A few years ago, I encountered this alternative/psychedelic/indies rock band called Yura Yura Teikoku（ゆらゆら帝国）and saw some of their videos with the expected impressions. However, I ended up writing about "Lonely Satellite", a Happy End-ish song that was so outside of their template that I actually categorized it as a pop number.
Well, this time, I'm going with something that's well within Yura Yura Teikoku's rock range. Even so, "Yakousei no Ikimono Sanbiki" (Three Nocturnal Animals) has also got its own distinctiveness that would probably get the song and its music video into a late-night surreal music video program such as my own beloved "City Limits".
Y'know...I think that I would rather translate the title into English as "The Three Nightcrawlers" to match vocalist Shintaro Sakamoto's（坂本慎太郎）lyrics about this grungy trio exploring every nook and cranny of downtown while he sings about subverting every bit of the listener's sensibilities into rust within the length of the song. A song as psychological suspense? In any case, the melody by Yura Yura Teikoku is rock'n twangy thanks to some shamisen (?) help, and according to Sakamoto in an interview through the J-Wiki write-up, he had patterned the music after the traditional Awa Odori（阿波踊り）dance, originally from Tokushima Prefecture, so video director Yasuyuki Yamaguchi（山口保幸）suggested the video simply have three Awa Odori dancers mixing it up onscreen.
The suggestion worked. It won for Best Alternative Video at the Space Shower Music Video Awards in 2004. "Yakousei no Ikimono Sanbiki" was never released as a single but was a track on the band's 4th major album "Yura Yura Teikoku no Shibire"（ゆらゆら帝国のしびれ...The Wobbling Empire on Pins and Needles） in February 2003. The album managed to reach as high as No. 28 on Oricon.
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