Credits

I would like to give credit where credit is due. Videos are from YouTube and other sources such as NicoNico while Oricon rankings and other information are translated from the Japanese Wikipedia unless noted.

Sunday, September 21, 2014

Denki Groove -- Drill King Anthem (ドリルキング社歌)



When I first heard Denki Groove's(電気グルーヴ)cheeky "Drill King Anthem 2001" from their self-tribute album, "The Last Supper" (July 2001), I had thought it was a parody of tokusatsu themes with a bit of techno stuff reminiscent of M.A.R.R.S.' "Pump Up The Volume". And the official video (pity it got banned by SME) added to the hilarity as Takkyu Ishino and Pierre Taki(石野卓球・ピエール瀧)showed off a Monkees-style PG-rated montage of their hijinks including the former nonchalantly walking down a spiral staircase au naturel.

Well, the song was a bit more than that, actually. The original version of "Drill King Anthem" came from the band's August 1994 "Drill King Anthology" album featuring artists under Drill King Records, a company supervised by Denki Groove. Kaoru Endo and Sumiko Endo(遠藤薫・遠藤スミ子)created this march for a pink salon which had made the rounds during live performances, and apparently got enough approval to get onto this particular album. Lyrics that include dreaming of becoming a pink Satan, pissing in the mailbox and setting fire to tempura oil lend to the gleeful anarchy. It was this song that cemented my image of Takkyu and Pierre as a duo that had its tongue implanted firmly in cheek. The album itself got up to No. 8 on Oricon.


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