Rawk

Last week was the Halifax Pop Explosion, a big rock festival that happens in town every year at this time. Most of the good local bands played, and a bunch of acts from out of town and around the world came to show our little isolated peninsula the current state of international indie rock. It's usually a weekend-long event, but this year it ran for five days.

The highlight for me and a lot of other people I've since talked to was a loud and energetic performance by this Japanese band called Zoobombs. I didn't really know anything about them going into the show, but remembered seeing a video of theirs on MuchMusic's "The Wedge" about ten years ago or so and thinking it was pretty exciting and then not being able to find out anything about them and soon forgetting about them entirely until I found out that they were playing at this year's HPX. I was pleasantly surprised to find that the lead singer and guitarist, Don Matsuo, was basically a Japanese Matt Murphy, quickly whipping the crowd into a frenzy with his hot guitar playing and intense, frantic manner. "Everybody! Everybody!" he kept shouting, apparently seeing no reason to elaborate. Another surprise was that even though they often slipped into funk-inspired rhythms and riffs, it didn't make me feel gross like it does when white bands do the same thing (Talking Heads excluded, of course). Why is the funk somehow less offensive when attempted by a Japanese band? I'm not sure, but their apparent worship of manic energy over technical precision played no small part, I think.

Anyway, if you ever get a chance to see these guys (actually three guys and a girl, the latter pretty hot stuff on the distorted drony keyboard), you should definitely take it. Their live show is really inspiring and exciting and fun. I bought their latest CD from Matta, the parenthetically mentioned keyboard player, and it's a live album recorded in Toronto so the energy and excitement I witnessed is happily captured. Here's a sample. I can't help but suspect they've been somewhat inspired by legendary German 70s band, Can, though they're not listed in the influences on the Zoobombs MySpace page. But Don was definitely channeling Damo Suzuki at times. And it's not just a Japanese thing, because at other times he sounded like Malcolm Mooney, Can's original singer. Check out this Damo track for easy comparison.

In other music news, I was in HMV the other day, looking for a particular Jonathan Richman album (they had none whatsoever, surprise) and this song started playing where the main part was a really nice, harmonically simple but rhythmically complex electric piano line, and my ears perked up to check it out. It was quite groovy and I was enjoying it a lot before I realized that it sounded kind of familiar. In searching the corners of my brain, trying to figure out where I'd heard it before, I suddenly stumbled on the very weird feeling that it was actually a recording of me playing a melody I'd created on my own Wurlitzer. And then I realized that it was a track from the upcoming Buck 65 album and the weird feeling was accurate. It sounded great! Feels pretty good to be digging your own material without knowing that's what it is.

- Andrew