Yuki Maybe. This is just my guess, but since we sit on our knees with the feet behind on a tatami and at a low table might be what has caused it. My parents’ generation had to sit like this until the dad came home. But I am always home, so!

Helen They came from a place in Malmö. I think they might be produced in China, so the quality is below par. Then we have a Japanese futon on top. Initially, the idea was to be able to put them away so that Ren could have a play area. Now we all sleep in bed together at night, but one of us usually falls out.
Yuki And of course that’s me.

Yuki I think I am very integrated.
Helen You are the most British Japanese person I have ever met. Like your sense of humour.
Yuki I think so too! Even just appreciating the bad food in the UK.
Helen I guess in our family I do a lot of cooking, like semi-British food. Like last Christmas, since Yuki doesn’t really have an experience of Christmas, we did it in a British way, had a tree, ate British food, things like that.

Helen Basically, I was in my early twenties, we had goose for Christmas. Then my dad took the leftover goose meat and fat and made a cassoulet, which is a rich French stew with beans, breadcrumbs and sausages.
Yuki You basically OD on fat.
Helen All of the fluid in the foot crystallises. I was too embarrassed to tell people at work it was gout, so I told them I had sprained my ankle. Felt like I was Henry VIII.

Yuki In Japan before each meal we say “いただきます” (itadakimasu) which means thanks for the food, thanking the person who cooked but also for the ingredients. Since Japan had more of a pagan religion before Buddhism and every thing was considered sacred.
Helen It’s also for my benefit, so I know how to be polite. It’s also nice to do it for Ren’s sake. We say it when we leave the house and when we return.
Yuki Instead of “see you later” which is a one-way greeting, the person leaving says “いただきます” (itadakimasu) and the person at home say “行ってらっしゃい” (itterasshai). When you come back, the person who comes back says “タダイマス” (tadaimasu) which means “I’m home” and the person at home greets back “おかえり” (okaeri) which means “welcome home”.

Yuki There’s a greater similarity between Sweden and Japan, than between the UK and Japan. The way people respect each other, are more reserved and almost shy. The cleanliness. How food and fashion is appreciated, people dress well and eat well. That’s probably why Japanese people find it easier to settle here and vice versa. I’ve noticed there’s more quality Japanese places here than in London. Not in quantity but in quality.

Yuki There’s one in Vasastan called Totemo Ramen. I really like them because of how they present themselves, the restaurant is so tiny, like it is in Japan. It’s just the counters and a few tiny tables, so what you do is basically get in, eat ramen and get out. There’s no side menu, just ramen.

Helen I wanted a different pace of life. I had heard about Swedish work culture: fair working conditions, reasonable working hours, long holidays. I actually expected it to be boring, but was pleasantly surprised. I needed a change from living in Dalston and going out all the time.

Yuki Similar to Helen. The life of touring with a band, getting wasted all the time, was fun, but had a lack of substance. I started to question whether I could do it into my old age—do I want to be the old guy at the show? Then the pandemic happened and it was a good time to make a change. Before that, Sweden was not on my radar. My impression was that it was cold and expensive. But moving here was a different experience.

Helen Met Yuki, had a dog, got pregnant, moved house, got engaged and married. I didn’t leave Sweden for a year.

Yuki Yeah, it was beautiful! It felt pretty great to be back on stage, to my real self. I almost forgot that I am a musician. The first ever show after Covid was actually a festival in the UK, called End of the Road. We were sort of like a secret act after all the other acts had finished playing, and we were on at two in the morning. It felt so bizarre for like five minutes, just being out in front of the crowd, there were so many people, it took a while to take in. It felt really fresh and that was the first time in ages that I actually felt nervous before a show.

Yuki We treat rock music as a form of art rather than a part of the music industry—I find that really boring and kind of despise it. We have managers, but we kind of manage the direction ourselves. Since we’re not that big, the label doesn’t tell us what to do. It’s still us four, we’ve known each other for 15 years or so, spending more time with each other than anyone. We kind of love and hate each other, kind of like family. We’ve have also aged as a band. I wouldn’t say we’re dad rock, but we’re not a young band anymore.

Yuki It was all guitar music back then, which is back again now. It was absent for a long time. When we started out, in the post- Indie phase, we came as a sort of shock to the East London scene, we were all Japanese and had super long hair, crazy outfits and a stage show. No one knew what to think.

Yuki In the UK a funny thing is happening. Our original fan base has stopped going out. Now we have kids coming to the shows. They don’t know that we’ve been playing since they were about five years old. They think they’ve just discovered a new band from Japan. We also have the parents of these kids, slightly older than us, who are really into music. And of course old geezers.

Yuki It has kind of gone. Our tours have become softer, maybe even a bit tame. My usual bed time is when I often start playing!

Yuki It’s more draining when I come off stage and it’s expected that you still have to be that person. Or if we do a fashion shoot, there’s no music there—it’s just a set and usually it’s early in the morning and it’s expected that we perform. We’re musicians not models.

Helen Something I’ve noticed from the people around me is that it is fine to age out of the demographic that you are pitching towards, but you need to recognize your own growing irrelevance. And you need to understand that you’re not part of the zeitgeist anymore. I’m a thirty six year old mother, not part of a genre defining moment.

Helen I have a theory on the “resurgence” of Indie Sleaze, it is just a way for people our age to make themselves relevant again. I’m not sure it is happening again, but it makes people our age feel part of the conversation. It’s only being perpetuated by people of our generation out of nostalgia, I don’t see it being referenced again by what people are wearing. It’s not being adopted by Gen Z.

Helen It’s definitely been a bubble economy and everyone has been invested in the hype machine, but we are past the peak of that now. Sustainability concerns are coming into it now, and people are starting to reject the cahoots that the industry has contributed to, the merry-go-round, driven by the number of releases. The thing is, the majority of people buying it are not the final customers, but resellers.

Helen There are raffle mechanics and other measures that tries to ensure that the product goes to the end customer, but at the end of the day a sale is a sale. Everyone has kind of been benefitting from the way that it is at the moment. But it’s changing, some people are starting to get bored of it, there’s fatigue around the sustained attention required to keep it all going.

Helen I don’t think so, there isn’t much brand loyalty. But then again there’s a geographic split. For years, no one in the US was wearing Adidas shoes, it was all Nike. But the next drop can change everything, as long as the right person is attached. Crocs is a huge brand now, because they’ve started operating the same way, by the drop model.

Helen It was brought around by the pandemic. I’m a bit bored of that now, I want to wear something uncomfortable and restrictive!