Tokyo's Coolest Sound

On Sunday January 6, I went to an event at Koenji U.F.O. Club part of a series celebrating the 17th anniversary of the popular GS (Group Sounds)/garage rock oriented venue. I first knew of the show because a friend's band was playing, Saitō Neon Sign, but coincidentally another band I had been wanting to see was also on the bill, bassist Sally Kubota's latest band Love & Revolution.

Because of other plans that day I got there a bit late and unfortunately missed the first two bands, but what I caught was great though. Emmy Lee & The Psyzans had just started playing when I got there. Drummer and vocalist Emmy Lee is also part of Goggle-A (a band on the Sazanami label). They gave a good energetic show, Emmy Lee leading the whole thing from behind her drumset. She sings in a low voice that reminded me of Kinoco Hotel's Marianne. Her band's guitarists and bassist took turns doing solos.

My last show of 2012 was Beat Communist, a regular event organized by Nakatsuka Takeshi every 2 or 3 months at cool jazz lounge JZ Brat located in Cerulian Tower, Shibuya. While having a club-oriented atmosphere, the event is held on a Sunday at a last-train-friendly time.

Aside from resident acts (Nakatsuka Takeshi and twin rappers P.O.P ORCHeSTRA), this time the event also featured big band Iga-Bang BB, jazz singer Aoki Karen and singer-songwriter Rie Fu.

Iga-Bang BB is an instrumental brass big band (hence the "BB") led by trombonist Igarashi Makoto. The band had a total of 18 musicians: 5 trombones, 5 saxophones, 4 trumpets, piano, guitar, bass and drums! They've had 2 singles released on iTunes last year, on Takeshi's digital label ("Bang!" and "Bang! Bang!"), and they played 3 tracks from these singles, as well as title track from album "Smile" (Amazon).

Set list: Second Line / Brooklyn / Fractale / The Sputnik Sweetheart / Smile