more local content from down here in the upside down country.
three and half years ago, linda and sam from teenagersintokyo started volunteering at fbi radio (home of fat planet). this was many months before fbi even hit the air, yet here were two 18-year-olds plugging away behind the scenes, helping to determine the shape and sound of sydney’s newest radio station. the thing that smacked my gob about the pair was not just that they had astonishingly good taste in new music, but that they also had a limitless passion for music way beyond their years – picking up on sounds and styles that were long-since buried. and they weren’t necessarily obvious choices either – to hear an early bauhaus single landing next to cut copy on linda’s friday afternoon radio show was a joy to behold. sadly, linda will spin her last disc on fbi this week; taking the golden path from fbi volunteer to full-time paid presenter on the abc’s national triple j station. she will be sorely missed by all the fbi family.
in 2005, when linda and sam let it be known that they were forming a band with their mates, miska and sophie, i was hooked from the first moment. given their respect for the full gamut of popular music, where would they land? truth be told, the band formed when the girls were but twelve-years-old, throwing paints around in their art class, harmonising on covers of daft punk.
i caught one of their first live outings last year at sydney’s hopetoun hotel, and it was everything i could have hoped for. consciously or not, their influences were many: sam did an excellent job of channelling ari up from the slits, and there was also more than a hint of ‘kaleidoscope’-era siouxise and the banshees, a smack of bow wow wow, suicide, interpol, inevitably chicks on speed got a look-in too. none of this however was copyist or fawning tribute, it was all gathered together and represented with a fundamentally contemporaneous flourish. since then, they’ve shared the stage with some of australian’s finest new and emerging talent such as expatriate, faker, van she, the valentinos, starky and more.
witness their demo e.p. (streamed online at their MurdochSpace) produced by jono ma from the valetinos & knife machine. ‘end it tonight’ and ‘snowstorm’, can sit stylistically happy, shoulders back, among many of their 2006 post-punk-electro-rock-whatever siblings. for a side-angled swipe at what teenagersintokyo are capable of, ‘black bones’ should get you stroking your chin in wonder. consider this: these demo tracks are only the beginning of a long trip down the yellow brick road for teenagersintokyo. we can but follow.