Mono
Eightball Club, Thessaloniki, Greece
26/2/2010.
Moments in life such as this one make you think that the gift of life given to you from the moment of birth, was worth all the pain, disadvantages and bad happenings that you have faced through the years. If you are to have a balance machine and put all these on one side, and moments like the gig of the Japanese quartet from Tokyo on the other side, it could easily unbalance all drawbacks and mishappenings of your life. Yes, so easily. Their music is beyond words and maybe they were the first ones to understand this clearly, so they decided that they would be fully instrumental, from the beginning of their career with their creation in 1999 until now, eleven years later.
They entered the stage at ten o’clock sharp and they played for 100 minutes compositions that drive you to another level of certain aspects in life. You could either close your eyes and feel it deep inside your soul, you could just sit and stare and wonder how such music is created by individuals. Not because it is difficult to play but because it is difficult to think and create such landscapes of sound without words and enable people to witness your musical vision. And to be honest, few waited that 400 people would come to Eightball that night for a band not so much promoted here in Greece, to say the least.
On the left and right of the stage stood the two guitar players, with rhythm guitarist Yoda on the left and lead guitarist Takakira Goto on the right, sitting in their chairs and exposing themselves in a sonic outburst of pictures that would flow inside your veins. As far as my mind is able to remember, I can only recall that the initial track was ”Ashes To Ashes” from their latest masterpiece ”Hymn To The Immortal Wind”. After that, I was lost like the rest of the crowd, trying to understand, think and give explanation to many things but mostly in vain I guess. Who told you that men are able to do anything?
On the center of the stage stood the female bass player Tamaki Kunishi. A very strong presence on the scene, standing tall in her high heels, unlike the two guitar playes who were sitting down on their chairs. She managed to create a great pulse with the help of the drummer Yasunori Takada, who would play with different kind of drum sticks almost in every song. It’s needless to say that their music is in a live situation about ten times more colossal than in the studio. And listening to them is already demanding on its own, so imagine seeing them in 5 meters of distance. Tamaki also played some keyboards in two songs that didn’t need her basslines. Addictable music in all senses however you look at it.
Without any microfones on stage, we were prepared that the band wouldn’t even say a word to us, they were just focused in their music like they were rehearsing without any followers. Many people say that people from the Far East tend to be cold hearted. I say that they sacrifice words so the feeling is exposed more. They have always been known for deeply spiritualism and what they do they do it in pure knowledge of what will come out as a result. The guys of Venerate that promoted the gig must be praised once again, for they brought us OM and MONO in 3 weeks distance.
As far as an outsider sees, there are people to love such sounds and they also multiply as days pass by. Let’s see what comes up next…
Aggelos “Redneck” Katsouras.