Tokyo’s bed are a band to get just a little bit excited by. Descending upon British shores for the first time last spring – whereas most new bands get a few months to rotate across the capital’s key grassroots hotspots and build their fanbases – bed covered all of them in a week, got up to Manchester as well, and even achieved the requisite Lou Smith ‘live at the Windmill’ video. Or make those two.
And such a motley, magnetic bunch they are too. Each musician’s live persona feels so individually distinct to their role. The aloof singer in sunglasses and a cocked hip. A guitarist, hood-up, eyeballing the audience with a dead-eyed, 1000 yard stare, suggesting that all he does is sit in a dark room and shred, only coming outside in order to shred some more. A drummer with ripped biceps, muscles bursting out of his tank-top, bashing away, bashing away.. A bass player grooving, feet rooted to the ground, jaw chewing, head bobbing, life lived solely ‘in the pocket’.
And so, after all that, following up the pummelling Model/Actriz-isms of last year’s ‘Kare Wa’, long in gestation new single ‘風｜Kaze’ feels less like a ‘song’, per se, but more like a Gaspar Noé-inspired film trailer for the upcoming movie ‘bed’, starring bed, and featuring the music of bed/ (The unnerving horror-leaning music video helps give this impression too).
Marking their signatures with the 40Miles imprint (Lover’s Skit, Nia Archives), ‘Kaze’ rises up like a sea mech-monster from the deep, whispering vocals pitching up to a painful scream, chewed up to bits by a wired kick drum, before clattering into a dark industrial rock-scrapheap of noise and despair. And then, after 105 seconds, just before a climax, it stops, because that’s it. You’ll have to wait for the full feature. They’re back in the UK this May.
Photo by Domu
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