月曜日の長い歌

Getsuyōbi no nagai uta. Monday Long Song. 

Apologies to any Japanese readers who find any errors in the translation of the title of today's Monday Long Song post- I relied on a popular internet translation service. 

A couple of weeks ago Ernie posted some Japanese psyche at 27 Leggies, by the band Nagasa Ni Te. I responded a few days later with some Japanese psyche by Yura Yura Teikoku. Last week Ernie raised me with a London based Japanese psyche band who go by the name of Barbican Estate- you can read about them here. I suspect this is a game of musical tag that we won't be able to keep going for very long but I'm going in again...

Bo Ningen are a London based  Japanese psyche rock four piece who make a fearsome racket. I saw them play at Manchester's Albert Hall in 2016 supporting Savages, quite an intense pairing. Bo Ningen were hugely impressive, four androgynous figures swinging their guitars around, the bassist/ singer Taigen Kawabe finishing the gig by turning his bass around and playing it with the headstock in his armpit and the body pointing out away from him and towards the audience. 

In 2021 they re- released their debut album on double vinyl but decided to rebuild it, taking the master tapes and completely remixing it. It ends with Triangle, a sixteen minute psyche epic that starts out gentle and then builds, becoming a ferocious noise. 

Triangle

The rest of Rebuilt is at Bandcamp along with several more Bo Ningen albums. 2024's live score for The Holy Mountain is an experience that should be enjoyed at least once. 

Savage

I went to see Savages on Monday night at Manchester's Albert Hall, a late offer of a ticket. I bought their Husbands single and the first album but hadn't got around to the new one yet. The venue is a dream gig venue and the sound is beautifully clear- the drums are mic'd up perfectly. Clad all in black and lit in bright white Savages are sonically separated too, into hard hitting bass and ringing treble. Gemma Thompson's guitar is viciously trebly and capable of crunching noise and sparkling picked notes. Ayse Hassan's bass playing is superb, bouncy, aggressive and rolling. Musically it's easy to spot the influences- Siouxsie, Joy Division, early Bunnymen, PiL- but they do it very, very well. Savages are an intense band and singer Jehnny Beth has presence. She enthuses about the crowd between songs but switches straight back into serious mode for the songs, stops Husbands part way through to check on a injury down the front, tells us one of the songs is 'the sexy one' and at the end walks on the front few rows hands into the crowd. No encore. The ten minute closer Fuckers is all that's needed to send the crowd home sated. If I were a seventeen year old girl- and unless I'm very wrong about reincarnation that's never going to happen- I'd have spent Tuesday looking for three like minded souls to start a band with.



The support act were jaw dropping. Bo Ningen are a four piece long-haired Japanese noise rock band. Their sound is incredibly tight. I can hear Black Sabbath, Sonic Youth and Can. They are tightly drilled and precise, creating a thunderous, ear splitting noise but can stop it dead in a heartbeat. Singer/bassist Taigen Kawabe plays with miniscule finger movements flanked by a pair of long-haired acid rock guitarists and a bang-on-the-beat drummer. When not singing Kawabe moves to the edge of the stage, feet spread apart, making faces at the crowd. In their final song he swings the bass behind his head and ends playing it neck first, body pointing out away towards the crowd. The guitarist on the left swings his guitar around his head by the strap while the one on the right freaks out. Drummer Monchan Monna keeps hitting the beat. I'm not sure how often I'd listen to them at home but seeing them live was a pleasure.