Whether it's the rainy weather or beautiful scenery, there is something about Washington state that has made it one of the most fertile places for independent music. Though Seattle may have a higher profile, indie labels are as numerous as nose piercings (and that means plenty) in the state capital Olympia, and the granddaddy of them all is Calvin Johnson's K Records.
"I've sold my soul to K," says Nissie, coyly exposing a shoulder tattooed with the label's logo. As president and only employee of Tokyo's Rebel Beat Factory, purveyor of K Records in Japan, a bit of skin isn't the only thing he's given up: A large piece of the floor space in his small Tokyo office is devoted to the label's releases.
A self-confessed "baseball kid" with close-cropped hair and a desire to join the Japan League, Nissie had a musical epiphany in high school involving the tunes of Elvis Costello that propelled him into the netherworld of punk rock. Nissie began Rebel Beat in the early '80s to release records by his punk band the Loods. The Loods would later feature highly in then-rock journalist Calvin Johnson's report on the Japanese indie music scene in Op magazine (the precursor of influential music rag Option). After a major label stint with J-pop act the Groovers ("I was thrown out for bad behavior," he says), Nissie returned to indie rock, putting out records by Tokyo groups Copass Grinderz and Blood Thirsty Butchers before re-establishing contact with Johnson in 1994 and becoming Japan's conduit for the K Record's catalog.