Peelander Z

So you might not have heard of Peelander-Z, but I was recently reminded of them by a Peelander-Z-t-shirt-wearing-dude, and went back to their website and here we are now, entirely brought up to speed on the series of events that led us here.

Ahem.

So last summer, as some of you know, I went to Bonnaroo, the giant, eclectic (though largely hippie-ish) music festival down in Tennessee. Most people get there on Thursday evening, though the concerts officially start on Friday, just to get settled, beat the crowds (though this doesn't really work, since the majority of people get there on Thursday - me and Jerf arrived at 7 o'clock in the morning on Thursday) and just start the incessant partying. Because of this, the Bonnaroo organizers feature surprise, unbilled acts on Thursday evening to get people warmed up -- and one of those acts was Peelander-Z. I had no idea who they were, but I just wandered over to their tent and had a fucking BLAST. They're this Japanese three-piece band, now based in New York, that's comprised of a blue-outfitted drummer, a yellow-outfitted guitarist/singer and a be-goggled, be-caped red-outfitted bassist. They are out of their goddamn minds, but the show was full of jokes, signs, sing–alongs and super-fun spazziness. They don't seem to speak very much English, but I think that's part of the charm.

You can see a video of their recent SXSW performance here.