Midori


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Hello Everyone Nice to Meet You We are Midori (2008), 7.5/10
Shinsekai (2010), 7/10
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Midori, a Japanese band fronted by vocalist Mariko Goto, after a couple of cassettes released the 8-song EP Shimizu (2007) that contains a spastic interpretation of punk-rock: Love is Sad has screamed female vocals over jazz piano and general cacophony, the insane singalong and rave-up of Ezoshika Dance recalls Melt-Banana during a crisis of stylistic confusion, Romantic Summer Mode is a sort of infernal bluegrass breakdown, and the singer sounds like a little child singing a nursery rhyme in The Dog Runs only to become a nightclub singer in the slow romantic ballad that closes the album, Goodbye.

The album Hello Everyone Nice to Meet You We are Midori (Sony, 2008), aka Aratamemashite Hajimemashite Midori Desu, is a merry-go-round of vicious musical jokes. Yukiko-san opens with a sort of circus frenzy while the singer alternates feral shrieks and nursery rhymes. Kanashii Hibi/ Sad Days is typical of their demented skits with bursts of psychotic angst. One moment they are intoning the children's singalong Konjo Nashi Atashi Aho Boke Kasu/ The Fool Grows Senile, It Isn't Her Spirit, which sounds like a twisted revision of Old MacDonald Had a Farm, and next they are indulging in the twisted lounge ballad 5 Hyoshi/ Five Rhythms. There is even a lot to dance to: the drunk jump blues Chiharu no Koi/ Power Spring of Love, the feverish Caribbean orgy Himitsu no Futari/ Two Peoples' Secret and the witchy charleston dance Osaru/ Monkey, with a peak of glorious insanity in the manic pounding of Howling Jigoku/ Howling Hell. The album ends with the instrumental blues-jazz-psychedelic jam Muyoku no Muryoku/ Powerlessness of Disinterestedness which removes the (intentionally) silly persona of the singer and replaces it with visceral impetus.

Their last album, Shinsekai/ New World (2010), contains the childishly manic Rhythm (the standout), the ebullient Meka, the grotesquely disjointed jump blues I Need the Guitar, the comically epileptic punk-jazz fit Bonyo vs Boyo, and their attempt at coining grindcore-pop, Sayonara Perfect World. There are cute and sometimes spectacular refrains everywhere, from the effervescent Caribbean jazz-rock of Speed Beat to the otherwise incoherent Two People on the Tower.

(Copyright © 2020 Piero Scaruffi | Terms of use )
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