Stormcellar Band Home Page

 Yesterday I got caught in Gorilla Rain, a new term in Japanese language for heavy rain storm. Only a recent  thing for Tokyo apparently These street display dolls aren't brought inside, but simply given their own umbrellas. The bar and coffee shops seem to do well when the rain hits as lots of people take shelter there and grab a drink or snack.

On the way to a gig I found a shop called Chicago, imported US clothes, at about quarter of the price we get stiffed with in OZ. Picked up a few shirts ($20 ea) and a belt $12....bargain.

Last night ventured into Roots bar called "c- artist"  cheap dinner and $7 cocktails. First three acts were sort of amateur singer  songwriters.
Then 3 serious young insects, obviously Con students studying compostion took to the stage and blew me away. Using a snare drum with brushes and mallets, a piano/grt player and a guy  playing a small set of vibes that he played not only with mallets but also at times with 2 violin bows, running them on the ends of the vibe bars to create haunting soft tones. Added to this were angelic 3 part harmonies but with outmany words, or none at all, ala Enya. The beauty and sparseness of their original compositions were breathtaking. The audience was totally silent thruought the 5 song perfornce, and you could see a lot of them were surprised at the effect of the haunting and sometimes heart wrenching melodies on them as they sat tranfixed. This music is begging to be used in movie soundtracks.  Have to find what band these guys come from. Usually they have a bassist as well, and use a full drum kit, but what I heard was as close to perfection as I could imagine, so I don't know whether it could really be any better, but with these serious young insects...you never know.  Sorry no pics, but I was in shock. LOL Another astounding find in back streets of Shimo. Cover charge $4.

Off to Shibuya (Shibs) today to try a few guitars out at a big shop, with "guitar-try" rooms, then catch some young bands busking at Harujku, sometimes 15 or 20 all playing with their own little PA's.

Ja mata (catch u later)
Whiz