Have you experienced a situation, where you discover a band, or musician or just a piece of music that you instantly fall in love with? Not like “hey this is pretty good”, but more along the lines of having an aural seizure. Total shock overcomes you and you just can’t believe what you’re hearing because it’s like all of a sudden your life is just that much more complete.

Well chances are this band will not give you the same reaction but, because I know you, the readers of Sparkplugged, generally have far better taste in music than the general populace, you’ll definitely be able to appreciate these guys.

Enter Galileo Galilei. (I’ll save you the anguish of a lame joke. Thank me later.)
Take this into consideration: at an age when Bump of Chicken had just barely formed and were doing covers of The Beatles at school events, Galileo Galilei has put out 2 full albums and a single, won a major music festival (SENKOU RIOT 2008), and is about to embark on their first national tour.
Not bad for a bunch of youngins who still have yet to escape the stranglehold of high school hey?

“But Jimi,” you curiously ask, “this is a pretty impressive resume, but how can they possibly be great if they’re so young? Truly great music takes years of refinement, and life experiences that mere high school students couldn’t have possibly gone through.”

Honestly, this is a bit of a mystery to me too.

Let’s take a gander at their latest album which was released Jan 21 2009: 雨のちガリレオ (ame nochi garirero / Galileo after the rain). It’s apparent in a handful of tracks that they’ve taken inspiration from many of the upbeat, heavy hitting bands of today. For example, “PIXIE” has some obvious pillows-esque guitar work. “Monday7s” has a playfulness reminiscent of Bump of Chickens’ FLAME VEIN album. Their flagship song, “ハローグッバイ” (hello, goodbye), is earnestly sung, with soft rolling rock melodies that fans of RADWIMPS should be familiar with; and so on. You can kind of sense Galileo Galilei is in a way, feeling around; trying different things to see what works for them and what they can incorporate into their own budding sound.

But then you have a song like “管制塔” which doesn’t have any immediately distinct influences other than being an amalgamation of all the bands previously stated. Thus making it original and fresh; not to mention it’s surprisingly well composed. It starts off with a lonely guitar rift that is soon joined by a steadfast bass, progressively building guitar, drums and vocals and in a moment of triumph breaks through into vivid daylight. An instant classic; it’s one of those great motivational songs that can pick you up on dreary days.

And then there’s “扇風機”. A solemn yet powerful song that that shows a level of maturity that you would think is unattainable at such an early point in the bands history; let alone at such a young age.

I realize we’ve touched upon their age quite a bit in this article, but I can’t help but think about the ocean of potential
Galileo Galilei has. At such a tender age they’re already producing high caliber music that’s close to, if not on par with most of the breakout acts of recent years. They’ve already rocketed up to one of my favorite bands along with Bump and tacica. Just imagine what another 5 or 10 years of experience will do for them.. oh the goosebumps.

Watch 管制塔 performed live at SENKOU RIOT 2008 (auto starts at 4:41)

Listen to a sample of “ハローグッバイ” from the album via youtube.

Buy 雨のちガリレオ