Power Empire - Live At Bears Nov 2011

Well hope you all had a good X-mas and New Year and with any luck the prophesied 2012 Mayan doomsday comet will obliterate the planet before Sarah Palin has the chance to sit behind the presidential desk in the oval office. Stay positive people!

It seems fitting to kick off 2012 with a band that became my favourite band of 2011. Power Empire formed a little over a year ago from the ashes of members previous bands have been on the up and up and exhibit all the traits that turn a band into cult favourites in the Osaka underground. A fetishistic love of noise, a blatant disregard for their audiences aural well being and the ability to empty venues inspite of Japanese audienes usual high level of tolerence. In short if I were to describe Power Empire in a single adjective it would be "facemeltinglyferocious". Power Empire's formula is pretty simple but is damn effective. Towering walls of guitar noise being rolled along by basslines thicker than London smog and pummeled into bloody submission by drums so brutal that even Amnesty international are concerned. The bands drummer also has the unique distinction of being the only drummer i've ever actually seen play so hard that he actually managed to tear a kick drum skin.

Live is definitely best way to experience the so I've uploaded a bootleg recording of the band I made myself of a live show of theirs at Bears a few months back. The recording is of 2 of their tracks 13mins and 9mins respectively. The audio quality is pretty decent, I've EQ'd it to clean it up a little and I think it does a fairly decent job of conveying the awesome intensity of the band.

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Ultra Bide - Sonic Crush!!!

Ultra Bide are one of Kansai's most respected bands and local legends on the underground circuit. Originally formed in the late 70's by core member Hide the band over the years has gone through numerous line-up changes and switch ups. The original line-up (Now fondly refrered as "The original Ultra Bide".) included noise legend Jojo Hiroshige on bass with Hide himself taking up duties on lead guitar. In it's current form Ultra Bide feature a brutal dual bass and drums set-up.

Bide are without a doubt Kansai's most consitently impressive live bands. No gimmicks, no fucking about just straight up ear drum battering punk. But despite how great the band are their recorded output is patchy at best and doesn't really do the band justice which is why I've held off on posting about these guys for so long.  Thankfully though the band recently put out a DVD-R of one of their live shows and luckily the sound is pretty good so I've taken the liberty of ripping the audio from it for your listening pleasure. It's obviously no substitute to seeing these guys but it'll have to do. Pure obnoxious, snot nosed punk is what you get. Fans of Friction, Big Black, Shellac etc should find immediate comfort.

Not resting on his laurels, Hide despite being one of Kansai's longest standing and well respected underground veterens (Hide turned half a century old this year. Happy Birthday you old cunt!) is also deeply involved in nurturing up and coming acts and is always seeking to use his status to champion the latest generations of bands. Not to mention that even at 50 Hide and his cohorts consistently manage out play bands more than half their age. Take note kids. This is how you do punk.

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The Impacts - Go! Mask Man From Hell!

A quick rhetorical question. Do you like Guitar Wolf? Ever wondered what they'd sound like even scummier and trashier than they already are? Well look no further because the appropriatley named Impacts are here to blow your eardrums straight out your ass. The Osaka trio who play their shows wearing all over chequered body suits were an impulse buy for me. Picked up from Timebomb for just 100 yen (That's roughly $1 U.S.) the band clearly aren't too interested in actually making much money. The only problem with the CDR is that it's only 4 tracks long and is over before you know it. Rock'n'Roll!

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Mach 1.67 - Star Burn

I'd been after this CD for quite a while so was happy as a pig in shit to find it lurking in Forever Record's Japanese underground/indie section for 500 yen. Mach 1.67 is the band formed by influential 70's Japanese new wave movie director Ishii Sogo (Who's groundbreaking movies inspired directors like Tsukamoto Shinya: Tetsuo Iron Man and Takashi Miike: Ichi The Killer among others.) and acclaimed Japanese actor Tadanobu Asano. The band originally formed in 1996 and released an LP before the members went their seperate ways on various film and music projects. The band reformed in 2000 and put out the single "Star Burn". A year later Ishii Sogo used the single as the soundtrack and visual inspiration for his awesome 2001 film "Electric Dragon 80,000 Volts". A 50min black & White punk movie about 2 rival "superheroes" battling it out in down town Tokyo. A cinematic audio/visual overload of face melting proportions.

Mach 1.67 much like Sogo Ishii's own movies deliver some harsh balls to the wall punk rock but the standout track on the single and the movie is without doubt epic 9 minute sleezy, ghetto dub creep of "Electric Buddha". Hopefully we'll see the winning combination of Sogo and Tadanobu pairing up again someday.

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Bonanzas - Live Bonanzas + Live 2

Bonanzas are a Kobe band made up of members from a number of other local bands including the excellent instrumental math-rock band Talking Dead Goats 45" and the hardcore band Suspiria. Sadly their output is fairly limited with only two 2-track live CDR's being put out by the band. As with so many other Kansai underground bands their sound is difficult to pin down but they sound somewhat like a down tuned Shellec or Big Black. Their music is minimal but heavy and reminds me little of Kyojin Yueni Dekai's stuff with a simillar use of muted, a-tonal guitar "playing" and the drums forming the backbone of the music. Hopefully these guys will get round to releasing something a little more substantial in the future as what's on offer here shows alot of promise.

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Ichiji Kujiru - Live At Shinjuku Motion (いちぢくぢる - ライブ@新宿モーシオン)



In japanese the word "Fuzakeru" (ふざける) means to playaround or joke about and it's a phrase often attatched to Kansai's bizarre and wonderful underground scene. Bands like the Oshiri Pens Penz and Kyojin Yueni Dekai exemplify the progressive but humorous approach to music left behind by the legacy of Osaka's underground legends The Boredoms. Ichi Kujiru are another such band. This drums and bass Kyoto two piece have just released their first album so I won't be uploading that just yet out of respect for the band but I will upload a 3-track CDR recording of a show they played at Tokyo's Shinjuku Motion. Amongst Ichiru's stop/start punk numbers are songs about wanting to be a girl, noodles, bananas and pricing schemes. Sadly much of the humour in the lyrics and the band's inbetween song ad libbed gags will be lost in translation but will probably seem no less bizarre. 

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Comanechi - Crime Of Love

Okay, I'm stretching the rules a little on this one Comanechi are probably considered more of a UK band than a Japanese band. But One half of this drums and guitar duet is Akiko Matsura, an Osaka local and longtime friend of Afrirampo's Pika. Besides these guys are too cool to overlook. Taking their name from a Russian olympic ice skater who earned herself infamy in Japan for her arousing routines, Comanechi specialize in no-nonsense, balls to the wall, sleazy rock'n'roll. Like Black Sabbath meets Motorhead filtered through some garage rock. Comanechi picked up quite a reputation on the London live circuit and just recently played their first shows in Japan a few weeks ago. Check the youtube link below to catch a video of their Japanese version of "My Pussy" performed with Pika at Namba bears. Great show. 

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Watusi Zombie - Buddha Mask Experience

Watusi Zombie have been around in one form or another since starting as a high school band in 1997. Since then the Osaka band have picked up a cult following for their frenetic and unpredictable live shows. The band have just released their 3rd album "We Are The World!!!" and are currently touring so it seems there's no better time to post their first album from 2005 "Buddha Mask Experience". The trio specialise in sleazy, bluesy, punky, noisy, garage rock. They sound pretty good on CD but ultimatley only seeing them live does their music any real justice.

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Amazon Saliva - Amazon Punch

Amazon Saliva are a local supergroup of sorts. Made up of local underground legends Hide of Ultra Bide on bass, Tabata of Acid Mothers Temple on guitar and Nani of Bogulta on drums. Released on Kochi's new Chaotic Noise label "Amazon Punch" is the bands latest studio album of hard rocking no nonsense punk/new wave and protests Japan's draconian drug laws.  I'll be posting some other stuff by the band members other projects later.

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