Franqueensense

A new ladies line from United Arrows.

How did they come up with such a catchy and succinct name? They took everyone’s favorite Jesus-friendly aromatic resin frankincense, replaced the “kin” part with “queen,” and then changed the “cense” to “sense” to indicate “having good sense.”

Now, I don’t mean to be sacrilegious or anything, but I don’t think the “kin” in frankincense is supposed to be “king” without the final g. The word is clearly a combination of “Frank” and “incense.” At this rate, the sister brand to Franqueensense is going to be Mxxrrh. Or maybe Fucqueen.

On rainy days, the Inokashira train line smells exactly like a 1970s era school bus.

The fine folks at QOOB have commissioned myself and 9 others to create original new short films promoting Alfa Romeo’s new car, the Mi.To. These films are the kickoff to a large film-making contest and a larger ad campaign.

Audio Dregs head honcho and all-time homie numero uno E*Rock kicked down a smoking original track for the video.

Thanks, QOOB!

My new album Forty Years from Now is finally out! The first quote-unquote single “Cat vs. Mouse” is available for free download and features vocals from UT of the band Kiiiiiii and production from Pandatone. The twelve-song album was recorded, mixed, and mastered in various recording studios and bedrooms across Tokyo and New York City.

For those interested in purchasing a physical copy, either order from my label Music Related or retailers like Other Music, Darla, DotShop (Sweden), Parasol, Warszawa (Japan), and HMV Japan. (Those U.S.-residents ordering from Music Related get a free orange-vinyl 7″ from Japanese picopop bands MacDonald Duck Eclair and Micro Mach Machine.) Digital downloads are available from Other Music, Amazon, Boomkat (UK), Rhapsody, and iTunes. (Those links go directly to my album page where you can hear samples of the tracks.)

Thanks to Néojaponisme Art Director Ian Lynam for the cover design.

I guess many MのT readers are also subscribed to Itai News, but this pile-on is too beautiful to go unnoticed. Let me break it down:

1. Ueno Zoo’s last panda, Ling Ling, dies.
2. Beloved Tokyo governor Ishihara Shintarō says “It’s not like it’s a sacred artifact or anything, does it really matter whether we have a panda or not?” (御神体じゃないんだから、いてもいなくてもいいんじゃないの) and “Look, living things die. That has to include pandas, right? The world’s getting smaller, so if you want to see one go to where they are and take a look.” (生きてるものは死ぬんだから。パンダだって死ぬだろうし。世界は狭くなったんだから、見たけりゃいるとこ行って見てきたらいい)
3. Panda merchandisers outraged: “Why would [he] say such a thing when everyone loved that panda so much?” asks a woman working at Sakuragi-tei, which sells “panda-yaki”. (Her words are described as a “KY [kūki yome] outburst”. Work it, Yomiuri!) Kono Shinji, “panda sable” vendor, warns that the governor is ignoring the “national sentiment” (国民感情).
4. 2ch posters outraged at the outrage: “Why should we have to keep a panda just so these stores can stay in business?” “Who are you to decide what the national sentiment is?” I knew those 2channelers were contrary, but damn. They don’t even like adorable, cuddly pandas!
5. Replenishing the zoo’s panda supply would mean renting one from China, a prospect at which, according to the Yomiuri, the phones at Ueno Zoo are ringing off the hook: “Panda rental is too expensive” (Kobe Zoo is apparently paying ¥100,000,000 per year for their pandas, and not earning it back), “I don’t want to rent a panda from China [because they are oppressing Tibet]”, etc. I note in passing that no proof, names, or hard figures on call volume are offered for this part of the story.

Ueno Zoo must know that they ain’t ever gonna recapture the magic of the 1986 birth of Tong Tong. The Bubble is over, the kids are mopey and don’t go on healthy, sweater-wearing dates to the zoo any more… but pandas are Ueno Zoo’s thing. What else are they gonna do?

Tonight in Los Angeles: A celebration of ten years of LOST, L.A.’s primero graffiti magazine, celebrating the anniversary and the release of the new LOST book.

The book contains highlights of the past decade editor/designer EyeOne has spent documenting LA writing. Includes imagery by Atlas (if you haven’t caught the documentary on his work, watch it now!), Pale, Cab, Haeler, and more. Screenprinted board covers, numbered limited edition of 2000.

Even if you are not a graffiti fan per se, the LOST book is a must-have for folks interested in Angeleno culture. More about LOST here.

LOST is a picture-perfect example of designer as author. I’m proud to have written the foreword for it.

肥留間正明の芸能斜め斬り フジは制作費5%カット テレビ局の大不況
(”Hiruma Masaaki’s Slanted Take on the Entertainment World: Fuji has cut production budgets 5%, TV’s Great Depression”)

If you thought that Japanese TV could not get less ambitious, I beg you to flip the switch and take a look at what passes for Prime Time. The beloved “variety show” hinges on its stable of “personalities,” and TV stations evidently can no longer afford anyone approaching funny. Dandy Sakano seemed like a low point a few years ago, but he’s Oe Kenzaburo in comparison to today’s hooligans.

But enough of my objective commentary. Professional TV critic Hiruma’s got some facts for us:

• TV stations are having a hard-time finding sponsors, and program sponsors want more on-air time for their products
• A decade ago, program success meant a 20% share. Now a passing grade is 12% and dropping.
• Hiruma blames low quality of TV for the drop in viewership. (Maybe Japanese networks should, I dunno, consider reforming their conception of “programming” that has not changed since the late 1950s and filming in Beta-cams that have not changed since the late 1980s…) But here we get the negative feedback loop: lower viewers means lower budgets, lower budgets means worse talent, worse talent means worse shows, worse shows means lower viewership, und so weiter.
• Variety shows are using “announcers” to host shows, since they are salaried and cost less than hiring talent from production companies.
• Youth are not watching TV.
• Television station salaries are still some of the highest in Japan, while programming production is being fished out to companies that only pay employees ¥2 mil a year.

Recently, I have taken to watch a lot of Discovery Channel programming through cable. Mythbusters and Man vs. Wild seem like perfect models for Japanese network TV, but I guess you would have to actually find individuals with interesting skills and Japanese talent agencies don’t really do the “skill” thing. Oh wait, they have that girl that eats a lot and that other guy who is half-Japanese…

Gin, Television, and Social Surplus

Many may have read this essay by now, but I wonder how much its lessons apply to Japan. J-youth are watching less and less TV, but is there a concrete place where that energy is going besides 2-ch? Japanese Wikipedia isn’t bad, but has yet to reach a peak of activity. Is the idea of “creating public content for free” with your leisure time even an idea that exists within Japan? How could something that doesn’t cost money be worth anything?

Also:

“Here’s something four-year-olds know: A screen that ships without a mouse ships broken. “

This is certainly not true in Japan. You have to be a 40 year-old white-collar employee to have ever seen a real-deal personal computer. I have come to the conclusion that the cell phone in Japan is not a sign of advanced technology, but a “patch” to bring internet functions to those who cannot get access to computers. That is how it works in the Third World, why not with the “refugees of affluence” (豊か難民) of Japanese Gen-Y?

Japan Today supports Church of Scientology

What Japan Thinks pulls out some crucial investigative journalistic skills to show a creeping influence of the infamous religious cult Scientology on the infamous Japan news site Japan Today. Taking money for Scientology ads is one thing, but letting Scientology members write editorials on “moral education“? Why can’t they leave the bad persuasive essays to lay expats?

I have never quite understood how the Japan Times or Japan Today have much potential as businesses, and I guess turning to aggressively-recruiting religious organizations is the only solution. I feel kind of insulted that cults aren’t calling me up to invest in Néojaponisme! I would refuse and all, but I would finally know we had made it.

Oricon wins suit against writer

I have a lot of other stuff going on right now, but I just wanted to bring this to your attention.

The Japanese legal system has ruled that, yes, companies can successfully sue individuals quoted in magazine articles for libel. Even though Ugaya neither wrote or published the offending Cyzo article on possible Oricon chart-fixing for advertisers and had a certain amount of evidence to back up his statements, the judge agreed with Oricon that Ugaya had committed libel. Oricon did not sue the publisher Infobahn for publishing the article, did not sue the magazine that printed the article, and did not sue the writer of the article. They only sued the person quoted in it (whose quotes were edited).

This is obviously a very bad precedent, and even worse that the Japanese mass media has not uttered a peep about this possible threat to media freedom.

When we interviewed Japanese leftist terrorism expert Dr. Patricia Steinhoff last September, I commented that someone should probably release the otherwise-unattainable early ’70s Adachi Masao and Wakamatsu Kōji documentary Sekigun-PFLP Declaration of War on YouTube. The film, created for Red Army recruiting and fund-raising purposes back in Japan, showed members of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine and Japanese Red Army training in Lebanon camps. Steinhoff told me that the film is “definitely not a YouTube kind of thing,” but this is the internet we are talking about. Finally, someone has uploaded the first bit of the film, and I would hope that more will follow.

Not a particularly engaging piece of cinema, but as Steinhoff explained, the close-ups of young men handling guns was enough to excite the hearts of young Japanese leftists at the time. Midnight Eye has a bit in this essay about the film.

Denki Groove are back with their first single in eight years, and the accompanying video is so good that it makes me want to throw a temper tantrum. An homage to the Japanese 1980s pop moment, directors Prince Tongha (DG’s Pierre Taki and Super Lovers/Super Milk Chan art director Tanaka Hideyuki) collected a large and diverse group of intentionally-unremarkable girls to act out Matsuda Seiko, Pink Lady, Pro Golfer Reiko, Sukeban Deka, and other iconic aesthetic moments of the “idol” era. The song’s not bad either.

Now this is the J-Pop I remember! The video shows Sony Music Japan at its best: slightly alternative production and catchy melodies mixed with high-level art-driven visuals. Imagine the entire label filled with acts like this (Judy and Mary, Supercar, Sunahara Yoshinori, Puffy, the Chappie album etc.) and you’ll realize why the mid-to-late 1990s showed such creative energy in the mainstream arena.

The more this decade progresses, the more I realize that the quality decline of Japanese music in the last 7-8 years has been essentially a generational problem. We tend to discount bands once the members start hitting their late 30s, but Denki Groove, Scha Dara Parr, Cornelius, and other core members of Gen X keep providing a level of pop music and visual that strives towards artistry and critical irony. Maybe the latest Cornelius stuff is less essential, but he’s still schooling everyone else.

This ragtag mopey Generation Y has basically rejected any sort of artistic pretension on the grounds that it gets in the way of fraternal compassion. Everything’s gotta be “real” — like Let it Be over Sgt. Peppers. You can’t be earnest and ironic at the same time, and they’ve chosen the former.

Although I have blamed Gen Y’s cultural malaise on their navel-gazing insularity, Denki Groove shows that you can create gold out of exclusively domestic source material. The problem again is Generation Y’s failure to know how to remix, sample, and recontextualize their own Japanese pop heritage. When you think the entire exercise of “contemporary art” is pretentious fakery, you limit your creativity to a small scale that will not impress anyone outside of your peer group. Denki Groove are a band that contributed to the idea of “Japan Cool,” and they seem to be the only ones these days performing up to the promise.

I normally am not a big toy fan, but I do approve of old school-style kaiju. And as far as kaiju go, these Portland/Tokyo guys make some of the most tripped-out, interesting kaiju out there today. I will fully be attending this opening and insist that you do the same!

Tentacles, Horns, and Scales
April 19th Thrash Out in Koenji, Tokyo.
Artshow, toy release, sneak attack.
Featuring all new works by Koji Harmon, Bwana Spoons, and Martin Ontiveros.
Sponsored by Dekline footwear.

Come join us for good times, art, toys, prizes, and a few big suprises.
Thrash Out is the Flagship store and gallery of mind bending vinyl pioneers Gargamel.

Gargamel makes toys that look like Jolly Rancher coated diamonds.
Koji, Bwana, and Martin make art and toys that explode with color, depth, and endless imagination.
Collector and fan Takaomi Fujiki put it best when he said “Happy Beam Discharge!”
For more info as it becomes available, interviews and photos please contact Grass Hut in the U.S. at 503 445 9924 or grasshut.corp@gmail.com

Martin Ontiveros
Martin Ontiveros grew up in San Diego, California. Graduated CalArts in 1996 with a Bachelor’s degree in Experimental Animation. Then he moved here to Portland. He isn’t rich… yet. But he is getting paid to do what he enjoys, and he’s been doing it for years now. He lives in an awesome basement apartment that he shares with his cool son named Felix and two cats not named Felix. His many many years of pop culture emersion and empirical knowledge of useless trivial information have somehow paid off in spades. Call it luck. His work has appeared in publications like Craphound, Juxtapoz, Pencil Fight, The Stranger, Portland Mercury, and Nickolodeon Magazine, as well as awesome books like BEASTS!, The Darkening Garden, Neither Here Nor There (Melvins), Qeedrophonic, Dot Dot Dash and others.

Koji Harmon
Koji Harmon is a zine maker, photographer, and collector. Koji has worked on several projects with Gargamel, and is fast on his way to master sofubi painter. This is koji’s first venture in to toy design.

Bwana Spoons
Bwana Spoons was raised in the woods. He likes moss and Lego and monsters. When he was a little one he would draw detailed crayon renderings of all his favorite Star Wars figures. When he was older he lost them all in a battle with a mildew giant. He likes making zines and comics and paintings and silk-screened prints and designing toys and making things with rainbows and animals. Recently Bwana was bitten by the textile bug. He has designed shoes for Converse, and Dekline, tees for Giant Robot, and MonsieurT., and baby strollers for Bumbleride. Over the years he has worked on and/or created several zines and comics. “Ain’t Nothin’ Like Fuckin’ Moonshine” was the first and longest running; his most recent projects include Pencil Fight, and Soft Smooth Brain, and the upcoming Welcome to Forest Island book designed by Ian Lynam on Top Shelf Books.

Info and directions to Gargamel here.

Tentacles,Horns,and Scales
開催期間：4/19〜4/28(13:00〜20:00)入場無料
＊19日は14:00オープンとなります。
会場：Gargamel Flag Store THRASH OUT

See you there!

Wow. SMAP’s Kusanagi Tsuyoshi is not so skilled of an actor, at least not skilled enough to play a “blind masseuse” without looking like a 1950s parody of the differently-abled. This movie Yama no Anata seems to be aiming for a certain nostalgic bittersweet, and yet, they had to throw the lead role to someone whose entire “acting” career was built on his management company’s economic extortion of the media.

Also, I love the fact that if you go to the press conference page, there are no pictures of the main actor. (This is why.) Is there anywhere else on earth that films are not allowed to use images of the STAR in the online promotional materials??? (Nevermind, he’s on the web page for the official site. Must be that he has his eyes closed and no one would want to steal this picture.)

An outside eye on Japan

I am quoted in this article.

I know there are some old-timer, culture-lovin’ expats in Tokyo who probably differ with my appraisal that there’s something new about being young and obsessed with contemporary Japanese pop in the 21st century. But every time I go to some obscure music event in the city and see a half-dozen white kids in the front row (something that would have been absolutely shocking at a Supercar show in 1998 or Readymade Records night in 2000), I have to think that things have changed for the positive. Heartland Brewery may be the new Gas Panic, but there’s now a countervailing force in town to all that Occupation-era residue.

Also, watch out Dave Spector and Pakkun! Here comes Magibon! Become a foreign Japanese-TV celebrity without leaving your own bedroom!