Biography
A Tokyo-based instrumental trio of women whose sound balances raw edges with dancefloor drive, Nisennenmondai came together in the late 1990s and adopted a name that rendered the then-popular expression “Y2K bug” into Japanese. Guitarist Masako Takada, bassist Yuri Zaikawa, and drummer Sayaka Himeno first crossed paths at a club near their university and soon launched the group, drawing equal influence from the school’s trendsetters and from experimental acts such as This Heat, Pop Group, Sonic Youth, DNA, and Neu!. Their initial EP, Sorede Souzousuru Neji, surfaced in 2004, followed the next year by Tori. The trio’s debut album, Rokuon, appeared in 2006, yet their recordings remained unavailable abroad until 2008, when Heartworm Press/Free News Projects issued the vinyl compilation Neji/Tori in the United States and Smalltown Supersound handled the CD edition. That spring, the more streamlined and rhythm-focused Destination Tokyo—the band’s second album—came out in Japan, reaching international listeners in summer 2009. By then Nisennenmondai had already issued the domestic single Fan, a continuous 35-minute piece that extended the polyrhythmic ideas of Destination Tokyo.
In 2010 a split release with the volatile Osaka outfit Oshiri Pen Penz followed; 2011 brought both a split single with Waiters and a live album. Zelone Records released a self-titled EP in 2013 alongside the full-length N, which pushed the group’s repetitive momentum further than before; N reached Europe and the United States the subsequent year. In 2015 the trio unveiled N’ (pronounced “N-dash”), containing reworked versions of material from N together with two Shackleton remixes, and contributed a volume to the Live at Clouds Hill series—documenting 64-minute performances captured on analog tape at producer Johann Scheerer’s Hamburg studio. That same year they collaborated in the studio and onstage with dub maestro Adrian Sherwood, yielding the stark yet atmospheric #N/A. The album first appeared in a limited run through Tokyo Beat before receiving wider distribution in April 2016.
In 2010 a split release with the volatile Osaka outfit Oshiri Pen Penz followed; 2011 brought both a split single with Waiters and a live album. Zelone Records released a self-titled EP in 2013 alongside the full-length N, which pushed the group’s repetitive momentum further than before; N reached Europe and the United States the subsequent year. In 2015 the trio unveiled N’ (pronounced “N-dash”), containing reworked versions of material from N together with two Shackleton remixes, and contributed a volume to the Live at Clouds Hill series—documenting 64-minute performances captured on analog tape at producer Johann Scheerer’s Hamburg studio. That same year they collaborated in the studio and onstage with dub maestro Adrian Sherwood, yielding the stark yet atmospheric #N/A. The album first appeared in a limited run through Tokyo Beat before receiving wider distribution in April 2016.
Albums
Singles
