is on record as being “embarrassed” by love songs, altho she is married and has kids.) Michie only stayed with the group one more year after this and it was shocking when she left but looking back, I kinda get it.
✿✿✿✿✿
- Cycling Is Fun (would have made top 10 at one point but doesn’t hold up as well as the others)
- An Angel has Come (Such a weird song, I really like it, but it’s pretty similar to Animal Song)
- Catch Your Bus (corny but genuinely uplifting, I’m a little angry no one uploaded it)
- Jackalope (half-dumb, half-brilliant)
UPDATE: I forgot 3 songs from Yama no Attchan, which are pretty good but apparently forgettable:
- Chinese Song (totally odd)
- Cannibal Papaya (bass drops! one of the best choruses)
- Dali’s Sunflower (one of their ‘most punk’ songs)
2ND UPDATE: I forgot another one, thanks, eris.
- Merman (b-side on the the Wonder Wine single, which never had a physical copy of. Has a pretty cool underwater psyche vibe. I’m just now listening to it more than once I think and it’s growing on me. That’s a really forgotten one. A not quite fully polished gem.)
Semi-Honorable Mention:
- The Moon World (just an ok one)
- Frogphobia (something bugs me about this one)
- Gomi Day (cute idea, not that great a song)
- Planet X (a demo they never finished)
Most Honorable Mention:
- Miracles and Watchin’ Girl are probably my two favorite SK songs. I have to fit that in while preserving the integrity of the list format. Carry on.
Songs written by Michie, sung by Naoko (or both):
- Miracles (Naoko verses)
- Watchin’ Girl (Naoko verses)
- Summertime Boogie (Michie verses)
Songs written by Michie, sung by Atsuko:
- Fruits & Vegetables
Neon Zebra
Atsuko did not sing lead on Neon Zebra. I don’t know why I thought that.Co-written songs: [sung by Michie]
- Neon Zebra (w/ Pat Fear)
Couldn’t find either studio version, but here’s a live video of it from ’91. It’s a little rough! They were only a band at this point for…10 years? You’ve gotta appreciate the tenacity. - White Flag (w/ Steve Davis)
- Expo ’90 (w/ Steve Davis)
I like these two songs (esp. the fuzz bass) but have never been able to find out who this “Steve Davis” is. Maybe she was dating this session dude and he was down for whatever. Little much to give him writing credit. But if it’s this guy that had nothing to do with punk maybe that made sense to him. It’s weird. The two songs have nothing to do with each other. Maybe he helped with the lyrics, but the lyrics are not even very good English. Bah! Expo ’90 is not even as good as The Moon World, which now I’m thinking was pretty good. White Flag, tho. Pretty hardcore. Doesn’t really make any sense but whatever. - Loop-Di-Loop (w/ Naoko & Atsuko)
This was the only SK song ever credited to the group as a whole and the result was kinda meh.UPDATE 2015.01.20:
- Mysterious Drugstore (w/ Naoko)
B-side of the quite difficult to find It’s a New Find EP. Only found out about this from the defunct (but informative) Rock of Japan as it appeared on the mostly needless comp Millennium Edition. Not exactly a classic, but there it is.Written by Naoko, sung by Michie:
- I Am a Cat
Could be a mistake in the credits since it’s the only song like that.Covers:
- Saboten
It’s Delta 5’s “You” with Japanese lyrics - Hokey Pokey
You might like to forget that SK did a completely faithful version of the Hokey Pokey, what with the legitimacy and the post-punk and the mellotrons and the time signatures and the adult(ish) themes and whatnot. But it happened. (Personally I think she was messing with the audience at this point.)
Honorable Mentions:
In the course of making this list, I have gone through the original liner notes for each album (it’s been a draft for over a year). So I might as well list every single song Michie wrote or sang:
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