FFWD Weekly
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Video by Jaime Frederick "The reason that most rock critics can agree on Half Japanese is that they’re so great that you either really do like them, or you can at least acknowledge that you should. And you’d be the worst square in the world if you said they were awful" – Byron Coley, editor, Forced Exposure Magazine Well, I’m no rock critic but call me L7. A few years back, in another, now-defunct publication, I savaged Jad Fair, leader of Half Japanese, after he played solo and with Toronto’s Phonocomb one evening at The Night Gallery. Strange what changes time can wreak on your tastes, but sometimes it’s a good feeling to acknowledge past transgressions, and an even better feeling to know it’s never too late to change your mind. Half Japanese: The Band That Would Be King is the wittiest, most charming documentary about rock ’n’ roll to emerge in some time. Focused on musicians Jad and David Fair, and their long history as Half Japanese – from their beginnings in their Ann Arbor, Michigan bedroom in the mid-’70s, to Jad’s current status as an indie rock savant – this movie makes a mockery of the entire mainstream music industry. With assistance from the likes of Coley, Gerard Cosloy (founder/ CEO of Matador Records), Maureen Tucker (Velvet Underground), Penn Jillette (Penn & Teller, President of 50 Skidillion Watts Records), and many others, director Jeff Feuerzeig has pieced together a hilarious anecdotal portrait of this band, interspersed with extended sequences of live performance footage, to create a tongue-in-cheek condemnation of all that is wrong with the major label, MTV world that Half Japanese has never been a part of. Nobody is safe from ridicule here – not Rolling Stone or Spin, nor their publishers or editors, nor The Beatles, The Stones, or any other rock ’n’ roll institution you can think of. David Fair, for instance, recounts his numerous victories in guitar battles with other guitarists, most of whom, he admits, probably didn’t realize he was competing with them in the first place. He then goes on to say that what distinguishes Half Japanese from most other bands is that those others have "people who can play good trying to sound a little bit wacky. We’re coming from a different direction. Maybe it’s wacky people but trying to sound as good as you can. It’s a big distinction. We’re not trying to sound goofy. We’re making the best record we can make." Call it lo-fi, call it artless, but one thing the band’s music has is passion – and so do their admirers. Cosloy insists, with a straight face, that most people just don’t have the "intestinal fortitude" required to enjoy Half Japanese. Jillette relates the story of how he started 50 Skidillion Watts, the record label that releases Half Japanese’s records, to essentially launder all the "dirty money" he earned working on Miami Vice with "Don Johnson and that other guy, three names." Coley gets back up on his trumped-up soapbox and proselytizes that given a choice between the Beatles’ Sgt. Pepper, The Stones’ Exile on Main Street, and Half Japanese’s Charmed Life, he’d take Charmed Life any day. This all just seems so preposterous. Everybody involved is so clearly in on at least half of the joke that you can’t help but love this movie. Plus, if you’re like me and you’ve never really liked or understood Jad Fair, you might find a new appreciation for him, too.

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