Rollercoaster
May 23, 2008 at Rooster
Kotaro Wada – Harmonica, Vocals
Yoshiki Yamazaki – Drums
Hitoshi Koide – Guitar, Vocals
Masaaki Komachi – Bass
Shio Hayasaki – Piano
The word "best" is best left alone, but with blues band Rollercoaster, the word just keeps coming up. Real blues, though, is not something you compare; it's something you feel. Rollercoaster has that real blues feel and they play it with energy, technique and down-to-earth good sense. They have the blues in their gut and it flows out as if Ogikubo was just another side of Chicago.
Rollercoaster's music just makes you rise on up out of your chair. That was especially so on this hot May evening, when twenty-some foreign fans in the audience turned Rooster into a dance hall. They were lawyers, it turned out, but they didn't have to file a lawsuit for dance space. They just stood on up and started shaking it. Dancing was sure OK with the band, who ratcheted up the beat to accommodate even more than usual.
The rest of the wall-to-wall audience was made up of the support group for Aung San Suu Kyi, whose birthday it was, Rooster's regular contingent of blues fans, Rollercoaster fans there every time, new fans who were surprised at first, but quickly got up and started shaking it with everyone else and this writer who had to stand in the back. The blues wrapped us all up into one fun-loving group.
Rollercoaster has this knack for picking great tunes and setting them up in the right order like shot glasses along a bar top. The first set featured a great version of "Telephone Blues" done with gutbucket grease and the Slim Harpo classic done with a New Orleans second-line groove, "Tee-Ni-Nee-Ni-Nu." Whatever that title refers to hardly matters: Rollercoaster makes it groove hard. After a bluesy birthday song, the second set got bumping with Jimmy Rogers' "You Are the One" followed by Willie Dixon's "Don't Go No Farther," a great one-two punch that got everyone deeper into the mood.
The band plays with just the right touches, trading vocals back and forth between Koide and Kotaro. These guys sing with passion AND pronunciation (since, it must be mentioned, a few other Japanese bands blur their vocals). "Sweet Home Chicago" and "Messin' with the Kid" poured on the Chicago style, while "Cut You Loose" and "Mustang Sally" got into funkier grooves. Rollercoaster also digs down into slow blues, the real test for any blues band. "Same Old Blues" and "Sugar Bee" got deep into the Delta mud.
What sets Rollercoaster apart from other blues bands is how they turn every song into an adventure and a celebration. It is not just that they know these songs, but know their insides, the small grooves and little nuances that bring them to life. It's easy to play blues that sounds one way or another, but to infuse them with vibrant spirit and make them really glow is a special, rare thing. The band's balance of instruments, personalities, and energies is just right, too.
Blues is personal music and individual character matters. Then, they know how to sweep it all up into a good time. Two hard-dancing encores were not enough.
June 5, 2008