If Beyoncé can release — and subsequently win a Best Record of the Year Grammy for — a country album, then pianist Satoko Fujii is perfectly within her rights to make a grindcore date, which is the best way to describe Dog Days of Summer.
OK, not really, but it is one of her most aggressive albums in recent memory, she and trumpeter partner Natsuki Tamura shredding alongside the bombastic rhythm section of electric bassist Hayakawa Takeharu and drummer Tatsuya Yoshida. This is a reunion of a band active at the beginning of the millennium, making five albums in quick succession through 2006. While Fujii, Tamura and Yoshida (of Ruins/Magaibutsu fame) are known quantities, Takeharu has actually been active the longest and is noted for his membership in the '80s group Doctor Umezu Band.
Fujii, who seems never to run out of interesting ideas no matter how many albums she releases, has composed highly bombastic pieces for the capabilities of the group, with the ironically titled opener "Not Together", featuring a lugubrious pulse, especially so. Takeharu has a nicely distorted tone, ugly and apocalyptic, akin to Blacky in classic-era Voïvod, while Yoshida deftly balances mechanical precision with primal aggression. "Haru wu Motso", the second piece, is, in contrast, almost a waltz, but a boozy one, which soon is expelling effluvia everywhere. Later on, "A Parcel For You" is not a frilly box of chocolates but, rather, a rigged explosive from some bearded anarchist creating havoc from a secluded cabin. The closing title track is highly unsuitable for lounging by the pool with a beer but could be anthem for Texan construction workers recently robbed of their mandated water breaks.
One of this reviewer's favorite concerts of thousands attended was the 2002 meeting between Fujii and Yoshida at the 19th Festival International de Musique Actuelle de Victoriaville and released as Toh-Kichi. They activate things in each other that don't happen elsewhere, Fujii becoming more percussive and Yoshida more melodic. "Circle Dance", the album's longest piece at over 11 minutes, exemplifies this synergy.
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