Quit Your Band! Soundtrack 1 (Japanese Pop 1950-2001)

When writing Quit Your Band! I made a conscious decision that the book wasn't going to be a guide to the music itself so much as a book about the world musicians inhabit and the background against which their music exists. Under this structure, the artists I talk about really function as examples for broader points I want to make about trends in music culture or aspects of how the scenes infrastructure work, and they fall into two main categories.

Firstly, there are the artists I encountered in the live venues of Tokyo and beyond as I navigated my own path through the music scene. This would include the bands I have released myself through Call And Response Records, the wider pool of artists I book my events from and the even broader tapestry of artists who make up that world. Basically no one knows who any of these bands are, and most people dont really want to.

 
Secondly, there are the artists mentioned in the books second part, where I discuss the historical background of Japanese pop and rock music. This section deals with mainstream and underground music in parallel, trying to note some of their key areas of intersection, and mentioning some key acts from the immediate postwar period through to the year 2001, when I first arrived in Japan.
 
A few people have suggested that as an accompaniment to this blizzard of band names, I might put together a playlist of some kind, and I’ve put off doing this for a long time — partly through being busy with other things, but also through embarrassment at the prospect of going through and reading the book again.
 
Another problem to overcome was how to reconcile those two threads, each featuring artists of very different levels of significance, without seeming like I was dishonestly trying to exaggerate the historical significance of bands who are really only important to me and my little world.
 
As a result, it makes most sense to me to make two playlists: one for the bands who have soundtracked my life in the Japanese indie scene and one to supplement the book’s broad historical overview of music in Japan. Since Japanese artists aren’t very well represented on streaming services, I did it on YouTube, although expect half the tracks to have been pulled by the labels within the first few weeks of me posting this (so watch it quick!)
 
Anyway, here’s the first playlist, covering the history of pop and rock. It’s broadly chronological, but broken up by themes, which often overlap. I’ll explain the structure in the track list below.

EARLY JAPANESE POP AND ROCK

1. Tokyo Kid - Hibari Misora

2. Ano Ko no Namae wa Nanten kana - Kyu Sakamoto

3. Test Driver - Takeshi “Terry” Terauchi & The Bunnies

4. Aoi Tori - The Tigers

5. Hey Joe - The Golden Cups

6. Marianne - The Jacks

 

1970s UNDERGROUND ROCK

7. Night of the Assassin - Hadaka no Rallies (Les Rallies Dénudés)

8. Horibieta-mono no Densetsu - Zuno Keisatsu

9. Kodomo Bosatsu - J. A. Seazer

10. Satori Part 1 - Flower Travellin’ Band

11. Lemon Tea - Sonhouse

 

1970s "NEW MUSIC"

12. Dakishimetai - Happy End

13. Jiko Ken’o - Yosui Inoue

14. Kanashikute Yarikirenai - Folk Crusaders

15. Hikouki Gumo - Yumi Arai

 

THE GOLDEN AGE OF KAYŌKYOKYOKU AND IDOLS (70s-80s)

16. Koi Dorobou - Chiyo Okumura

17. Hitonatsu no Keiken - Momoe Yamaguchi

18. Junketsu - Saori Minami

19. Shochuu Omimai Moushiagemasu - Candies

20. UFO - Pink Lady

21. Young Man (YMCA) - Hideki Saijo

22. Makka na Onnanoko - Kyoko Koizumi

23. Akai Sweet Pea - Seiko Matsuda

24. Sailor Fuku wo Nugasanaide - Onyanko Club

 

PUNK/HARDCORE/NOISE/EXPERIMENTAL ROCK (70s-80s)

25. Crazy Dream - Friction

26. White Man - Totsuzen Danball

27. Ponytail no Kawaii Anoko - Ultra Bide

28. Coca Cola - SS

29. Kii Kurete - Inu

30. Subete Urimono - Aunt Sally

31. Signal - Phew

32. Romanticist - The Stalin

33. Broken Generation - Laughin’ Nose

34. Nih Nightmare - G.I.S.M.

35. Fuck Head - Gauze

36. Zouroku no Kibyou - Hijokaidan

37. Pow Wow Now - Boredoms

38. Ecobondage (Ending) - Merzbow

39. Galois - Aburadako

40. Dadaism - Ruins

41. Twist Barbie - Shonen Knife

42. Owaranai Uta - Blue Hearts

 

NEW WAVE & AVANT-POP (70s-80s)

43. Mummy Doesn’t Go to Parties Since Daddy Died - Sadistic Mika Band

44. La Femme Chinoise - Yellow Magic Orchestra

45. Sheena & The Rokkets - You May Dream

46. Copy - Plastics

47. Bijutsukan de Atta Hito Darou (Artmania) - P-Model

48. Puyo Puyo - Hikashu

49. Medaka - Chakra

50. Jenny wa Gokigen Naname - Juicy Fruits

51. Radar Man - Jun Togawa

52. Uchoten - Wahaha

53. Parallelisme - Miharu Koshi

 

BIRTH OF J-POP (CIRCA 1990)

54. Ai ga Tomaranai (Turn it into Love) - Wink

55. 17-sai - Chisato Moritaka

56. Furyou Shounen no Uta - Blankey Jet City

57. Kimi Shika Inai - Tama

58. Aoi Kuruma - Spitz

59. Rosier - Luna Sea

60. Gravity of Love - Tetsuya Komuro

 

PEAK J-POP (1990s)

61. Boy Meets Girl - TRF

62. Can’t Stop Falling in Love - Globe

63. Only You - Yuki Uchida

64. Seesaw Game ~ Yuukan na Koi no Uta - Mr. Children

65. Mottö - Judy And Mary

66. Asia no Junshin - Puffy

 

SHIBUYA-KEI (80s-90s)

67. The Audrey Hepburn Complex - Pizzicato V

68. Dolphin Song - Flipper’s Guitar

69. Konya wa Boogie Back - Kenji Ozawa featuring Scha Dara Parr

70. New Music Machine - Cornelius

71. Good Morning World - Kahimi Karie

72. Fantastic Cat - Takako Minekawa

73. New Rock - Buffalo Daughter

74. Living on the Same Planet - Seagull Screaming Kiss Her Kiss Her

 

END OF A CENTURY POP AND ROCK

75. Boys & Girls - Ayumi Hamasaki

76. Can You Keep a Secret? - Hikaru Utada

77. Love Machine - Morning Musume

78. Ne~e - Aya Matsuura

79. Cream Soda - Supercar

80. Ai Naki Sekai - Quruli

81. Toumei Shoujou - Number Girl

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Comments: 2
  • #1

    Matthew Guay (Tuesday, 11 July 2017)

    I'm very curious your thoughts on fishmans. Inspirational to all the post 80s Japanese musicians I know.

  • #2

    Ian (Wednesday, 12 July 2017 00:02)

    I thought about whether to include them or not (or someone like Sunny Day Service, who seem to have been the other big Shimokitazawa band of that era) and I suppose the only reason I didn't is just because I didn't, really. They do get a mention in the book, but they're just one of a number of important bands (like RC Succession or The Spiders or whatever) that I omitted from the playlist because I decided to arbitrarily draw the line somewhere. No reason, basically.