Why Japan Wins At Public Holidays

Yesterday was the second public holiday this month! And really, what's a better way to get through a cold workweek than to have a holiday splitting it into two manageable halves? I do love my three-day weekends, but with how cold it's been getting recently, it was a relief to not have to wake up before the sun rose, as well as wear jeans. :x

 

Since it was labor day here in Japan, me and Matto packed up our gear and drove over to Tokushima to have band practice and see a live. Why they decided to have a live show on the actual holiday and not the night before so everyone could party.... I will never understand (but it was a fantastic show, nonetheless). We practiced for two hours in Torigoro's (practice/recording studio) nicest studio; it was soo spacious and fancy feeling, compared to the cramped old spaces they rent out here in Kochi. We finished a 6^th song together and finally decided on a band name: Leeway. It feels appropriate for our strange little group of four (our two Tokushima bandmates keep getting weirder/more interesting the more time we spend with them. I'm loving it).

Arase, our amazing teddybear-esque lead guitarist and my lyrics notebook in the spacious studio <3

Atsushi still in his work clothes. Isn't the studio fancy looking?!

After practice, Atsushi had to get to a show at another venue called Grindhouse, so Matto, Arase and I all went out to an izakaya/sushi-ya to eat, drink, and bond (I could not participate in the drinking part, seeing as I am always DD). Since there was so much time between practice ending, and the show at Crowbar beginning, we wandered over to see Thirsty Chords play at Grindhouse. They played amazingly, as usual, but for a crowd who was not thrilled to see them. Now that I've seen them enough times in enough live houses, it's interesting to see what songs they choose to play for which crowds. When they know that the crowd loves them, they play all their amazing songs from the “I Continue I...” album. Otherwise, they play either really old or really new stuff...

The band before them was a Sublime ripoff, and the guys after them (who were assholes) had this reggae/ska/rap thing going that I was really not a fan of. Thank god the tickets to the show were cheap, because we peaced out after Thirsty Chords finished and headed over to Crowbar to see anti-18, not for, Your Pest Band, Gleam Garden, and WHAT-A-NIGHT's. As usual, I love WHAT-A-NIGHT's and their perfect performances (they seriously sound like their recordings every time), but I was especially excited to see Tokyo's Your Pest Band again. I think the main vocalist got even more attractive since I saw him last time in Tokyo during the summer... and I forgot how tall he was too!

Your Pest Band

Spalding from WHAT-A-NIGHT's

Anyway, great way to spend a public holiday (even though I didn't get to sleep until 2AM): full of music and Arase's drunken kabuki poses. :D