Urusei Yatsura

Noisy stars

Fergus Lawrie and Graham Kemp met in summer 1993 at the University of Glasgow; Elaine Graham joined on bass and her brother Ian Graham on drums. The name comes from Rumiko Takahashi's manga, and the band prefers the translation Noisy Stars. Releases in the US and Japan used the name Yatsura for legal reasons. Their first recording was "Guitars Are Boring" on a Kazoo Club compilation in 1994, from a Glasgow night at the 13th Note that Alex Kapranos ran at one point. All Hail Urusei Yatsura (Hipster) was an EP that year. John Peel, who had seen them at the 13th Note, had them record their first session late in 1994 at CaVa Studios in Glasgow, reported as the first outside Maida Vale since the Undertones, because the band lacked amps and travel money; they made four Peel sessions in all, plus the Steve Lamacq Evening Session.

Che Records signed them in 1995, and "Siamese" came out in 500 copies on colored vinyl. We Are Urusei Yatsura (May 6, 1996, Che Trading) was recorded at Woodbine Studios in Leamington Spa with producer John Rivers. "Hello Tiger" reached number 40 in the UK for one week in February 1998, their only chart single. Slain by Urusei Yatsura followed in 1998, then the Yon Kyoku Iri EP in 1999, and Everybody Loves Urusei Yatsura (2000) on their own Oni Records. They supported Garbage and Super Furry Animals and were compared with Sonic Youth, Pavement and Teenage Fanclub. Kemp described a writing practice of crediting the main writer and splitting the rest four ways.

They split in June 2001. Kemp went solo, and the others formed Projekt A-ko, making Elkloft (2006) and Yoyodyne (2009); Lawrie later formed the drone project Angel of Everyone Murder. Rocket Girl released You Are My Urusei Yatsura, their BBC sessions from 1996 to 1998, in 2016, Can You Spell Urusei Yatsura: Lost Songs 1993-2000 in 2020 and an expanded We Are Urusei Yatsura in 2023. The band's Bandcamp page has live recordings from Edinburgh, Amsterdam, London and Sheffield. Grant McPhee's Scene Within a Scene includes an oral history extract.