Japanther Are A Punk Band And A Living Organism

In the opening of "The Boss" from Japanther's new Skuffed Up My Huffy album, a girl yells out, "When you're a kid, everyone tells you what to do. Your bosses! Your teachers! Your parents and those bullies at school! Well we say fuck that! You're not the boss of me!"

Those lines alone explain everything that Japanther stand for and everything that the record is about.

"The album's title is just about having a shitty bike," explains drummer/singer Ian Vanek. "When I was young, my dad used to build bikes, so he always encouraged us by saying any bike is a good bike.

"We jumped and crashed our bikes a lot when we were younger, too. That's how me and Matt [Reilly] bonded — over BMX-ing and skating. It also has to do with experimenting with shit and remaining childish."

With a hip-hop approach to punk music, the members of Japanther stay kids by sampling stand-up-proud speech samples, beats and noises. Lyrically, Vanek says they cover a variety of topics.

"There's a song about the oil crisis, abortion, television and advertising politics. There's one about learning through travel and experience, selling your soul for music, overdosing on heroin and watching your friends overdose, living in New York City and living with overcrowding, getting by your principal when you were in elementary school, a funeral of a good friend, crack heads and being too sensitive, quitting your job, and I guess that's about it. It's political with a dose of sugar."

The electrifying Brooklyn, New York DIY duo have played alleys in Australia, bathrooms, under bridges and accompanied a synchronized swim team. They create their own logos, album art and zines, which Vanek first learned to make while banished to the photocopier room for detention in elementary school. Japanther give a voice to the violated and beaten down, but also make people feel alive and wanting to dance.

"Music is like a living organism, and if you're an organism that only lives in one certain space like a dark bar, where you're only able to thrive in this dark bar because alcohol flows and you're finally able to get your thing going because there's enough alcohol and darkness, then that's not enough," Vanek says. "We're an organism that wants to go to the beach on Sunday and go up in an airplane the next day — just living all over, trying to make it more like a journey."

Japanther will play as part of the Over The Top Festival alongside Meligrove Band and Matt & Kim on Friday at Toronto's Mod Club.