Spotlight: Guitar Wolf NZ Tour - Tributes & Memories From The D4, Stink Magnetic, Transistors, Bloodbags & More

Only one week to go before Tokyo's Guitar Wolf electrify Aotearoa New Zealand's stages with the untamed raw power of JET ROCK 'N' ROLL. Led by eponymous guitarist / singer Seiji, with recent recruits Gotz (bass) and Takuro (drums), Guitar Wolf's earlier visits have attained mythical status. Read homages to and memories of one of the most jaw-dropping live bands of our era from an assortment of local legends, and don't even think of missing Guitar Wolf's explosive return this March — brought to you by CLEAN DiRT...

UnderTheradar proudly presents...

Guitar Wolf NZ Tour 2025 - Jett Rock & Roll From Tokyo, Japan

Saturday 8th March - Threes & Sevens Records, Invercargill w/ Vagina Dry, The Merseys, Hattford (all-ages)*
Sunday 9th March - Pearl Diver, Dunedin w/ Vagina Dry, Dale Kerrigan (all-ages)*
Monday 10th March - The Penguin Club, Oamaru w/ Mads Harrop, Cuticles (all-ages)*
Tuesday 11th March - Space Academy, Christchurch w/ PGX, DJs Matthias Leather Jacket & Missy G*
Wednesday 12th March - Paisley Stage, Napier w/ Spring Flowers, The Ideas*
Thursday 13th March - Valhalla, Wellington w/ Lavender Menace, The Ideas*
Friday 14th March - Rosemarys, Taupō w/ B.U.M.s
Saturday 15th March - Under The Bridge, Tauranga w/ Somacaine (2pm, all-ages, free show)
Saturday 15th March - The Monkey House Theatre, Whitianga w/ Prisoners Of War (all-ages, evening show)*
Sunday 16th March - Whammy Bar, Auckland w/ Transistors, Crying Ivy, Nothing at All! Tribute and D-light4ul special guests (all-ages)*
Monday 17th March - Artworks Theatre, Waiheke Island w/ Vital Signz (all-ages)*

*Tickets on sale HERE via UTR
Wellington, Napier dates all-ages, but the person under 18 must be with their parent or legal guardian

Towards the end of the band I was in in the '90s, Nothing At All! I was listening to a lot of Japanese rock 'n' roll. Especially Teengenerate and Guitar Wolf.

Guitar Wolf’s first tour of NZ gave The D4 its first international support slots. I was living in Newmarket and Seiji stayed at my apartment. He slept with his glasses on and his arms across his chest. Like a RNR vampire. Not even stepping out of character in his sleep. These were early times in The D4’s career and we were reminded of the commitment necessary to give to our performance by Guitar Wolf. This is not simply playing a bunch of songs with some friends over a few beers. This is giving all of your energy and soul and anything else you can muster up to something more than yourself. Our performances got more unhinged and committed after playing these shows with Guitar Wolf.

Soon after we were invited by Seiji to play some shows in Japan. Our first ever shows outside of Aotearoa. This was to be one of the best experiences of our lives while reinforcing what needs to be given to stand out and not become the enemy, a cliche in a sea of mediocrity. Long live Guitar Wolf!

Dion Lunadon
Nothing At All!, The Snitches, The Rainy Days, the D4, A Place To Bury Strangers, Dion Lunadon

I found the Planet of the Wolves LP in 1999 in a record store in Palmerston North. Incredible cover design with all three Wolves in full black leather against a blood red background with white and yellow text burnt across it. Reverse side showed a pixelated black n white of Seiji, knelt down covered in beer and sweat, wailing into a microphone. The design caught the attention of my current obsession with raging rock 'n' roll mayhem and when I dropped the needle the howling, feedback drenched wild aligned so beautifully with me I was sold right there.

Sometimes fate plays a clear hand and a few months later they were coming to play in town. I can’t overstate this but for a band from Tokyo to play a rural town in New Zealand is nuts. I couldn’t believe my luck. That night I staggered toward the venue in a state of disbelief that it was actually real and a large part of me wasn’t convinced. I remembered seeing Bass Wolf first. Here is a slick, straight from the Tokyo back streets badass — the kind covered in tattoos, which in Japan often pointed to the feared Yakuza, pacing some very average excuse for a bar in Palmy. I recall trying to resolve a number of completely disassociated elements into some kind of sense but it wasn’t working. I don’t even think they had a door and ticket situation set up because I remember one John Baker — in signature hat — announcing the need to pay from just the bar area where everyone was hanging out drinking. I went outside and got some air.

At this point I realised I had probably overdone the amount of mushrooms I had and was in a serious predicament. Everything took on a super heightened tension, visually things were moving they probably shouldn’t and things just weren’t really adding up. I was kinda freaked out and overwhelmed by it all. Luckily my buddy Mardy Pune was outside too and as I confessed my experience handed me his smoke and reassured me that the intensity would pass. That was enough to get me in exactly the right headspace and suddenly it was all good.

I’m gonna say this, and you’re gonna think I’m talking bullshit, but nothing can prepare you for a Guitar Wolf show. Put simply its wildness taking its supernatural course in front of you. From the moment the gangster noir swaggers over the revving of a motorcycle roar, to the perplexing human feat of wearing that much leather, to the pools of sweat and beer, cables, people, cans and screams, to the climactic reverence of Seiji scaling the tallest thing in the room and launching off it into a pit of hypnotised jet generation. I saw my mate Dane handed Thee Guitar… I saw human waves arching over and around them in genuine thrill and disbelief while my pupils expanded to incapsulate my heart exploding with great joy. If you’re lucky you become a piece of a sacred pyramid.

I realised that this is more than just a show. It’s witnessing actual rock 'n' roll Gods in front of you. Guitar Wolf is not fucking around. They aren’t in it for anything else but the spirit of rock n roll and something you gotta see to believe.

Dylan Thomas Herkes Tekai
Stink Magnetic and Magnetic B.S Records

Tokyo’s loudest rockers Guitar Wolf were booked into two nights at the Kings Arms in 1999. Dressed in their black leather, leaving your ears bleeding, and the crowd wanting more. They returned the Sunday night but unfortunately (and not unexpectedly!) received a noise abatement notice the night before which was given to bloody Baker who put it in his pocket and forgot about it. Just as the Wolves started for the second night the police turned up to shut us down and confiscate the equipment if we continued. Baker made a frantic call to Java Jive in Ponsonby, paid off the covers band playing to no one, and moved the whole show within an hour to the end of Ponsonby Road. I was gutted!!

As a result of that show, we had to get three shipping containers, and slam them up against the back of the stage wall to act as sound insulation.

Lisa Gordon
Kings Arms booker 1999

2005 / 2006, can't remember which year, Kings Arms, Tamaki Makaurau. I was real down and low on music, didn't like much going on, lotta generic crap polluting the airwaves, my band had fallen apart, I was about to give up playing music altogether. Saw three gigs in quick smart succession that changed my mind. Motorhead, Billy Childish and ....... Guitar Wolf. Each never quit, do or die protagonists. Would it matter if Seiji had an audience to play to? I doubt it. Sure he feeds off the energy of any given audience. But's he's thee eternal motosickle burnout, sweaty leathered whip crack lone wolf, guitar screaming and feedin' back, powerchords breakin' up in distortion drench, endless loop plays on Link Wray's evil stalker riffs. His identity and meaning all wrapped up in maximum fuzzed out wreck & roll. At that time the original bassist Billy had sadly passed, but with new guy UG, and Toru, the rhythm section still thumped and pumped behind the Seiji hyper highway howl & hiss. I left that show completely deafened but re-inspired.

Andrew Tolley
Bloodbags

It's hard to know where to begin to talk about Guitar Wolf and the impact they have had on our band. After the Chch earthquakes our first proper show back was at the newly formed Dux opening for Guitar Wolf. That was the first time we met the incomparable Seiji, a man of mystery and intrigue. We did the whole NZ tour with them - Dunedin, Auckland, Hamilton and Wellington. It was after a night of extremely heavy drinking in Wellington that Seiji told us we would need to harden our livers if we ever wanted to play in Japan.

So clearly Japan was out of the question… but a couple of months later we received a phone call from John Baker that blew our young minds - “would the Transistors support Guitar Wolf on their upcoming US dates?” Of course there was only one answer and the ensuing 27 date tour was truly one of the greatest experiences of our lives.

Seeing the Guitar Wolf work ethic, the commitment to the cause, and that explosive energy up close night after night was so inspiring. It didn't matter if the show was a sold out Saturday night in Brooklyn or ten kids slam dancing on a Wednesday in South Dakota, they gave it everything and more every single time. Seiji taught us to treat every show like a battle, and he really did take on the role of a rock and roll mentor to us after doing battle with us at every show.

There are so many great memories from that trip but the last night of the tour, lying in the back of a flatbed pickup in the wee small hours, being driven around Memphis at breakneck speed, clutching on to Seiji's leathers for dear life and staring up as the stars blurred into streaks in the endless night sky while I tried not to spew was a very surreal moment.

All these wild experiences have forged a special friendship between Seiji and our band. After we went on hiatus, Seiji was the reason we came back together. When they returned to NZ in 2017 he asked if we’d play their Ōtautahi show. Who are we to say no to Guitar Wolf?!

James Harding
Transistors

Seeing Guitar Wolf at Chicks Hotel in 2013 felt like a seminal event. They were surrounded by an aura of excitement and mystique – "This is one I’ll remember forever!" The crowd was amped up and ready for anything; there were bucketloads of energy, which — once the band started to play — translated into a vigorous mosh-pit. Guitar Wolf played like it was Earth’s final night before certain destruction, but the obvious highlight was their onstage acrobatics. I’m sure I will never see another band make an onstage human pyramid. Next level!

Caitlin Lester
ODT

I remember seeing Guitar Wolf at Harvesters in Palmerston North in 1999, it was wild and nothing my teenage self had seen before. 25 years is a long time but I can remember the energy was through the roof, their hair was immaculate, they were leaping all over the place, the feedback was ear splitting and my friend Dane jumped up and played with them for a moment... It still is one of my all time favourite shows, we were enthralled and hitched down to Wellington to see them again, it was one of those moments which set me on my path working in music.

Rahine O’Reilly
Meow & Meow Nui

Where do I start... so many moments... Maverick movie and TV producer Glen Elliot (and landlord of Bob Frisbee) named his company Buttobase after a Guitar Wolf All Through The Night Buttobase, which original bass player Billy told me essentially means "I’m going to kick your ass into space like a MF!” And somewhere in the vaults is Glen’s documentary of that first tour... a North Shore mature lady so enamoured with seeing the Wolves rip apart a Devonport venue on Christmas Eve, getting them to play a Boxing Day show in the lounge of her new Takapuna apartment for her friends and feeding all-comers pizza, night time drive stops in the middle of nowhere to marvel at the Aotearoa night skies with a chorus of oooohhhsss... Seiji jumping off the Kings Arms PA to the crescendo of their version of 'Rumble'... there have been many a challenger to out drink Seiji on whiskey, my flatmate Kenneth and Jimmy Christmas all falling and unable to wake up the next day... with Seiji up before dawn and telling us he felt “Great!”

At another suburban lounge show, this time in Titirangi, Seiji makes friends with local motorcyclists and the next day sees him ripping off into the West Coast roads on a day off on a motorcycle, coming back telling me he got up to 200 km/hr... Waking up after a particularly long night to see Seiji bouncing on a trampoline with my then 3 year old son in his sunglasses and leather jacket... Seiji building human pyramids in Wellington... original drummer Toru a total BAD ASS DRUM MONSTER on stage then off stage being the most softy spoken gentleman who loved the nature of West Auckland , and bass player Billy — no one could chew gum like Billy... and no one combed their hair on stage with as much style like Billy or Toru.

I once DJed at a bFM Summer Series and dropped a 45 of 'Jet Generation' - a song recorded and mastered to be the loudest 45 ever... the PA company got alerted and furiously tried to see what was wrong with their system.

And lastly on their most recent tour to NZ — they performed three GW shows in 24 hours in Raglan, Tauranga, and Auckland. Some bands will never expend the energy GW does in one show in a whole career... GW did three!

And this all started in 1999 with a (pre-internet) fax — "Dear Jhon – I hear you are a great gay..."

Jhon Baker
CLEAN DiRT

Editor's note: I would like to chime in and mention the INCREDIBLE free set Guitar Wolf played on top of an awning on Karangahape Road back in the '00s. If you haven't seen them — go see them!