Ellegarden

Eleven Fire Crackers (2006)

Mr. Mysterious

To put it simply, Ellegarden is a Japanese punk band that sings in "Engrish." Despite the Japanese languages' lack of the letter "L," they handle themselves pretty well. Yes folks, Ellegarden sings mostly in English so you can understand them. Following the trend of J-punk (it's an abbreviation) bands like Asian Kung Fu Generation and Thee Michelle Gun Elephant, Ellegarden makes pop-punk sounds with hard-hitting lyrics.

The record opens with a toss-away song titled "Opening." I could post links to about 50 other bands that have those little randomness 30-second-long songs to open a record with but I won't. I think every song on this record besides it, however, falls into a toe-tapping category, even the Japanese songs like "Winter," "Koukasen" and "Gunpowder Valentine," which are pulled off well enough that a person who doesn't understand Japanese will like it. The record's high point comes with the fast-paced, catchy-as-hell song "Salamander"; many music fans will know what I'm talking about when I say it screams single. The ending song "Marie" is fast and once again catchy, leaving you wanting little more.

In case someone was wondering, the band only has a few grammatical errors, nothing to really ruin the experience. On top of that (and as mentioned before) the songs are good enough to stand on their own in English or not.

This record comes off as a true pop-punk record with all the ups and downs of a roller coaster…. A roller coaster of sweet tunes.