Introduction Climb the Mind are pretty much the loudest and most epic three-piece ever. Members Yuta Muramatsu [drums], Kojiro Yamauchi [guitar, vocals], and Masaki Tomita [bass, keyboards] take some time to talk to Keikaku about being jealous of skillful younger bands, the tricks they come up with while writing songs, Pixar movies, and what it's like to be a member of Climb the Mind. back to features		Climb the Mind Q: Please introduce yourselves. Muramatsu: Hello, I'm Yuta Muramatsu. I play drums in Climb the Mind. I like to play guitar also. Nobody believes my actual age. I like the concept of positiveness very much. Fortunately, I have many great friends. I guess that I have leadership skills too. I dislike conflicts, controversial things, and gambling. I also REALLY want to have a girlfriend. Yamauchi: I'm Kojiro Yamauchi and I play guitar and sing. Tomita: I'm Masaki Tomita. The bassist. Q: How did the members of Climb the Mind originally meet? Tomita: Yamauchi and I were in the same junior high school and high school. He's one year younger than me. Muramatsu: I met Tomita when I was supporting the favorite band of a college buddy. He also joined the band as a support bassist later and I became his friend. Before becoming a member, I turned down joining Climb the Mind as the drummer once, since I was leading in another band at the time. But a short time later, my band broke up and I got proposal from him again. Q: Where did the name "Climb the Mind" come from? Yamauchi: I came up with it more than seven years ago without a second thought. Now I regret it. We should have been called "A Situation That A Lilliput Climbing the Giant's Head." [laughs] Q: What are some of your musical influences? Tomita: It may be pretty typical. Stuff like Braid. Yamauchi: I'm influenced by underground bands and musicians. But I don't know if I've been digesting that music into myself and expressing those essences in our music. After all, I think our life reflects our sound and lyrics most. Q: How would you describe CTM's sound? I find it as some of the most epic hard rock I've ever heard. Yamauchi: Live in a hurry. Music played in such a flurry. Tomita: Though I can't listen to it objectively, I think we're not so much of a "sing a song"-style band. Muramatsu: Based on the former and original members' graduated schools, personalities, back stories and so on, I think it's intelligent rock. Many of the former drummer's phrases were transcendent and unnatural for me. Q: You seem to like using jolty transitions and layer upon layer of powerful melodic noise. What's the process like when you're writing a new song? Yamauchi: First, while feeling gloomy, I compose a song alone at home, and then get the other members to listen to the song in the studio. Then, Tomita lets me know how it is by saying things like "awful," "too simple," "not good at all," "similar to other songs," and "it's good if only you could sing well." [laughs] After that, a few of the songs are arranged by the band. As for the lyrics, I don't write them until the very last minute. The lyrics of "Subculture Engineering" were written the night before recording. In an extreme instance, it was not until recording vocals that I found out that I hadn't written one line of the song "Yasashii Cycle wo." Ooops... About the intense instrumental play, it's to cover up my poor singing. And the jolty transitions are just an excuse to say, "The reason why I make mistakes is that they're such jolty transitions." [laughs] Q: On "Shokuji Chuu no Shizuka na Danwa," there's some wonderful piano and violin work from Yamauchi and Muramatsu. How long have you guys been playing piano and violin? Yamauchi: My mother had me play piano when I was in kindergarten. I was so reluctant to play that I used to cry while playing. In retrospect, crying while playing was pretty "emo"tional. Anyway, that piano skill stuck with me. Q: What is Climb the Mind currently planning? Yamauchi: I don't know. Some people say, "You're still doing such things? It's outdated." Yet we keep on playing. Tomita: Since we all have jobs, the extent of CTM activities is limited since we don't want to get into trouble with our jobs. [laughs] Fortunately, regardless of our slow pace, we're still able to play some lives and release CDs. We've been getting along far happier than we think. Now, if possible, we are planning to release a full album. Q: What do you think of the rock music scene in Japan now? Tomita: Although we thought we were young, many young bands came out one after another, and now we no longer feel young. And many of those young bands are very skillful. I envy them. Muramatsu: I think that the trend to pursue "popular" music is strong. I think that there's a lot of good music out there though. Yamauchi: Many upcoming bands are skillful and write good melodies. But there are too many bands which are boring. As for the major music scene, I feel sad when I see some bands manipulated by major labels who then lose their substance and start to play commercial songs. Though we aren't in the position to deny such commercial activities 100%, since we also sell our CDs, I nevertheless dislike profit-oriented music. I guess this kind of trend is going on all over the world. Q: Can you name some of CTM's favorite books or movies? Muramatsu: Toy Story and all of Pixar's movies... Thunderbirds Are Go... I'm impressed by the puppet technology of those days... Doraemon... It's a really famous Japanese animation. I think that it has a lot of good messages. Yamauchi: Well, it's pretty difficult to explain. I'm apt to love movies that are lesser known, the same as my music taste. Q: What about heroes? Yamauchi: I've never thought about my hero. But I respect my close friends. Q: All of your birthdays are within a range of nine days in January. What do you think of this? Tomita: It's merely a strange coincidence. Yamauchi: Yeah, but it also makes an interesting conversation piece. [laughs] Muramatsu: I find it surprising. I was also surprised to find out that the fomer CTM drummers were similar to me in that they loved humming and drinking. I guess I was drawn to Climb the Mind by something. [laughs] Q: Do you have anything you'd like to say to your fans overseas? Tomita: I'm moved to see that overseas media have interests about us even though we've been active slowly in Japan. If there are overseas fans of us, I would like to sincerely say thank you. Muramatsu: I am also a Climb the Mind fan. I'll do my best and try to keep up with the other members. Thank you. Yamauchi: Sushi! Sumo!! Geisha!!! - Shawn Grover. Interviewed on 2006.03.20. Thanks to Climb the Mind and its members for participating in this interview. Thanks to fellow Climb the Mind fan Hiroshi Nishizaki for helping CTM with the translations.
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