RIO Drop-In Centre

 

Also sorry to be annoying but would you be able to put that myspace link in the format of www.myspace.com/(insertsomethinghere) I'm sitting behind a firewall and for some reason they block the page when it is in the other format.

 

Oh I was messing around the other day at work and stumble upon this site

 

 

Ths is the little caption under the website link in google read like this.

"A very dancy kind of gipsy-progressive-ska band playing free happy music"

 

 

 

 

 

 

KNEAD s/t

 

Ruins + Keiji Haino = Knead! Yes, this new PSF group Knead (we're curious about how/why they picked that name, it's kind of odd isn't it?) is none other than a trio consisting of Keiji Haino, Tatsuya Yoshida, and Hisashi Sasaki. Haino of course is the guitar/vocal shaman of Fushistsusha and much solo fame, while Yoshida and Sasaki are the drummer and bassist of equally famous Tokyo duo Ruins! Indeed, Haino and Yoshida are both truly titans of the Tokyo underground rock scene. Haino is a pillar of dark, psychedelic phantasia, while Yoshida is more of a progressive rock stalwart. On paper, it might seem like the super hyper, stop start hardcore acrobatics of Ruins would be an ill match for Haino's freeform drone guitar freakouts. But fans familiar with the respective massive outputs of both, know there is in fact much common ground. That said, Yoshida and Sasaki pretty much let the 50 year old Haino take the lead in Knead, with bassist Sasaki accepting a supportive role more typical of his instrument (which is certainly not the case in Ruins), wisely deciding not to directly duel with Haino's apocalyptic guitar. But you still hear a lot of nimble playing from him, while partner Yoshida of course unleashes mighty drum salvos pretty much continuously. The eight tracks (75 minutes) of Nipponese noise rock nirvana found here are kind of like Fush*tsusha with a supercharged rhythm section. At the energetic peak that much of this attains, Haino torches the place as if his guitar was a flamethrower, while the Ruins duo busily thrash away. Upon a few other moments, they find calm, throwing in sections of atmospheric clatter and vocal babble. At the outset of track 5, Haino's primal, gutwrenching singing is joined by Yoshida's much less anguished, falsetto cries and bizzare vocal sound fx. (Although Yoshida's vocal model has always been Magma's Christian Vander, we noted while listening to this the similarity of Yoshida's warble to Robbie Basho's singing!) Soon, though, the vocal duet gives way to Knead's combined instrumental firepower.
Haino, even though he hardly needs anyone's help to generate entire universes of emotive psych-skree, has thrived in collaborative settings, having recorded with Boris, COA, High Rise, Musica Transonic, Shoji Hano, Peter Brotzmann, Masada's rhythm section, Bill Laswell & Rashied Ali, and others...much of it great stuff indeed. Whereas, the Ruins collaborative track record is not so good: generally fun but tossed-off improv sessions. Their jams with Derek Bailey, Guapo and Omoide Hatoba were pretty much ok, but we could've done without their meetings with Ron Anderson, Jason Willett, and the Sun City Girls. Knead, thankfully, is much better than these -- infinitely better than RonRuins!
Haino and Yoshida of course have actually vibrated the cosmic ether, I mean played, together before. Haino guested on the first disc by Yoshida's Tairikuotoko vs. Sanmyakuonna band, and he also did an album with Musica Transonic (for whom Yoshida drums)...more recently there was an excellent Haino/Yoshida duo disc (and tour in China) called "When Water Grasps Flame". We sold out of that disc before we could even list it, but hope to get more of 'em in soon!
Recommended, especially to Haino fans. After all, Fush*tsusha's last record, the shockingly guitar-less "Origin's Hesitation", really was pretty great -- but even those of us that loved it can't help but yearn for more of Haino's intense wall of sound guitar playing. And for that, Knead will more than meet your needs!!

 

 

My attention was not totally focused on lyrics/storyline, I did pick up that it was about Mister Green and the factor that there seemed to be a rather humorous side to the story during certain stages. Am I right in thinking this? In further listens it will be something I will take more of an active interest in.

 

Overall I though this was a really good album but I would not site it as a masterpiece just quiet yet. I think I will give it a lot more listens before I make statement of this proportion. I'm sure in time all those loose ends will start to come together, I'm assuming they all have purpose in someway to the storyline. Thanks for suggesting them they were well worth my time.

 

Also I read in another thread where you said something about them bring out another album soon. I would be quite interested in this, especially to see how the band has matured as a group over the years. Do you know any specifics about the album?

I have not been following the lyrics of Taal too much (mainly enjoying the music like Adam), so I am not in a position to enlighten anybody. The lyrics are really unreadable in the booklet. I will try to decipher some of it.

By the way, in Skymind the opening is a sort of reminiscence of Mister Green in that the opening is conjuring up sounds from the first album (Coornibus etc). Is Skymind a continuation of the story on Mr. Green?

 

Regarding your purchase, Adam, I have not looked yet, but I would refrain from the Wolf Eyes until you at least heard some of it. I got a negative impression from their music. Try here for some samples at the bottom of the page: http://www.subpop.com/scripts/main/bands_page.php?id=423