MVP Events from www.saltlakecityevents.net

Gito Gito Hustler Attacks Salt Lake!

By Colin Hickey, 3-01-07

Gito Gito Hustler is an all-girl Japanese rawk band from Tokyo.  These young ladies have been playing music together for more than ten years and have toured the country many times.  I had the pleasure of playing a show with them a couple years back.  The story goes a little something like this:

For the last five years my band, The International Playboys, has gone on an annual tour to the South by Southwest music festival in Austin, Texas.  We do other tours during the year but this one is always a must.  In 2005, we made our way down there playing a couple shows on the way.  Once you get to Austin you are surrounded by music for four days.  I think we played six shows in four days and saw tons of bands.  After SXSW, the tour took us through the Midwest before it took us home.  This is where we met Gito Gito Hustler. 

We pulled up to the Green Door rawk club in Oklahoma City on March 21, 2005 knowing that we were playing first out of five bands—which is never fun.  That night, we weren’t too bummed out because there were three Japanese bands and one British band on the bill so we knew it was going to be insane.  We got in and loaded our gear on stage and that’s when I saw the lovely ladies of Gito Gito Hustler for the first time.  Imagine four gorgeous Japanese girls all wearing matching denim outfits.  I’m talking denim shorts, fish nets, knee high leather boots and denim biker jackets that say Gito Gito Hustler on the back.  It was like they were the missing gang from the movie The Warriors.

We played a pretty awesome set that night, if I do say so myself.  I think I put in some extra effort trying to impress the ladies.  GGH played after us so there wasn’t much talk in between.  I think I expected them to suck at first.  I mean a really hot all-girl Japanese band sounds like a shtick to me.  Then I remembered that they were on Gearhead Records which only puts out kickass bands like the Riverboat Gamblers who are one of my favorite bands of all time.  So I guess I didn’t know what to expect.  Those ladies got on stage and kicked my band’s ass.  Not only are they fricking hot but they can play a mean set of rawk and roll.  I love a band that smiles on stage and these girls were screaming and smiling at the same time.  They had everything.  After they got off stage they came up to us and told us they loved our set.  We traded CD’s and then spent the rest of the night teaching them how to do really good rawk leg kicks.  My bass player does a really awesome leg kick.  Then they talked about us touring Japan together.  Talk like that always happens at shows when there is alcohol involved which is every show.  The other bands didn’t have what these girls had and they were good bands.  The guitar player for one band did a solo with a vibrator while the drummer for the other band played the whole show naked with his dong in a sock.  GGH didn’t need tricks to rawk—they just did. 

So the night came to an end and we said our goodbyes.  When they said goodbye they didn’t say “goodnight Colin” they said “goodnight International Playboy.” How cute is that?  So they went to their hotel while we went to a friend’s house.  I think I ended up wearing makeup, throwing up in a bathroom and passing out with my glasses on.  I love tour.  The next night we were in Kansas and the ladies of Gito Gito Hustler were pushed to the back of our minds so we could make room for new friends—and that’s just the way it goes on tour. 

Gito Gito Hustler is playing Burt’s Tiki Lounge in Salt Lake City on March 7th.  If you live in SLC, get off your butt and go check these girls out. I promise you won’t be disappointed.  You can check out some of the girls’ tunes by going to their myspace page or check out a video here. 

Colin Hickey is New West’s Events Editor keep an eye out for his “MVP Events” or check here for your own.  www.NewWestEvents.net

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