As well as mothercoat, I talked a bit with Kotone and Ryotaro from Kulu Kulu Garden about the Next Music From Tokyo tour of Canada. Here’s what they had to say about their future, and their hopes for the tour:
We talked in December, but what’s new with Kulu Kulu Garden since then?
Kotone Miyahara: We’ve started to expand acoustic Kulu Kulu Garden seriously. We ask our favorite musicians to come in and help us out. The non-acoustic side of us has been busy writing new songs. They’re a lot more poppy than before, but I think people will be excited when they hear them and I think they are turning out really well. I can’t wait for everyone to hear them.
Ryotaro Aoki: We technically have enough songs for a new mini-album already, but I think we’re going to wait a bit and let some more songs get written before we start any recording. We’ll be giving out a sampler CD-R with demos of some of the new stuff to people who buy our EP. It’s a bit of a preview of things to come.
How has the international response to Detorake Yuuenchi been?
Ryotaro: We see people on last.fm and stuff who are listening to us who probably couldn’t listen to us before. Hopefully we’ll see an even bigger reaction once we start the tour.
How did you get involved with this tour?
Ryotaro: Steven Tanaka, the organizer, came to see us play early last year at Shinjuku Motion. We didn’t know he was coming, much less did we knew who he was. Apparently he heard us on some free compilation my friend had made. Anyways, he came to see us, and we started talking after the show, and since then he’s come to see us a couple of times and we gradually started to get to know each other a bit more.
Some time last summer, he came up to me at another show and said that he was interested in taking a couple of Tokyo bands over to Canada and the States. I was overwhelmed, but at this point it was just a little idea of his, and nothing more. I expected it would be a while before things would start to materialize, but he e-mailed me just a couple weeks after, asking if we were still interested. I couldn’t believe it! We jumped on immediately.
What is one thing you want to do in Canada?
Kotone: I want to eat maple cookies while watching the Niagara Falls.
Ryotaro: I like going to record stores, so I want to check out as many stores in Canada as I possibly can.
Have you traveled abroad before? Where? What was it like?
Ryotaro: Kotone and I have both lived abroad. She lived in Hong Kong and I lived in the States. I was in a really rural part of the country, so it was very peaceful and quiet.
What would you like to say to Japanese music fans in Canada?
Kotone: We hope to bring you all the live power of the hottest Japanese indie musicians that you can’t get on CDs or youtube. I’m sure it will be a very worthwhile experience.
Thanks Kulu Kulu Garden! The tour is currently underway. Ironically, I’m in Japan while an amazing tour of Japanese bands passes through my hometown, so those of you in Canada would be well-advised not to miss these shows!
May 22 Vancouver @ the Biltmore Cabaret
May 25 Montreal @ il Motore
May 28 Toronto @ the Rivoli
May 29 Toronto (All-Ages !!) @ Whipper Snapper Gallery
July 9 Tour finale in Tokyo, Japan @ Shibuya
O-nest !!
