Nobody Listens to…Kemuri

I often feel that I’ve not fairly represented the whole world with these posts.  For better or worse I have more to to say about musicians from South America, Europe, and Africa more often than Asia.  I can comfort myself, however, by claiming that the Asian groups I do write about are among the most impressive that I feature.  Such is the case with this week’s post about the Japanese ska-punk band Kemuri.

I have been a fan of ska music since I came to the realization that it isn’t just punk reggae music (ska actually predates reggae as a musical style).  Especially in its recent incarnation as a punk-infused, fun-loving genre centered around positivity, ska music is just exciting to listen to.  Much like reggae, ska has become a worldwide phenomenon stretching from its native Jamaica to the U.K., the U.S., and further still abroad.  With this in mind, it’s no surprise that Japanese ska is a vibrant sub-genre, and one that churns out no shortage of incredibly talented and polished bands.  One of the headliners of this group was Kemuri.

Kemuri busted onto the Tokyo ska scene in 1995 with frenetic punk arrangements, a dedication to positive lyrics and content, and a really awesome logo.  In 1997 the band released their recorded debut, Little Playmate, which remains a landmark both for the group and for the ska-punk genre in general.  Riding Little Playmate’s success and an intense live show, Kemuri went on to tour heavily and record nine more full-length studio albums, thrice releasing multiple LPs per year.  After the tenth-anniversary double release of Waiting for the Rain and Principle and a similar double-down two years later at the tenth anniversary of Little Playmate, the band released a statement thanking its fans for carrying the music farther than anyone had expected and announcing Kemuri’s amicable breakup.  In keeping with their “Positive Mental Attitude” ethos, the band elected among themselves to stop at the height of their success to conclude in a positive way.  The band has briefly re-formed, presciently enough, for the 2012 Air Jam music festival.  So far there is no word on whether this will be a full-fledged reunion or a one-off.  In any case, Kemuri’s original lineup (sans trumpet player Ryosuke Morimura, who passed away in 2003, drummer Shoki Hiraya, and saxophonist Mike Park, who hasn’t played with the band since 1998) will be together on stage once again this year.

Kemuri plays a hyper-precise brand of ska punk that honestly puts a good deal of the well-known American ska groups to shame.  The punk rhythm section comprised of guitarist Hidenori Minami, drummer Shoji Hiraya, and bassist Noriaki Tsuda hammers away like a well-oiled machine.  Tsuda’s bass parts are perhaps the most impressive part of the band, as the bassist shifts effortlessly between metallic picked bass lines that are so indicative of punk music to wild walking lines that fly up and down the range of the instrument.  The band is rounded out by sax player Ken Kobayashi (formerly Park and Morimura lent their talents to an on-point horn section as well) and the constantly almost-yelling Fumio Ito on vocals.  Ito sings the vast majority of his songs in English, which further helps to set Kemuri apart by the heavily-accented English lyrics the group screams over distorted guitars and staccato horns.

It should be pointed out that Kemuri is more than just a punk band with horns, as ska-punk groups occasionally devolve into.  The band gets loud for certain, and the guitar, drums, and lyrical ethos are all soaked in late 1980s American punk music, but Kemuri also shows a great interest in the Caribbean ska roots of their primary style.  As such, Kemuri joins with the top echelon of ska-punk bands in truly striking a balance between the component parts of their music.  Also notable in looking at Kemuri’s music is the relative lack of change over time: in a career than spanned ten studio albums in as many years, songs from 1997’s Little Playmate would sound just as at home on 2007’s Blastin’ (and vice versa).  It seems that Kemuri simply had dozens of songs they needed to put out from the beginning and needed ten years to finally record all of them.

Because of the lack of progression, it is easy to listen to all of Kemuri’s music as one work.  From the rare Japanese-language slam of “Ato-Ichinen” to the band-defining “P.M.A.”, horns and gang vocals soar over a rhythm section that alternates between punk distortion and upbeat ska skanking.  Standout tracks along the way include the Boston-stomp of “Go! Under the Sunshine”, the horn-driven instrumental “Sunset”, and the super-catchy singalong chorus of “Rainy Saturday”.  While many of the songs are similar, instead of leading to boredom or disinterest each track just shows further the band members’ command of their instruments and the style they play.

With Kemuri reuniting this year after a five-year hiatus, it’s difficult to say what may be next for the band. As of this moment Kemuri has two websites: an outdated Universal Music page that has some fun graphics, but little helpful information, and an official website that features only a brief message about the group’s appearance at Air Jam 2012.  The group has little presence on social networking sites, though in fairness they haven’t been a band during much of the development of that phenomenon.  In any case, it is exciting that such a talented and productive ska-punk group is playing together again, and the chance that new music could be a reality in the not-so-distant future is encouraging.  In the meantime, it is entirely worthwhile for listeners to reacquaint (or acquaint) themselves with Kemuri’s Japanese ska-punk music.  Nobody is listening to Kemuri right now, but between the band’s dedication to positivity and positive attitudes and their blistering musicianship, the group definitely deserves another go.

Nobody Listens to…La Vela Puerca

As I wrestle with my proposal for a Fulbright grant (yes, I am applying for a Fulbright-MTVU Fellowship), I’m feeling the need to return a bit to my roots.  Over my career in college, I became more and more interested in South America and its contemporary music.  This was reflected in my major (Ethnomusicology), my minor (Spanish), and the certificate program I completed (Caribbean and Latin American Studies).  At some point during my studies, I realized that there is a great deal of really incredible ska music coming out of Argentina and Uruguay, and one of the greatest exponents of this movement is an Uruguayan band called La Vela Puerca.  As such, while I consider working my Fulbright proposal to get me to Uruguay, it seems appropriate that I write a bit about a band there that I love and would ideally (may very soon?) be studying with.

I discovered La Vela Puerca completely by accident.  I had been searching or clips by an Argentine progressive rock group from the 70s (I still haven’t heard anything of theirs…has anyone heard Contraluz?), and landed instead on songs from La Vela Puerca’s 2004 album A Contraluz.  I fell in love instantly.  The songs on A Contraluz range widely from pop to punk to ska to folk, but all are anthemic and catchy.

In every song by the Uruguayan outfit I’ve heard, the band members have done an impeccable job orchestrating fascinating and inventive melodies and harmonies.  La Vela Puerca seems to work largely by a rule of pairs: two singers harmonize on every song, two horn players blend their arrangements behind the wall of electric sound that most tracks feature, and two guitarists trade duties with chords and lead lines.  The resulting effect is a surprisingly sophisticated ska-punk sound that is much more sonically dense than one might expect, and every listen gives the listener a new melodic or harmonic line to follow through the songs.  Add to this occasional touches of strings, pianos, and harmonica on the group’s more recent albums and La Vela Puerca is playing a style of music that retains the excitement and exuberance of punk while very much avoiding sounding immature or sophomoric.

La Vela Puerca formed in Montevideo in December 1995 after some loose jam sessions outside a bar.  Lead singer Sebastián Teysera entered an early demo into a contest without his bandmates’ knowledge, and by the time the Concurso Generación 96 contest had named La Vela Puerca as finalists, the friends from Montevideo were a legitimate band.  The contest prize led to eighty hours of prepaid studio time, giving the “banda nacional que descansa en un reggae, sueña insumisión y se enchufa en ska” a foundation for their debut album.

Since Deskarado’s release in 1998 and re-release as a self-titled debut the next year, La Vela Puerca have recorded and released four more studio albums and one live disc, 2009’s Normalmente Anormal.  With each record, the band sounds more polished and tight.  The soaring melodies of A Contraluz that first introduced me to the group are very much still present on their latest, 2011’s Piel y Hueso.  The group’s discography boasts an impressive cast of producers, including Academy Award-Winning composer Gustavo Santoalalla and Uruguayan guitarist and composer Juan Campodónico, both of Argentine-Uruguayan Tango fusion band Bajofondo (They’ll get a separate entry here later).

On A Contraluz acoustic songs began appearing more often, most notably with the band’s chosen anthem, “Zafar”.  The song’s name is a Buenos Aires-area slang term used by musicians to describe leaving the establishment, and the upstroke bounce of “Zafar” paints the listener a picture of the urban life Teysera is a part of, but doesn’t necessarily love.  Many of the songs on A Contraluz in fact relate a similar sentiment, expressing simultaneous love and discomfort for the group’s situation as a successful rock group in the Montevideo-Buenos Aires metropolitan area.  It’s not quite as though the band is conflicted about their place in society, but that they feel they are in two places at once.

This duality is almost the given theme of the group’s newest release, Piel y Hueso.  Translated the title means “Skin and Bone”, a reference to both the lyrical content of the album and to its musical makeup.  Piel y Hueso is a two-disc set, the first being a full electric album paired with a six-song acoustic EP on the second.  This approach, similar in some ways to the American group Foo Fighters’ 2005 double-album In Your Honor, allows the group to focus on their down-tempo and acoustic songs without the stigma of having them categorized as ballads or filler tracks on an otherwise electric rock album.  The first disc of Piel y Hueso is very much what is expected leaving off from the upbeat rock and ska of A Contraluz and 2007’s El Impulso, albeit with the horn section mixed a bit less sharp in the rockier songs.  The second disc is an entirely different story, with songs such as “Sólo un Paredón” and “Hoy” developing into sweeping orchestral arrangements featuring choruses.  The album doesn’t feel terribly cohesive as a whole, and is clearly not an even split, as the first disc features twice as many tracks as the second.  Within each segment of the album, however, the pieces fit together seamlessly, one of the group’s trademark inventive melodic hooks trailing off into the next.

La Vela Puerca is still very much a live band, and is actually currently gearing up for two big release shows for Piel y Hueso, one each in Montevideo and Buenos Aires.  These release concerts will kick off a tour that immediately moves to Europe to tour with German group Die Ärzte.  Information about the tour, as well as complete liner notes and lyrics for each of La Vela Puerca’s albums can be found at velapuerca.com.  The band also has a Twitter account, @LaVelaPuerca_.  In any case, the undeniably talented musicians and songwriters of La Vela Puerca are continuing to write, record, and perform, as well as expanding the scope of their stylistic influence.  Many of La Vela Puerca’s songs, especially from A Contraluz, strike me as contagious and instantly brighten my mood. Nobody is listening to La Vela Puerca right now, but the Uruguayan band’s well-written melodies and appealing mix of pop, punk, and ska make them a band that impels the listener to move and dance, and always leaves me smiling.