Katana is a heavy metal band from Gothenburg, Sweden established in 2005. The 5-member includes Johan Bernspång on vocals, Patrik Essén (guitar), Susanna Salminen (bass guitar), Tobias Karlsson (guitar) and Anders Persson (drums). The name of the band Katana comes from Japanese katana, a backsword, because of Japanese influences on the band's music. They are signed with Listenable Records / Sony Music and managed by Gain / Magnus Lundbäck.
Katana is Japanese for backsword and often refers to uchigatana, especially in English. For a list of fictional katana, see Katanas in fiction. Katana may also refer to:
The Dreamcast (Japanese: ドリームキャスト, Hepburn: Dorīmukyasuto) is a home video game console released by Sega on November 27, 1998 in Japan, September 9, 1999 in North America, and October 14, 1999 in Europe. It was the first in the sixth generation of video game consoles, preceding Sony's PlayStation 2, Nintendo's GameCube and Microsoft's Xbox. The Dreamcast is Sega's final home console, marking the end of the company's 18 years in the console market.
In contrast to the expensive hardware of the unsuccessful Sega Saturn, the Dreamcast was designed to reduce costs with "off-the-shelf" components, including a Hitachi SH-4 CPU and an NEC PowerVR2 GPU. Released in Japan to a subdued reception, the Dreamcast enjoyed a successful U.S. launch backed by a large marketing campaign, but interest in the system steadily declined as Sony built hype for the upcoming PlayStation 2. Sales did not meet Sega's expectations despite several price cuts, and the company continued to incur significant financial losses. After a change in leadership, Sega discontinued the Dreamcast on March 31, 2001, withdrawing from the console business and restructuring itself as a third-party publisher. 9.13 million Dreamcast units were sold worldwide.
Katana is the name given to a Ricoh photocopier. It is a high volume machine that is able to copy at speeds of up to 135 pages per minute, while the slowest Katana copier can copy at 90 copies per minute. This machine is user friendly and the user can replace most of the parts when they are worn out or exceed their life span. It is a black and white machine but has a color scanner fitted to it. It can be used as both a photocopier and printer at the same time.
Ricoh copiers, including Katana series, are gaining popularity in Europe as reliable and more affordable in the long run alternatives to companies like Xerox, Konica and Canon.
+/-, or Plus/Minus, is an American indietronic band formed in 2001. The band makes use of both electronic and traditional instruments, and has sought to use electronics to recreate traditional indie rock song forms and instrumental structures. The group has released two albums on each of the American indie labels Teenbeat Records and Absolutely Kosher, and their track "All I do" was prominently featured in the soundtrack for the major film Wicker Park. The group has developed a devoted following in Japan and Taiwan, and has toured there frequently. Although many artists append bonus tracks onto the end of Japanese album releases to discourage purchasers from buying cheaper US import versions, the overseas versions of +/- albums are usually quite different from the US versions - tracklists can be rearranged, artwork with noticeable changes is used, and tracks from the US version can be replaced as well as augmented by bonus tracks.
Bandō may refer to:
!!! is a dance-punk band that formed in Sacramento, California, in 1996 by lead singer Nic Offer. Its name is most commonly pronounced "Chk Chk Chk" ([/tʃk.tʃk.tʃk/]). Members of !!! came from other local bands such as The Yah Mos, Black Liquorice and Popesmashers. They are currently based in New York City, Sacramento, and Portland, Oregon. The band's sixth full-length album, As If, was released in October 2015.
!!! is an American band formed in the summer of 1995 by the merger of part of the group Black Liquorice and Popesmashers. After a successful joint tour, these two teams decided to mix the disco-funk with more aggressive sounds and integrate the hardcore singer Nic Offer from the The Yah Mos. The band's name was inspired by the subtitles of the movie The Gods Must Be Crazy, in which the clicking sounds of the Bushmens' Khoisan language were represented as "!". However, as the bandmembers themselves say, !!! is pronounced by repeating thrice any monosyllabic sound. "Chk Chk Chk" is the most common pronunciation, which the URL of their official website and the title of their Myspace page suggest is the preferred pronunciation.