Melt-Banana – Cell-Scape

(A-Zap, 2003)

Remember those series of books about useless Japanese inventions? Well, this album is exactly like one of those; utterly ridiculous… but at the same time so wonderfully absurd that you can’t get enough.

Cell-Scape starts off innocently enough; Phantasmagoria, a noise-metal-ish intro leads into Shield for Your Eyes, a Beast in the Well on Your Hand which has a math-rock Battles type feel. All well and good until BANG! The vocals hit you like a tonne of duster slippers for cats (socks for your cat, with little mops attached, so that the cat dusts the floor as it moves around). Melt-Banana are a strange band and Yasuko Onuki’s vocals are one of the stranger elements; her voice sounding like something out of Pokemon having a disagreement with a tantrum throwing Japanese schoolgirl.

In addition to Onuki’s vocals, the fact that they are from Japan and some of the song titles make Melt-Banana an intriguing band. But apart from having song titles like A Dreamer Who is Too Weak to Face Up to and A Hunter in the Rain to Cut the Neck Up in the Present Stage, they are more than just a novelty act due to the strength of guitarist Ichirou Agata who displays an amazing array of techniques and effects, he is particularly brilliant on Lost Parts Stinging Me So Cold and Like a White Bat in a Box, Dead Matters Go On.

Joining Onuki and Agata on Cell-Scape is bassist Rika Hamamoto and a drum machine. Together they make music which is like Isis on speed; Key is a Fact That a Cat Brings is like someone swinging a cat at a Fantomas concert, If it is the Deep Sea, I Can See You There is like someone swinging a cat at a J-pop concert. Melt-Banana is the cat being swung.