Wednesday, September 9, 2009

Hijokaidan ( 非常階段 ) - Ferocity of Practical Life 10" (1997)

| Harsh Noise |

Hijokaidan is one of the most important japanese bands on the harsh noise scenario. Alongside with Masonna, Gerogerigegege, Incapacitants, and the legendary Merzbow, they were one of the firsts 'pure' noisy bands from the Japanese underground. The group began at 1979 as a performance art-based group whose anarchic shows would often involve destruction of venues and audio equipment, food and garbage being thrown around, and on-stage urination. As the group’s lineup changed over time, their focus became less performance-based and more musically based, fine-tuning their sound into a dense wall of white noise created by each member making as much of aural-headache as humanly possible. The group is the project of guitarist Yoshiyuki “Jojo” Hiroshig, its one constant member, who is head & owner of the Osaka-based Alchemy Records. Other regulars include Jojo’s wife Junko and Toshiji Mikawa (from Incapacitants).

Ferocity of Practical life 10" consists of two tracks, side A and B, full of white noise. It's hard to even hear them screaming behind this giant wall of noise. Well, there isn't much to say about this. One of Hijokaidan's most white-noisier performances. I found side A a little more comfortable and listenable than side B, though I don't really know if there is any difference from both. It's cool that Masami Akita, better known as Merzbow, does the drumming on this album. You barely can listen to any kind of beat on this, though...

My best advice for you is: Stay Away from this. If you're not a Harsh Noise lover, just don't even download this. Stop looking at this and go listen to something else on this blog... there's keiji haino, shizuka, high rise... all of them are fine (ok, keiji is fucking more than fine, but that's not the point). Just stay away from Hijokaidan or any Hijokaidan record you find.

Serious. This isn't reverse psychology, believe me. (check other Hijokaidan's releases here)

Catalog: FDTEN56 (Fourth Dimension Records)
On Last.fm
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