Lajeunesse, singer Arlie Carstens, and interpreter Shuko backstage at Sendai
Lajeunesse, singer Arlie Carstens, and interpreter Shuko backstage at Sendai
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JUNO
WITH AVEO, ASAHI
VERA Project, 206-956-VERA, $7 all ages
8 p.m. Fri., Jan. 31
WITH THESE ARMS ARE SNAKES, AUTOMATON
Graceland, 206-381-3094, $8 adv.
10 p.m. Sat., Feb. 1
Throughout their seven-and-a-half-year history, local five-piece Juno have crossed the U.S. seven times and toured Europe twice; in mid-January, the group made their first trip to Japan, playing five shows over 10 days, before returning to Seattle for their first local appearances in nearly a year. This is singer Arlie Carstens' diary of the band's adventures.
JAN. 7
I spend the afternoon of the sixth running errands and asking cashiers stupid questions like, "Do you have this size stuff sack not in purple?" I finish packing at 4 a.m., and [guitarist] Gabe picks me up at 5 a.m. We drive around freezing our asses off gathering the rest of the good old Juno Boys Band: [drummer] Greg Ferguson, [guitarist] Jason Guyer, and on bass this time around, Mr. Jason Lajeunesse. Eight months of planning all coming to a head. The flight from Seattle to LAX is uneventful.
Now aboard the finest airline in the world, Singapore Airlines, we're on our way to Tokyo, Flight SQ 11. Oh shit, we've got turbulence! The painfully attractive flight attendants unleash their pearly-white smiles all around the cabin, making eye contact with every passenger as if to suggest, "Oh this? Pay no mind, this isn't a big deal." Fakery. The plane bounces around on and off for an hour. The guy next to me is double-fisting a Coke and Jack and a gin and tonic; more gets on his lap than against his tongue. Poor bastard, you've got just 11 more hours of this. I need sleep.
JAN. 8
Hiroshi, Ari, and Shuko meet us at the Narita Airport, about 30 miles outside Tokyo. They arrive in a small white passenger van the size of a loaf of bread. Hiroshi's our 21-year-old promoter. He's slight, wears wire-rimmed glasses, black jacket, and jeans. He smiles wide but speaks very little. Ari plays guitar, sings, and chain smokes for the band Blass Two Licks. A three piece, BTL sound like Hsker D sung in Japanese. Juno will be doing four of our five shows around Japan with BTL. Hell, yes.
Shuko used to live in Fort Worth, Texas, and played in the Japanese noise-rock band Aspera Bay. She now lives in Tokyo, where she teaches English to Japanese businessmen. Shuko will travel as our interpreter for the duration of our stay. Without her, we are idiots.
After dropping our bags and instruments at Shuko and Ari's flat, we go for dinner at Ikki. The restaurant's an izakaya, a Japanese traditional-style bar. On this tour, we'll eat at many izakayas. Ari orders dinner for us, huge plates of sashimi and stir-fried vegetables. Guyer and Lajeunesse freak out when the waiter carves up a live fish and places it still breathing on our table, lips gasping and tail flexing. Welcome to Japan, fellas. With a real tear in his eye, Guyer names the fish Herman. We return to the flat, divide up the floor space, and go to sleep. It's 3 a.m.—we're off to a good start.
JAN. 9
I awake around 6 a.m. I can rarely sleep on tour. Like those scenes in Blade Runner, out on the balcony a marvelous sunrise does battle with a dense gray mist obscuring the bay and most of the outlying cityscape. The human ingenuity of this place is both magnificent and horrifying. It's just huge, skyscrapers for miles and miles. Bright blue cargo vans, bicyclists, and screaming yellow taxi cars zip across the canal bridges below.
This is our day to rest and deal with jet lag as we drive to Hiroshi's parents' home in Nagoya, some four hours away. It's windy and balls-cold here. Japan isn't the tropics; patches of snow occasionally dot the roadsides. We stop at every Hello Square rest stop along the way to stretch, buy oddball snacks, and bullshit with Ari's bandmates, Ryu and Miu. This extends our journey to seven hours. BTL travel into the city to find a hotel for the night, while we make our way out to Hiroshi's home in Nagoya's farming region.
Upon entering the house, I come face to face with his tiny, rolled-shouldered grandmother. Silence. Not a word passes between us, only the slightest bowing acknowledgement. She retreats to her room. Hiroshi's father sits smoking in the living room wearing light blue pajamas and a black down vest. He makes us a huge feast of soba noodles, fried chicken, pumpkin, cuttle fish, and pickled daikon. Delicious. Hiroshi's mom heats sake and then withdraws to another room, returning only twice to see if we've finished up. Pronto, she wants us to please take our white interloping asses to the room they've arranged for our evening's quarantine. Off go we go.
For the remainder of the night, we sit around on reed mats next to a low, heated table, the kotatsu. The fellas drink sake and Kirin beer. I eat chocolate-covered soybeans until I nearly pass out. Everyone huffs grizzlers [cigarettes? We think so—Eds.] till they can no longer see each other. Madness. We listen to Hiroshi's CDs and reminisce about our favorite Clash songs.
