Green Flames – new band

A pretty exciting new band has sprung up in Tokyo: Green Flames, featuring the great Narita Munehiro from High Rise (guitar & vocals), with the equally infamous Tabata Mitsuru on bass (of Zeni Geva, Acid Mothers Temple, Leningrad Blues Machine, and so many more), and the less-recognized Ujiie Yuro on drums. Anything with these guys is worth a listen, obviously, and it’s great to always hear Narita going batshit crazy on guitar. Check out a video clip of a recent show:

Podcast by Takeo Udagawa

Thanks to Alan Cummings for pointing to this one:

http://fringemusic.podomatic.com/entry/2010-06-27T06_35_14-07_00

Some great early stuff from folks like J.A. Caesar, Morita Doji, Tomokawa Kazuki, Kan Mikami, etc. Enjoy!

Afrirampo finis

Sad news that Afrirampo are calling it quits, but I’m sure that both Oni and Pika will end up doing more work in the future in other guises. If you’re awake in the middle of the night (U.S. time), they’ll be live-streaming a finale concert. Details on the WFMU blog (with some great streaming recordings too): http://blog.wfmu.org/freeform/2010/06/afrirampo-split-live-webcast-626-over-ustream.html

High Rise “Tapes”

I would expect that High Rise needs little introduction to readers of this blog, but you never know. It’s been quite some time since High Rise were active, so it’s worth digging up some old evidence of their insane power.

Started in 1983, High Rise were the ultimate power trio. Named after the book by J.G. Ballard, a combination of Ballard’s dystopian views and a blend of punk and garage psych made the band one of the most freaked-out rock groups ever. Bassist/singer Nanjo Asahito was the idea man and the producer, responsible for the completely blown-out sound of the band’s recordings, which hit the red and stay there for every song (though others have sometimes taken or been given credit for the production style). Guitarist Munehiro Narita gave the band its overdriven, wah-crazy freakiness, and original drummer Euro kept things together and moving forward at high speed. Fans of Mainliner will clearly see the heritage, with the main difference being that of the differing styles Narita and Kawabata bring to the guitar side of things. Nanjo actually started Mainliner because he wanted to tour more and Narita wasn’t able to take the time, which is why the bands were similar propositions.

This cassette was the second release by High Rise, in 1984, although this copy is the 1996 reissue from Nanjo’s La Musica label. Most of the songs here were included on the band’s first proper release, High Rise II, from PSF Records, though a couple of them didn’t appear again until the CD reissue from Squealer. Given the various releases, bootlegs, and odd things put out by Nanjo on La Musica it’s hard to keep track of what appeared where and when. As with most things having to do with Nanjo, the facts are hard to separate from the rumors and legends.

Regardless, here’s a vintage piece of overdriven garage psych from 1984. Enjoy.

Listen to “Orange Desire” by High Rise.

Ongaku Otaku issue #1 PDF

For some reason I hadn’t stumbled across this until now, but I was pleased to find that someone has carefully scanned all of the first issue of my Ongaku Otaku magazine and packaged it as a nice PDF. The Shock Corridor blog posted this back at the end of 2008. Since the issue has been out of print for many years, I’m quite happy to find this and, in fact, want to post a copy of it here as well to make sure it remains available. It’s interesting looking through it again now, 15 years later. Quite a time capsule. Enjoy!

Download Ongaku Otaku #1

Various items for sale

Just a quick note here that I need to slim down my collection a bit so I’m listing quite a lot of items (CD, cassette) on eBay for sale that may be of interest to readers here. Look for seller name ‘charnel’ to see what’s currently up there. Items include releases by Masonna, Aube, Otomo Yoshihide, Ground Zero, Keiji Haino, Null, Violent Onsen Geisha, and more. Thanks.

“Japan Bashing” volumes 1-3

Just a quick note that the terrific Friendsound blog has posted the three 7-inch singles released by Public Bath back in the early 90s, Japan Bashing Volumes 1-3. These were the introduction, for many, to bands like UFO or Die, Omoide Hatoba, Hanadensha, Subvert Blaze, and so on. David Hopkins, who ran Public Bath with his then-wife Betsy, was instrumental in helping get some of the indie bands there recognized by U.S. listeners. Living in Osaka, David was particularly in touch with the Kansai underground and the Alchemy Records label in particular. He introduced me to Alchemy head honcho Jojo during a trip to San Francisco with Sekiri, around 1991 or so (when I interviewed Sekiri and Jojo for File 13 magazine). During my first trip to Japan the following year on tour with Torture Chorus, David was very helpful to us. He and Betsy really were key to the big groundwell in the 90s that brought over so many great bands to the U.S.

Check out the posting of these singles here. Volume 1 is sort of the Boredoms axis, with tracks from them, UFO or Die, Omoide Hatoba, and Hanadensha. It’s perhaps the chaotic-psych material. Volume 2 is the old-school stoner rock volume, with Subvert Blaze (“Butterfly” is a kickass song, no doubt about it) and Playmate. Neither of those bands made much of an impression here, but the drummer from Subvert Blaze went on to be a major player in the Osaka scene and drum teacher to many young players. Volume 3 is the noise single, with Hojokaidan, Solmania, Masonna, and Hanatarash (a bit of an oddity since Hanatarash were done by 1991 when this came out).

Shizuka – Doll photos

In my previous post about Shizuka’s passing, I mentioned that I have a number of pictures of her dolls, and I wanted to share them. I had the chance to take some decent photos of some of the framed pictures I have, so here they are. A couple of them were framed by Shizuka when she gave them to me, and you’ll see the special care she put into them. I scanned them fairly large, so if you click on the thumbnails below you can get the bigger, better pictures. Sorry my photography isn’t better, but nontheless, enjoy.

Shizuka R.I.P.

It took me a little while to get to this, after hearing the news, but it saddens me to write that Shizuka Miura passed away at the end of January. Her music will live on, of course, but it’s still such an unexpected shock… Especially because it was a suicide. Apparently it may have been due to medication, but at this point we’ll simply never know.

I first met Shizuka and her then-husband Maki Miura in the 90s, when their first Shizuka CD, Heavenly Persona, was released by PSF Records, followed shortly thereafter by the Live album from Persona Non Grata here in the U.S. I organized a couple of shows here in San Francisco for the band shortly after that, and quickly discovered how lovely both of them were. The other members of their band varied, but the two of them were the voice behind the band: Shizuka’s delicate, almost timorous vocals and softly-strummed guitar mixed perfectly with Maki’s intense playing, which would explode into some of the greatest psychedelic shredding this side of Fushitsusha, with whom he played in the past. I should also note that despite Shizuka’s somewhat timid stage presence, she was actually a very strong person: this wasn’t Maki’s band, it was truly hers, even though it wouldn’t have been what it was, of course, without his remarkable playing.

The band never became nearly as well-known as they deserved over here. Partly it was that they found touring to be very trying, and suffered health issues that kept them at home at a time when other bands were touring constantly. Partly it was also that they never had the money to go on tour extensively. For whatever reason, I’m always surprised when people who are now fans of Acid Mothers Temple, LSD-March, and Suishou no Fune have never even heard of Shizuka. Thankfully, you can still buy Heavenly Person from PSF: go here. And here’s my nudge-nudge that someone should really look at reissuing that album or another, with wider U.S. and European distribution.

Not too many people know that Shizuka was also recognized in Japan for her doll work. She studied under master dollmaker Katan Amano, and made some stunning, haunting dolls. Years ago when my wife was researching modern Japanese dolls (partially for an article I published in Ongaku Otaku magazine), Shizuka and Maki very kindly invited us to their apartment, where we visited them and got to see a number of Shizuka’s dolls, which were seated all around the small living room. They were beautiful creations. I have a number of photographs and cards of the dolls, including some small handmade framed pictures from Shizuka, which I’ll try to scan here shortly for another post.

Rather than just posting an mp3 here, I think it’s better to provide a link to one of the few videos I can find online of Shizuka live. Enjoy.

Bobos “Yumeko”

Last time I was over in Japan playing Numinous Eye shows, this crazy fun two-piece called Bobos opened for us in Kyoto, and I thought they were pretty cool: two women, both singing and playing bass, with a sampler behind them, and one also played accordion! And they did a cover of “Iron Man”! What’s not to like? They didn’t have any recordings with them, though I recorded their set.

Later on during the tour, we played an insane all-night show out in Tokyo’s Koiwa suburb, and there was a record store downstairs from the venue. So I spent some time looking through all of their CDRs, and what do you know, I stumbled on one from Bobos! 250 yen, had to have that of course. It’s an EP, 16 minutes long with seven tracks (though only 6 are listed on the tray card), released in 2006. As near as I can tell they haven’t released anything more recently, though who knows.

The first track, though it’s the title song, is just a short accordion intro that doesn’t prepare you for the fast drum-machine and bass of “Nana” — they switch between baby-like singing and grindcore growling, while the sampler throws down a breakneck toy-snare beat and they lay heavy bass over it all. Weird stuff, and very fun.

I was happy to find that their cover of “Iron Man” was on the CDR, with alternating little girl verses and growling choruses, accordion, and a blippy synth sequence playing out the oh-so-well-known riff. On “Gya!” they toss out a minute-long blast of hypercore, and “Hebi” (snake) takes thing slowly, with a skeletal beat and accordion drone.

Fun stuff, and I’d be interested to know whether the band are still playing or not — their web site as listed in the CDR is no longer active, unfortunately. I’ll have to ask some friends over there and see if there’s any news. For now, enjoy a couple of samples.

Listen to “Iron_Man” by Bobos.
Listen to “Nana” by Bobos.