Tag Archives: deculture

A quick message of congratulations to Kenichi and Maaya

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I rarely pay any attention to the latest news in the worlds of seiyuu and Jpop (my knowledge of the language is too limited to appreciate the former and my musical tastes veer too far into the indie/alternative to appreciate the latter) but I felt that the announcement of Maaya Sakamoto recently marrying fellow VA Kenishi Suzumura deserves commenting on. I’m supposed to be working on another writing project ATM though, so I’ll have to keep this short.

Source: Alafista (click image for full article)

Maaya is one of the few VAs I’ve paid much attention to: after seeing her name crop up so frequently a while ago, I checked her ANN profile and realised how often I’d heard her voice, both as a singer and an actress. Similarly, Kenichi is another industry veteran and it turns out that they’ve often worked together and have known each other for some time. Compared to, say, the negative reaction to Aya Hirano making certain details of her private life public, the messages of goodwill from the fans at this piece of news are both heartwarming and completely justified.

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Reading stats: 571 words, 1 image; estimated reading time 2:17 mins

Mass of the Fermenting Dregs are my new favourite band

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One of the first things I learned when getting into Jpop/Jrock was this: never judge a band by their name. Mass of the Fermenting Dregs (or Masu Dore to their fans) seem to follow the same path as the likes of School Food Punishment and Bump of Chicken in the sense that their name has no relation whatsoever to the music (for the record, Mogwai are also quoted as saying “it [their name] has no significant meaning and we always intended on getting a better one, but like a lot of other things we never got round to it.” so I guess it’s not a Japanese thing either).

Their sound is described as partly shoegaze, but to my ears the similarities are somewhat limited next to the early-90s bands of that genre; they do make use of the female vocals paired with distorted guitar-based arrangements and they also strike a balance between catchy melodies and experimental noise though. The songs are also quite punk/new wave- and powerpop-influenced so I’d say they share as much with the pillows and early Supercar as, say, My Bloody Valentine or Slowdive.

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Reading stats: 716 words, 2 images; estimated reading time 2:52 mins

Macross Frontier: The False Songstress

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It’s fair to say that the anime industry’s track record for feature film adaptations of TV shows isn’t a good one. For the first Macross Frontier movie I was torn between the idea that another Macross cinematic outing helmed by Kawamori himself could only be a good thing and the opposing notion that similar efforts from other franchises have left me disappointed. This one could well polarise opinion among the Macross fandom but for me at least it’s not the waste of time the nay-sayers claim it to be.

The inescapable factor is the Serial Narrative Compression Effect or, to put it simply, the fact that an episodic TV series has to be squeezed into two hours or less of screen time. Certain details have to to be left on the cutting room floor, others are shuffled around and the thematic emphasis shifts too. Itsuwari no Utahime (a.k.a. The False Songstress) does suffer from these limitations but the streamlined plotline and the production values stemming from the feature film budget are where it really shines.

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Reading stats: 979 words, 1 image; estimated reading time 3:55 mins

Yukikaze, Unlimited Blade Works and playing to the strengths of the medium

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Maybe I’m stating the glaringly obvious here, but since it wasn’t obvious to me until recently I might as well set out my thoughts on it. I’m not saying that the Unlimited Blade Works is a great movie but it’s worth stopping to think about the broader context or what the movie itself is trying to accomplish. Similarly, there are a few things I could say about the Yukikaze OAV but now I’ve read the original novel I feel a bit different about it. Feelings concerning the motives behind, and effects of, adapting stories from one medium to another mostly.


Click for full size

An extreme example of the importance of context that I stumbled on is William Gibson’s Neuromancer. It’s an enjoyable enough cyberpunk novel but not as enjoyable for me as I expected: I’m finding it tedious in places but when I remind myself that it was written before any of that stuff related to the internet, VR and even the cyberpunk genre itself were commonplace, I admire it more. Not that it makes the book itself more fun, but it makes its limitations at least understandable.

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Reading stats: 1403 words, 3 images; estimated reading time 5:37 mins

Memory Lane is paved with gold

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It’s strange how you remember certain things from a long time ago so clearly. Rewatching my childhood fave The Mysterious Cities of Gold for the first time in nigh-on two decades is proving how accurate my memory was before it was addled with things like schoolwork, girls, beer and all the other crap we’re preoccupied with as we grow up. Even more surprisingly, it’s still entertaining to me now.

I remember watching this for the first time when I was around four or five; the reruns were a few years later, when I was around seven or eight and able to appreciate it more. At that point my family had a single-floor house in Norfolk with a cherry tree in the front garden; rewatching this has dredged up memories of living in that place and sitting in front of the old 4:3 CRT Sony TV set. Good times…and now I can see how good they were.

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Reading stats: 1087 words, 1 image; estimated reading time 4:21 mins

K-On!!, cats and finally forming an opinion on moe

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As of this week I’m looking after my sister’s cat, which is one of the reasons why I’ve been too busy to post and reply to comments lately. Now I have three full weeks of paid leave I’m able to keep an eye on the kitteh, update here, catch up on animu and movies, visit friends, write songs, arrange my career change, etc., etc..


Classy

I’ve been following High School of the Dead and Shiki only a couple of eps behind people who’ve kept up with them properly but K-On!! is the one thing I’ve found time to watch every week. My earlier attempt at explaining my position only caused misunderstandings, although the resulting discussions made up for the disappointment I felt at the time. I just can’t bring myself around to the view of the hypothetical ‘haters’ for the simple reason that the series shouldn’t elicit a stronger negative reaction than a mere lack of interest…a view I can explain with my view on moe. And cats.

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Reading stats: 1124 words, 4 images; estimated reading time 4:30 mins

Several girls galore (the alluring aroma of Perfume)

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The PC’s on the blink again. It’ll be over a week before I can put right whatever’s wrong so in the meantime I’m working on the backup machine, my trusty four-year-old low-spec laptop. So here I am, running in the Aniblog Tourney with little to write about because I can’t watch much; I feel like I have an important call to make when my mobile phone’s in the pocket of My Other Jacket.

So I thought I might as well write about Perfume. Music dominates a lot of my spare time: I immerse myself in as much as possible, ignoring the usual boundaries of time, trends and genre in favour of my own so sometimes my tastes are a bit unpredictable. My fascination with Perfume is a guilty-pleasure kind of thing, but not completely so.

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Reading stats: 1177 words, 2 images; estimated reading time 4:42 mins

Sputnik Sweetheart, Senjougahara fascination and fanboying

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I love Bakemonogatari. From the Heavy Crab, through the clever twist to the Lost Snail, the truth behind the Monkey’s Paw and the tension of the Snake Constrictor, it’s a visual treat and provides a metric fucktonne of characterisation and cinematography that I could wax lyrical on for ages. Except I won’t. First, it’s spoilerific. Second, I think I need an entire post just to explain why I find Hitagi Senjougahara to be awesome before even outlining what makes everything else about these episodes so great.

hitagi-loves-you
I would hardly dare to argue

Granted, she doesn’t appear much in the middle portion of the series, but trying to make sense of the Senjougahara Fascination phenomenon became a bit more important when I found myself a part of it. What the hell is this? Am I developing a 2D complex? Well, yes. And no. Idle thoughts coming up.

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Reading stats: 1115 words, 2 images; estimated reading time 4:28 mins

The otaku view of Tokyo, with added Engrish

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This is the first half of my Tokyo retrospective (which I can do properly now the damned jet lag has worn off); I want to give an intelligent and balanced view of the place from a more personal and tourist-y perspective but a common view of Tokyo is that of a paradise for otaku, gadget freaks and lovers of Weird Stuff. While it’s indeed common to see people reading manga on the train (assuming there’s enough room to do so) the anime industry is still a niche interest next to the usual mainstream media, although it still enjoys a higher profile than in the West. The aesthetic is common and one or two titles are household names but it’s very dependent on where you choose to look. Wall of text punctuated by my favourite pieces of Engrish BTW.

shop-security-barrier-engrish
A security barrier near the entrance to a shop in Akihabara

If it’s anime/manga stuff you’re after, or just anything electrical, Akihabara is the most obvious place to go. Elsewhere there are the chain stores: Tower Records and HMV are good for CDs, while Book-Off stock DVDs and graphic novels. My favourite spot is Yodobashi Camera which, as its name suggests, is an epic camera shop but is also a full-on department store for all things electrical, be it DVDs and CDs, toys, household appliances or computer parts. There are plenty of comic book shops that sell both new and used (the used stuff is actually very good value for money since it’s a lot cheaper but is in my experience in very good condition). Oh yeah, I’ll list the results of my shopping to prove that it’s easy to visit Japan on a budget but it’s also easy to spend a lot of money if there’s stuff you want to buy.

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Reading stats: 1148 words, 5 images; estimated reading time 4:36 mins

Harajuku and Asakasa

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I must admit I was a bit disappointed that the weirdness and wonderfulness that is Harajuku’s fashion and cosplay scene was dampened by the rain (that infamous bridge was pretty short on photo opportunities) but the surrounding area is still worth wandering around. It made for an enjoyable afternoon, not least because I walked back into Shibuya to sample the Tokyu Food Court again and discover how certain things are cheaper here than back home. It plays into my guitaku tendancies if nothing else.

asakasa-kimonos-in-the-rain

The best thing of the past couple of days is the fact that it’s the Sanja Matsuri festival, one of the annual events that are held in the local area. I mentioned previously that Taito City, and Asakusa in particular, are pretty quiet and laid-back but in the last couple of days it’s become much, much livelier.

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Reading stats: 509 words, 5 images; estimated reading time 2:02 mins