pq - From Neon Town

Recently I've been fishing for bands outside the Kansai area in search of fresh, new, ungrazed pastures. These guys are one of the most impressive bands I've come across so far. Formed in 2005 this 5-piece Kanagawa quintet made up of the usual drum, bass and guitars and supplemented by alto and tenor sax produce music that is a little tricky to pigeonhole but definatley takes its ques from New York's 80's jazz-infused no-wave punk scene.

From Neon City is the first of 2 CDRs the band have put out so far. 11 short but so very sweet tracks of rhytmically driven angular punk/math/jazz rock. Most tracks clock in just a slither over the 1 minute mark but it's impressive how many ideas and change ups the band manage to cram into such a short period of time without it ever feeling overly complicated, clever or esoteric. I can't gush more about how much I enjoy this bands music and I'll be keeping a close eye on their output.

Anyone who digs this may also want to check out the Bosston Cruizing Mania CDs I put up a while back and the recent album by Aichi band The Act We Act.

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Seppuku Pistols (切腹ピストルズ）

Apologies for the long break in posting. It was Obon holiday here in Japan recently so I've been especially lazy these last few weeks.

I had the slightly awkward pleasure of seeing these guys play the other night. I say awkward because Seppuku Pistols (Seppuku being the samurai tradition of disemboweling oneself in an honourable suicide.) are a 4-piece, Tokyo-based, ultra-nationalist punk band whose hits include "Nanking Boogie", "Kill The CIA" and "No Mishima No Future". The band wear their Sex Pistols influence on their militaristic sleeves but fuse their old school style of anthemic punk with some sub-bass electronics and a plentyful supply of traditional Japanese samples and news audio clips.

Their World War II-centric political views may be a little distasteful to some but seem to fall closely in line with Mishima Yukio's own brand of militant nationalism. The focus being the restoration of Japanese pride and power following its downfall in WWII. Often this sort of nationalism is misunderstood or dissmissed as being apologists for Japan's crimes in WWII or a revival of Japanese imperialism but to be sure is a far, far cry from being a brand of neo-Nazism or having any association with it. This isn't really a place for debate on politics and ideology but I thought it would be useful to clarify a little about something that might seem immediatley repellent for some.

Anyway back to the music. The band haven't released any CDs (Perhaps ideologically driven, though they seem to have little trouble selling T-shirts.) but have put their music up on their website for free complete with lyrics and downloadable mp3s. I've downloaded the 7 available tracks which make up 2 mini-EPs for your listening pleasure. Banzai!

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