Panchiko

Panchiko is a British Indie rock band formed in 1998 in Nottingham. The band comprises Owain (vocals, guitar), Andy (engineering, guitar), Shaun (bass programming) and John (drums). Last names omitted due to members wishing to remain anonymous. According to guitarist and engineer Andy, the name Panchiko came from an attempt at naming the band after the Japanese slot machines but was accidentally misspelled and “it just stuck”. The band cites Super Furry Animals, Ultrasound, Radiohead, The Beatles, Kid Loco and Nirvana as some of their major influences.
==Background==
===1998–2001: Early years===
The group was formed in 1998, although not much is known about their past. Owain mentioned in an interview that him and the rest of Panchiko once entered a battle of the bands at a bar called "Berlins" in Nottingham but that they were disqualified when they were found out to be underage. Their debut album which would later resurface online "D>E>A>T>H>M>E>T>A>L" was recorded during 1999-2000 and a quantity of 30 to 40 copies of it were made while their three track EP "Kicking Cars" was recorded during 2000-2001. The copies of D>E>A>T>H>M>E>T>A>L were reportedly sent to music journalists and record labels but nobody responded (with exception of Fierce Panda Records). 
===2016–2020: Resurface===
The bands first EP "D>E>A>T>H>M>E>T>A>L" first gained public notoriety when an anonymous user on the imageboard 4chan purchased a heavily rotted and damaged copy of the album from a local charity shop and uploaded it to the website’s music board in 2016 where users praised the album. The EP was mostly unknown until 2017 when a YouTube user uploaded it to the platform. After this upload the EP started to gain some following online. At that point in time the CD containing data rot was the only copy of the EP known to exist. The clean version of the album was considered to be lost media. Many fans of the album wished to hear the album without the disc rot present on the existing release, as such some of these fans created a Discord server dedicated to the search for a clean copy of the album in 2019.
In early 2020 a member of the now official Discord server discovered a postal code on the price tag for the original disc, which helped track down the location where it was originally purchased and on January 21, 2020 another member of the server successfully made contact with Owain by locating people named Owain who lived near the postal code on Facebook. Andy and Shaun were contacted shortly after. None of the members contacted still owned a copy of D>E>A>T>H>M>E>T>A>L and began searching for any copies that friends or family may still own. On February 16, 2020 D>E>A>T>H>M>E>T>A>L was finally re-released in its original state along with the three tracks from their unreleased EP "Kicking Cars". Shortly after this re-release of the band's debut, Panchiko started gaining more attention from new fans and music critics receiving mostly positive reviews.
In May 18, 2020 the band released its first single in 20 years titled "R>O>B>O>T>S>R>E>P>R>I>S>E", which is a re-record of their song Laputa. A second single titled "Machine Gun Drum" was released the same year.
==Controversy==
After the re-release of D>E>A>T>H>M>E>T>A>L several people online questioned the validity of the album's release date and some even speculated that the whole story to it was just a successful advertising campaign to promote the album. The band's members debunked this many times in their official Discord server and in interviews but people remained skeptical about it. The skepticism escalated further after the band released R>O>B>O>T>S>R>E>P>R>I>S>E, which had been their first song in years.
==Discography==
===Studio albums===
*D>E>A>T>H>M>E>T>A>L (Re-Release) (2020)
===EPs===
*D>E>A>T>H>M>E>T>A>L (2000)
===Singles===
*R>O>B>O>T>S>R>E>P>R>I>S>E (2020)
*Machine Gun Drum (2020)
==In the media==
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== References ==
==External links==
* Panchiko (Music) - TV Tropes
* Panchiko Reflect on “D>E>A>T>H>M>E>T>A>L,
* Panchiko on spotify
* Panchiko on google play
* Pachinko on music youtube
* The Surprising Story of Panchiko — CORDUROY THREADS
* D>E>A>T>H>M>E>T>A>L by Panchiko - Rate Your Music
* Panchiko Albums: songs, discography, biography
* Spectreview: Panchiko - D>E>A>T>H>M>E>T>A>L
* Panchiko - D>E>A>T>H>M>E>T>A>L - Discogs
Category:Musical groups established in 1998
Category:British indie rock groups
Category:English indie rock groups
Category:British musical groups
Category:Musical groups from Nottingham
Category:Trip hop groups
Category:Emo musical groups