CMJ 2007

The number of Japanese bands showing up for this year's CMJ was small enough to count on one hand, heck even those missing fingers could still accurately represent the few "nippon" artists there. Lets' count them off: Ruins, Bleach 03, and PRE, who actually are an American band with only have a Japanese lead singer so I really wouldn't even count them. Of these three I managed to catch the Ruins at a small show put on by the wonderful people at Death by Audio, a small art space located in Brooklyn. The good news, however, is that this show also had other noise rock bands on the list such as AIDSWolf (Montreal), HEALTH (San Francisco), and other artists that kept my ears constantly destroyed. Anyways, here's some pics below of the Ruins:

Yoshida on the drums (he is what we call a virtuoso)

Yoshida singing

(or rather SCREEEEEAMING and HOWLING
in short, spastic yelps and accented cries........)

Actually what would really help illustrate just what the hell I'm trying to explain about a Ruins show can easily be seen in a short live clip. Enjoy. (P.S. hope you can already guess the sound quality will not be up to Hi-Def standards...and.......how should i put this...tilt your head to the left might help as I haven't installed my movie editor just yet, thanks.)



Okay so by this point you are noticing that Ruins consists of only one guy on drums. Well, the truth is that the Ruins used to be a bassist and a drummer but since the two some how ended up on bad terms, they don't tour together so Yoshida (the drummer and creator of the band) tours with a sampler that has all the bass lines from the songs and drums over them to recreate their songs live. Still, this performance was sick and truly ridiculous in trying to watch Yoshida's arms go all over the place. Definitely check this band out if you have not yet heard them.

the Ruins- __________ (from Tzomborgha)

What did end up saving the CMJ Music Marathon this year was the non-associated Japan Girl Nite show that followed the night after everything was coming to end. This show I'll cover in a separate post with plenty of pics and live clips....Go Japanese girl punk bands, Go...