Nisennenmondai
THE EXCHANGE, BRISTOL | 30 JULY
Nisennenmondai’s upcoming LP N has just 3 tracks but a total running time of 40 minutes. For many noise-rock enthusiasts, they have been considered a “best kept secret” for many years. A band who craft bewitching sound patterns and loop them to the point where they get entombed in your consciousness. Structures like this can only ever succeed when the maker has a winning handle on repetition. When the pounding rhythms of the Tokoyo trio’s experimental dance rock filled the room at the Exchange it was clear that they had just that.
Their show seemed to hurtle past us before we could really gauge what was going on. The unrelenting pulse of Sayaka Himeno’s drumming perfectly recreated the skeletal climaxes that they manage to reach on record. The band barely took the time to glance at one another while playing, they appeared almost robotic as their minimalist beat-structure was joined by a dissonant guitar that seemed to drift in and out of earshot as they headed towards their raw crescendos. There is no question that the Nisennenmondai live experience is a constant variation on a theme but once the audience embraced the detour-free nature of their sound, they had no choice but to get totally hypnotised by the drone. If it wasn’t for the total synchronisation between Yuri Zaikawa’s bass rumbling underneath Himeno’s drum patterns then the whole experience would fall apart. The complexities of what they were doing on stage almost left us on tenterhooks at times when the tunes culminated in a fit of noise. There was so much hanging on that seemingly never-ending beat, that any slip up would have seen the entire sound demobilise. Unsurprisingly, they didn’t let that happen.
Nisennenmondai share the same dingy club-friendly qualities of Factory Floor. Another band you could get taken aback by during the day but totally lose yourself to in the dead of night. Bands like this only thrive in a live setting when their musicianship is tight enough to keep going and going and going. When the unyielding din of Nisennenmondai finally ends, it’s impossible to pick out any standout moments or favourite tracks but that’s beside the point. It’s about the ride, and while we’re struggling to recover from it, getting trapped in it for a night was an experience we won’t be forgetting.
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Words: Duncan Harrison
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