M U T A T I N G M E L T D O W N

Veronica,from Finally Punk and The Carrots,might be now one of the enthusiastically hardworking players in the world of the indie music scene.

Mutating Meltdown consists of her and Erin,also from Finally Punk,and Chad,from Zom Zoms,and sounds bit of goth-chic cheap post punk,reminding me of Numbers and Erase Errata and Meho Plaza,all of which are from California,though.

Their debut 7" will be out in January, 2009 from M'lady's Records,releasing Finally Punk already and waiting to come Jenny Hoyston's out of the space.

N O A G E

They hit Toronto twice or more.

Shoegazing,not really,experimental pop duo,No Age,came here again.

It's passed only four months since last time they played at Horseshoe.

It was a terribly humid night and more inside the tiny room for them to play in the historical bar.

There was a crowd of more than 400 people,I guessed,and half of them might have been young kids,under 19.

One young kid talked to me when I was in line to wait for the room opening.

He was like,"Your tee is nice.I like HEALTH,too."

Hey,if I had been in Japan,could I have heard the words like his saying?

Absolutely,NO.

I hope young kids in Japan will change their own style and attitude to everything about music and art and etc.

Anyways,at this time,however,there was no teenager in Lee's Palace.

Why not?

Do you know why No Age called themselves No Age?

Sucks.

I will never go to the place they played on November 21 unless something special to me is planned.

Before No Age played,Silk Flowers,from New York City,and Soft Circle,from Brooklyn,as solo project by Hisham,who used to be in Pixeltan and Black Dice,played as openers of the show.

Silk Flowers' psychedelically freak out synth sound took me to the heaven.

No sooner had I returned to the ground safely than Soft Circle took me higher than the heaven by the layers of the hyper experimental dance music.

I've never seen any shows of Black Dice and Pixeltan and it would be impossible forever,so I was really happy to see him playing.

 

Staying at the higher place,I saw No Age playing on the stage.

I took many pictures and movies,some of which had already put up to Flickr and YouTube,and danced during the very last three or four songs.

They played some new songs and they were so nice.

If you go to their show,please listen to and see carefully.

 

After the show,we moved to another place where a guy organized an event as a secret show for No Age to have a chance to play in front of young kids.

It was located on Bathurst street between King street and Richmond street and like a deserted warehouse,actually it reminded me of Death By Audio,Brooklyn,where PWRFL POWER,one of my Japanese friends,played in the end of June.

There was full of people who got drunk and were young except some hicks in the colorless building.

We managed to put some equipments inside,waiting for a band from Toronto started.

They sounded just like Hardcore.

It was fun and their performance was filled with much violent energy,but there was a lack of something special.

After the twenty-minute storm of violence,No Age was going to start playing.

In fact,they played two songs right through.

But the soundsystem there was not good or something happened at the moment,which could throw No Age into trouble.

They tried to recover their own sound,but it seemed so tough,then Dean,singer and drummer,quit singing and Randy,guitarist,played some cover songs.

It could have grabbed hearts of people there shortly.

After all,they couldn't play their own songs,but it was so exciting and they could have had fun,I don't know.

I left there after chatting with Dean and Hisham for a while.

F I N A L L Y P U N K

How was your Halloween?

After those crazy parties in the cities in the North America,Finally Punk released their great new seven inch called Hypertension from M'Lady's Records.

I've really been looking forward to it coming out since the song,Hypertension,appeared on their MySpace.

It's so short and might get you hypertension.

Actually,they have never changed their style at all,but the EP is pretty brilliant.

Now they are being ready to go touring around US and UK.

Elizabeth,one of singers in Finally Punk,told me they will be playing at SXSW too.

Yes,it's time to dance all day long!

E R A S E E R R A T A

This is a story about Erase Errata,one of my favorite bands,when I asked Kim from Death Sentence: PANDA! what they had been doing recently.

What she said was just bad although I had expected it.

Although it was unofficially announcement,they might not work any more.

Now Jenny Hoyston,singer and guitarist of Erase Errata,is living in Portland,said Kim.

The rest members of Erase Errata,Bianca and Ellie,are still living in San Francisco,so it is a bit hard for them to take enough time to make new songs and practice them.

Jenny told me that they hadn't had time to meet each other to practice their wonderful songs as the band before touring around Japan when they came there last year.

Before it,she released an incredible album as her own solo project,not Paradice Island,and it could have predict the unfortunate ending.

But their show in Kyoto last December was amazing and the audience got excited apparently.

This YouTube with a terrible sound was taken by me on that day.

The camera was a normal digital one so there was no way at all.

Pass The Crimson is one of my favorite songs Erase Errata played.

This was released as B side of 7" named The Alphabet Single Series U from Tomlab.

Jenny is one of my precious friends,and I will love Erase Errata forever.

A B O U T J A P A N T O U R O F D E A T H S E N T E N C E : P A N D A !

I think I should write about Japan tour of Death Sentence: PANDA! in English,but my English must be poor enough to do it.

Sorry for all English speakers who enthusiastically read this silly blog.

I will just say "It was amazing.They were so kind and nice.People who we met at the places where we went were full with affection."

O C T O B E R 1 2 N A G O Y A

O C T O B E R 1 3 K Y O T O

O C T O B E R 1 4 K O B E

URLs above are another blog written in Japanese.

I hope you guys have friends who can read and speak Japanese.

S I K A S I K A

I've been to Japan for two weeks and toured between Nagoya and Kobe with Death Sentence: PANDA! for four days.

After seeing them off at Kyoto station,I went back home.

They played at a karaoke studio in Nagoya as an event by Sika Sika,which was my favorite band in Nagoya.

Paul,Clarinet player of Death Sentence: PANDA!,said their sound was like Le Shok after their show.

I told it to Kazutomo,vocalist of Sika Sika,and it made him so surprised and happy because his favorite band was Le Shok.

Please check them out because they might go to the US to play with Death Sentence: PANDA!.

T H E C A R R O T S

There are two 7 inches which were delivered to my home in Japan a few weeks ago.

Two of them are by The Carrots,from Austin,Texas.

Very 60's poppy sound they play will comfort you and you can't help but dance,even if you are alone.

You can listen to The Carrots' excellent choice of the cover of Breakaway that Tracy Ullman sang.

Now they released two 7 inches,both of which were a little limited and from Elefant Records,located in Spain,and a smash hit.

I think it is a good thing for them,but I'm worried about one thing.

It is about Finally Punk,also from Austin.

If you have a good sense of guessing,you can understand what "also from Austin" means.

Yes,three of The Carrots are Finally Punk.

I love Finally Punk,so if The Carrots went to a long tour around the world,they would not work well.

According to the announce on MySpace,they will tour around UK next summer.

Of course,I won't be able to go there but I'm looking forward to it.

Who knows which will get more famous until then?

OMG.

D E A T H S E N T E N C E : P A N D A !

My favorite avant-toy-pop trio based on San Francisco, Death Sentence: PANDA! is going to hit Japan soon.

Their sound is obviously strange if you never see or listen to them.

Death Sentence: PANDA! doesn't consist of three instruments which are a guitar, a bass guitar and drums, but of course, they have a drummer who hits the drums.

The singer, Kim West, plays flute, saxophone and glockenspiel between the time she doesn't sing.

The drummer, Chris, bangs his drum kit lightly but heavily like a thunder.

There is one more guy, Paul, who plays a pitchshifted clarinet with manipulating a sampler, making the sound like a spell that is a part of a witchcraft.

Can you imagine their magical sound?

You couldn't understand what I mean unless you see or listen to Death Sentence: PANDA! at shows or on YouTube or MySpace, etc.

If you live in Japan,you should be ready to go to their Japan tour.

This must be great.

D E T A I L

This YouTube was recorded at SXSW in March this year, but I didn't see this show because I was in another place to see a brilliant pretty punk quartet, Finally Punk at that time.

The place Death Sentence: PANDA! played was so miserable and poor, but I liked it.

I will be there next March.

J A P A N E S E V E R S I O N

V I V I A N G I R L S

An extreme limited debut album of Vivian Girls is finally reissued by In The Red.

I really regretted that I didn't see their show at SXSW in March.

It must have been nice.

I don't know why I didn't go to theirs.

Anyway,this reissue can be one of the happiest things in this year 2008.

Actually I don't listen to many bands after I came to Toronto,but Vivian Girls is one of the most important bands recently.

I guess that you wonder why I recommend them such enthusiastically,but,even I don't know why.

Their kind of shoegazing sound basically doesn't fit me,which is proven by my preference that I don't like most of the bands had played and are playing now.

What is their attraction to me?

Their appearance?

No.

Their personalities?

Yes,but it is not enough to get a perfect approval.

It is just because Vivian Girls play that kind of sound in this moment.

Their style is so similar to No Age and Liars,both of which are also playing a kind of shoegazing.

So I'd really love Vivian Girls to go touring with them.

It'll be delightful and filled with expectations for the next level.

RIYL:The Vaselines,Talulah Gosh,Jesus And Marychain,No Age,Liars

J A P A N E S E V E R S I O N

M O T H E R M O T H E R

Vancouver's alternative country five-piece Mother Mother finally released their hopeful second album a few weeks ago.

The sound got moderately changed and it became a fantastic result.

Their charms of country style goes back a little,and from 90s to 00s alternative sound,one of my favorite styles because I used to be in the center of the new storm after grunge,could get forward somewhat.

Means there's nothing left to deny their newest one called O My ♡.

Mother Mother is going to kick off their great tour in two or three days.

After playing around some cities in Ontario and Quebec,they come to Toronto,but I won't be here.

To be honest,the fact that Mother Mother exist and make good songs in Canada is one of the reasons I decided to come here.

This is a tragedy.

Anyway,you can enjoy Mother Mother's delightful performance unless you have a wry view.

J A P A N E S E V E R S I O N

Mother Mother - O My Heart

L A N D O F T A L K

I was standing in the line to come in the place where Land Of  Talk would have been playing.

There was already an announce of the cancellation on some free papers in Toronto,but I didn't know it.

The details about the cancellation was written by Lizzi,singing and playing guitar in the band,on their blog of MySpace.

I hope that she gets better soon.

J A P A N E S E V E R S I O N

H I G H P L A C E S

High Places' first full length called "High Places" is out now.

I have seen their show three times before.

I think their performance is getting better,so is their sounds.

The first show I saw was as a showcase performance for Upset The Rhythm at SXSW 2008,and it was not bad,but less impressive.

High Places came to Toronto with No Age and Abe Vigoda and their performance at that time was awesome.

Audience were all dancing while they were playing,of course I was.

Some of the performances at that night are available on my YouTube channel.

Then,in the beginning of September when I was in New York,they played at East Village Radio Festival.It was outside,in fact their sound fit in it more than inside.

After the show,my friend who had never listened to High Places told me that he really enjoyed it and he will buy their CD.

Yes,High Places has the power which could move people's heart.

So,I would really like many people to listen to their brilliant debut album as soon as possible.

J A P A N E S E V E R S I O N

I N T R O D U C T I O N

I will start sOUnDFreAk LOves yOU in English.

This is for my study and all people who don't speak Japanese.

If you,reading this in front of your fucking nice PC,could understand Japanese,please try Japanese version of sOUnDFreAk LOves yOU.

I will update it mainly because I am Japanese and NOT good at English.

Thank you for reading.

Joe