The Alternative Counter Organization

“Tako” means “octopus”, “kite”, and even “bunion” in Japanese. Bald men or men with shaven heads, as well as red-faced, staggering drunks, are also referred to as “tako”. It’s a word that appears in a lot of slang and sayings.”Tako” is also the name of an 80s music and performance collective whose performances were like nothing before or since. The Japanese band Tako, formed at the beginning of the 80s, is a loose group/collective of varying members that belongs to the post-punk alternative music movement. The network of members were all friends and acquaintances of Harumi Yamazaki, ex-member of Gaseneta and Tako’s central member.Tako can be described as a band of guerrillas who, over the years, continued to connect, collect, interrupt, and scatter while sending out into the world music and sounds that can best be described as transient. Tako also performed without Harumi, and so it is as though the band is an anonymous group of mercenaries.