GOCOO
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| GOCOO | |
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| Background information | |
| Origin |  Tokyo, Japan |
GOCOO are seven female and four male Taiko drummers from Tokyo (Japan) who capture their audience with original grooves woven with Japanese drums, Taikos. GOCOO performed at major Blues&Roots, Rock&Pop and alternative Rock festivals, in live clubs, classic theatres and concert halls or at techno events. For many performances GOCOO is supported by guest musician GoRo, a didgeridoo player who adds spherical sound flows to GOCOO's music.
While many Taiko groups stoically pursue a traditional style, and while others seek new interpretations of traditional Japanese music, GOCOO's beat exhibits free-spirited Taiko music, rising freely between the East and the West, tradition and pop, rite and party. Although GOCOO's music is often referred to as crossover or world music, or even new terms such as Techno- and Trance-Taiko are created, GOCOO overcame any stereotyped concepts not only of Japanese drum music and reached their own, independent cult status. Free of ritual obligations, women, for example, have the majority among GOCOO's members.
GOCOO was founded 1997 in Tokyo. They debuted the same year, completely untypical for a Taiko group, at the Techno Festival Rainbow 2000. Since then, GOCOO's frequent live performances at Tokyo's cult locations, such as Aoyama CAY and Shibuya On Air, are packed with a young audience who usually tend to shy away from traditional music. GOCOO also appear side by side with other bands and DJs at rave parties or open air festivals such as the Fuji Rock Festival, Asagiri Jam, or the Hotaka Mountain Festival.
Yet, GOCOO are respected among the circles of traditional Taiko. For instance GOCOO performed at the 35th Nihon no Taiko: Taiko ha Koeru (Japanese Taiko Drums Transcend) at the Japanese National Theatre in 2001 and they appeared together with the traditional Taiko ensemble Kodo at Tokyo's Earthbeat Festival in June 2005. GOCOO performed with several highly achieved artists such as Korea's Kim Duk-soo of SamulNori, West-Africa's djembe player Mamady Keita, and Seiichi Tanaka of the San Francisco Taiko Ensemble.
In 2000 GOCOO's first solo album Healing Asia Vol.2 was released.
At the beginning of 2002, GOCOO joined Juno Reactor (UK) for a recording session which resulted that same fall in the release of the maxi single Hotaka. In June 2002, Universal Music published GOCOO's first live album Live'01.
In January 2003 GOCOO performed for the first time in Europe at the opening party "The Cutting Edge of Japanese Underground" of Graz as the Culture Capital of Europe 2003. They followed-up with a tour throughout Germany. Later the same year GOCOO recorded together with Juno Reactor the tunes "Tea House" and "Tetsujin" for the soundtrack of the Hollywood blockbusters Matrix Reloaded and Matrix Revolutions. Successively, GOCOO released their first DVD Live'02. In December two new CDs with tracks performed by GOCOO were released: Juno Reactor's CD "Zwara EP" and the CD Best of Healing Asia: Amatsuchi No Aida.
2004 GOCOO returned to Europe. While being on tour, GOCOO went to a recording studio in Hamburg (Germany) to contribute to the soundtrack of the third sequel of the role-play computer game Gothic 3.
In autumn 2005 GOCOO performed 34 concerts during a two months long tour through Europe and Mexico. Another tour followed in 2006.
Lead drummer, Kaoly Asano, attracts much attention as a female Taiko artist. Whenever not performing with GOCOO on stage, she teaches the art of playing the Taiko at her famous Taiko school in Tokyo.
