JinnyOops! came together about 13 years ago. In the beginning, music was void and without form, and in academic clubs, not nightclubs. There was Hitomi and her school friends, and then — the Big Band!
The name origin is shrouded in mist, until somebody tells me. When the members pronounce it, it sounds the way they would write it —
jinīoppusu. "Opps", not "oops". But they also say
kō-hī and definitely mean the English "coffee".
Let's have a look at them.
Informal publicity shot used 2009 and into 2010.
Fine till they had a label, a record, and a tour to support.Official band portrait to promote the Eat Your Brains tour
First portrait of the decimated 3-man line for 2010 press kits
2014 portrait to promote the release of BREAK
2015 portrait is a composite that showed up in August of this year
Band portraits by Hiroshi Maeda from the official website.〰〰〰〰〰〰〰〰〰〰〰〰〰〰〰〰〰 ♪♪♪♪ 〰〰〰〰〰〰〰〰〰〰〰〰〰〰〰〰〰
A 5-piece ensemble with a horn section that really could blow, JO! had an aggressive pop/rock/ska sound bigger than they were. "Japanese Assault Ska" as one blogger/music pirate likes to put it. Under Hitomi's leadership, they wrote a few songs with some of the Heavy Heavy Monster Sound of their UK role models, and a little spy-movie jazziness to boot.
When the horns would get rolling on a chorus, it was like a runaway train. The brass was a great foil for Hitomi, who may never have drummed harder in her life. The smooth bed they laid down for Mitsuyo's buzzsaw guitar overdrive was pretty sweet, too. They blended nicely with the strong vocals, and got on fabulously with Chihiro's slinking, pumping bass. They traded leads like champion relay runners. When JO! perform those same numbers now, the thrust just isn't all there, and that's the way it is.
JO! original membership:Gt. Vo.: 石橋 光世 (Mitsuyo Ishibashi)
Ba. Cho.: 石田 千尋 (Chihiro Ishida)
Dr. Cho.: 普天間 瞳 (Hitomi Futenma)
Trp: Minami
Trb: Shiho
Big and brassy in an unidentified dungeon around 2009-20102010 JAN 24 at Osaka King Cobra. The 'bone sets the tone.
Where are Mitsuyo and Minami? Stage left, somewhere. I'm busy now.
Shiho will hurt you if you let your face foul her slide. And that thing's got reach.King Cobra photo set from 2010 JAN 24 at the VIVA Rock Band Photos blogMinami one-hands a keynote
Jinny Oops! 11 2008 March 1 original photo and © by
Kinoshita Loco at FlickrAll rights reserved,
alles verboten, you may not anything.
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And then, sometime before the 2010 US tour kicked off, the horn section disappeared like the dinosaurs. Suddenly, no ska arrangements, no special identity... almost, no act. What the hell happened to JinnyOops!? There might be a little more explanation buried in a blog, but the official severance announcement was 100% bland. JO! stayed with the same songbook, because that's all there was.
Mayumi Saito mentioned meeting up with the band in a hotel in Austin, and having a disoriented moment of, "Wait, there's only...
three of them?"
JO! soldiered through their commitments with comrades Chatmonchy and Red Bacteria Vacuum. They got good notices. In fact, people loved them as a power trio, and that's how they stayed. A r
eviewer for the Austin Chronicle name-checked Joan Jett, Björk, and Bad Brains all in one misbegotten sentence.
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This is a pretty decent fan tribute made from a bin full of published material on either side of the great horn vanishment:
YouTube/h6x_38iN6eU in a new tabJINNYOOPS! FAN MADE MUSIC VIDEO JAPAN NITE 20102010 APR 01 by enasccis209
A music video using clips of JinnyOops! performance and photos from Japan Nite edited together with one of their songs. Credits are given to the owners of the videos and photos of who captured them. Also i forgot to give credits to JinnyOops for their personal and live photos, Mauralyn for her photos of JinnyOops and dmtken for their earlier live Ground Zero show in Japan...More live fan-footage of the 2010 Boston Japan Nite:
YouTube/Enho0ahbXGQ in a new tabJinnyOops! - 時 (TOKI, Time) (2010/3/22)2010 APR 18 by JerseyJesus (02:47)
At Boston Japan Nite 2010 at T.T. The Bear's Place, Cambridge.
JinnyOops! from Osaka, Japan performing "Toki".
JinnyOops! perform their unreleased song, "Ross Death Money".
YouTube/OjhZbX3rzpE in a new tabJinnyOops!/"Ross Death Money"2010 JUL 09 by JinnyOops! Video Collection (01:14)
Jinny Oops! New sound source!!
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The best way to hear the band in original form is to buy the CD of the
Eat Your Brain mini-album at a gig, or from Osaka's Nasty Records
at their web store, using the Japanese bank account and receiving address you obtained because you knew this day would come. Or, used somehow, but $75 is not an unusual price for this.
At that page, there are links to
Soundcloud streams for the top tunes: "Toki", "HO! Communication", and "Namakokoro Uka".
The song titles don't all translate so definitely. 「時」(toki) is literally
time, as in time on the clock. But because of association with the (fleeting) moment, it has connotations of: present moment, location in time, opportunity arising ("now's the time").
Namakokoro Uka I don't even know. It's only my guess how they would pronounce it, but I break it down this way: 生心 (namakokoro): natural mind/heart/spirit, and 生歌 (uka): raw song, meaning unskilled/unpolished/immature, and/or live/unprepared, karaoke-style. It's a darkly energetic major/minor thing with adult chords. Be sure to turn that mother up.
You can theoretically contact Nasty Records through
their JP Facebook page or their linked Yahoo email account. Good luck with that, I found it was like talking to the ocean waves.
Second-best is head over to Audioleaf.com and listen to "Toki" and "HO! Communication" from
Eat Your Brain; also "Raimei (Thunder) Shocking" from Mother Shock! The Mother Shock! cuts are on Spotify, if you can still stand to listen through their app. You can purchase the
Mother Shock! album, and only that on iTunes. Since the CD is still in print, at least a little bit, you can wait-list it at JP Amazon. Tower and the others are just, :shrug: .
audioleaf.com/jinnyoops/Orphaned JinnyOops! playlist at Audioleaf
There are some teaser trailers in the official video collection on YouTube:
YouTube/gzL7unjsgFA in a new tabJinny Oops! - in the brain - 15-second commercial2009 SEP 24 by JinnyOops! Video Collection (00:15)
"WE ARE JO! (In za brain.)"Did this song ever really get released? Dunno.
YouTube/dHRWvB30YP8 in a new tabJinnyOops!/HO! KOMYUNIKĒSHON 60-second commercial 2010 JAN 09 by JinnyOops! Video Collection (01:00)
JinnyOops! 1st mini-Album "EAT YOUR BRAIN"
2010-02-10 Release!!!
NASTY RECORDS NRC-004EAT YOUR BRAINS TOUR 2010 confirmed dates!2010/1/24 18:00 @ KING COBRA Shinsaibashi, Osaka City
2010/1/31 15:00 @ WARP Kichijoji, Tokyo
2010/2/11 18:00 @ BELIER Yonago, Tottori Prefecture
2010/2/12 18:00 @ REDBOX Kurashiki, Okayama Prefecture
2010/2/13 17:00 @ Goith Sakai Higashi, Osaka City
2010/2/20 18:00 @ ORANGE COUNTY Yokohama, Kanagawa Prefecture
2010/2/21 19:00 @ BIRDLAND Yokohama, Kanagawa Prefecture
2010/2/261 8:00 @ B.B.STREET Yokohama, Kanagawa Prefecture
2010/2/27 18:00 @ EASYGOINGS Koshigaya, Saitama Prefecture
2010/2/28 18:00 @ FIREBIRD Matsudo, Chiba Prefecture
2010/3/17 8:00 「SXSW 2010」Austin, Texas
2010/3/18 8:00 「SXSW 2010」Austin, Texas
2010/3/19 8:00 「SXSW 2010」Austin, Texas
2010/3/20 8:00 「SXSW 2010」Austin, Texas
2010/3/21 19:00 Japan Nite @ Bowery Ballroom, New York, NY
2010/3/22 19:00 Japan Nite @ T.T. The Bears Place, Boston, MA
2010/3/23 20:00 Japan Nite @ Empty Bottle, Chicago, IL
2010/3/25 20:00 Japan Nite @ Tractor Tavern, Seattle, WA
2010/3/26 20:30 Japan Nite @ The Independent, San Francisco, CA
2010/3/27 19:00 Japan Nite @ Viper Room, Los Angeles, CA
2010/4/2417:00 Tour Finale @ GOITH Sakai East, Osaka City
That takes us safely to the middle of 2010. We were a hit, but now what?