Nestor made Tokyo come alive
On stage in Shibuya, Nestor won Tokyo with its catchy melodic rock.
Nestor at Veats Shibuya, Tokyo, Japan on 14th January 2026
Swedish band Nestor builds on the Nordic country’s proud history of melodic rock from the ’80s. Originally active as a local rock band in the late ’80s and early ’90s, the band reunited with its full old line-up some five years ago. Since then, they have released two celebrated studio albums and toured in Sweden and internationally. Now the time had come for the band to play in Japan for the first time.
At the Tokyo show, Nestor opened with the song “We Come Alive”. That performance certainly made the band’s Japanese fans come alive. The band – Tobias Gustavsson on lead vocals, Jonny Wemmenstedt on guitar, Marcus Åblad on bass, Martin Frejinger on keyboards and Mattias Carlsson on drums – gel well and seem to have fun together.
They performed nine songs from the 2021 debut album “Kids in a Ghost Town” and eight songs from the 2024 album “Teenage Rebel”. They also played their latest single, “In the Name of Rock’n’Roll”. Highlights included smashing versions of “Perfect 10 (Eyes Like Demi Moore)”, “Signed in Blood”, “Stone Cold Eyes”, “Firesign”, “On the Run” and “1989”. By the time the time came to perform the encore, which consisted of “Addicted to Your Love”, “Victorious” and “It Ain’t Me”, Nestor had already won Tokyo. It was quite remarkable to experience a “new” band with only two albums to its name perform a headline show in Tokyo like it’s nobody’s business. They already have a back catalogue of songs that blows most of the competition out of the water.
The sound in the venue was superb and the band’s performance was flawless. The band’s melodic rock is a perfect fit for Japan. It includes plenty of flashbacks of the great ’80s era for melodic rock, but without sounding dated or like a tribute. This is modern and catchy rock, here and now, but with a foundation in ’80s rock.
No doubt this band has a real shot at building something great in Japan following this first visit. They have the performance skills, musical style and songs to make it. This was a fantastic evening in the name of melodic rock.
