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Tracklist |
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01 - There're So Much Fuckin' Coffee Shop,No Guiness Beer
02 - East Tenth Article On Fire
03 - Hello World, It's Me!
04 - About My Unclearly Far Fuckin' Tomorrow Song
05 - Marathon Runner Has Gone ThroughThe Water Service Swiftly
06 - Million Days, Knife With
07 - Broken Home
08 - Gazebo : Fine View
09 - My Short Summer Tention (Vacation Song)
10 - Girlfriend
11 - Socks Koroppokkur |
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Review |
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The greater Tokyo metropolitan area has a population of more than 30 million people, a good 10 million more than its closest competition, Seoul and Mexico City. More than a quarter of Japan's population resides in an area that can be traversed in a matter of a couple hours. Whereas an American band must drive hours upon hours, day after grueling day, to rendezvous with each tiny hub of punk rock scattered across the map, Tokyo's intense population density enables it to have a hyperconcentration of great punk bands in constant proximity to each other, and Four Tomorrow are undoubtedly the kings of the Tokyo scene. Each year, the country's best underground punk bands gather together under the banner of Four Tomorrow's Daigassoukai Festival, and they will have extra reason to celebrate this year. After spending the better part of a decade teasing the world with demos, splits and compilations, Four Tomorrow have finally released their debut album.
Four Tomorrow have never been shy about touting their influences, from Cap'n Jazz to Crimpshrine to the Dillinger Four in alphabetical order, but it's with this record that they've finally carved out their own niche in the punk rock pantheon that goes beyond trying to sound like their favorite bands. Their songs mainly occupy a realm that could lazily be called melodic punk, but the interlacing guitars add some mid-90's emo texture on songs like "Socks Koroppokkur", and the twangy rock and roll melodicism of songs like "Hello World, It's Me!" lends enough variation to help establish the band's own aesthetic. The multiple, overlapping, call and response of the four vocalists (everyone sings, usually in the same songs even) give the songs an urgent energy and is one of the band's most unique traits. In album opener "There're So Much Fuckin' Coffee Shop, No Guiness Beer" they order us to "dance until the show ends" and I really have no choice but to comply because the album just started, and because I know that Four Tomorrow's going to be headlining the show.
While it would be hyperbole to declare this the greatest record ever, it stands as a hallmark for this generation, this community, of Japanese punk. Of course, punk's not dead and it never has been (though it remains as fractured and schizophrenic as always), but the arrival of this record really seems to herald a sort of revival for one little corner of punk rock in Tokyo. This vibrant and flourishing scene will be following the trail blazed by Four Tomorrow for years to come, and I couldn't think of a better band to carry the torch. |
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