Listening to Montreal-based Japanese psych-rock band TEKE::TEKE is a bit like watching some crazy cult-classic foreign film. Blindfolded. Their very cinematic music is enough to conjure vivid imagery alone, and second album Hagata is a cinemascope epic. “‘Hagata’ is a very deep word, something present but also something leftover from someone or something no longer there,” singer/guitarist Maya Kuroki says of the title, if you were wondering about its meaning. “It’s like waking up from a dream, or being connected to the other side of something.” Understanding Japanese probably helps, but Hagata is plenty entertaining despite the language barrier, offering bonkers action sequences, spy movie setpieces, exotic locales, danger, romance, evil twins, and lots of flutes and the occasional theremin.
For additional insight into Hagata, bandleader Sei Nakauchi Pelletier takes us through the whole album, track by track. Read that and listen to the album below.
TEKE ::TEKE Hagata (Track by Track) by Sei Nakauchi Pelletier
Garakuta :
The album opener is an anthem for the rebellion of wastes which serves as an analogy for anything or anybody that is cast out of society because they are considered useless by the norm. The idea behind the music was to play around with the ‘Matsuri’ (traditional Japanese street festival) vibes, reinventing it, making it heavy, psychedelic, and punk. We knew we wanted this second album to start with a high energy, in-your-face type of song.
Gotoku Lemon :
This song took many different forms before getting to a place where we all felt good about it. The work that went into it was a big lesson to us all and I’d even go as far as saying that it serves as a blueprint to how we approach the process of making music together as a 7-piece band. It was a real eye-opener and an extremely positive experience. We really allow ourselves to explore further and deeper.
We talked about ‘Chindon’ya’, the costumed street marching bands of the 19th century in Japan, and it somehow became a reference (hence us as a marching band in the song’s video). The rhythm section groove comes from listening to a lot of amazing Indian music, while the guitar is played slightly in the shamisen style (the traditional Japanese 3-stringed banjo) and the trombone/flute themes interact with the vocals as it often does in (again) ‘Matsuri’ music. All the while, Maya is singing about being a merchant of lemons that have healing and enlightenment powers.
Hoppe :
This is one of the earlier songs we wrote for the album. It came in the form of a demo that I put together and that we then collectively disassembled and reassembled with everybody bringing in new ideas. It’s such an abstract process, looking back I can’t really explain clearly what happens… but something happens, and songs go somewhere I never would’ve gotten to on my own, that’s the magic of collaboration.
I always thought of ‘Hoppe’ as having a bit of a 90’s vibe, perhaps the Fugazi in me… but with Maya’s delirious tale about an old man who’s cheeks fall off after eating a rice cake… ha, ha!
Onaji Heya :
For this song, we wanted to go into what one might say is new territory for TEKE::TEKE, however very familiar territory to each one of us individually. The dissonance, the noise, the non-melodic vocals (in the verses), the electronic and drone sounds… Those are all elements we love and play with in other projects, whether it’s Hide, Ian and Etienne with their noise project Noizu_Ihan, or Mishka with his duo FHANG, or Maya with Tamayugé and all the improv shows she does with other artists, we thought it’d be interesting to use more of those elements in the TEKE::TEKE world.
The song’s lyrics tackle with themes of paranoia and introversion.
Me No Heya :
Mishka wrote these chord progressions with the idea of having Yuki write her own flute part on top of it. It all came together while we had already started the studio sessions for the album. It was meant to be an instrumental interlude with a quiet and peaceful intro to contrast with the dark and chaotic ending of the previous track (Onaji Heya).
Doppelganger :
The idea for the music of this song was influenced by ’60s Okinawan psychedelic rock music, ’70s Japanese pop ballads, and our love for the beautiful arrangements of music by Serge Gainsbourg and Jean-Claude Vanier. The song wasn’t initially written for TEKE::TEKE per se, it was just an idea I had… but when I showed the skeleton of the song to Maya, she immediately felt inspired and started writing. The song’s lyrics touch on themes of duality, identity, and nostalgia.
Setagaya Koya :
Setagaya is an area in the Tokyo metropolis. The song tells a story with strange characters set in this part of the city where Maya spent some of her childhood. While this residential area was meant to be family friendly, with promises of comfort and well-being, Maya’s take on it chronicles the rather heavy feeling of loneliness that haunted her years living there.
Kaikijyu :
This song was very much influenced by some of the solo music that we had heard Yuki, our flutist, play on the shinobue (traditional Japanese flute) with long dissonant notes and breathy textural sounds. Something we always thought would be interesting to incorporate more of in the music of TEKE::TEKE. However, it would have to be done in a more quiet type of song so we could actually hear it with all its nuances. Hence the long intro with flute and drums only, and every other instrument slowly coming in, one after the other, until the bass takes the lead and introduces the melody that the vocal will take for most of the song. There’s almost a nursery rhyme quality to it, with Maya singing about a person transforming into a whale and travelling through different dimensions.
Yurei Zanmai :
That’s the only song that was ‘demoed’ and stayed in its exact original form and structure. We worked on the arrangements and added percussion in the studio to push the cinematic side of it. This song is about ghosts, fun ghosts… ghosts that are free and dancing!
Jinzou Maria :
This is one of Maya’s personal compositions. She wrote this song several years ago and we decided to re-arrange it and make it a TEKE::TEKE song. The lyrics tell a story of rebirth, a recurrent theme in Maya’s poetry. This time it comes in the shape of a godlike kidney (Jinzou means kidney in Japanese) that purifies one’s broken body and soul to give a new life.
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The best way to listen to TEKE::TEKE is to see them live, they put on an amazing show. They’ve got Canadian and UK dates this summer:
TEKE::TEKE – 2023 TOUR DATES
JUN 24 SAT – Ottawa Jazz Festival 2023 @ 10:30pm – Ottawa, ON, Canada
JUL 7 FRI – Festival International De Jazz De Montreal 2023 @ 9:00pm – Montreal, QC, Canada
JUL 9 SUN – Northern Lights Festival Boreal 2023 @ 5:00pm – Greater Sudbury, Ontario, Canada
JUL 14 FRI – Festival d’été de Québec 2023 @ 7:10pm – Québec, QC, Canada
AUG 11 FRI – Regina Folk Festival 2023 @ 7:00pm – Regina, Saskatchewan, Canada
AUG 19 SAT – Salmon Arm Roots and Blues Festival 2023 @ 8:00pm – Salmon Arm, BC, Canada
SEP 2 SAT – Manchester Psych Fest 2023 @ 10:00pm – Manchester, United Kingdom
SEP 3 SUN – End Of The Road Festival 2023 @ 2:00pm – Salisbury, United Kingdom
SEP 5 TUE – Heartbreakers @ 8:00pm – Southampton, United Kingdom
SEP 6 WED – Clwb Ifor Bach @ 8:00pm – Cardiff, United Kingdom
SEP 7 THU – Crofters Rights @ 8:00pm – Bristol, United Kingdom
SEP 8 FRI – Moth Club @ 8:00pm – London, United Kingdom
SEP 9 SAT – The Hope & Ruin @ 8:00pm – Brighton, United Kingdom