BALLOONS

The first trio formed in 1996 including two brothers -the drummer Daisuke and singer/guitarist/songwriter Kyohsuke-, under the influence of The Beatles, XTC and Dinosour Jr, their initial emotion sounded like alternative rock loudly distorted with BigMuff. With several demo-tapes and participation to some compilations, they kept playing shows around Tokyo constantly.
With one-year suspension by Kyohsuke's visit to Canada in 1999 and through some changes of the bassists, their self-made "LAST FRONT EP" was out in 2002. About that time another guitarist Shiokawa had joined.



In 2003, the quartet -w/Yoshinori Kanemoto on bass- released 1st full length 9:40pm from SitffSlack, the independent label based in Nagoya.
Now it's distributed in US by 54'40" OR FIGHT! and in Spain by BCORE.



In the next year, the bassists changed again and Jun started supporting from the Japan tour of 31Knots which Balloons hosted.



May 2005 saw their first tour in US.
With Taking Pictures of Chicago in some shows, the band played 12shows in 2 weeks around MidWest/EastCoast.
Back in Japan, 3dep was out in June. The ep contains 2 songs and 1 Quicktime Movie of live performance of "excess baggage" from "9:40pm".
During the summer, they did several expeditions nationwide supporting the ep, including the tour with Traindodge from Norman,OK. in July.
On February 2006, Balloons committed a short tour and shared a couple of shows with 31Knots again.
And in April, they hosted HaymarketRiot's japan tour and had a really really great time together with these Baka Gaijins -crazy stupid americans!!!.
In 2007, after the hardest struggle on recording in May/June,
their 2nd full length named "451 deg F" has finally been completed and released on Aug.8th. Details are noted on our MySpaceBlog.
(we've been looking for labels to deal with it in licence release or, at least, distribution. IF you're interested, please email us.)
On Aug.26th, they kicked out for nationwide tour across the country spending most of the weekend and holidays until Dec.23rd.



In 2008, they flew over to United States again and played 9 shows from Feb.22nd to Mar.1st, around Mid West area. The tour was entitled "Endless Bummer Tour 2008". Hosted by Haymarket Riot in turn, Balloons had much fun in playing and touring with them and new friends called Hitch.
Back in Japan, they've still kept on making new songs in the studio and doing several shows every month. Things are going well with us as always.
Please check the dates here.



Well,
After 3year-struggling in making, arranging and brushing up the songs,
Year 2010 will see the release of the quartet's new album on Dec.22, 2010.
Recorded, mixed and mastered by Hajime Yamamoto from nenem ,
this 10track album is entitled " Egal ist 88 " and released from Say Hello To Never Recordings.
On next February, they will tour nationwide 9 cities.
pls wait for the schedules to be updated here.



+Balloons have an honor having played shows with such great foreign bands as:
Shiner (KansasCity,rip), Juno (Seattle,rip), No Knife (SanDiego), The Mercury Program (Florida), Minus The Bear (Seattle), From Monument To Masses (SanFrancisco), 31Knots (Portland/SanFrancisco), Karate (Boston,rip), Medications (DC), Taking Pictures (Chicago,rip), Joshua (NY), Traindodge (Oklahoma), Your Black Star (Louisville), Jairus (UK), Balboa (Philadelphia), Kaos Pilot (Norway), Haymarket Riot (Chicago), Comadore (SanFrancisco), Daitro (France), Aloha (Cleveland/Rochester/NY/DC), The Life And Times (KansasCity), Sleeping People (SanDiego), Ampere (Boston), La Quiete (Italy), Hitch (Belgium), Off Minor (NY), Aussitot Mort (France), mike watt & brother's sister's daughter (California), Cinemechanica (Georgia), Enemies (Ireland) .



.and with uncountable great domestic friends.