Last day of grad school in Umeda, and it seemed best to keep my options open for the evening should the rest of my class want to go out for a drink or three. To be honest, I actually had sort of secretly planned to head up to
Whynot? Japan's X'mas party at Pure. I mean I AM writing an article for Japanzine on them (officially). But then I started thinking: what was the best that could come out of an evening there? I'd spend a nomihodai drinking it up and flirting with semi-attractive women, maybe a few e-mail addresses and knowing winks might get exchanged, but then I'd be back on the way home to the crabby wife anyway. So a little Net check later, and...oh, there's that drum thing at Bears.
First I dropped by Canopy to have a few beers before the show. Can't see I really dug the vibe much at this Umeda standby, but the drinks were cheap at happy hour, and nowhere else opened at 5. So with
Yuganaut blaring in my walkman (and prepping my brain for some of the madness to come), I hopped on the subway and I was off to Namba. On the way, I dropped by the 130 yen Cabbage-yaki stand (yum!), a convenience store for an Yebisu for my pocket (Bears is BYOB), but I was still a bit early. So I hopped down Chicaichi, that 200 yen for everything joint just down from Bears. The place isn't much bigger than my living room, and there was just one old guy there at the time, but there were loads of polaroids of both gaijin and Japanese alike extolling the virtues of this after-concert uchiage hole, so I'm sure it rocks on occasion.
So anyway, I saunter into Bears already tipsy, and thrown my stuff down in the corner as usual. Good lord, the drums! There were 10 kits arranged in a circle, spilling out into the audience area. Reminded me of a mini arrangement of that new
Boredoms project (the 77 drummer event). Oh, this was going to be tasty. And was I right.
The drummers, when they finally came on about a half hour late, were the cream of the crop of the Osaka underground, including
NANI from
BOGULTA/
Zuinosin, Pikachu from
Afrirampo,
Watchman (ex-
melt banana/
Coaltar of the Deepers, plus members of
Boredoms,
Para,
Suspiria,
オシリペンペンズ,
neco眠る and
DMBQ. Yes, it was just as awesome as you'd imagine.
The ringleader in the center of the circle was
Yamamoto Seiichi, who directed the group in a fur parka and sunglasses with what looked like some sort of lighting fixture. He started off pairing off drummers names on notecards and showing them to the audience and the drummers, basically drum duels. Drummer A would play with B, then B would play with D, then D would play with G - you get the picture. Then when everyone had their two duels, he clumped them into massively racket-inducing groups of fours, and then finally the inevitable finale where everyone attacked full blast. Basically a drum solo that lasted nearly 2 hours.
Things I realized during this poundathon:
1) NANI is hilarious.
2) Pikachu is still the hottest sentient being on the planet.
3) Yamamoto Seiichi is a genius.
The whole thing ended around 9, and I didnt' wait around for an encore. I trotted down to Fore Play to regail my adventures to the bartender and MILFy owner, and talked with Gary, an expat living the high life in the Phillipines. MILFster told me that someone was taking her to a secret "American only" casino run by army types; apparently you can't get in without an American passport. Bizarre. I also bumped into the Japanese-Australian dyke who I remembered tearing up Cinquecento a few months back; she was calmly chilling with a (male) coworker.
Need I say more? It was a drum kit/stick destroying epic. If you live in Osaka, you still have one more chance to see this awesome event (on the 21st). Go, go, go.