Interview: Nissenenmondai

Nisennenmondai and I are in a Turkish restaurant in London, and we are trying to speak to each other in English. Katoman, their tour manager, translates some questions into Japanese, answers others on the band’s behalf. Sayaka Himeno (drums, driving force) concentrates on my words as if lipreading. Masako Takada (motorik riffs; quartzy loops) and Yuri Zaikawa (one-note bass thwacks) smile encouragingly, Masako chiming occasional responses. On the recording, her high, soft voice and Sayaka’s lower one bloom sporadically between MP3 harshness, traffic, the clatter of kebab skewers, shouted Turkish, Katoman’s “Let me explain…”, and my own voice, at its most annoyingly language-teacherish, as our words bump haplessly against one another.

Nisennenmondai’s music is the precise inverse of their interview recording, existing in a space where words fall back and a path is cut, roughly, through misunderstanding and into bright-white light. The band’s three-pronged no-wave is a hand-made interpretation of infinity that hovers on a knife-edge between the fierce propulsion of Neu! and a more feral, pragmatic post-punk scuttle. Songs exist at a point of permanent climax, an ever-popping firework. Live, process is laid bare: there’s a feedback loop between them and you, a challenge to never lose focus, as the three women play chase with guitar loop and raging disco hi-hat.