Hijokaidan brings the oi in noize!

Last weekend I went to the 30th year anniversary party of the legendary noize collective Hijokaidan in Namba Bears Osaka. There is an extensive story about their history on the following link with some crazy facts like shovels on stage and carcasses thrown into the audience. Hijokaidan released for their birthday a 30 cd box named “The Noize”  with a lot of their live recordings.

The evening started with Hijokaidan as 3-piece on stage with Jojo Hiroshige on guitar, Takeshi Ishida on drums and Toshiji Mikawa making some electronic noize. This was some kind of introduction, it was good not too extreme and no earplugs needed yet.  Next up was a dude on guitar playing some mellow Japanese folk songs. First I was a bit dissapointed, but later I started to appreciate the subtle songs and good guitar work. Later singer Junko joined him. She didn’t really sing, but made short hellish screams full of fear. Most of it seemed improvised and the dude was totally tearing appart his acoustic guitar to make all kind of weird noizes, like slapping on it with two hands, but it suited the screaming of Junko very well. Good intense stuff.

Then Hijokaidan came back on stage companied by jazz saxophonist Akira Sakata.  A really good musician who studied to be a marine biologist. I always like it when people end up doing things far away from their original field, like Japans most famous architect Tadao Ando used to be a truck driver and doesnt have any qualifications to  be an architect.

With Akira Sakata on sax, Hijokaidan even sounds more like a free jazz band. Especially at the start of the set, where I made a video of:

Later on the sound gets more dense, the saxaphone only produces dissonant tones, Jojo trashes his guitar and the drummer is smashing his fast complex patterns with a deadly accuracy on his kit.

After a short break Akira Sakata and Hijokaidan come stage again. Hijokaidan is now on full strength with Junko and Mikawa. Especially with Junko her haunting voice this set is more intense. Akira his magnificent play drowns a bit in the noize. Haha, yeah this is not summertime. “Oi, oi, oi, oi” , screams Jojo into the microphone, while holding his guitar up in the air. The show is building up to a climax. Jojo and Mikawa launch themselves into the audience. Jojo puts himself on a crate and shouts again: “oi, oi, oi”. The audience screams along with the fists in the air.

 Then Jojo lifts his huge amplifier in the air: “Oi, oi, oi”. He jumps with the amplifier into the audience and works his way through to the end of the hall. I almost get pushed to the ground as well. Soon after this act of desctruction , that was part of the climax of noize the show ends. The small fanatic crowd, most like me younger than Hijokaidan, shout for an encore. Hijokaidan comes back on stage with only Jojo, Mikawa and Kosakai. Jojo thanks the crowd and cracks a joke that I dont understand because I speak only “chotto chotto” Japanese. They play a short set more analog kind of noize, not unlike the Dutch FCKN’ BSTRDS wihtout masks. The guys launch themselves in the crowd again, madness. I love it. One of the better shows I have seen in the last years and definitely a good anniversary party! Oi oi oi!

Oh yeah within a week I’m leaving Japan and I have some of my horror noize punk zines left with interviews with Integrity, Adolf Butler and including personal stories about nightmares. The 40 pages zine is unlike above post language edited. For only 400 yen I can send  a copy to you in Japan.

Nightmare

Yesterday I went to see Nightmare with some other bands in Osaka. I was too late so I missed Organisms… Bummer. So the first band I saw was Masterpeace, who sound like Rage Against the Machine on speed. They are a good band, but three guitarist combined with a turntable makes it too messy.  Next up was Nightmare who totally fucking rule! Explosive show and an energetic crowd.  D-beat crust is not my favorite style, but if it is played like this I definitely love it.

For the first time ever I also made an attempt to make a live video, sound quality is quite poor, but a lot of live footage on youtube has that issue. Check yourself:

After that World Burns to Death from Texas came on stage. They sound quite like Prong I thought, but then not so tight. They are a good band, but compared to the Japanese bands just not good enough and for me it was way too crusty metal anyway.

After that Blowback from Niigata who also a bit too metal for my taste, but totally fucking rule. The singer goes nuts and the band plays tight, precise and fast.Unfortunately I had to catch the last metro out to my place, so I missed Paintbox. Oops….

Doddodo

I`m travelling through Japan for 2 weeks, so not to many updates.  Since i am not a backpacker with a laptop who is uploading pictures on facebook every day.  It`s really weird, but that seems to be the norm these days. So here from a manga internet cafe in Hiroshima a post about the amazing singer Doddodo that I already promised 2 weeks ago. A wee bit crazy girl:

and this cool video:

Two weeks ago I saw her live in Osaka (see below post) giving an incredible show with DJ Mighty Mars. I couldn’t find a live video that really captures the intensity and crazyness of her show, but that says a lot about her.

Make Tea, Not War!

Last weekend went to my first concerts in Osaka. On Friday I went to see Unit21 and Acrostix in Namba Bears. First band of the night was San Pedro, named after the city where the Minutemen are from I was curious,　but then candles were lit, incense was burned on stage and  girls with hippie skirts and make up cam e on stage, I started to doubt… Of course I wrong, like most bands here it was tight and fast! Good stuff.

Next up was Zyanose, a noizy crust band. The concert started by the singer throwing his can of beat in audience. Probably my favorite band I saw this weekend, destructive grindy noise! The singer constantly launches himself into the audience and crawls over the ground  screaming into the microphone. The guitarplayers also jump into the audience, scream along and attack their singer. After 15 minutes the singer walks off stage and the guitar players start singing and falls over the drum kit.

The Unit21 from Texas,  USA came on stage. Good band, fast trash punk and the audience goes wild. After the show I did a cool interviews with the these dudes about touring in Japan. This will appear in the next zine about Japan. Last band was Acrostix, really fast tight crust, reminded me of Tragedy, but that is the only band in that genre I really know. Not really my cup of cha, but still damn good.

Next day I went to a festival in Namba Rockets. I saw a lot of good bands, but will only give a review of the highlights. For the first ever on a show I also made some pictures, but as you will see I]m  quite a shitty photographers.

Tone Deaf, good early eighties hardcore band like Minor Threat, SSD, etc. Next was B side Approach, really tight New York style hardcore like Killing Time and Leeway. They reminded me of New Morality.

Next band was Angel OD from Osaka. Great noizy grind hardcore band! The frontman who plays bass constantly launches himself into the audience  and the guitar players do the same, still they keep playing tight. Half way the show some from the audience gets on stage and smashes the microphone standard on the ground and then jumps in the audience and starts moshing. I love these kind of weird spontaneous actions that seem quite normal here. Just like guitar players who grab their mic and start screaming while destructing the whole stage. Everyone who loves grindcore or any other form of extreme fast music should check this band out. They already have released an EP.

Low Vision from Tokyo, great harcore with lively stage act. Dude from Justice did their t-shirt and album design.

Nanda?!? Next band that I really like and where the crowd was going completely nuts was E X-C. A Japanese tough guy hardcore band with band members with amazing tattoos that looked like yakuza members. Just before I left Holland I saw a concert with Mongoloids, Strength For A Reason and Death Threat and these Japanese bands totally fucking overrule these American mosh bands. Especially in intensity and instrument skills. If their English lyrics were not so poor…. I also love how these guest singers jump on stage, shout their lines and then mosh into the audience. At the end of the show the guitar players jumped into the audience and started moshing, one of them trashed his guitar on the ground. I hope he already was planning on buying a new one…

Then something totally different but also really cool Dj Mighty Mars with Dododo. A weird cute Japanes girl in red shirt and black eye make up singing over electro and hiphop beat. Amazing stuff. Audience also goes wild. I hope i can post a video soon, coz it is hard to explain. Great stuff!