Ningen Isu

Ningen Isu (人間椅子) is a Japanese rock band formed in 1987 in Hirosaki, Aomori Prefecture, by Shinji Wajima and Kenichi Suzuki. They are characterized by their unique musicality, which combines the sound of 70s British hard rock like Black Sabbath with Japanese lyrics. History: Shinji Wajima (guitar) and Kenichi Suzuki (bass) were classmates at Aomori Prefectural Hirosaki High School. The two had been friends since junior high school (Wajima from Municipal Third Junior High School, Suzuki from Municipal Fourth Junior High School), lending each other records of KISS and the like. After entering the same high school, they began writing songs together. Songs from that time include Wajima's "Otogi Hime" (a masterpiece that made Suzuki say "I might have strayed from the right path", a folk-style love song) and Suzuki's "Demon" (lyrics quoted from the library of a friend's father who was an ethics teacher, which later developed into the riff for "Mandrake Flower"). These were later performed on the Aomori Prefecture local TV program "Ningen Isu Club." Wajima still owns his composition notebooks from that time, which include a song called "Akai Tsuki" (Red Moon) that shows glimpses of the current Ningen Isu sound. After graduating from high school, the two went to Tokyo, Wajima to Komazawa University's Faculty of Buddhism, and Suzuki to Sophia University's Faculty of Foreign Studies, Department of Russian Language, but their friendship remained unbroken. One day, Wajima, who had not found a job even as graduation from university approached, was browsing through blues records at a record store when he happened to meet Suzuki, who was on his way home from job hunting. Suzuki said to him, "Wajima, you know what? I've decided to quit job hunting and do a band!", inviting him to start a serious music career. Incidentally, Suzuki had been offered a job at Hitachi Construction Machinery at this time, but he turned it down. In 1987, they officially began their musical activities as "Shine Shine Dan" (derived from the name of the enemy organization in the tokusatsu program Rainbowman). However, after learning that there was a band with the same name ("Dai Nippon Teikoku Shodai Shin-Tokorozawa Gurentai Shine Shine Dan"), they changed their name to "Ningen Isu" (The Human Chair), taken from the short story of the same name by Edogawa Ranpo. Other band name candidates that were rejected included Edogawa Ranpo's novel "The Swindler and the Air Man", which later became the title of their best-of album. Wajima positioned Suzuki as the "swindler" and himself as the "air man" in the liner notes for that best-of album. In 1989, they appeared on the TBS late-night program "Miyake Yuji's Ikasu Band Tengoku" (Miyake Yuji's Cool Band Heaven)...