Caught Japanther this past Friday at their record release party for Rock and Roll Ice Cream, it was insanity as usual, although I think they benefit from a nonconventional space. They won me over one day a long time back opening for Death from Above at Club Exit, since then I've caught them in backyards and basements and they're always amazing. I'm into the recordings but they really can't capture what a manic fun fest they are, just those two guys kicking all kinds of ass. The super fans make the show even more entertaining, getting on stage singing along diving into the inevitable pit, kicking the house lights. It's nice to feel a tiny bit in danger watching rock and roll. I also insanely appreciated them playing an entire Unwound album before they went on while Ian stood off to the side air drumming along.
The Pharmacy on the B-Side are groovily rocking the slightly distorted vocals, jangly garage in the vein of the Jacuzzi Boys, it's not frantically convincing, it's just going to slowly win you over. Like the patient garage pop of the Mantles... with hammond organ, huge room drums, classic sounding almost psych...they focus on the smooth reverb sound, heavy on pop hippie vocals and soul? Yeah, I'd agree with that.
They'll be in town at the Cedar house April 2nd and then DBA in May...who knows, maybe they'll have copies of this split there....
This red hot slab of wax was recorded in the desert whilst on a shared U.S. tour. JAPANTHER (Brooklyn, NY) let loose a trashy version of their anti love/anti war number "Not At War." A song that captures the duos true Ramonesy/Germish brat-pop style to a T. THE PHARMACY (Seattle, WA) fire back with "What Are You Doing With Your Life" an upbeat epic complete with piano hooks and breakdowns. Some where between Nirvana and Otis Redding these three smiling friends kick out good poppy punk anthems with a tinge of soul.On Bachelor Records, which unfortunately is based out of Austria accepting the Euro, but they have a bunch of other great stuff, so it just might be worth splurging for some sweet imports I haven't seen anywhere.
Checking out their blogspot they just posted this old out of print single for free, so you can go check that out if you're so inclined.
I'm not biased or anything :)
ReplyDeleteBUT FUCK YES. What a great way to sum up the experience of seeing them live. I have been commenting here off/on ever-so-slightly for a while now. But I just had to let you know, I'm just a super-fan not a bandmember or whatever. I am totally loving their new album. Just shipped today. Gray/black/white marble wax, came with a little note from them and everything. They love us superfans too!
I saw that record label's offerings via google a week or two ago, and I ALMOST put in an order for a few things on their. I wasn't even lookin for japanther stuff. If I remember correctly, they had some rare Rock N Roll Adventure Kids stuff I was looking for, but was also unfortunately OOP.
I'll place an order after I do the math for the Euro + S+H.
(speaking of, watch out for Japanther's website. S+H was 10 fucking dollars for some fucking reason. Maybe it was a browser(ff)/paypal(?)/windows error... but I could only select 'AIR'.)
Thanks a lot, I love those guys.
ReplyDeleteThat damn shipping rears it's ugly head...I should have picked up their new full length after the show, but I placed an order for Rock and Roll Ice Cream and a couple of singles I didn't have on their site, but I don't think I had that same problem...weird. Maybe I got a brooklyn discount.
Let me know how that import single is.
Yeah, I got all their 7's off their site at the same time. Great stuff, if you haven't heard it yet the Divorce/Evil Earth 7'' features alternate versions of each. The Evil Earth side is the most different, with fist-pumping proto-pubescent swear-word laden breakdowns that are not found in the proper version. Divorce might not even be different at all, maybe I'm just new to owning speakers/vinyl etc... but I finally could understand all of the lyrics to this song.
ReplyDeleteTheir Ice Cream grey swirl full length came this weekend with the Divorce single...both awesome, even had to save the retrun mailing address part because they wrote it so rad!
ReplyDeleteThe sleeve on the Divorce single is hardcore offset, totally bad ass. Glad I caught that one.