Kulu Kulu Garden released Detorake Yuuenchi in Japan in August, and have just made the album available internationally through iTunes and CDBaby. I really enjoyed their album and definitely recommend it now that it’s easy to get outside of Japan. Kotone and Ryotaro from the band were kind enough to answer a few questions about their music, influences and releasing music internationally.
Can you describe your music?
Kotone: Slappy, spanky, happy music♪
Ryotaro: I’m not sure about the “slappy” and “spanky” part, but it’s something like that, yeah.
You just played a show at Kichijouji Planet K. How’d it go?
Ryotaro: It was a lot of fun. We’ve only played once there before, but it’s a really great club. The sound system is fantastic. We all really got into it around the middle of the set, and Kyohei was just on fire for the last half. It was a blast!
Who are the musicians who have influenced you?
Kotone: Puffy, Shena Ringo, and children’s music!
Ryotaro: When we started this band, I told Kotone that I wanted to sound like a cross between Afrirampo and Melt-Banana. We’ve obviously expanded on that as we’ve put our sound together, but the fundamental ideas are still there I guess.
I listened to stuff like Sonic Youth, Boris, and At The Drive-In in high school. Bands like Boredoms, Nisennenmondai, and Panicsmile have been very big influences too. I’m also into shoegaze-type stuff as well. I love My Bloody Valentine. And I’m a really big Smashing Pumpkins fan, which might come off as strange to some people, but that’s all I can hear when I listen back to our music!
But we listen to all kinds of things. We like Merzbow, Brigitte Fontaine, and Deerhoof just as much as we like Perfume, Ego-Wrappin’, and Judy And Mary.
You’re a young band, and still establishing yourselves in Tokyo – what made you decide to release your music internationally so early into your career?
Kotone: I think that music fans abroad are more willing to accept and appreciate unique, weird, interesting music. The capacity to accept different ideas seems larger. It’s not that people in Japan aren’t willing to accept us, but I think that over here, people are very cautious when they’re faced with stuff like that. A lot of people worry about what other people think. So I think it’ll be nice if we can get people abroad, who aren’t like that, to listen to our music and get some sort of response from them. And Japan is so tiny! The world is so huge!
Ryotaro: I think a lot of bands our age in the local scene here spend a lot of time thinking about Tokyo, and to a lesser extent Japan, but not really about anywhere else. Bands really don’t have any excuse these days about not reaching out to people outside their own local area. And we just sort of felt like it. I just woke up one day and thought it might be a cool idea. And the e-mails from Italy and Canada asking for our CDs didn’t hurt either!
How do you find the music scene in Tokyo? It is made of many small scenes, but do you feel like there is an overall musical identity of the city?
Ryotaro: There are a lot of tiny scenes so it’s hard to define one single musical identity. Obviously some scenes stand out more than others, but on the other hand there are a ton of scenes we have no idea about or know that they even exist. In that sense I don’t think the city is really unified musically or anything. There doesn’t seem to be much cross-pollinating between scenes happening unfortunately. But we’re not a part of any particular scene; we don’t really know what’s going on, so we can’t really speak for anyone.
The scene we’re most familiar with has been really exciting, with great bands like Owarikara and Far France. I think there’s a batch of young bands who don’t really give a crap about “indie cred” or whatever, and are influenced by a whole slew of things, both underground and mainstream, and are sort of putting everything in a big blender and coming up with a bunch of crazy things.
Kotone: I honestly have no clue about Tokyo’s music scene. But one thing for certain I think is that, the more you dig into it the more you find different things. But that probably has to do with the fact that there are a lot of people in the city.
How did you start working with Kyohei from Far France?
Kotone: We said, “Please play drums for Kulu Kulu Garden!!!”, and he said,“Sure!”.
Ryotaro: There was a bit more to it than that, but that’s pretty much how it went. I’ve been friends with Far France for about four years now. I met Kenji, their guitarist, one day at school, and we had really similar tastes in music so we got along immediately. I got to know the other guys through him.
We had a drummer when we first started out, but we had a lot of problems with him so we kicked him out. When we were thinking of a replacement, Kyohei was really the only person we could think of. I’m really picky when it comes to the drums, and he was the only guy I knew who could play our material. I really love his drumming. He’s very physical, and the little quirks he throws in make him very interesting to watch. I like drummers who sort of engage you visually.
He was really enthusiastic about our band and our songs from the start, so it’s been a lot of fun playing with him. He’s definitely the best musician in the band, and pushes us to be better.
When you’re not playing music, what do each of you like to do with your time?
Kotone: Sleeping, eating, reading, eating, reading, eating…
Ryotaro: We like to watch movies a lot too, and so we end up talking about that sort of stuff when we’re not playing music.
Do you have any message for your overseas fans?
Kotone: I want to see you guys in your countries!!!
Ryotaro: Hopefully we’ll be able to play in places outside Japan one day. For now, please enjoy our records!
Thanks Kotone and Ryotaro!
