What we wrote about them at the time…

Black-clad and with an ominous aura created by their distorted guitar epics, burnt-out ballads and raucous mantric jams, UP-TIGHT are seriously not to be messed with. Heading up the second generation of Japanese psychedelic rock acts, (following on from Fushitsusha, Kousokuya and Shizuka) they’re one of the best live groups in Japan. This is the first time they’ve ventured abroad.

As you might expect from their name, there’s a chiseled intensity to their playing which displays some startling post-Velvets stances. With the moves to lay down spontaneously loose, acid fried and drugged garage psych jams of hypnotic guitar squall, and a line in impassioned and fathomless vocals are capable of kicking you right in the gut, UP-TIGHT have a mesmeric feel to them, unmatched by any of their peers.