When Japan produced the strangest discordance

Such a superficially happy place Japan seems today. No anger is displayed outwardly; and I feel little is felt inwardly. This can't be true. Dormant volcanoes bide their time after seeming inactive for centuries. The aftermath of rapid economic growth and the appearance of meat-munching middle-class offspring, whose height towers over westerners brought up on junk food, signal there has been a big change. Why wouldnt they be satisfied? Smiles are everywhere, which is good, what what?

It's a long time since there were riots in Tokyo and Kyoto, and according to a colleague I spoke to last week this was mainly in protest of the Vietnam war. A generation tired of kowtowing to a foreign master exploded - for a short while. That foreign master has taken over the culture, though not the language. English is held at arms length and a Japaanising of English took place.

Around the time of the above riots, the bass player from Les Rallizes Denudes is said to have taken part in the hijacking of a plane bound for Pyongyang. The singer was asked to participate - such was the groups connections to radical groups formed whilst at university - in terrorism. But who knows the truth? I suspect much is mythmaking. I don't even believe the story that they handed out political texts to junior high school students for their concerts. How could such a group be invited to play to JHS students? If ir happened, what a treat for the creative!

There is no sign of radicalism with today's students. Campuses without beer, few after-hours meetings, or even radio stations. No lingering on campuses either. Get them bussed out quick sharpish. Back in the 1970s, singer Takashi Mizutani suggested rebel culture existed. He wasnt merely aping Lou Reed and psychedelia as I first thought. His group veered into drone rock with texts tinged with subversiveness, which is hard to imagine coming from this current crop of eager-to-please conformists. Maybe I'm not looking in the rite places?

But yes, their music from this period was great. Les Rallizes Denudes, combo who had political links with a whole host of groups antagonistic to the state, and who functioned sporadically between 1967 and 1982. Julian Cope has just put a stream to a newish collection on his website, and, in a week when many are talking about the Jesus and Mary Chain revival, it's good to hear some music which covers the pure path they once trod. Perhaps the Chain knew of Rallizes as a definite link is there.

The savage guitar in the tracks mid-way through Fightless Bird tramples over the likes of Sonic Youth and the Chain, succeeding without question with Flames of Ice. Listening to (what I think is) Enter The Mirror/Smokin' Cigarette Blues/Flames of Ice is taking me back to the first time I heard certain groups that made inroads into taste buds. The only downer is that some tracks have been mastered from recordings of recordings released in small quantities or via bootlegged from their infrequent concerts.

Flames of Ice: what a fantastic track!

They didn't enter the business for money. No need for accountants. Deeply sinister with their repetitive simplistic bass riffs that splinter behind disconcertingly glassy lead guitars. I really didn't think such intense music could be created here - how wrong I was. The possibility of making such music will be drummed out of them through the schooling of most. Or maybe new foods have moulded their minds to be placid and content. Anyway,though I'm not going to rush out and buy all Rallizes' work, if only as it's too darn expensive, at least I'm aware of their splendid works, which take me back to the first rush from bands I've shared much of my life with. It's a relief (to me) that Japan didn't always have Stipey Smiley Happy People.