Tasteless and cheesy and dumb as the CD booklet of Electric Eel Shock’s Slayer’s Bay Blues may be, the music therein isn’t.
In fact, Electric Eel Shock has done a pretty good job of keying into a visceral, raw vibe that made the pioneers of punk music — you know, the usual suspects, MC5, Stooges, Television — so damn good.
The Tokyo-based trio draws upon the same garage rock reference points as Thee Michelle Gun Elephant, but for some reason, Electric Eel Shock does a better job of emulating its idols.
It’s probably because TMGE’s Yusuke Chiba has a voice that really gets tired after a while. Morimoto Akihito is only marginally better, but he emotes a far larger range. He does more than scream his voice hoarse — he growls sometimes, hollers off-key other times.
Morimoto can also tear out guitar riffs in such a way that even the most overused garage clichés sound new. Tracks such as “Turbo Slayer”, “Puma” and “Vegas Night” don’t further the evolution of rock, but they do bring it close to its amateur-is-good roots.
Plus, few of the songs on the album exceed four minutes. Many clock under two. That kind of brevity is hallmark to textbook punk.
The production of Slayer’s Bay Blues is an odd mix of lo-fi messiness and hi-fi power. Somehow, Electric Eel Shock has managed to make a 16-track console sound like a 4-track home studio. The album does a tremendous job of capturing the feel of the trio’s live show.
It’s too bad this kind of gloriously rock ‘n’ roll sloppiness doesn’t translate into the album’s cover art. The booklet shows one of its members sitting on the toilet.
C’mon, guys — that image totally doesn’t reflect your music. Sure, you sound like shit, but you don’t make shit.
Electric Eel Shock is an honest-to-goodness rock band, distinctive in the way it makes amateurism sound downright professional.
First, a warning: If you’re expecting The World Is Mine to grab, hold, shake and rattle you the way previous Quruli albums have done, prepare to work very hard for your aural gratification.
The World Is Mine is Quruli’s dark album. Sure, Kishida Shigeru and gang have always had one foot planted firmly in moody, introspective balladry, the other in tuneful, hard rocking work-outs.
But on the band’s fourth full-length album, Quruli has taken a dive into more ambient territory.
The World Is Mine starts off slowly — very, very slowly.
“Guilty” has a pretty loud outburst of energy midway through the song, but “Shizuka no Umi”, which means “calm ocean” in Japanese, lives up to its title. The track never builds to a climax, instead retreating inward into a sea of studio effects.
Quruli albums tend to hit the proverbial racetrack, running, so it’s shocking and unsettling to witness The World Is Mine crashing before it even gets anywhere.
Or so first impressions would leave a listener to believe.
Even though the band obliges fans with its trademark rockers — “Go Back to China”, “Thank You My Girl” — this album is mostly about sonic exploration.
“Mind the Gap” combines big beats with bagpipes in a quirky but appealing instrumental. “Suichuu Motor” obliterates the lead vocal, masking it in robotic effects.
“Buttersand/Pianorgan” takes the backbeat of the beautiful “World’s End Supernova” and turns it into an exercise of creating aural collages. “Pearl River” concludes the album with two minutes of water lapping against a pier.
When the band isn’t fiddling around with effects processors, they’re sharpening their skills in writing poignant slow songs. “Otoko no Ko to Onna no Ko” (“Boy and Girl”) has a majestic feel, while “Suna no Hoshi” (“Sand Star”) bounces along on a waltz meter. “Amadeus” is so indescript, it doesn’t register.
Perhaps the one track that epitomizes the creative direction of this album is “World’s End Supernova”, Quruli’s catchiest song to date. Kishida sings a plaintive melody over a driving four-on-the-floor beat, and yet the song’s Spartan arrangement darkens it.
It may feel like a dance song but one you’d dance to by yourself.
The World Is Mine definitely takes at least a week’s worth of listening before it reveals its beauty, and that might try the patience of long-term fans who love playing “Wandervogel” and “Bara no Hana” on repeat.
Quruli has taken a daring artistic step, and it’s not easy making that leap with them. But if you follow the band, they won’t steer you wrong.
OK — let’s get the comparrison blurb out of the way.
Nananine is the coin’s flipside to soulsberry.
There. Said it. Now let’s prove it.
Both bands traffic in a beefy, power chord-driven sound akin to Fountains of Wayne or a more polished Weezer, but Nananine edges precariously to the overused “emo” tag.
First off, singer Kawaseki Hiroshi has a less trained, more nasal voice than soulsberry’s Ishizaki Tomohiro. While Kawaseki’s voice may not have Ishizaki’s immediate appeal, Kawaseki definitely puts in a more emotional performance.
Check out Kawaseki’s workout on “Chasing Becky”. He practically makes his voice hoarse bellowing over Ono Kentaro’s energetic guitar work.
Nananine’s songs are also much brighter than soulsberry’s.
There’s no mistaking the exuberence of “Courtney” or “Orange” on Nananine’s first mini-album, Schnaff-rhythm for anything else.
soulsberry, on the other hand, might darken the edges a bit.
Although these differences seem subtle on paper — or rather, pixels — it becomes glaringly apparent in execution.
True, Nananine and soulsberry are aesthetic soulmates — right down to album covers — but scratch beneath the surface, and Nananine’s unpolished performance comes across as edgy and sweet.
Unfortunately, Nananine hasn’t quite graduated to the kind of studio budget that put viscera into soulsberry’s The End of Vacation.
If Nananine could hook up with a producer that could capture the essence of its live performance, the Fukuoka City quartet would definitely yield the album it has in them.
The Brilliant Green had better watch out — soulsberry and Nananine definitely have all the elements to snatch Kawase and co.’s alt-pop crown.
OK — let’s get the comparrison blurb out of the way.
soulsberry is the male version of the Brilliant Green.
There. Said it. Now let’s debunk it.
Both bands traffic in insanely tuneful late-60s-meets-early-90s alternative pop. While the Brilliant Green lean more toward the Byrds-by-way-of-R.E.M., soulsberry goes for a beefier, power chord-driven sound akin to Fountains of Wayne or a more polished Weezer.
The band’s members lists a number of 70s-influenced alternative rock acts as favorites — Jellyfish, Blur, Elliott Smith, Jason Falkner. Bespectacled lead singer Ishizuka Tomohiko could very well be Rivers Cuomo’s Japanese cousin.
The End of Vacation, soulsberry’s “major” debut on Avex Trax, sports a stronger, more robust sound than the band’s self-titled indie album, effectively capturing the energy of the Hokkaido quartet’s live show.
A re-recorded version of “Smash”, in particular, shows how far the band has come. With a slightly faster tempo and a hook played in double-time, this newer version of “Smash” improves vastly on the old.
soulsberry’s punchy performance, however, doesn’t quite mask a dark undercurrent inherent in the band’s music.
“Spirit Song” rocks out, but if it were played at half tempo on acoustic guitars, it would definitely transform into something more haunting. “Personality” sounds as angry as it does joyous.
When Ishizuka proclaims “It’s a beautiful day” on the like-titled opener (“Beautiful Day”), he sings the line with more biting delivery than the lyrics reveal.
Played side by side with fellow countrymen and aesthetic soulmates Nananine, soulsberry comes across as buoyantly poignant.
soulsberry definitely have all the trappings for a critics’ darling band and more than enough potential to be hitmakers. The End of Vacation packs one well-written, terrifically-performed song after another.
Two years ago, this very web site declared FEED as the best UK band not to come from the UK. If that award were bestowed today, it would easily go to farida’s cafe.
Where FEED evoked the Cranberries and the Smiths, farida’s cafe would probably be lumped (somewhat unfairly) with all the UK bands gunning for Radiohead.
Of course, most writers evoke the name “Radiohead” because the kids reading music mags these days wouldn’t recognize the name “the Cure”, let alone “the Sundays”.
Led by the angelic croon of Rie Sekine, farida’s cafe specializes in the kind of high volume, introspective alternative pop that steers clear of any navel-gazing preciousness. Jewel, this band is not.
Sekine, who lived in Canada before returning to Japan, flawlessly switches between Japanese and English on the band’s debut, Hear Nothing. Her powerful voice dominates such songs as “G-Song” and “Kaerimichi”.
Even though the band’s songs slower songs tend to start quietly, it doesn’t stop guitarist Andre Sakai from tearing out a loud riff midway.
“Tuesday” and “Watchman” both begin as seemingly haunting songs, then turn into a roaring epics. “Until It’s Mine” stays pretty quiet until the chorus, when the band kicks in with full force.
farida’s cafe works best when they’re rocking out, as they do on “Kaerimichi”, “G-Song” and the album’s title track. With the likes of Starsailor, South and Elbow cashing in on the whole “slow is more” aesthetic, it’s nice to see a band like farida’s cafe navigate both fast and slow tempi.
Hear Nothing, however, suffers from a somewhat indescript mix. There’s always a sense the guitars could be louder, the vocals more forward. It’s easy to imagine the band’s songs would sound far more powerful in a live setting.
Still, Hear Nothing is an incredibly strong beginning for farida’s cafe. If chasing Radiohead gets tiresome, check out this Japanese quartet instead.
The public relations machinery behind Norah Jones’ debut is some of the most disproportionate effort placed on an album in recent memory.
When writers from Newsweek start name-dropping Alicia Keys to describe Jones, there’s a definite whiff of publicist strong-arming.
Keys and Jones couldn’t come from more different musical planets. The former traffics in slick, hyper-produced R&B, the latter in intimate, country-tinged cabaret vocals.
No sleight to Jones’ house guitarist Jesse Harris, but Bill Frisell should have been all over this album. Fortunately, the Seattle-based downtown New York City legend shows up on “The Long Day Is Over”, and does he ever sound totally at home.
Like Frisell, Jones performs jazz music with the heart of a country artist.
Although her singing affects a smokey Dinah Washington-by-way-of-Erika Badu timbre, her music is thoroughly grounded in twang and heartbreak, all without using a single steel pedal.
Jones’ ghostly cover of Hank Williams’ “Cold, Cold Heart” sums up the entire album nicely — she captures the essence of the song without sounding anything like a country diva.
On “Turn Me On” and the album’s title track, Jones tackles Memphis blues with uncanny coolness, while on “Seven Years” and “Nightingale”, she dabbles in the singer-songwriter prettiness that made the careers of Shawn Colvin and Lyle Lovett.
“Lonestar” could have been a demo outtake from an Emmylou Harris recording session with Daniel Lanois. Lucinda Williams could have applied her rough-hewned drawl on “Feeling the Same Way”, and Mandy Barnett could have fleshed out the Patsy Cline potential of “Don’t Know Why” and “One Flight Down”.
If anything, Jones has probably made an album closer to the spirit of country than most self-styled country artists. Tim McGraw and Faith Hill could cover Bruce Robison songs till their blue in the faces, and they just might reach the kind of immediacy of Jones.
While Jones, who was raised in Dallas, infuses her songs with a southern sensibility, Come Away With Me is far more versatile than anything Music Row could ever produce.
Keeping her minimalist arrangements strictly to a tight-knit house band, Jones avoids the country pitfall of emotive excess. Come Away With Me occupies a creative space where whispering expresses more than belting and categorization is just a nice suggestion.
In other words, people who wouldn’t be caught dead handling a Willie Nelson record can walk out of a music store with Jones’ album in one hand and their pride in another.
P.S. Any chance Jones can snag Frisell and producer Wayne Horvitz for her next album?
Japanese artists — or perhaps, their label bosses — strongly abide by that old addage: “If ain’t broke, don’t fix it.”
Onitsuka Chihiro’s inoffensive, inspirational, hook-filled balladry has been a huge hit in Japan for the past two years. The young singer-songwriter even managed to land a television spot in an American ad for Applied Materials.
As such, the last thing Onitsuka would want to do is rock the boat, which she doesn’t do on her second album, This Armor.
Everything that made Insomnia work the first time takes another bow on This Armor — an arsenal of introspective, pretty ballads interspersed with an occasional uplifting, up-tempo song. In short, it’s Insomnia, Part II.
If Onitsuka weren’t such a good songwriter, she could be accused of being totally predictable and only marginally original.
This time around, her songs are fleshed out. Before, it would be just Onitsuka and her piano. Now, tracks such as “Ibara no Umi”, “infection” and “Ryuuseigun” have a sense of direction, building up to an inevitable dramatic climax.
Even when she keeps things minimal, like on “Shadow” and “Arrow of Pain”, there’s a lot more going on than on such previous hits as “Memai” and “edge”.
Onitsuka’s limited singing abilities once again imbues her songs with an unpolished, emotional rawness that gives her the apperance of depth. If Mariah Carrey or Celine Dion covered Onitsuka’s songs, they’d become instantly shallow.
However much Onitsuka’s feel-good, God-loving music might grate on the sensibilities of old curmudgeon critic-types, her tuneful music ultimately wins listeners over.
Onitsuka doesn’t have the kind of bold artistic vision of labelmates Number Girl or Shiina Ringo — or even Utada Hikaru, for that matter — but what she does, she does well.
Bonkin’ Clapper pretty much occupy the same aesthetic space as Missile Girl Scoot — huge guitar riffs, choruses with hooks, a rapping front woman who also sings.
All the elements that made Missile Girl Scoot a sure-fire bet also make Bonkin’ Clapper pretty enjoyable too.
At both Austin and New York City Japan Nite performances in March 2002, Bonkin’ Clapper won audiences over, selling out copies of the band’s most recent disc, Bonkanesia.
The album’s seven tracks doesn’t quite give Bonkin’ Clapper enough space to explore the vocabulary of rock ‘n’ roll the way Missile Girl Scoot does, but that doesn’t stop them from trying.
Michael Corcoran of the Austin American-Statesman beat me to the Lucious Jackson comparrison, an influence clearly evident on “Mars Stone” and “Power to the People”.
“My Way” owes a bit to the Kinks, while the framing tracks “Intro” and “48th. Street (T.A.D.)” indulge in some Middle Eastern ambience the way Pearl Jam’s Ten did. (Someone shoot me now — I just made a reference to Pearl Jam’s Ten.)
The biggest difference that separates Bonkin’ Clapper with its musical brethen in MGS is a studio budget.
Bonkanesia sounds like it could have benefited if everything from the guitars to the rhythm section were punched up a bit more. The base energy of the band’s live show comes through on recording but not its full, head-crushing impact.
70*, however, has a tremendous vocal presence. She dominates Bonkanesia the same way Junn and U-Rie tend to get buried on their respective albums.
On “My Way” and “Warp!!”, she bellows and snarls like she owns the whole fucking planet, and damn if she doesn’t. At the same time, she can draw back when she needs to, as she does on the epic “Rookies Story”.
Even though Bonkin’ Clapper is far from being the first band to make an honest go of mixing up rap and rock, they certainly rate as one of the most fun — something seriously lacking with American bands purporting to sport the same muse.
First, an English lesson: If N.E.R.D. really stands for “No One Ever Really Dies”, the trio should use the British spelling of “no one” — Noone Ever Really Dies.
Other, more reputable music publications have already chimed in about In Search of …, and by now, everyone’s heard about how the band released one version of the album, didn’t think it was edgy enough, re-recorded it and released it again.
It’s tempting to write A-B reviews comparing In Search of … v.2 with In Search of … v.1, and for good reason — with the live drums and guitars, the new version of In Search of … really does sound like a totally different album.
Besides, the Neptunes are riding such a wave of hype, it’s easy to get curious about them. More to the point: can people who usually despise hip-hop get into N.E.R.D.?
First, some perspective. In Search of … v.2 has been reluctantly described has a rap-rock album. The term “rap-rock” pretty much conjures up images of blistering metal riffs backing spit-fire freestylers, most of whom are white.
In reality, In Search of … attempts to find a middle ground where it’s neither rap nor rock. Sure, there’s no mistaking the elaborate hip-hop rhythms, and Shay does his share of rapping. But when the guitars kick in on “Lapdance” or “Rock Star Poser”, it’s definitely a raised-fist moment.
By employing live instruments on the album, N.E.R.D. has injected some humanity into hip-hop without having to use a tired heavy metal cliché.
It’s easy to find all this cool and pioneering — if you’ve never listened to Dragon Ash’s Lily of da Valley.
Now, there’s an album that did away with the middle ground and went beyond rap and rock. In spirit, the Neptunes seem to want to accomplish what DJ Bots has been doing for years.
Still, In Search of … has a rock ‘n’ roll spirit that comes through loud and clear. N.E.R.D. hasn’t quite produced the watershed album most American journalists would like you to believe, but they’ve certainly created something special.
Maybe hip-hop really is more interesting than MTV makes it out to be.
I’ll disclose my lack of expertise in the genre right off the bat. My knowledge of hip-hop is as informed as a judicial defintion of pornography — I don’t know what it is, but I’ll know it when I hear it.
But if the guys in Dragon Ash have any say in the matter, they’re going to keep me guessing.
Steady & Co. is the latest of Japanese supergroup side projects. Furuya Kenji and DJ Bots of Dragon Ash teamed up with Ilmari of Rip Slyme and Shigeo of Skebo Kings to produce one of the most distinct rap-rock projects anywhere.
Of course, “rap-rock” is an incredibly imprecise description for Steady & Co. Unlike Dragon Ash’s seamless intergration of metallic riffs and sampled rhythms, Steady & Co. aims for a more unplugged sound on the quartet’s debut, Chambers.
Furuya, Ilmari and Shigeo are little more than window-dressing here — this is entirely DJ Bots’ show.
And Bots does a brilliant job crafting a spacious, acoustic tapestry of upright bass rhythms, six-string guitars, electric pianos and those trademark beats.
On “Sorrow”, “Stay Gold” and “Time Erases Everything”, Bots and co. expand on the balladry hinted by Dragon Ash on “Shizukana Hibi no Kaidan wo” and “Face to Face”.
Jazzy bass lines and thundering beats drive “Pass da Mic”, “Kaze Makase” and the title track, while snappy hooks stamp “Wonderland”, “Hip drop” and “Up and Down” with a singular identity.
Chambers does sound homogenic after a while, and for all of Bots’ sonic weaving, he doesn’t do much with the tempo lever on his gear. The album starts to become a blur by the end.
Still, Chambers sounds like nothing else happening in hip-hop or rock music. Steady & Co. effectively sews together hip-hop and jazz the same way Dragon Ash blur rap and rock into a whole bigger than its parts.
That’s far more than MTV would ever imagine possible.