Full EP Premiere: Takafumi Matsubara – “Poison”

In releasing this new six-track 7″ EP via Roman Numeral Records, Japanese grind virtuoso, Takafumi Matsubara, offers a stark contrast—at least lyrically—to his 2019 solo album. The positivity of that release is forsaken for darker, angrier themes, as guitarist Matsubara has relied on vocalists from SWARRRM (tracks 2-4) and Palm (tracks 1 and 6), as well as his former bandmate in Gridlink, Jon Chang (track 5), to voice his rage. “Lyrics are written in Japanese (except for Jon), which was my request,” he explains, “and I recommend you to translate them, [so] you will know our grudges and anger for the internet tough guys, party grinders and the terrible world.”

The origins of the material on the EP go back to Matsubara’s time in Mortalized in the late ’90s through the late ’10s. “During playing in Mortalized, I always thought about all the possibilities of grindcore guitar playing, and practiced so, so much,” he explains. “That made [me] what I am today. On this EP, I wanted to write and play in strong, strange and evil manner. I hope that I’m able to make it possible for the playing style in grindcore, in particular, to expand.” Matsubara gathered previously unreleased tracks he’d written from the era, and assembled friends and former bandmates to complete them.

In addition to the vocal contributions noted above, Matsubara obviously handles all guitars, and the drumming is split between his former Mortalized bandmate, Hoonee Jo (tracks 1-3) and Wormrot’s Vijesh Ghariwala (tracks 4-6).

All six tracks can be streamed below and you can purchase the EP from Roman Numeral’s Bandcamp page here.