Abingdon
Boys School
Made in Japan and totally different
Honestly, after having seen the band pic on the album cover I never would have thought how amazing this band could be? What was this? Oasis live at Bodukan or the early days of Captain Future? But fortunately I gave this album named „Teaching materials“ a try ... and wow, this is the best album I've heard for a long, long time. Sometimes the cover lies! So, I wanted to get more information about this extraordinary band made in Japan, so check this out. Interview with vocalist Takanori Nishikawa, by Dennis Rowehl:
Autona: First, would you like to introduce yourself to the readers?
TN: I formed Abingdon Boys School, as performing as a solo artist T.M.Revolution, I thought it would be nice to make new music as a band.
Autona: Your tour is now finished. What do you conclude from that tour?
TN: 13 years have passed since I started performing as T.M.Revolution. As becoming famous in Japan, when I perform in overseas, it needs to have a certain largeness, such a large Anime Convention with a huge stage and large equipments. On the other hand, if it’s a band, we could performe in any kind of stage, it’s possible to have a club tour in several small venues with small capacities, which we’ve done in the Europe tour. Only three years have passed since we formed the band, so we’re still trying to build up our appearances in more venues in Japan. We were slightly worried in how the fans in Europe would react. Though, we were very happy to see the fans in Europe were very welcoming us as much as the fans in Japan.
Autona: You were in United Kingdom, did you see the Abingdon School?
TN: As a band, we first had our sound made in Ebisu in Tokyo. It’s like a certain word playing, Ebisu souds like an Ebisu, leads to a.b.s., so we came up with the name a.b.s.. Furthermore, making sense to its meaning, we found out that there is a school called abingdon boys school. In the beginning, when we met at Ebisu, we were thinking of making new music from our roots music, so we thought that usuing the name of the school, the concept would be macthing as we could feel like we have become teenagers again. Also the members are formed by all boys, well we could say we are men, anyways boys, we learn a lot from music so we thought it best matches to our image. That’s why we named ourselves abingdon boys school. We really wanted to go to Abingdon School. However, because it was a very distinguished school, they didn’t accept us...The next time we’d go to Abingdon School, we would try to become even more famous, so that they would notice us. If it’s possible, we would be honored to have a live at Abingdon School. Anyhow, we went to Abingdon. We weren’t just admitted as a student.
Autona: Will you try something different?
TN: Of course, as abingdon boys school, we would constantly want to have performaces in overseas.Besides, touring around Europe, I have been told from many fans and people that they would want me to come to other counrtries, and have concerts overseas. I would want to have concerts in Northern America, Southern America, other European countries, and around Asia, if possible.
Autona: A lot of your songs are used as theme for anime, do you think that it contributes to your popularity overseas? Have you felt that while performing?
TN: Japanese is very domestic, and a minority language. We couldn’t imagine how would the overseas fan would listen to our music. When I saw everyone singing in Japanese with their mouth wide open, I was deeply impressed. I believe animation is having great influences in the excport, and culture exchange. We are wanting to give any support to this throughout our music.
Autona: You have released the new single "From Dusk Till Dawn", what is the story told in it?
TN: What I wanted to explain in this title was, the sun would rise and tomorrow would come. It’s a very obvious fact that tomorrow comes. Also I think you usually would not recognize the importance of your family. Though, I realized this year that these obvious things are the most imoportatnt thing for me. Especially through the fact that I performed in and origanized a festival in Japan, had live performances out of Japan touring around Europe, which led to myself meeting so many fans. I felt that creating chains through music, taught me so many things, I put all those feelings in this song.
Autona: (laughing) Many people right here think that Japanese are a little crazy. Could you think of any crazy things or attitudes of Japan?
TN: Well, Japanese cannot drink until we say “Kanpai”(toast). Until everyone gets a drink, even if it’s not an alcohol, Japanese would not start drinking, would wait to say toast together. I think Japanese are sad species. 13. When visiting Europe, did you experience culture shock? Did anything in particular stand out to you? In Japan it is very normal that the toilet seat is warm, and the warm water comes out and washes your bot. This type of toilet is very popular in Japan. Being surprised in overseas, we saw that there weren’t even a toilet seat to sit on. I just felt that the culture is very different just taking an example of toilet. Also, in Japan, it should be a private room with a door that you cannot see through, but in overseas, the door doesn’t cover the top and the bottom. I’m not very used to it, and seeing other staff suffering, I felt some sympathy, too. I didn’t suffer much in the difference of food. We know it’s very natural in Europe eating bread and cereal instead of rice, but thinking about that, we kind of thought that eating rice may be a typical Japanese thing. Also when I went to the cafe in the morning to eat breakfast, I ordered a one plate breakfast with a combo of sausage and bread and pretzel. When I saw the person next to me, I was very surprised to see that the most of the German people are drinking beer. Very surprised. In Japan, that never happens. A beer at breakfast. We were shocked. I was longing to see the autobahn. Of course I am a great fan of motor sports and cars, I was very happy to be able to run that road by bus. Japan is a very small country, though we have a road called freeway, but it takes money, and it’s even much paved. It’s not even close to the autobahn. People in Europe, speaks their second languages very fluently. Varieties in English, French, Italian, and any other language, everyone has a second language. They are having communication very naturally. In Japan literacy may seem high, it’s not really as it seems. In terms of language, I believe that if we try harder, Japanese and the people around the world would become much closer. Autona: Some elements of your album reminded me of Loudness. Have you ever listened to this band that used to be very successful for a Japanese band in Europe? TN: I myself do not have much inspiration from them, but the band members and the people at same age seems to be listening to LOUDNESS a lot. Like LOUDNESS, we would be very happy if there would be people in Europe who would start to get into Japanese music by listening to abingdon boys school’s music. If we could become a good catalyst like them, and people gets familiar to Japanese music, we would be much appreciated.
Autona: You participated at Live Earth concert in Japan. Are you concerned by the environmental protection? What advice can you give us to help the Earth?
TN: I am very much concerned by the environmental protection. I’ve just had a festival in my hometown at September in Shiga. The funding raised at the festival, a part of the money were donated to ensure the water quality of Shiga. Shiga has a largest lake in Japan, called Lake Biwa. The water of the lake is used as the drinking water for the people living around Shiga, so under the philosophy of protecting water, we have planned to do so. We believe it is very difficult to help the earth. We would try to do various activities to help, and would want to become a help for you and everyone as well.
Autona: And finally, do you have a message for your fans that will be reading this interview?
TN: Well, we promised to come back to our European fans, we would try the best as we can to come back, so please send more cheers to us. Thank you!
Redakteur: Dennis Rowehl
© 2010
