A lot has been made of the 80s Japanese hair metal influences on Smile. 80s metal is still enormous there. The university I was in had a music society called ‘New Music Research.’ They covered 80s Japanese and western metal exclusively. Because they only had low stages to play on, so the audience would kneel in front of the tiny stage and mosh, to make it seem like the stage was actually at chest height.
So anyway. Where is Atsuo’s favourite music from? "America, UK, Europe, Japan… A little while ago I was listening to a lot of old rock stuff from Argentina. I think most Japanese music is pretty boring. A lot of bands only think of the domestic scene in Japan and because of that, know nothing of the outside world. But I like to good music, irrespective of where it’s from."
So what does he think Japanese people prefer? "I think a lot of people are biased one way or the other. People who only listen to foreign stuff, people who just listen to Japanese stuff. A lot of it is just fashion, you know?" The popular indie circuit in Japan consists of bands such as Qururi, Ellegarden or Zazen Boys who’ve been around in one form or another for ages, playing dull music in big venues around the country and selling 100,000 or so copies of their CDs domestically without really looking abroad. The underground scene that operates beneath that level seems to be much more interesting. Is it terribly different to the underground scenes outside of Japan? "It’s different. Incredibly insular. Because of that, strangely enough, you get mutations, so that interesting things can appear."
When asked for recommendations, Atsuo replied "Pedal Records productions are really good." Pedal Records is the label run by Boris pal and collaborator Michio Kurihara. Their joint LP Rainbow is the best thing I’ve heard on the label, but Takeshi from Boris explained that, following the Rainbow recording, he’d recorded "more music in the style of that LP" with Wata (Boris guitarist) including a few cover versions, that he thought would be released as an LP soon. The first of these appeared on the label last year on a split single with Wata covering a song by YBO2‘s Masashi Kitamura’s prog band Canis Lupus on one side, and Ai Aso covering King Crimson‘s Islands on the other.
So there it is. I asked for some guff about Smile, but Atsuo didn’t reply to that email. Despite wanting to wait for the real thing, I downloaded the leak of the Japanese release of Smile, as produced by You Ishihara (the US version was produced by Boris) and I reckon it’s brave and inventive stuff. With some fine bizarre production. In a recent interview, Atsuo spoke about Boris being so fake they’ve come out the other side and that this LP is like Pink II. I can’t see that at all. That would’ve been the easiest thing for them to do. And they haven’t. In the Pitchfork interview he talks of those hair metal influences, which make more sense. It sounds like a pleasant mutation to me. Mutation the main word I remember from this interview and I’ve been waiting for a chance to use it since.
Totsuzen-hen-i!
