Thee Michelle Gun Elephant

Though little-known in America prior to 2000, Thee Michelle Gun Elephant formed in Japan back in 1991 and began playing raucous garage rock & roll inspired by the Stooges, Thee Headcoats, the Who, and MC5. Futoshi Abe's thrashy guitar riffs propel the fast-paced, hard-hitting tunes over the driving rhythms of Kouji Ueno's thick bass grooves and Kazuyuki Kuhara's heavy backbeat. Yusuke Chiba's mod, raspy vocals, alternately sung and screamed out mostly in Japanese, hold the whole thing together with a rough-as-rock-gets swagger. Initially, Thee Michelle Gun Elephant's sound wa...