Over 40 Dream Chasers

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It is after 9 pm on new year's eve, the venue in Shibuya is not quite full but a big rock n roll noise is blowing away the dull atmosphere.

The band on stage is ELECTRIC EEL SHOCK a 3 piece Hard Rock band in which all the guys are over 40.

Aki, the vocalist and guitarist was wide eyed & shouting. Gian, the drummer was beating the drums  almost naked. Kazuto raised his bass and showed his tongue. People were getting excited, shaking their hair and dancing..

They believe it is very dangerous to rely on anyone or anything in the music business but they trust their own music saying “we will be on the 1000+ capacity stage with in 2 to 3 years"

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"You are not tight enough "  said Gian’s drum teacher Hiro Tsunoda when he took his examination at drum school in Shinjuku in the summer of 1997.

At 29, he was the oldest  student in his school…and the worst. He was disappointed by his tutor’s comments but then he saw the light "I am in EES! Wild Rock, forget about playing tight, that's the way I live ". He quit school the following week. He had joined EES two years before after leaving a jazz funk band.

Aki and Kazuto came from Osaka.  Their first band ‘Bonnie Duck’  were signed to a major label in 1992. (Last year I found a BD cd on a Korean e-bay page…it’s great, sounds like a cross between Lalo Schiffren & Sesame St!!...Dan). They shared a stage with  "Mr.Children"  during this time and also "Sha-ran-Q" was an old friend. (both bands are famous in Japan - Kazuto) Bonnie Duck broke up after 2 years.

At this point the three guys joined up to form EES.

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Their self-released first cd came out in 1998 but no one really noticed & they couldn’t get a good reaction anywhere so in 1999 they made their first appearance in New York. They got a much better response from the American audience who all wanted to congratulate them after the show.

At this point they moved their base to America. They worked to make money as a dental technician (Gian), a flyer designer (Kazuto) and a stage carpenter (Aki) and they bought an old van. They then set off all over the US with their van & equipment.

They made their living by selling CDs and T-shirts and stayed in people’s  houses or sometimes slept in the van in sleeping bags. A year later they did the same thing in Europe.

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They were in NYC on September 11th 2001. Aki got a wake up call from Gian "planes just hit the World Trade Centre”. He could see the attack from his window.  4 days later they played in a secondhand shop in Manhattan. After the show one lady told them that her friend was still missing in the WTC but that their show had cheered her up.

They have always been helped by their audience. None of them are parents but their families are sometimes embarrassed because they are over 40. They need other jobs to survive but they are confident in their abilities due their experience of playing over 1000 shows in 28 different countries.

 Kazuto said "We will keep going & we will make it next year or the one after." and Aki and Gian agreed.
"They never regret if they will fail and die like stray dog."

by Shinsaku Mano

To be honest I thought that Bonnie Duck was kind of like Eel Shock’s idiot deformed child that they kept in the basement & about whom we were all sworn to secrecy but since Kazuto has let the cat out of the bag I thought you might like to see these…check out the bling on Maekawa san!!