Live: Tokyo New Wave vol.1 @ Shinjuku MARZ/Motion (03/28/10)

As the the date of my trip drew closer I started browsing more and more live house websites in search of concerts. I had never heard of Shinjuku Motion before(nor did I really associate Shinjuku with music) but it was on their home page that I discovered the Tokyo New Wave event. Some bands on the roster that I had heard of were Far France, the mornings and Sebastian X, but I can’t say I was familiar with any of their music. One thing they all had in common was their reputation as great live bands, and I decided that this was enough to check out this event.

The weather that Sunday was horrible. The sky was as gray as the skyscrapers that loomed overheard and light rain fell occasionally. That day my host family, who I had stayed with nearly 2 years ago, took my friend and I around Tokyo. We ended up at Shinjuku with lots of time to spare before the concert. Looking to relax and escape the drizzle outside we went into countless coffee shops in search of shelter but were denied every time. It was probably an hour later that we finally found a less stylish place that wasn’t filled with patrons seeking the same escape we were. At that moment I realized how precious space was in Tokyo. I also discovered there were no benches in this city.

For once, my feet were rested and my stomach was content before attending the concert. I was certain the place was near a hospital, and luckily a street map proved more useful than the one I had made. When I found Shinuku Marz It was still about 15 minutes until the event started and the person inside told me I needed to come back. Thankfully, an arcade was right across the street and I was able to enjoy a game of Drummania XG, the only one in my entire trip, and finish just in time for the 5:30 open time.

Tokyo New Wave would take place in two clubs: Shinjuku Marz and Shinjuku Motion. The event started and ended in Marz at 5:30 and would end at around 10:00 with the last in Marz being Owarikara, the event organizers. There were short breaks between each band’s set for set up time and it gave a small amount of time to go between clubs to check out another act. Some bands setlist’s intersected for a small amount of time but technically you could see every performance that night for a fraction of the time if you kept moving.

After getting my ticket I slowly made my way down the steps to the stage of MARZ. It was a lot bigger than I had expected it to be(the entrance was already in a basement so how the hell did they manage to carve this huge space underground?). People started making their way down too as I looked at the schedule on the wall to try and plot who I was going to see that night:

I was certain I wanted to see Sebastian X, the mornings, whoever the secret guest was, Owarikara and Far France. I had never heard of the other bands on the bill but since most of them were performing in Motion I would just be staying in Marz most of the time. It was difficult to decide what to do so I decided to just wing it and explore at my own will.

I waited in Marz until the opening act, Sasaguchi Sogo Harmonica, came onto the stage.  He played a few songs on his acoustic guitar and harmonica. His vocals were top notch, often escalating into a high pitched scream, and containing an honest quality a lot of singer songwriters try to have. I later found out he was the vocalist/guitarist of the thrird band to go on that night, Taiheiyou Shiranui Gakudan.

The floor wasn’t as crowded as I expected it to be once Sebastian X was ready to play. Most of the bands playing that night I had either never heard of before or had just seen a few clips or heard a few samples, but I had given the band’s Wonderful World EP a few listens prior so when the opening number, “Tour Star People”, started I was already swinging to the music. A lot of what I had heard about Sebastian X was true: they were so much more amazing on stage. Their vocalist, Manatsu, was cute and charismatic and the other members were always having fun with the music they were playing. They were always moving and giving their all into the performance which was something I don’t think you see often in Japan. I couldn’t imagine anyone seeing Sebastian X and not having a big smile on their face during at least one part of their set. After they played their last song I felt a lot more excited about the rest of the night and was assured that the remaining bands would be great.

I followed a crowd of people up and out of MARZ to Shinjuku Motion to see Siamese Cats, Motion’s first act of the night. Motion was in the same building as Marz on the fifth floor. A small elevator trip was all it took to get from one venue to the next. The merch tables crowded the little space there was between the club and the elevator. Beyond the soundproof doors the first band to play at Shinjuku Motion was warming up the stage for the rest of the night.

Motion was already full of people and I had to squeeze in to get to the side for a good look. Motion was less than half the size of MARZ; I think it was about the size of, if not smaller than, a school classroom back at home. Siamese Cats were mid-set and I watched one or two of their songs before having to get back to MARZ to see the mornings. I can’t say much about the brief moments I was in there, but I recall the band being very young looking but having some great sing-a-long parts in one of their choruses.

I didn’t know what to expect from the mornings. I had only heard they put on an awesome show but that can entail a number of things about the band’s music. The band came out on stage and immediately built up this huge wall of noise and distortion followed by loud abrasive guitars, the shouts of the vocalist, the manic drumming and the melodic synth. The fury got the crowd into a mosh pit and I recognized the bassist from Sebastian X joining in. It wasn’t long before the band started on their stage antics, with the vocalist climbing on top of speakers and the guitarist occasionally leaping into the crowd. The band’s music was very noisy but I heard a lot of new wave influence. I thought they sounded a lot like a very noisy, abrasive, version of Polysics if they turned up their amps a lot louder and stopped making gimmicky songs.

When the dust settled(it really seemed like you had to take a few moments to recover from seeing the mornings) I decided to wait around for the next band. At the time, I had no idea that the opening act was the next band’s guitarist and vocalist. I had no idea who Taiheiyou Shiranui Gakudan was and I didn’t even try to make an attempt at reading their Japanese name on the flier(太平洋不知火楽団). But I figured, with such an interesting name they must be good, right?
Suddenly Marz felt a lot more crowded and I found myself chilling out in the center of the club, sitting down against a pillar. Taiheiyou Shiranui Gakudan started with their song “Moshimo Boku ga Uretara”, which was a chill rock song and a welcome departure from the chaos the mornings had displayed before them. I figured they would be the chill band that toned it down for the night but Taiheiyou began tearing up the stage. They rocked a lot harder than their opening number have been and they put their all into their music, nothing less. The drummer was pounding as heavy as he could while the bassist owned his part of the stage, and vocalist/guitarist Sasaguchi Sogo shouted at the top of his lungs in a manic fury, barely containg his emotions and channeling them into his stage performance. At the end of their set, Sogo jumped into the crowd with his guitar as the audience carried him to the back of the club. The crowd made way as they let him down in the center and he hung his guitar strap by a hook on the wall. The noise of the guitar enveloped the whole club as the audience stood back and watched it hang from the center, making noise until the amp was finally cut off.

I had been here for a few hours already and fatigue started to hit me. I knew that walking all those stairs at the Tokyo Tower were going to come back to get me, and here I was in Shinjuku Marz struck with a sudden urge to take a nap. Some girls sat on the floor at the side of the club and I decided to take my seat near the front in an empty spot on the floor. It felt good to sit down again. I checked my schedule and up next was the secret guest. I had mixed feelings, hoping that it was some artist I already knew but also wanting to hear something new.

The club got dark, leaving only the strings of lights hung around the band’s equipment to illuminate the room in a yellow, fluorescent hue. When Yomoya came on stage I had no idea who they were but when they played their music it created this un-escapable atmosphere in the barely lit Shinjuku Marz that enveloped me in its entirely.

After playing a few songs I finally caught wind of their name during their MC. I had heard of Yomoya before; the year before I had went to Okinawa and read in a magazine or two that they were the best new-band of the 2008. I never took the initiative to listen to Yomoya but I was glad I got the chance to see them live that night.

I felt a lot better knowing who the band finally was and I think the fact that I had heard of them before made me more open to the remainder of their set. The band played this minimal kind of music, relying on simple vocals, occasional use of piano or synthesizer and a modest rhythm section to create their music. It worked out extremely well and with just these four instruments I was surprised at what the band was able to conjure up. Their last song, “Ameagari Ato Sukoshi”, is nearly 10 minutes long and made for a mind-blowing final song. The build up eased into this epic chorus at the end of the song. The mood the song put me in was almost trance-like, and truly the highlight of that night.

Even if Yomoya had the honor of secret guest they still had to compete with Far France who started playing in Shinjuku Motion during the middle of their set, so their crowd wasn’t as large as it could have been. I wanted to check out Far France as well, the last band to play at Shinjuku Motion, so right after Yomoya left the stage I headed to Motion with a bunch of other people to see them.

The place was packed, again, and I stayed in there for 2 or 3 of Far France’s songs. I was really anxious to see Owarikara, the night’s final act, but Far France made me not want to leave Shinjuku Motion. It was really high energy rock and the band never seemed to stop kicking ass with every song they played. I looked next to me and the same girl I had seen earlier when I checked out Siamese Cats was standing in this exact same spot, rocking out to Far France. She looked totally engrossed in the music and I didn’t think Owarikara was going to pull her out of there. But my time in Motion was up, and I wanted to check out the final act of the night.

I stopped when I got back to Marz to pick up Yomoya’s CD at the entrance. I had hung out up top where the bar was before, too nervous to buy one of Sebastian X’s CD. I had debated whether it was in my budget to or not, and even had some second thoughts of purchasing Yomoya’s CD, but the night was too awesome to pass up all these records. The person running Yomoya’s booth, probably one of the members, was a really nice guy. I decided to go back for Sebastian X’s stuff later.

By this time most of the people had come back to Marz to see Owarikara and the place was full in the front. I settled on a spot in the middle to watch them.

I can’t quite describe Owarikara‘s music. Their website describes it as Psychedelic rock but I don’t think it leans all the way toward the Psychedelic side. Their music was a lot more accessible than I think they genre is. I’ve heard many good things about them live and even right away you could already tell the band was giving it their all with their performance. A few times during the first few songs the keyboardist nearly jumped off his seat. The club was packed form back to front, the most it had been since it opened that afternoon. Owarikara’s music was something you rarely see in Japanese rock. They put everything they could into performing live. They didn’t just play their music, their music played them; they let their own music affect them which gave them this ability to make it amazing.

The entire crowd was into the performance and as they ended the bassist(or guitarist, i don’t know) and the keyboard player as well as his keyboard found their way into the audience and back to the stage. I was in awe.

After Owarikara played an encore or two Tokyo New Wave had finally come to and end. The crowd headed up the stairs and I checked the time on my watch. It was a little past 10. I walked up the steps to the lobby and bar area of Marz atop the stage level. People were crowded into the spaces between the merch tables and the bar and people squeezed to get out the door. I mulled things over before I went to the merch table and got a silly idea. I didn’t want the night to end “just like that” and I knew I wouldn’t get another chance to talk to these bands for who knows how long. So I shuffled through papers and took out the nights schedule and went over to the corner to Taiheiyou Shiranui Gakudan’s merch space.

I asked their singer for a copy of their album and to get the member’s to sign on their little spot on my paper. The bassist was amused at this, and told me to stay put while he looked for the singer. The singer came back, dragged by the arm by the bassist, looking piss drunk and wondering why in hell someone wanted his autograph. The bassist was laughing, but I think they were totally cool with some weird foreigner asking for their signature.

I later went over to Sebastian X’s little table and waited until they were done talking to some other fans. The vocalist was doing all the talking while the other members just stood by and the drummer noticed me on the side and asked what I needed. I grabbed their CD and a shirt and asked them to sign the paper as well on their name as well. The vocalist was totally engrossed in her conversation but when the bassist interrupted to get her to sign she turned towards me and gave me the biggest hug ever. It took a while for what happened to settle in and I probably looked really embarrassed when Manatsu, the vocalist,  eventually signed the paper. They were really cool people, and I think they asked me if I was one of Steve’s friends…lol

I saw the mornings up there too but the drummer, who I really wanted a signature from, was chatting with the piss drunk singer from Taiheiyou so I passed up the offer. On my way out though, I noticed the singer from Yomoya chilling at the exit next to the singer of Far France and I asked them both for a signature on their band’s names. They were both kind of amused at this request as well(I think the guy from Yomoya asked the dude from Far France if he even had a signature).

After this, I finally felt like going home. I had accomplished something for the night, even if it was just a meaningless paper, but it was probably the coolest thing I got that night. These bands were all in the running of becoming Tokyo’s next biggest underground act, if all them weren’t already.

The streets of Shinjuku were crowded even if it was almost 11 at night. Since I took a different route to get to the live house I tried to remember the route I drew from google maps and follow it back. I weaved through the endless crowds of people and on to a cramped, late night train and back to my hotel. I could still feel the warmth of Manatsu’s embrace on my tabacco scented jacket if I thought hard enough. It had been a great night.

~hideki~

Chris

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