Swamp Ratz -- Swamp Rat

 

To be frank, I don't know very much about rockabilly aside from some of the 1950s Japanese singers such as Masaaki Hirao（平尾昌晃）and then of course, the 1980s versions led by Stray Cats from the United States. Brian Setzer and his group were at one point regular residents on the local CHUM radio singles charts in my decade of musical discovery with "Stray Cat Strut" and "Rock This Town". Ah, but then I also now remember about all those dancers and bands at Yoyogi Park in Tokyo at around that time, too. Some of those guys had the most gravity-fighting pompadours that anyone would see, but I certainly wouldn't laugh about them to their faces.

Not too long ago, I found out about this band called Swamp Ratz (which I guess would be the rodent equivalent of Stray Cats) from Shizuoka Prefecture (green tea country). There isn't a whole lot of information about these fellows although they do have a Facebook page and I discovered that they have been around since at least 2007 according to Discogs. From their FB description, they specialize in 80'S Rockabilly and Old School Neo Rockabilly, so I gather from that first genre, Stray Cats are probably their inspiration. The members are Daisuke Ohishi, Yoshimasa Ohishi, and Yu Fukuhara although I couldn't track down their kanji.

From their 2nd album from 2009, "Do You Know... Slap Back Style?", here is "Swamp Rat", a frenetic number to get the guys and girls off onto the dance floor. Y'know, when I hear one particular guitar riff, I get memories of Bill Haley & His Comets and "Rock Around The Clock", and of course, Stray Cats. Not sure where these guys hang out, but I don't really think of Shizuoka so much. It's more certain blocks of Shinjuku, Shibuya or Shimo-Kitazawa.