For those who don't like to read: Disgusteens are from Japan. They play shit kicking pop-punk. They've been around for a solid 12 years now, they just released a new LP. I'm really trying to not say "disgustingly good pop-punk," because I feel like that would be douchey.
I had a glorious moment earlier today when I went to look up this band. The last thing I knew about from them was "Songs for Swinging Losers," which came out in 2001. Safe to say, I thought this band was long fucking gone, like everything good about the world. Upon checking their geocities website out (apparently this place still exists in Japan? What in the fuck?), they're still fucking killing it, and they just came out with a new LP. I'm currently trying to see what I can do about getting this LP, but it'll probably be a little bit before anything becomes of that, if anything comes of it.
Disgusteens- "Born to Sleep"
So yea, this band, once had 4 members, apparently operates as a 3 piece now. They used to release quite a few things under Snuffy Smile records as a band called "Blew". I'm running out of things to say because just download the god damn songs and listen to them, they're fucking ragers mannnnnnnn. It's pop-punk that is played correctly, what the hell do you want me to say? I still find it weird that these dudes consistently play shows (there are videos on youtube that range between 2001 and 2010 of them doing live shows), but these guys are just now releasing their 3rd LP. Whatever, none fucks given, they've already released two great LPs (as well as some great tunes in their previous band, Blew), so I really can't complain about wanting more music.
But I'll always complain, because it's fucking fun and I live in America. Everything sucks, fuck you.
For Those Who Don't Like to Read: You probably know Off Minor. If you don't, well they write some of the best lyrics I've ever read. I'm also going to try and write shorter entries now, I hate being redundant.
Instead of putting this in the little disclaimer, I feel it's better to write this here. Off Minor is one of the very small amount of bands in the world that can actually move me to tears. Off Minor is one of the very small amount of bands in the world that I will actually throw out all of my voice to, for every single song. All of their lyrics are truly something else, and it also helps that the music they play along to is also quite fantastic. It also helps that Off Minor wrote 2 of the most sincere (god I hate using that word when it comes to describing music) and fantastic albums of the last decade.
Off Minor- "Everything Explicit"
what's best left unsaid? a speaker spent, a listener left with regrets in his stead. in a life of loss, silence can cost you more than you expect. held tongues relate a bitter taste when prone to reminisce. anamnestic but recipient absent, the circuit's dead. as we live these linear lives, unidirectional, towards an inevitable end we must make everything explicit. that's how we left it: unsaid. i'm at a loss for words.
There are two songs that Off Minor wrote that are especially important to me. The first one, and probably the most important, is Everything Explicit. I don't know how Off Minor managed to nail the thoughts I've had about losing someone close to me, but this song hits way too close to home for me to be comfortable hearing. Honestly, this might rank as the most important song in my life, because nothing I have ever heard as ever been able to put into words how hard it is to know you can never ask someone another question again, it's something will forever burn into your conscience. I really hope anyone that reads this doesn't know what this is like, or will never know what it's like; it's truly one of the most awful feelings in the world; one of the feelings that will forever haunt me, straight to my fucking grave.
Off Minor- "Staring Down the Barrel of Limited Options"
post-morbidity, pre-mortality, the dying proceeds and the living itercede
on behalf of your best interests as we perceive them
and so you sign, this document, stating the following: "please let me go"
post-morbidity, pre-mortality, facing the inevitably
that i could never begin to understand
what is it you see staring down the barrel of limited options?
what goes through your mind as you make the decision to end all decisions?
never say everything will be ok
never say everything will be ok
never say everything will be ok
NEVER, AGAIN
The second Off Minor song that means more than the world to me is "Staring Down the Barrel of Limited Options." Reading the lyrics, it should be painfully obvious what this song is about. If you don't, well shit, sorry, I'm not spelling this one out for you. I will continue to talk about it though, and then the painfully obvious will become painfully obvious to you. Wanting to kill yourself sucks. It sucks too much. That feeling is also up there for one of the worst things I've ever felt, and I really hope I never feel this way again. It's a true burden of weight upon your psyche, and the thought of it alone is enough to crush you. To anyone who ever feels this way, please talk to someone you care about. Let people know the way you feel, because feeling this way is a whole other world, and if you don't find help, it will get to you. And no one should have to feel this weight, everyone has a purpose, even if you haven't found it yet.
Sappy and shit, I know. But something like this is really important to me. These two songs are really important to me. And that bass line in "Staring Down the Barrel of Limited Options" is really fucking great. If you haven't heard anything by Off Minor, I really do strongly suggest you hear at least these two songs.
Split w/ Life Detecting Coffins (as far as I know, no upload of this exists, but the songs on this 7" should be In SL and Staring Down the Barrel of Limited Options)
For those who don't like to read: this is a collaboration in a park between two dudes, bibi & hummingbert stereo. they're from thailand. I really like it.
Days are fucking long, and days are fucking boring. That's this weekend for me, a whole lot of nothing, and then the Super Bowl (which I'm not really excited for at all, weird feeling). I spent the past 3 fucking days watching season 1 of The Wire (great show, the parts with Wallace at the end of season 1 might be some of my favorite television ever), and I really haven't had damn much else to do. I have no fucking idea how, but I started searching up Japanese electronica and some how from that, I found myself searching for stuff by a dude named hummingbert stereo.
Hummingbert stereo is a guy named Ekkachai Klomcharoen from Thailand. How the fuck I found music from Thailand, I dont know, fuck you. Besides from random links from his soundcloud, I don't really think he has done anything by himself. Thanks to the wonders of random people uploading random shit, I did find a collaboration with Hummingbert Stereo, and a dude that goes by "Bibi." Who is Bibi? I don't have a damn clue. What I can tell you though is that this stuff sounds really beautiful.
From what I can gather (which is about nothing, this is all assumptions at work), this is really just two dudes in Thailand sitting in a park and recording an album, which is fucking awesome. So we've got an acoustic guitar, an xylophone, and I'm pretty sure also a toy piano thrown into the mix (mostly the guitar/xylophone combo though), and it really is just some astounding, pretty (yea I said it, pretty pretty pretty pretty) music. And that's really all there is to it. I'm going to continue throwing this on not only whenever I'm feeling a little down (this music is pretty uplifting), but just shit, whenever I want to relax. There really isn't much to say about this, because I'm not going to over-fucking-analyze two dudes sitting in park playing their instruments, but it definitely is recommended if you're just looking for, I guess, softer music to listen to.
For those who don't like to read: charlie brown gets a valentine was a band. they played songs. they probably drank. their songs are hard as hell to find. you'd like them. my boss is tired of them, but fuck her.
I had an idea to right about Charlie Brown Gets a Valentine (CBGAV) for a while now. But it took me a while to find their first release, Save it for the Van. But that's neither here nor there, now that I've finally got it. CBGAV were from some part of Maryland (money is on Baltimore, because that is where later bands were started from, such as the very fucking good Dead Mechanical, and the mediocre/slightly shitty The AV Club).
Charlie Brown Gets a Valentine- "Cluttered"
CBGAV were a pretty awesome emo/pop-punk band. One of those bands that hit the sweet spot right in the middle between the combination, and they hit it fucking hard/perfectly/whatever. CBGAV is one of the first bands I throw on when I'm felling a little down, and usually I'm instantly thrown up into a happy mood. I found about them a long time ago, probably early 2007, when I found two random downloads (this was the days of scouring rapidshare/megaupload and random posts that contained links upon links upon links!) for a band called, CBGAV. I liked the name enough to download it and try them out. That's when I first heard them in the song "Sentimental Fool," which I must say, might be one of the best acoustic tracks ever made. After that, I was instantly hooked. I mean, I never really listened to them too much, since I was all over people screaming into mics and slamming their instruments because they had no clue how to play them. This all changed about 6 months ago.
Charlie Brown Gets a Valentine- "Distrust in Things Certain"
I don't know what caused this change, maybe it's just growing up. I've gradually lost interest in screamo/hardcore/whatever music, and it's all getting focused on pop-punk with songs about not knowing what the hell you want to do with your life, and just getting piss drunk. Obviously fantastic decision making, something I feel all too well right now. So what it boils down to, really, is that I fucking adore this band, and I think you'll absolutely love them too, because there is no way not to like them. They play fast, great pop-punk that everyone loves to hear. In no way am I trying to sell this band to you, they should already be sold. Download any of the albums below, and I swear you won't be disappointed (I even posted two songs for you to figure out how much you love them!).
For those who don't like to read: Deathconsciousness is the greatest album of all time, fuck you I said it.
Suggested listening for while you don't read this.
Have a Nice Life- "A Quick One Before the Eternal Worm Devours Connecticut"
I really hate making lofty claims such as: "Hey, this band is my favorite band of all time!" or "Hey, this truly is the greatest song I've ever heard, I mean, did you HEAR THAT BASS DROP?!" The problem with these statements to me are, times fucking change man. What you may love one year may not be your favorite band the next year, month, week, or day. I've really tried to stay away from these claims, although I have been known to do it before (Man, City of Caterpillar/Kidcrash/The Vidablue/Ten Grand is my favorite band ever); but it's definitely not something I do as much, or at all now. I'm in the middle of a big music taste change anyway, so any of these lofty claims I make are most likely bullshit and I'll just make another one in the next week (that will also most likely be bullshit).
That's why it's weird for me to declare that Have a Nice Life's Deathconsciousness is the greatest album of all time. For close to 4 years now, I've said this, and I'm pretty damn fucking sure that I will continue to say this for as long as time will go. I mean cmon, the album art is one of my fucking favorite pieces of art all time, Jacques-Louis David's The Death of Marat. I'm pretty sure I downloaded this years ago just for this simple reason. It's not to say this album hasn't had a profound fucking affect on my life though. There has been times in my life where, fuck it man, I'm depressed, and I would just turn off the lights, throw on this record, and turn it up all the fucking way and sit in there in this ambient/drone/shoegaze-y noise. It's fucking hauntingly beautiful, absolutely wild.
And that's the best way to describe the first song on this album, A Quick One Before the Eternal Worm Devours Connecticut. Hauntingly beautiful. I've never been one for a droning ambient noise, but there is absolutely something different about this track, different from the first second I listened to it, different as I listen to it right now. I could really just go on and on about how great it is, the looping guitar line, the keyboard or whatever coming over and whisking away in the background, shit, it's still unlike any other ambient track I listen to, which usually will just bore me to tears (DARK AMBIENT, I'M LOOKING AT YOU).
Have a Nice Life- "Bloodhail"
And that's really the flow of the first disc, The Plow That Broke the Plains, very subdued, very laidback, very fucking good. The best track on this disc is easily the 2nd track, Bloodhail. The whole song is perfectly laid back with a great bass line (which happens more than once on this entire album). And the whole song builds up to the great part of "We kill everyone with, arrowheads, arrowheads" with arrowheads being repeated until the end of time, which is absolutely fantastic. I'm not saying the rest of The Plow That Broke the Plains is bad, because it is in no way close to that; it's just so fucking hard for the rest of the first disc to live up to how great the first two tracks are. Really, the first disc is the perfect thing to relax to, to wind down from whatever awful day you've had, to get you to calm down from anything. Honestly, it's the perfect problem solver of an album, nothing better to do anything to.
Have a Nice Life- "Waiting for Black Metal Records to Come in the Mail"
Now the 2nd disc, entitled The Future, is something completely fucking different. It still has that ambient feel you love to it, but it's just, way fucking better. All 6 songs on The Future are fucking fantastic, just perfectly made songs. Waiting for Black Metal Records to Come in the Mail was the first Have a Nice Life song I've ever heard, and it will forever remain my favorite Have a Nice Life song. Something about the drums, coupled with the guitar in this song, just makes it an absolutely, hauntingly, perfect song. It's hard to describe shit like this (and really, this whole 2nd disc) because it's hard to put feelings like this into words. Whenever I hear the chorus of this song, I literally feel a lightness in my chest, like some sort of mental anguish is literally lifted off of me. Weird shit, eh? Even weirder to try and fucking explain. This is what makes the 2nd disc so hard to describe, because this isn't the only song that gives me that feeling in my chest. The next song, Holy Fucking Shit: 40,000, may do an even better job of putting this feeling in my chest. It's really hard to put this song in words. The fucking chord progression of the acoustic guitar is just, better than perfect, better than the greatest thing I've ever heard, better than achieving nirvana, just holy shit it's really fucking good. So good, I don't even want to use italics to get my point across how good it is, because it's better then that. Not only do we get this fantastic chord progression, but then the song breaks down into this fucking wall of electronic/guitar noise that rips you apart, before seguing back into the original chord progression.
Have a Nice Life- "Holy Fucking Shit: 40,000"
You know how I said Waiting for Black Metal Records to Come in the Mail was my favorite song on this album? Bullshit, it's Holy Fucking Shit: 40,000. And that's why you can't make bullshit lofty claims without being 100% sure.
The rest of this album is straight out of the park home runs as well, from the instrumental track, to the most out of place track on this entire album, The Future. From the fantastic opening of I Don't Love, to the absolutely glorious ending to the entire album with Earthmover. Earthmover is basically 11 and a half minutes of "Fuck you, this whole album rules." To be completely honest, I'm already sure I'll never here an album this good in my life again. It's not even close to depressing either to know I've found music's entire fucking zenith. It's sort of a great feeling actually, knowing this album will always be here, and I'll always be able to listen to it. Great feeling, but eerie as well.
Have a Nice Life has also released two other tapes, Time of Land and Voids. To be honest, I have never listened to either of these tapes. It's not these tape's fault, it's just that, whenever I go to listen to Have a Nice Life, why the fuck would I put on something other than Deathconsciousness?
Deathconsciousness is the greatest album of all time, fuck you I said it, and I'm sticking with it.
For those who don't like to read: Cigaretteman is really fucking good pop-punk from Japan, really fucking good. Split female/male vocals, the whole nine yards (minus Bruce Willis). Get at it.
First off, before anything is mentioned, I would like to thank Servo from the Internet for uploading this for me.
I learned about Cigaretteman about a week ago looking for more Japanese pop-punk (which there will be a part 2 post as well). I fell in love with them immediately, because not only are they really fucking good, just look at that god damn picture up top. LOOK AT IT. I really love it for some reason, I have no clue why, it just rules. So after already building up a love for a band I never heard of, I found some stuff on youtube, and it turns out, they're actually really fucking good. Not just the picture, but man, what a fucking band.
Cigaretteman- "Stay"
From what I can find online about them, they had 4 members:
Chikako - Vocals / Guitar
Hiroaki Uozumi - Vocals / Guitar
Seiji - Bass
Hiroyuki - Drums
After that, not a fucking thing to be found. Well, there is a fucking fan site set up, but it's all in Japanese and google translator blows ass, so the mystery will forever remain. Speaking of the band, it's really great 90s pop-punk, basically yet again proving that I was born a decade too late. So that pretty much means you've got a the "Jawbreaker-y" riffs and music to go along to, with some awesome male/female vocals to accompany you. Pretty much the perfect music (to me anyway) for any moods; feeling happy? You fucking know I'm gonna jam to some Cigaretteman. Feeling sad? You fucking know I'm gonna cheer myself up to some Cigaretteman. Weather outside is looking shitty because Mother Nature is a total bitch? I'll tell Mother Nature to go fuck herself by blasting some Cigaretteman. It's summer and I've got my windows down and I'm totally blaring down 95 at unsafe speeds? You guessed right that I'll be fucking blasting Cigaretteman while driving like I'm from New Jersey (and I totally am so this works).
I'm not going to prolong this post by dragging on about how great it is. You probably like 90s pop-punk because you have to have something seriously wrong with you to not enjoy it. Cigaretteman embodies everything I'm looking for a lot of days, great music to bob my head along to while I have no fucking idea what they're saying.
For those who don't like to read: Haha, this is going to be a really long fucking post. Go wild at the bottom, all bands are great. Looking back after writing this, this isn't as long as I expected, whatever.
Maybe I'm a little too into Japan. Sure, there is only 3 posts on this blog (including this one, because I got really fucking lazy already, oops), but I can't even remember when I got seriously interested in Japan. I can guarantee that the music that comes from that island is a big reason for it though. Seriously, every country has their shitty bands, but the good bands in Japan are really fucking good. Maybe I can't understand them all the time, but that doesn't stop it from being some really enjoyable shit.
I think the weirder thing about this whole thing, and this post, is my gradual descension into pop punk. Sure, I can call what I listened to most of elementary school/middle school pop punk, but this is different. This is the rawer sounding late 90s pop punk that was going around (think Sore Loser, Dig Dug, other Texas pop punk bands). Then mostly throughout late middle school through my graduation (and a year after that) all I would listen to is idiots screaming at the top of their lungs. Really, just anyone in the town I lived in knew exactly where the fuck I was because of what was coming out of the car. Well, now that my ears only work at half capacity, and I'm just not as angsty anymore, I've moved more into the pop punk style of music. Not exactly the most creative genre around, but it's more about listening to great tunes, and the happy jams. A complete fucking shift in what I listen to now, maybe I'd rather just get blackout fucking drunk now instead of whining about how unfair the world is and how much life sucks (but alcohol costs money, and tears don't cost a god damn thing!).
Minority Blues Band- "Hands to Build"
I don't remember exactly how I grew so interested in Japanese pop punk, but my greatest guess would be to pin it on 1000 Travels of Jawaharlal. Shit, they're not even pop punk (maybe one of the best bands to come out of Japan, because Owari Wa Konai definitely ranks as one of my favorite LPs of all time), but they sure did do a lot of splits with pop punk bands, respectively: Minority Blues Band and Pear of the West. These two bands were definitely the first experiences I've had with not only Japanese pop punk, but Japanese punk in general. Sure, finding the actual split between 1000 Travels/Pear of the West is absolutely fucking impossible, but the 1000 Travels/Minority Blues Band split isn't, and really, it's almost as fucking good (Pear of the West is #1, for reasons explained soon). I don't know much about any actual histories of these bands, and for Minority Blues Band, I know they existed between 1998-2004. They released two LPs, and a final album that was a compilation of all their splits and such. Really, I'm awful at describing bands, so for any next bands, just give the videos I'm posting a shot, and if you enjoy it, really consider downloading the stuff I post.
Pear of the West.
Now this is where shit gets really good, really fucking good. I'll always rate Pear of the West as one of my favorite things to come out Japan, because it's female fronted pop punk, really fucking good female fronted pop punk. Honestly, I can't describe just how perfect this band sounds for me. It's either the just the fantastic combination of pop punk and her voice, or maybe because I don't understand a fucking thing she is saying, but holy shit it's really good. It's everything you're looking for, short and fast songs, great riffs, you wanna bob your head to it, whatever. I already told you once I fucking suck at describing things, now I have to tell you twice. Get a fucking hint.
But really, female fronted pop punk that is really good? ITS LIKE DREAMS ARE SHATTERING EVERYWHERE. No really, I love the idea of this, and I wish I knew about more female fronted pop punk bands that I would totally be into (hint). I honestly wish I knew more about these bands, but I have no idea how to read Japanese, so until then, I'm stuck giving you half-assed descriptions of why I really love these bands.
Pear of the West- "All I Want All I Need is Communication"
Her Spectacles
Her Spectacles are another great pop punk hailing from Japan. I'd tell you more about them, but their website looks like someone vomited a bunch of text that ASCII couldn't understand, so I'm basically grasping at straws here on what to actually say about them. And I feel like this late in the post you should get the fucking idea what kind of music it is.
Her Spectacles- "Deception"
Then there is Cigaretteman:
Cigaretteman- "Fade Away"
Thanks to the idiots that shut down megaupload though, this one is going to have to be saved for another day.
I wish I knew more about Japanese pop punk, and if you do know more, or would just like to converse on the subject, please feel free to send me an email and we can talk until the Mr. Burns blocks off the sun. But really, learning new music is the best thing there is around, and I hope whoever reads this learns and finds something new to love and enjoy, that's what this blog is about.
