Pastor rock vs Buddhist monk blues in Japan

Tokyo

MOST days, Lutheran pastor Kazuhiro Sekino preaches to his congregation in a soft voice with religious hymns playing in the background of a Tokyo church. But as night falls, he hits a smoky stage criss-crossed with whizzing strobe lights, shedding his pious day job in a battle of the bands against a group of Buddhist monks.

"We are rock, pastors are rock!" Sekino, 36, shouts into a microphone to stir up the several hundred concert-goers. The band, Boxi Rocks - the name is a play on the Japanese word for pastor - features Sekino and three other pastors, who don church robes during their raucous performances, sometimes with a leather jacket thrown over top.