Astonishments

There was something very Japanese about Mitsuru Tabata and Shoji Hano performed at Smiths, single minded, committed, excellent, but also connected in joy.  It's not an image we think of but it's what I saw well enough in Japan when there for a few weeks.  Very busy so that's a first image, distant, private, but not that way really.  I chatted with Mitsuru and he was friendly, welcoming, perhaps given a pic of a Tokyo club with free improv.  So what of it?  I was amused to find a cast of many older but also younger for this outing that no one knew but promised a blast.  It was a blast!  I was initially confounded, it being hard on, unrelenting, atonal, noisy improv, effects on guitar and loops and hard hitting unrelenting drums.  How does this fit with other loves, orchestral, choral, bebop and the rest?  Nothing of that order, but perhaps not absolute improv: I guessed some shouts may have signified changes, but they had both been shouting and the end of the first number (~35mins) came neatly given Bevan's clock viewed form the stage, and the request for another that then lasted neatly to 15 mins and the gig's end-time, and there were chords that suggested song (just maybe) at the start of this second tune. So maybe (very slightly) more ordered than I noticed.  But a string of different eccentric sounds and styles if not obviously structured, plenty of pick influence from guitar and those driving drums beyond beats, effects and effort and abandon all round.  Pretty loud too.  I was initially perplexed but finally captivated.  So much fun, too, to see how they managed the crowd for a long cheering finale and plenty of smiles and expressed captivation.  We all love the Japanese and there was much love for Mitsuru and Shoji at Smiths that night.

Mitsuru Tabata (guitar) and Shoji Hano (drums) performed at Smiths on tour from Japan.