Go-Bang's -- Zamaa Kankan Girl（ざまぁカンカン娘）

 

A decade ago when "Kayo Kyoku Plus" was in its infancy, I wrote a couple of articles on a band that served as one of my musical touchstones when I was on the JET Programme in Gunma Prefecture between 1989 and 1991. "Ai ni Kite I Need You"（あいにきて I Need You) and "Special Boyfriend" were those two songs. In the article for the former, which was the big hit for Go-Bang's in 1989, I noted that I hadn't been sure about how vocalist/guitarist Kaori Moriwaka（森若香織）, drummer Mitsuko Saito（斉藤光子）and bassist Misa Tanishima（谷島美砂）came up with their name. There was one theory noted that it came from a merging of the names for two popular American girl bands, The Go-Gos and The Bangles.

Well, according to the journal "J-Rock 80s", another story is that Moriwaka, who is a fan of actor/rock singer Takanori Jinnai's（陣内孝則）band TH eROCKERS...and yup, that's how the spelling is stylized...got the name for Go-Bang's from a lyric of one of their songs "Bacillus Bomb"（細菌爆弾）. It has yet to be confirmed but no one seems to want to go to the trouble to find out for sure. What I've also neglected to put into that first article is the origin of the band which goes all the way back to the ladies' junior high school days in Sapporo, Hokkaido. A band was first put together in 1983, but Moriwaka, due to her father's work transfer, had to move down to Tokyo which put the kibosh on any further musical activities. As such, the to-be Go-Bang's recorded a tape for posterity and left it at a café/recording studio called Coffee House Milk.

Later on, as it turns out, the late and legendary RC Succession（RCサクセション）rocker Kiyoshiro Imawano（忌野清志郎）was at Coffee House Milk and he took a listen to the tape and basically yelled "Eureka!". He was somehow able to get Moriwaka and the members together in Tokyo where they began their performing career in June 1985.

In April 1988, Go-Bang's released their first major single in the form of "Zamaa Kankan Girl" (Serves You Right, Kankan Girls) which was the theme song for the Osaka-based late afternoon television variety show "Zamaa Kankan!"（ざまぁKANKAN!）that ran between 1988 and 1990. Written and composed by Moriwaka, it's very much in the style that I've always envisioned for Go-Bang's...the jaunty country pop-punk that I also associated with a young K.D. Lang. 

Although Go-Bang's has been the trio of Moriwaka, Saito and Tanishima, there is a fourth woman playing guitar in the video above. There were others involved in the band before they made their major debut, and so, going with what J-Wiki has listed, that other guitarist could be either Ayako Tomita（富田綾子）or Yuka Suzuki（鈴木由花）.