Sick Of Listening
(2006/Nonsense Fiction/Dead.Rock)
2006 is shaping up to be a good year for Tokyo's underground rock scene. With the last couple of years increasingly dominated by the wacky antics of the Kansai scene, there are some strong Tokyo bands who have been gaining a reputation (if not exactly a following) and are now starting to release albums. Hot on the heels of the magnificent Deracine debut, and with the Nhhmbase album due any time now, another of Tokyo's most hotly tipped bands, Tacobonds, hit us with their own first album.

The first thing that hits you is how fucking good it sounds. Shitty production is a way of life for Japanese bands (and it's a lot of their charm for some people), so it's frankly startling when a track as solid and heavy sounding as Flashback Hours comes at you. The production is credited to AxSxE from Natsumen, and there's definitely something of his band's fusion of prog rock, punk, and jazz on display here, particularly in tracks like Citybank and Morningcall ~ Sick Of Listening, although the more immediate tracks such as 12.5% ~ Natiview and Minexico draw on more traditional punk and krautrock rhythmical motifs. It's challenging music, but thanks to the clarity and depth that the production lends it, Sick Of Listening is accessible in a way that so many of Tacobonds' contemporaries fail to be on CD. -Ian Martin, May.22.06.