DAY TWO OF CANADIAN BANDS YOU NEED TO KNOW

Now that we’re rolling with the idea of only Vancouver based bands, we now move on to Japandroids or JPNDRDS if you will. I’m blogging about this band, because so far I’ve been unable to locate their debut album on compact disc, only on vinyl. But today, amazon.ca has the cd version available for order. I hope this means that local cd shops will start carrying it, but I can only hope.

Formed in 2006 after meeting on campus at UVIC, David Prowse and Brian King released two EPs before releasing their 2009 album Post-Nothing, which has received rave reviews. (including a spot on Pitchfork and SPIN’s top songs of the year) Originally intended to be a three piece band (with a “hot girl” as the lead singer), the two decided they didn’t want to go through that kind of nightmare. With Brian on guitar and David playing drums, they decided to just share the singing. Even though there are only two of them playing, this band is far from minimal. They sound more like a five-piece band.

I first heard about Japandroids through the myspace of a local band, formerly International Falls. They had been around for about 6 or 7 years, but finally bit the dust in 2008 after a good run. David Prowse once drummed for this band, which is how I found out about Japandroids. But, David quit the band and moved to Victoria to study at a university. Japandroids originally signed onto local label Unfamiliar, but joined up with Polyvinyl for a much wider release. This band has drawn comparisons to bands like No Age and Husker Du and don’t take themselves too seriously. Describing this band isn’t a hard thing to do exactly, but I’m afraid my limitations as a writer would just make people roll their eyes and forget this entire blog. So please, don’t take my word for it, watch the video. Only one thing is for sure about this band:

Supporting Japandroids gets you into Heaven - no questions asked.