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http://publish.pots.com.tw/english/Music/2004/04/09/304_20_music/

The future of live "music"

A little less than three years ago, sci-fi guru William Gibson wrote, "The Japanese love 'futuristic' things precisely because they've been living in the future for such a very long time now." In this spirit we review two bands that played at the Spring Scream music festival in Kenting last Saturday (Apr 3). The New York band Dynamite club was led by Japanese Kentaro Saito through a spasmatic set of nudity and mock-kung fu in the mud. It was very in your face, maybe like what punk rock used to be...you had to see them live.

At a time when everything is recorded, these were music performances that can't be captured. They were reasons to actually go to a show for a change, reasons why music is not doomed to go stale.

Dynamite Club
BY ANDY O'BRIEN

At last year's Spring Scream, Kentaro Saito hit the stage wearing what he usually has on for gigs, his guitar and a pair of tighty-whites with his band's name written across the ass: Dynamite Club. He had no sooner strummed three chords than he threw the guitar down and began swinging from light racks above the stage. In the meantime drummer Mike Pride screamed and grunted as he nailed the drums. Toward the end of the show, the two jumped into the mud pit in front of the stage and traded spin kicks and pile drivers.

Earlier that day I'd met Pride, who is based with the band in New York. He told me: "Yeah man, we're jazz musicians trying to play punk. That, and we'll give you kung fu lessons. By the way, we don't have a bass, or a bass player right now. Do you know where we could locate these objects?"

I answered that my band's bass player was too drunk, but that earlier a guy who'd been offered me weed said he played bass.

"Great! Thanks man!" he said.

Dynamite Club was on the first leg of their 2003 World Domination Tour at the time. When Pride told me of his past musical projects, I was floored. The resume included several years on the New York City avante guard jazz circuit and stints with Trevor Dunn of Mr. Bungle Dunn (theMP3) and Millions of Dead Cops.

Later that afternoon I located the Canadian dealer/bass player and the band hustled him into the woods for a last minute rehearsal.

"It's okay!" Pride called over his shoulder, "We never rehearse anyway!"

The set ended with the Canadian stoner playing a five-minute bass solo while Pride and Saito traded pro-wrestling moves.

But this is not to say that Dynamite Club's music doesn't have structure.

"Kentaro and Mike write the score for every song very neatly and precisely," said Byrne Klay, the regular Dynamite Club bass player who came to Spring Scream with the band last weekend. Lying around their hotel room, they had pages of musical tablature with various parts written in: "bass line a la Prince", "heavy metal guitar fill", and also bars just basically full of notes. "But you wouldn't know it from seeing our live set," he continued.

"Everyone goes off in all directions, playing their own thing. Kentaro's off somewhere with his ass hanging out. Whatever."

The Dynamite Club's latest seventeen track CD, "It's Deeper Than Most People Actually Think", rips through every possible musical genre that counts: surf, country, jazz, punk reggae, metal, funk, "retard-core" - it's all covered. The disc hasn't left my player since I got it last weekend. From the bouncy opener, Friend of a Friend, to the bizarre ragamuffin reggae tune, Drinkin & Drivin, the insanity doesn't let up. I see it as the perfect gift for a friend or family member with ADD (Attention Deficit Disorder).

The day of Dynamite Club's show last Saturday in Kenting, it poured rain around midday. Later that night as they were about to hit the stage, Pride looked at the pit of muck in front of stage and shook his head. "Ummm...maybe we'll keep the kung-fu on the stage this year," he said turning to Kentaro. But that didn't stop the diapered Kentaro from rolling in the mud and challenging the crowd of Taiwanese kids. They parted like the Red Sea every time the maniacal, mud-covered Japanese dove into. The kids grinned at each other as Kentaro squatted on the stage and leered,
wildly thumping his package on the stage floor to the beat of Pride's frantic drumming (Kentaro had stuck his guitar's wireless pick-up in his underpants). Then Pride ran up behind Kentaro and pulled down his skivvies to give the audience a quick peek. "Alright!" he shouted as Kentaro snarled and writhed around the stage, "This next song's called Butthole! 1,2,3,4...!"

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From Airforce Records
Action figure music going crazy in New York. For those who live for weird you will breathe easier with this record.
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From ROVINJSKO LUDILO Zine. Pula, Croatia (translated from Croatian)
This project of Mike Pride (who is at the moment the drummer of the MDC) and a Japanese, Kentaro Saito, brings you a lot of miniatures in a rock-jazz-grind-cartoon manner and offers a new aspect of "playing around" and experimenting with music, or better, of smashing the old musical borders down and exploiting the importance of individuality in the music world. Anyhow, it is played professionally (boys are academically educated) and it is funny, "to die from" laughter. I haven't laughed so hard for a long time listening to a CD, but I think that was the real aim of these guys. It was a total bingo! Awesome!
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From The Spill Magazine Wesite - NXNE Review
By: Liz Worth
Dynamite Club
Bovine Sex Club
June 6, 2003
This math rock punk band combined fun, chaos, and a whole lot of irreverence, making this one of the weirdest shows Iﾕve ever seen. With an anarchic attitude but a lot of talent, Dynamite Club allowed themselves to get lost in their music. ... Dynamite Club is a band to admire for their avant-garde approach and seeing them live is definitely an experience not soon to be forgotten.
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From KZSU Zookeeper Online:
Album Review
by Tim Kempf
Reviewed 2003-05-21
It's like the smart-ass ADD class got good at their instruments, learned how to play all these different types of genres, then when they got bored with that, they'd just freak out in any way imaginable.
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From Planetary Group:
Dynamite Club -The Legend of Tiger Mask-Big Sleep
An incredibly talented tripwire of avant-jazz, where time and space have imploded leaving only random, nihilistic outbursts, decayed riffage and shoes-in-the-dryer rhythms. Many have attempted to handle their volatile conundrums, few have lived to tell the tale...
-Brooke Black (Planetary Group)
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From PUNK PLANET
issue#55 MAY AND JUNE 2003
Dynamite Club - The Legend Of tiger Mask, CD
Dynamite Club plays mish-mash of just about every different style you can imagine. Very experimental stuff influenced by everything from jazz and rock to country and punk. (KM)
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From Splendid
ﾒIt's like a shot of caffeine in the middle of a dead sleep, followed by a smack in the head.ﾓ
-- Mike Baker
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From New York Time Out:
" Dynamite Club is a moderately cracked duo that sounds like Boredoms at times (though a Boredoms staffed by only two people), and like constipated farm animal at others. Thankfully, they've pressed such sounds onto a digitally formatted disc, The Legend of Tiger Mask."
-New York Time Out October 17-24, 2002 Issue No. 368
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From Sponic Zine:
ﾒpost-punk blues soul geniusﾓ
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From The Dirty Rotten Truth
LIVE SHOW REVIEWS
11/23/2002 ﾐ DYNAMITE CLUB CD RELEASE PARTY ﾐ \
ﾒIf Gumby played guitar like Slash and practiced Kung Fu, heﾕd be this band's guitarist. This guy was literally bouncing off the walls and running up the walls while finger picking these punk/thrash metal melodies with his fingernails. Then heﾕd bounce around into these martial arts Iﾕm-about-to-kick-your-ass type stances.... There were even a couple of sumo/WWF fights... What a fun show. Loud, fun, crazy-rock. Thank God for The Dynamite Club.ﾓ
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From freewilliamsburg.com
ﾒThese guys are so much fun and the music is so whacked out of its mind, while maintaining a great deal of quality musicianship that is extremely listenable... Now I can't get enough!ﾓ
--Alien Rock!
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From Liz Reyes in The Disintegration of the Persistence of Memory
Dynamite Club "The Legend Of Tiger Mask" : CD review
Honestly I believe this record has all the elements a good record would have, comedy, love songs, disco, creepy folks, hair raising screams, flamenco flavor, lots and lots of noise and an overall tightness. I definitely recommend this record to all the mutants out there. BUY IT!

炸裂！ジャパニーズパンク！！
ダイナマイトクラブ＆ゼラチンで大爆発
　
　ＮＹで精力的に活動するバンド「ダイナマイトクラブ」と「ゼラチン」が１０月
２３日ニッティング・ファクトリーでライブを行った。
　ダイナマイトクラブは、ニュースクールのジャズプログラムで出会ったメンバーら
で結成、ボーカルの斎藤健太郎が会場を走り回ると観客も歓声をあげる。ドラムのマ
イクが「ダイナマイトのショーはラスベガス・ウィズ・セックス」と言うように、徹
底したエンターテインメント性が特徴。アーロンのサックスが、前衛ジャズ的要素を
利かせている。
−以下略。
OCS NEWS No. 690 November 8, 2002