Thursday, April 29, 2010

G&P Review: Hayaino Daisuki

Hayaino Daisuki
Invincible Gate Mind of the Infernal Fire Hell… Or Did You Mean Hawaii Daisuki

Hydra Head
In an era of vaporizing record sales (oh, you naughty downloaders, you know who you are) and general economic malaise, the idea of packaging a four song, 12 minute EP in a DVD case is downright baroque in its conspicuous consumption. Never mind Hydra Head plunking down the cash for a 20 page zine-style liner package that includes a multi-page cartoon, doll making instructions (wait, what?) and a quickie interview with Cephalochromoscope’s own Davydd Grimm. Hell, the ink just to print that mouthful of a title would probably blow most bands’ art budgets. But Hayaino Daisuki’s whole shtick is a celebration of exuberant excess. For starters, this little fucker is mastered exceptionally loud, and Matsubara’s songwriting M.O. seems to be geared toward the kind of ADD people who wish Slayer would trim the verse and chorus fat from the epically overlong Reign in Blood and get straight to the shredding.
What’s most surprising from a band fronted by Jon friggen Chang is how the vocals are the single most improved element of the package. The familiar tonsil (testicle?) twisting scream still dominates, but Chang et al have introduced more variety to complement the EP’s shifting moods. “Kirei” has a startlingly feminine touch that adds an unexpected dimension to its thrash assault while “Shibito” has a throaty, alleyway pervent come-on that sounds outright villainous.

Hayaino Daisuki – “Shibito”

For all the goofball trappings, Hayaino Daisuki are deadly serious about their craft and the game has been upped again. This just slays every teenaged wannabe retro thrash band surfing eBay for retro white high tops.
When last we heard from Hayaino Daisuki they were playing John the Baptist to the advent of grindcore messiahs Gridlink. Will the same revelatory process take place in 2010 with the impending Orphan?

6 comments:

Alex Layzell said...

Ooohhh I have to purchase myself a copy of this, the amount of effort they must of put into that 20 page zine, will make me feel bad to download it. Yet another thrashing review

Vinnie said...

One of my favorite records of the year.

Bill Willingham IV, Esquire said...

Totally ripping! Every single second of that disc is crammed with batshit shredding.

I hope you are correct about the possibly prophetic nature of it, as well.

goatfather said...

Beautiful, beautiful, makes me think of both 80's Kreator and X Japan. Also, great to see that they're recreating the concept of 80's speed/thrash, rather than rehashing the form (which many nostalgia bands do) and that they're humorous without being hip ironic. It's obvious they truly love what they're doing.

And speaking of prophetic, this has been released almost 2 years to the day since their first EP (19 feb. 2008, feb. 18 2010). So maybe Orphan will arrive on june 19.

andrew said...

look at goatfather getting all numerological on us. nice catch on the dates.

Anonymous said...

Kirei IS sung by a woman...