I give them another two months before their popularity burns out, and they fade from public memory. But for now Tetsu and Tomo, the singing "nandedarou" guys, are unavoidable if you turn on the TV (your first mistake, by the way). They're shtick is pretty straightforward. It's two guys in red and blue jumpsuits, one plays guitar and other has wacky hair, goofy eyes, and gitchy hand waving action. The format of their song is blah-blah-blah (verse), nandedarou?! (chorus). Where blah-blah-blah is some vaguely funny observation and where 'nandedarou' is approximately equivalent to 'why is that', I think. They started out on just one TV show, but now they're everywhere. Yesterday I heard two kids singing the nandedarou song on my train.

A heavy burden it is that I carry indeed, that I should feel responsible to be the disseminator of Japanese pop-culture happenings unto the wider world. But as I have taken it upon myself: go their website and download the Nandedarou MP3. Additionally Nandedarou chord charts for guitar players. I'll transcribe them to ukulele soon.

I also think Tetsu (red jumpsuit guy, picture at beginning of post) and the lead singer of Static-X are some kind of geography-defying half brothers. Can't you see it?




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