Melt Banana
Oran Mor, Glasgow - 12th November 2005
Oran Mor have an odd rule: gigs start early - very early. I arrived as support act Lapus Linguae were either amusing or freaking the audience out with their obscure, angular noise, which was just after 7pm.
Between songs they switched around instruments, for no other apparent reason other than maybe to show that they could. They talked in 'cat' between songs, leaving me feeling a triffle pissed off that they clearly were trying to be weirder than anyone else. Just talk to the fucking audience, eh?
The music itself was somewhere between the extremely experimental of early Mr Bungle, and the spastic ravings of The Locust, but not as good as either. There was something ridiculous and posturing about them that didn't agree. The songs were OK, there were some interesting ideas, but I didn't like them much.
Having had this gig built up by a friend who had seen them before and who said they were brilliant, I was waiting for Japan's Melt Banana with a fair degree of anticipation.
I was not disappointed.
Jaw-droppingly amazing, the four piece from Tokyo roared through countless songs, a blistering display of experimental hardcore punk at its best.
All members threw themselves into the performance with visceral intensitiy, but mention must be made in particular of guitarist Ichiro Agata, who beat such a wealth of bizarre sounds from his rather innocent looking SG, throwing it around himself, running around the small stage, all in all appearing like the proverbial nutter let loose.
The highlight was probably when they took 10mins to play 11 songs, each one a short napalm-fueled punk explosion, against a sound backdrop of futuristic samples and lighting.
The only band I have seen in quite sometime that did two encores, and seemed to be genuinely coming back for them, rather than following a rock cliche.
A stunning live band. Go see.
Review - Kenny Mooney
Melt Banana website