VAMPS

A couple of weeks ago, Ryan from New York-Tokyo sent me a press release for a Japanese rock band that is playing this weekend. They are called VAMPS, and I'm kind of upset that I already have tickets to a different show that night because from the looks of them, they are pretty much the epitome of my idea of what Japanese rockstars are like.





The guys' names are Hyde and K.A.Z, and from what I understand they each had years of being in other bands under their belts before deciding to form VAMPS together. It's hard to find much else about them other than the other bands they were in before, but apparently they are a big deal and sell out all over the place. One look at their MySpace page shows that they have 17,579 friends and six pages of just fansign photos, which is really endearing. And watching this album teaser really makes me sorry that I can't make it:



I know, right?

This is their first world tour, and if you live in NYC you can catch them at Roseland Ballroom this Saturday the 9th. Get your tickets here and let me know how it is!

Death Note & A Cross The Universe

Two DVDs I ordered last week arrived –


The first one is called Death Note, which screened 2 years ago at the NY Asian Film Festival and is adapted from an animated series of the same name. I heard someone call Death Note a "gothic thriller" once, which I think is pretty accurate. And as you can imagine, this equals throngs of teenaged girls and otaku kids going nuts for it. I recently watched both live action movies and the sequel via Netflix and am minorly obsessed with one of the main characters, a detective named L with lots of eyeliner, a massive sweet tooth and aspergian tendencies. I fear that if I start watching the series, I'll never leave my house and spend a small fortune upping my Netflix plan.


The other one is a Justice tour documentary called A Cross the Universe that came out almost a year ago. It came with a bonus CD featuring a live show they did in San Francisco. The booklet features a ton of pictures from their 2008 tour, which fans got to submit when they were putting together the DVD/CD set. (Just a note: the trailer is a little NSFW)



I listened to the set at work last week and loved it, especially Phantom pt 1.5 (click to listen). The best part was that they closed with Master of Puppets with some Uffie mixed in, which they didn't do when I saw them @ Terminal 5 in 2007.



As for the DVD, I watched it on Friday night and it was thoroughly entertaining; never a boring moment. It definitely made me feel like my life was suddenly very boring. Let me know what you think if you've seen either or end up checking them out...

More Japanese phones and Galapagos Syndrome

Well, this came at an opportune time. Remember when I was gushing over those Japanese phones last week? Today someone tweeted a link to this NYTimes article, which explains why they haven't been able to expand to other markets.


One of the reasons is that the phones themselves are too advanced for anyone else's infrastructures and capabilities. I knew they were years ahead of the rest of the world, but didn't realize just how much:

[Japan's] cellphones set the pace in almost every industry innovation: e-mail capabilities in 1999, camera phones in 2000, third-generation networks in 2001, full music downloads in 2002, electronic payments in 2004 and digital TV in 2005.

E-mail in 1999? That is bonkers. Apparently this conundrum has a name – Galápagos syndrome. Japan’s cellphones are like the endemic species that Darwin encountered on the Galápagos Islands — fantastically evolved and divergent from their mainland cousins — explains Takeshi Natsuno, who teaches at Tokyo’s Keio University. The only Japanese handset manufacturer that's been able to significantly move into other markets is Sony, largely because of its partnership with Swedish manufacturer Ericsson.

Another big reason for this stunted global growth is that Japanese handset hardware is what seems to get the most resources and attention – bar code readers, credit card chips, electronic built-in car keys, facial recognition, etc. This seem to put the focus on the entire experience within the handset itself, rather than how it can be used as a tool to receive information from other places.


For instance, connecting a phone to a computer is a foreign concept to them, which is one of the reasons the iPhone did so poorly in its launch there. Coincidentally, this Wall Street Journal article from today talks about Apple's and RIM's successes over other brands because of services, software and data packages. "The two accounted for only 3% of all cellphones sold in the world last year but 35% of operating profits." Guess they were onto something all along.

I wonder if Japanese manufacturers could find a way to merge their innovations and vision in hardware with other company's software advancements. Can you imagine a Japanese phone with Apple's software/services, or something like that (one can dream)? It would be even more bonkers than mobile e-mail in 1999. The NYTimes quotes Natsuno's recommendation: "Japan’s handset makers must focus more on software and must be more aggressive in hiring foreign talent, and the country’s cellphone carriers must also set their sights overseas." What do you think?

Give me some Japanese phones, please.

Let me tell you about one of my favorite people. His name is Fumio, he lives in Kyoto, and he found me on Flickr at around the time I was starting to learn Japanese. Over time we became friends, communicating only through Flickr comments. It was a pretty cool dynamic, because our conversations were always sparked by something visual.

Anyway. You probably pretty much know that I am into Japan. Or if you are new to this blog, guess what: I am into Japan. Now, here is a wonderful thing. If it is:

a) Japanese
b) cute
c) flat

Fumio will send it. Case in point: a couple of weeks ago, an exciting package came in the mail.


That is a preview; I will write about the issue of Brutus in a couple of days. When I wrote this post, I saw two pretty different thoughts happening, so I split them. Stay tuned.

The rest of the package made me a combination of wistful (I miss working on Nokia); jealous (of living in a place with mobile infrastructure about 5 years behind Japan and parts of Europe); and delighted (with everything). Behold a pretty comprehensive collection of carrier catalogues:


Here is a section that struck out at me from the iida one:


There were a couple of pages with phones in this red /white /dots theme, and that woman was in them also. Fumio let me know that it was Yayoi Kusama. I must a complete twit, because Wikipedia informed me that something of hers recently went for over $5 million at Christie's.

Anyway, the spread displays a line of Yayoi Kusama-designed phones, brought to you by iida. This a really good idea – are you listening, U.S. carriers? Commission a big artist to design a line of phones with a handset manufacturer, and make them only available through you. Do you know how collect-y art fans are? If KAWS were to design a line of handsets, do.you.have.any.idea how many kids would sleep outside of your store in the pouring rain, attracting camera crews, to buy every single one in the collection? Do you know how much eBay would blow up? Please stop releasing skinny phones that play 20 MP3s and do something that people can't get somewhere else.

Back to phones, and back to my jealousy. This design (hardware) and presentation makes me feel like I slept in on a Saturday,


While this one makes me feel like I'm in an MRI (which Noah described once as feeling like you're in a German techno club):


This blurb (?) makes me want to play with Tinker Toys,


And this one:


makes me want to... I don't know, go to a big box retailer or something.

I don't really have a point here, other than to share the delight with you and wish for a bigger culture of cute here. We wouldn't lose our credibility, guys, promise. We don't need Times New Roman on a navy background for credibility. And we certainly don't need stock photography for it, either :B

Gizmine

I'm a tiny bit late on this one, but I just found out about Gizmine, an online store full of Japanese gadgets. Now, it's not that hard to find novelty Japanese thingies today at all, especially in New York. But wanting a specific item – rather than just browsing aisles and aisles of cuteness – has always been a little tricky. My most recent headache came from trying to get one of these beautiful humidifiers from Middle. Well, Gizmine has it. Now I can find almost any cute, colorful gadgety thing I can think of, and not have to convert from ¥ or pay a fortune in shipping.


There's some other interesting stuff about the site too, aside from its products. I've seen many "flash /html" links on sites before, but never this:


Now, I guess sometimes I'm a real twit when it comes to the web, but why would anybody want to turn Ajax off? An older browser?

This is on every single product page, tapping into a "Hey, look at this crazy /awesome /cute thing I found" insight about Japanese innovation:


The store has your average categories, like home/office/bath, price ranges, toys/cameras/games, etc. But there are some awesome ones stuck in there as well. You can sort by color, which seems somehow especially "delightfully Japanese" to me. You can also search by theme, kawaii being one of them (it means "cute," which is an entire culture in and of itself in Japan).


Poke around... you can buy a wooden keyboard. A live plant-in-a-bottle cell phone strap. A waterproof, teardrop-shaped speaker for your bathroom. A Swarovski-encrusted mouse. And you can also subscribe to the New Product Feed, which is just plain dangerous.

Norio Matsumoto

Well, forcing myself to stay up sure didn't work since my last entry, even though I am doing that very thing right now. Hi again. Still on the super cool project, still no time. Enough excuses and onto the point though, yeah?

So, Theme Magazine. It's a magazine that I got an issue of for free at a conference, adored every single page in and kept forgetting to pick up again at newsstands. I have been thinking about one feature in particular in the summer 2005 issue every few weeks for years now: an interview with a guy named Norio Matsumoto.



Matsumoto is a photographer who lives in Alaska. And not just in Alaska, but in a tiny, tiny little tent for half of the year (in the summer) and in a tiny, tiny little igloo for the other half (in the winter). He spends his life taking pictures of the things he sees there: mostly the Alaskan range, whales and the Northern Lights. He stumbled upon photography (and more specifically: nature... even more specifically: Alaska) during a quest to find something he found more interesting than anything else; something that he would want to spend his life doing.



Here's a chunk from the interview about what he eats and how he spends his days:

How and what do you eat? Do you carry all your own food out there?
In summer, I eat angel hair pasta, twice a day, all summer long. I add seasoning packets from ramen noodles to add flavor. For lunch, I eat energy bars. I also drink V8. In winter, I eat ramen noodles with veggies and sausages for breakfast and dinner. I eat rice crackers for lunch. I have all the food brought in by boat in summer and by Cessna in winter.

Describe a typical day for you, from morning to night. Both summer and winter.
Summer: Get up at 9 a.m. Cook pasta and eat. Pull the skiff (ten-foot inflatable) down to the beach. Go out to look for whales by 10 a.m. Go around the ocean and photograph whales all day. Go back to the island as the sun goes down, around 10 p.m. Put skiff back on the island. Cook pasta and eat. Write in journal. Go to bed by midnight.

Winter: Get up at noon. Cook ramen and eat. Take some pictures of the alpine glow as the sun goes down, around 3:30 p.m. Go back to the sleeping bag and take some rest. Wake up at 8 p.m., cook ramen and eat. Stay outside from 9 p.m. to 4 or 5 a.m., to wait for/photograph the northern lights. Eat rice crackers, write in journal. Go to sleep at 5am.

Now, I'm not that huge of a nature person. I have definitely begun to appreciate (and enjoy) it as of late, but I could NOT see myself living in a tent and igloo with such little human contact. So I couldn't figure out why I kept thinking about Matsumoto so much over the past several months.



This is what I think: it's because he is someone who seems to have found the one thing that he loves THAT MUCH to make such a drastic life change for. Something that he is perfectly content to do every single day and has so much patience for. Matsumoto has gone up to two months without seeing any other people before, and sometimes he can go an entire season without getting any decent shots – "Out of sixty days there may be only two or three with the right conditions. It sometimes happens that I don't get any of those photos after an entire winter." Whaaaaat. How does he do it?



I don't know at all how I could incorporate this type of outlook and sentiment into my life – which seems so different from his – but I hope I figure it out.

[all images from noriomatsumoto.com]

Brutus writes about Naked

Back in April, there was a team of very nice and gracious Japanese photographers on Naked's 2nd floor. I knew it had something to do with a "cool offices" piece they were working on for a magazine, but I didn't have much other information. Well, today we were sent a copy of Brutus Magazine:

You can click on the images to blow up, but unless you can read Japanese characters (help me out with this at least: is this Hiragana or Katakana? Or KANJI?), all you'll be able to understand is that they called us a World Hip Office.

If you do choose to click, you can see me on one of the couches in photo #3. Hooray, this is the second time I have been in a Japanese magazine (barely any American ones, though)!

We e-mailed our friends at Naked Tokyo for help in translating the article. Until then, enjoy the photography (^_^)//

x-posted to House of Naked.

Origami bookmarks

Back when I asked everyone what they used as a bookmark, my friend Shanna mentioned origami bookmarks that her husband knew how to make. Recently, she learned how to make them herself and sent me an envelope full of them!


I really admire Japanese craftsmanship and the incredibly varied patterns of paper that are used for origami. Aren't they beautiful?


Shanna was also generous enough to include some vintage photographs that she knew I had an interest for; including a tintype (which I had never heard of or seen prior to this – they have the coolest feel and sound when you clink them down onto a table)!


A million thanks go out to Shanna for these treasures. I would never have guessed that you had just learned how to make the bookmarks – they're perfect.

Weekend mochi experiment

I had adventures with mochi blocks this weekend. I don't know the correct term for them, so that is what they will be called.

First, let me explain mochi (I know many of you know what it is, but some might not). It first entered my consciousness in 2004 because Super Milk-Chan talks about eating rice cakes all the time. These aren't the dry, crumbly kind that Americans eat when they want to lose weight or "be healthy" – she's really talking about mochi. According to wiseGEEK,

Mochi is made by soaking short grain glutinous or sticky rice overnight, cooking it, and pounding it into a sticky paste. The paste is molded into shapes...

I think the most mainstream form that we're used to here looks like this:


That one is filled with red bean paste. This stuff is very popular in Japan, as I increasingly saw when I was there in April. My cousin's wife in Nagasaki made me the most delicious snack one day called isobe maki. It was unlike anything I had ever tasted. It involved mochi blocks (again, remember, they probably have a better name but I don't know it). They are little individually wrapped rectangular blocks of the stuff; they look like mini bars of soap. When cooked, they expand a little and get very chewy and sticky. They were wrapped in a specific way (she had to teach me) in two sheets of seaweed, and dipped into this thick mixture of soy sauce and sugar. I thought I had died and gone to heaven.

Last week I randomly saw a package of these blocks in an Asian Market and squeaked of happiness.


I immediately also bought seaweed sheets. This weekend, I tried making isobe maki. I was nervous, because all I remembered my cousin saying was "cook in pan." So, I tried that. Good thing there aren't too many ingredients.



It worked! I had also remembered how to wrap it in the seaweed.



I was so excited and delighted by this that I made it in a different way the following morning for breakfast. This time, I boiled it (to not have the cooking oil taste) and ate it with honey and strawberries. This was inspired by my friend Jess' mother, who used to make it with honey for her before school tests as a child so that the information "would stick to her brain more." Cute, yes?


Now the tiniest lesson imaginable: The Japanese word for "delicious" is "oishii." Pronounced "oi-SHEE."

Paprika

I saw a movie called Paprika last night:


The movie made about as much sense as the trailer does. I was slightly confused for much of it, but things tied together throughout. The 90 minute Satoshi Kon film from Japan is about a device that allows you to record dreams as you're having them... it was developed to help in treating psychological disorders /issues. It fell into the wrong hands and dreams were starting to blur with reality. Everybody's dreams that had been hooked up to the machine started to meld together as well, slowly becoming a living nightmare.


I didn't realize until afterwards (from some special features) that a third to half of the movie had CGI in it. I suspected a little, but didn't know it was that much. They paid such attention to detail in this movie. There is a scene where a car is driving into a tunnel at night in the rain, and you can see the reflection of the car on the wet asphalt for a split second, before it goes in.


Those blue butterflies seemed to be present whenever evil stuff was happening, which was a little dissonant because they were so pretty. I bet Kon did that on purpose. Other strange things in this movie included a large Japanese doll that terrorized the protagonists, two bartenders that when combined would have looked just like Hitler, a parade of strange objects including a bendy refrigerator containing a boom box dancing around in it, solid objects that fell away like blankets, people taking in gibberish right before throwing themselves out of windows, you get the picture. Well, maybe you don't. I don't think anything will be able to describe this movie accurately, so please see it.

body as art

A couple of weeks ago, I found a clip of my absolute favorite part of Big Bang Love, Juvenile A. This happened within the first 20 minutes of the movie.


Does anybody know what this is? It made me think of capoeira, which is a Brazilian, dance-based martial art. I don't think this is capoeira, though. Something traditionally Japanese, I would imagine. Whatever it is, it's beautiful. Imagine the colors about 40% more saturated (think vermillion) and on a huge screen. It was stunning.

EDIT | Here is a capoeira montage. It's definitely not the same thing, but slightly similar.