LOOMER: Asobi Seksu, Johnny Brendas, Last Night
1. Studio magic be damned. Let it be known now that Asobi Seksu know how to create that beautiful wall of noisy fuzz live, and do we ever love them for it. You can tell we love them for it when the crowd will wait around for an encore even when James Hanna puts a guitar face down on an amp before leaving and let the fans cheer at the face-melting feedback solo.
2. I was wondering about this for quite some time, and yes, Asobi Seksu does have a rhythm section.
3. James Hanna isn’t the world’s most exciting guitarist to watch. After checking him a few times to make sure he was still playing, I understand it’s a bit hard to play guitar that actually stands out over all the fuzz. That being said, he excelled at creating that unmistakable background that helps define their sound.
4. For a shoegaze band, Asobi Seksu are a pretty animated bunch of musicians. Between James thrusting the entire upper half of his body into much of his strokes and Yuki swaying and bobbing to the rhythm, they were giving the photojournalists in the front something of a workout.
5. Let’s talk about Yuki Chikudate [pictured, above] for a quick second. Man is she tiny! Now that I got that out of the way, she is a musical force to be reckoned with, having almost superhuman control over her falsetto. Never missed a beat, and her voice still manages to strike the perfect balance between being overly forceful or delicate. She also threw down some feisty drumming at the end of the show. Always entertaining.
PHOTO & TEXT BY ADAM BONANNI