Mick arrived in Tokyo on 13/9 and left on 19/9, again with a lot of nice memories about Japan and the people. This time it was a one-day stint on 16/9, so he could pour all his energy into a single gig and have more free time with his Japanese friends, whom he now calls "family".

The background of this visit was very unique. The 2-day event (16th & 17th Sept.) called Rock Is Our Life was organized and sponsored by a huge Japanese company called World Co., an apparel industry giant headquartered in Kobe with annual sales of more than GBP1.2 billion (US$2.2 bil.). They are opening a new "concept store" named "Tokyo Hipsters Club" in October in a ultra-hip district in Tokyo called Harajuku. Rock Is Our Life was an opening event to advertise the start of this business.

Located in the very center of Harajuku - a Mecca of the Japanese sub-culture - THC, which is comprised of a store, a gallery, and a cafe, is expected to make a unique hub to convey the vitality and dynamism of the '50s-'70s culture to the Japanese youth, covering music, literature, art, and garments. The biggest space, 360 squares, is assigned to a shop which sells books (primarily Beatnik), CD's (primarily Rock and Jazz), DVD's, clothes, art materials, and any other fashionable goods. And they so appropriately selected Mick Farren as the only foreign performer that covers all the above cultural aspects of the era to provide the audience with a good perspective and idea of this new enterprise of World Co.

RIOL was produced by 2 suspects, Maki Fujimoto and Gaku Torii, the former is a well-known graphic designer/producer in the Japanese fashion industry, the latter was once referred to by Mick as "the most forceful individual I have met in All of Japan and something the local - but far better organized and mortally adept - Lester Bangs". Maki has also a criminal record of ruining the very first issue of a magazine published by the biggest children's educational materials company in Japan by putting a photo of naked Allen Ginsberg hugging another naked man on the cover of the mag when he was its first chief editor. So, you get the picture of the event. The bands got together exclusively by Mr. Torii's selection, some of them were obscure but the loudest, most talented, and weird groups representing the diversification and dynamism of the current Japanese garage scene.

As said, Mick flew in on 13th September. On the next day of his arrival, i.e., 2 days before the first day of the big event, I had a call from Gaku going, "We must change the venue to somewhere". A family who live next to THC threatened the event organizer saying they would call the police to stop the event and would not make the shops open if they conduct this noisy thing at night. The wealthy family proved to be heavy in the local community in Harajuku and their prediction of "you shall not open the store" frightened World Co. So, it's rock'n'roll again - and the result was, "Let's go to the Tokyo Tower". Everything was moved to a basement studio of TV Tokyo Station located right at the feet of the magnificent Tokyo Tower, an equivalent of the Eiffel Tower in Paris. I had never seen it from the angle that I looked it up when arriving at the entrance of the TV station with Mick - it was HUGE. Although it must have been tremendous work for the event staff, for the performers, it turned out to be even better to play there instead of THC because, since it was a studio of a TV station, each band could have comfortable private dressing room, could play as loud as they liked being free of any regulation, and could play over their slot of time a bit as the event didn't need to finish precisely by 10:00PM, which should have been the limit if in Harajuku.

Maki and Gaku gave Mick the longest performance time among the participants to do a poetry reading, a rock show, and a public interview. Same as in his previous visit to Japan last November, Marble Sheep and a guitarist Nabeji provided the background music to the reading as well as backed him in the rock show. I wouldn't describe it in detail here as I'm sure he'll post his own review of the experience, but to say the least, it was cool. Toward the end of the interview, a Punk kid raised his hand for a question, stepped up in front of a mic stand to utter, "Well, I just wanted to say, 'Thank you - your gig was cool'". In conclusion, Gaku threw Mick a last question, "How do you think we can become a true hipster?" Mick's answer was, "Have beer, light a cigarette, and start walking toward a different direction than others, and don't trust what comes out of TV".

It was a wonderful night.

Photographic commentary:

On the night of his arrival in Japan, Ken Matsutani, the head honcho of Captain Trip Records, hosted a welcome dinner for Mick, where the label staff, members of Marble Sheep (Ken's band), and Nabeji (an awesome guitarist from Slunky Side) got together to greet him. As a welcome gift, they gave him a key which was actually used on the sleeve design of his live in Japan album, To The Masterlock, which they released on 25/9. In return, Mick gave us "The Deviants Survival Kit", which he had assorted for each of us and brought over from L.A. The pic is of the package given to the reporter.

The pix #1-#4 (Photo Gallery 1) were taken at the event, Rock Is Our Life. As you may see, the setup was great - the stage was big, the lighting was beautiful, and they provided the visual effects behind which should have been infeasible due to certain restrictions with facilities had the event been held at the original venue. Same as in the last year, Marble Sheep plus Nabeji worked as his band. The set list is as follows.

Poetry reading:

1. Long Walk with the Demon 2. Diabolo's Cadillac 3. When the World Was Young 4. The Key to the Masterlock

Rock show:

5. I'm Coming Home 6. Need Somebody on Your Bond 7. Black Transit Blues/Dogpoet 8. Waiting for My Man 9. Heartbreak Hotel 10. Trouble Coming Every Day

Subsequently, he did a public interview (sorry, no pictures of this) with a translator. Toward the end, it turned out Mick's rock'n'roll speech in which he advocated that rock is a common language for unity and its source of power is anger, and we should use these tools to make the world change. The pics #5-#9 (Photo Gallery 2) were taken by the reporter at a mysterious town in Tokyo called Koenji, where he went to see Ken's solo performance at a record/book shop called Enban (meaning UFO). Although being a tiny shop, Enban frequently holds various events such as talk shows by rock critics and musicians as well as live performance. The atmosphere of the venue and the district pleased Mick, who said it reminded him of Lower Eastside in the '80s. As he hadn't predicted he would be coming, his sudden appearance made Ken and the audience excited. Ken asked Mick to read something "satanic" for him to play to, and, after Ken's own mesmerizing guitar improvisation, they exuded an esoteric mixture of words and guitar on the small stage.

Yukiko Akagawa
September 2005