Kumaboshi!

Best Albums of 2011

2011-12-26T19:26:00.005+09:00

Who knows, possibly I'll post more here in the new year. Possibly I won't. Anyway, here are my favourite albums of the year. As always I'm painfully aware that there's a lot of good stuff I've missed, but of the records I picked up this year here's what did it for me. Possibly the only album I bothered to get which I really didn't like was the Kurt Vile one. Such a great stage name. Such terrible music. So that means I basically spent the time listening to music that I'd already tried, or that I was pretty sure I was going to like. I am not, as they say, a professional musical listening writer.

IN NO PARTICULAR ORDER, as they say:

Fucked Up - David Comes To Life

I liked individual songs by Fucked Up before but this is the first time they really clicked for me over an album length. It's just a fantastic, fantastic rock record, like one long anthem to love and how tough it is. Actually in a way it's like an hour-long chorus, which I guess is how your music sounds when you have a frontman whose every utterance sounds ripped out of his guts.

Radiohead - The King of Limbs

Yeah, I'm basically down for whatever Radiohead do now. It's all good.

Mr. Muthafuckin' eXquire - Lost In Translation

In a way it's kinda cheating since a lot of why I like this mixtape is all the old El-P beats he uses, but I really like his flow too. Hope whatever he does next is similarly great.

Mr. Dream - Trash Hit

Never has a band that was so consistently compared to other bands I love actually turned out to be as good as this one. (NB: video is cheating as it's the non-album single that they put out after the record, but I always listen to the lot and I just found this cool live version of it and it's easier just do youtube vids rather that switch to vimeo where their great video for Croquet is...)

Oneohtrix Point Never - Replica

I dug the Ford and Lopatin album that he was involved in too, but this is other-world music. Something to get lost in.

Tuneyards - W H O K I L L

I went up and down with this one, but in the end I love it I think. One of the few times when a video irritated me so much that I thought again about liking the great song that went with it (not the video I'm posting here of course).

Office of Future Plans - Office of Future Plans

J. Robbins put out a new album this year and it basically sounds like Burning Airlines and Channels and late Jawbox and there is no way an album like that is not making it into my favourite albums of the year (even though this video dates from 2010).

Wilco - The Whole Love

I didn't pick up the last two Wilco albums even, but this is just great, great music. I listened to it a lot.

Tokyo Jihen - Daihakken

I'm surprised I didn't find more stuff from Japan that I loved this year, but it was just this and the Perfume record basically. One of those records where the singles they released before hand were the worst songs on there, which is how it goes I suppose.

Shabazz Palaces - Black Up

More other-world music. Deep, I mean with a sense of physical depth, not in a cheesy way.

See you in 2012, ya mooks!

Sapporo Food: Hachikyou

2011-11-15T21:55:00.000+09:00

Hokkaido! The vast Northern island of Japan where I live! And it's getting pretty bloody cold at the moment! Seriously, I was sorely unprepared for how chilly it was out there today.

Hokkaido is rightly famous for its food, both in terms of produce (a whole lot of Japan's homegrown produce comes from here) and in terms of the cuisine too. Every now and then someone comes to visit from elsewhere in Japan wanting to experience the Hokkaido food that they've heard so much about, and generally I can help them out. There's good sushi from Kushiro at Hanamaru in Sapporo Station, there's good Soup Curry everywhere, miso ramen all over the place, Jingisukan lamb barbecue (I like Daruma in Susukino)... there's a lot of stuff. But this time when some friends came we went to Hachikyou. Hachikyou is a famous Izakaya that serves the kind of Hokkaido dishes that you might not find at those more specialist restaurants I mentioned above. It's just North of Susukino Station and judging by the autographs they've got all over their walls it's pretty popular for visiting celebrities. And tourists, I should add.

Sorry for the shoddy photos this time out, it was an authentically dimly lit bar. My phone camera (such a pro-blogger, I know) had a hard time.

We tried a bunch of things, mostly with a Hokkaido bent, but I should probably cut to the chase and show you what Hachikyou is most famous for - the sukko-meshi.

That, my friends, is a whole heapin'-helpin' of salmon roe. Ikura (salmon roe) like a lot of seafood is really good and fresh in Hokkaido, and Hachikyou do this crazy Ikura-don (salmon rice-bowl) where they bring you the rice, then bring out a massive bowl of Ikura and all the staff start shouting along as one of the guys strikes and dramatic pose and starts ladling the fish eggs onto your rice until you say stop, or until it overflows. It's fun, and it was good Ikura man. OK, we split this four ways, but it might've been a bit much to get more than one.

The cool thing is that in the menu and in a speech before serving, the staff acknowledge that serving up such a crazy serving of a pretty expensive food is somewhat... gluttonous? Opulent? Anyway they tell you not to order it unless you're sure you can finish it, and also ask you to make extra donations to a charity box that goes towards protecting fish habitats (I think, I might be remembering that a little wrong).

Here's some of the other stuff we got too:

Salmon chanchan-yaki is a Hokkaido dish that's made by cooking salmon in a kind of miso dressing. This was delicious, and it's more of a home-cooked dish, so it was cool to find it at a restaurant.

These were... hoke croquets, I think? A kind of fish, again, more Hokkaido produce. They were great.

And this was crab (Hokkaido) and avocado salad. It was nice, but I think I was blown away by the other stuff more.

And sashimi too. Because, Hokkaido fish etc.

Hachikyou wasn't too expensive (even the sukko-meshi wasn't crazy, though it did cost a bit) but it was a little more than your bog-standard izakaya. To be honest, I'd say that while all of the food was very good, it wasn't astonishingly delicious, but then the place really is more about serving up great Hokkaido izakaya food than mind-blowing culinary excellence, so it does exactly what it sets out to do. It's well worth going to for anyone who's living here, or just visiting, for the sukko-meshi alone. Also, see if you can spot any famous people's autographs that you know! All Japanese of course, and I can never read kanji signatures, so I only spotted a few bands that I knew.

I have marked it upon my map, for your locating pleasure.

This week in Japanese Pepsi flavours

2011-11-08T18:34:00.001+09:00

Oh god.

Did you just throw up in your mouth? A little bit? Man, it should be pretty obvious by now but really all these flavours that Pepsi rolls out now and then actually have nothing to do with Pepsi-cola at all. They're like flavoured soda - just weird variations on carbonated drinks with the Pepsi brand name attached.

And I cannot resist them, even when the very colour of the drink makes me feel somewhat queasy. This one was actually ok, but incredibly sweet - a very boiled-candy kind of flavour. But boy, I can still feel it coating my teeth.

Recommended if you like those swirly 'strawberries and cream' boiled sweets they used to make, or if you're a spelunker into the cave of oddball limited-edition junk foods like me.

Sapporo Food: Maruyama Mushroom

2011-10-17T18:20:00.000+09:00

Out near Nishi 18 Chome station on the Tozai line, Maruyama Mushroom offers (according to the English slogan) hamburg steak and casual French food and despite the fact that I can't stand mushrooms I thought I'd check it out!

It's a nice, small restaurant and they're clearly very serious about their food. It's one of those places where as much of the menu is devoted to describing the ingredients and their origins, as is devoted to actually laying out the food. Most of their dishes are based around Japanese style hamburg steak, and although it's not very expensive, you can tell that you're in for something of a quality meal because it's certainly not as cheap as your bog-standard hamburg chain. The cheapest set thing is a little over a thousand yen:

And it looked very nice. I pushed the boat out a little more and had the hamburg with Parmesan risotto which was really good. Mushrooms, actually, weren't all that obvious in the dishes. Since I really don't like them I did ask - um, does this have lots of mushrooms in it? And the waitress said it did, but very quickly said that they could leave them out if I wanted. And I wanted, so they did, but I'm a little curious as to what they left them out of. The hamburg? The risotto? The salad? And for that matter I was feeling guilty because the chef is clearly very serious about his food, has called the place Mushroom and I was asking him not to include them? Well, I enjoyed it in the end, and he didn't look too put out so I hope it was ok.

If you're in the Maruyama-ish area this place is worth checking out, and it's on my map. I'm glad I got over my distaste for the name to try it!

Sapporo Food: Soup Curry Samurai

2011-10-16T21:49:00.000+09:00

I knew that there were a bunch of branches of Soup Curry Samurai around, but I didn't know until recently that one of my friends rates it as the best place in Sapporo. Since in actuality I needed no incentive to go and check the place out, that was all the incentive I needed to finally go to the one I spotted in Susukino and see if it was any good.

It's very good.

Soup curry for beginners - curry in the form of a soup that's served with lots of meat and vegetables in the soup and with rice on the side that you can do with what you wish. It originated in Sapporo and as yet there's no massive nationwide chain, or in fact much similarity at all between the different shops. Some shops use vaguely Indian spices, while a lot of them have a hint of Indonesian or Thai flavour to them. But it's always grounded in a uniquely soup-curry taste. I can probably stop doing this spiel whenever I talk about soup curry can't I? There are some small chains with multiple shops in Sapporo and a few have even opened in Tokyo I think, but I find that sometimes flavour can vary between different branches of the same chain so I'm reluctant to review all of one company's restaurants on the basis of visiting one. Anyway, this was the Odori/Susukino Samurai I went to, accessed via street level but spread over the second and third floors of the small building it's in.

The place was nice and cozy and the soup curry was excellent. The soup was nice and thick in comparison to many other places, and it had a very full, rich flavour. Yuki had the monthly special which was this chicken pumpkin thing, pumpkin soup too!

Her comments afterwards were that she was blown away by the first six mouthfuls, but that after that it was maybe a bit too rich and there was too much chicken. I hardly need say that this won't be a problem for others. I went for the buta kakuni (slow cooked pork) which is something I really like trying everywhere. There's a choice of six curries but I had the regular and it was pretty wonderful. In fact the soup was so good, and so flavoursome that I regretted getting the mozzarella cheese topping for it since it really ended up confusing the otherwise wonderful taste. Then, choosing spice levels and toppings are part of the fun of soup curry. Next time I'll keep it simple.

I had spice level 4, the highest you can go before they start dropping chillis in and charging more, and it was nicely spicy. Nothing to worry about if you like spicy food. The vegetables here were crisper and less cooked than a lot of the places I've been too recently, and to be honest I prefer them softer than this with soup curry. But the pork was cooked to perfection, so I assume that's the way they do their veg here and some people will love it. There was certainly a nice selection as you can see.

I don't know that this is the best place in Sapporo, but to be honest considering the number of Soup Curry places out there I doubt I'll ever find that holy, curry-filled grail. It was great though, and I'd love to go back. There are four branches scattered around Sapporo that you can find from their website that I've linked to at the top, and I'll put this city centre one on my map. Ahhhh, I love soup curry.

The Book of Mansion Names 8

2011-10-04T14:26:00.000+09:00

Sapporo Cafes - Kenon

2011-10-03T16:35:00.000+09:00

A bit too far to be of use to most people, this one. Still, their bagels and donuts were just heavenly and if you live in the North of Sapporo, or better yet in Shin-Kotoni, then it's nice to know there are nice places around. Right?

Kenon is a stylish little place in a very suburban part of Northern Sapporo that clearly knows its target market is mums and housewives. They had mother's magazines and I'm pretty sure that they're a very 'baby friendly' place considering there were two very young babies while we were there. So it's not a hipster hang-out, but it is very minimal and chic, and really stands out in the area it's in.

It has a small cafe space attached, but I think that Kenon's main thing is baking bagels and donuts for take-out. And they're damn good bagels and donuts, let me tell you. We had chicken and salmon bagel sandwiches, amazing filled donuts and I got a herb sausage bagel to take away that turned out to be a bagel with a whole sausage running through it. It was all seriously good stuff and strongly recommended.

The coffee was good and the people were super friendly. As I said it's probably too far out for anyone to justify the trip out there, but if you're in the area it's great to know about. I've stuck it on my map... here.

Sapporo Autumn Festival 2011

2011-10-01T21:00:00.001+09:00

Well! It looks like google are upping their 'blog' game and, in addition to google-izing the blogger interface they've finally got around to an iPhone app! So, consider this an on the road test post. Blogging from the palm of my hand. Already I am skeptical.

Sapporo Autumn Fest is actually a lot of people's favourite festival in Sapporo it turns out. In the winter the central stretch of Odori Park is turned into the Snow Festival, and in the summer it turns into an endless sea of drunk people for Beer Garden. I love them both, but not everyone does, and it seems a bunch of people I've spoken too much prefer the relatively young Autumn Festival, which is all about food.

Sapporo Autumn Festival has been held every Autumn since 2008, and yes, the had "since 2008" written on the poster in 2008. That's just how they roll here. It's been getting bigger every year, and that's good for the variety of food on offer, but bad if you don't like crowds, or spending a long time waiting to buy food from a stall.

Oh, by the way, this year's Autumn Fest us still going on - but only until tomorrow, October 2nd. So you have a chance to check it out... but not much of a chance.

This years Autumn Fest takes up five blocks, each one having a different theme. There's a welcome area, a block for ramen and new food from all over Hokkaido, a block for restaurants from Sapporo itself to have stalls, one for wine and... classier things, and probably the best one - other food from all around Hokkaido. The new food area has been rotating dishes and I think the food there is part of a competition, but it's expensive and has an annoying ticket-based system. The other area for local Hokkaido foods is more of a farmers' market affair and I had good food from there without having to queue much at all.

Hokkaido is famous for good food, Hokkaido people are proud of their produce and it's really a no brainer to have a food festival right in the middle of town. It's well worth checking out - uh, if not this year then next!

I think this app thing is just going to dump all my photos down at the bottom in a jumble, so I'll just tell you what I ate and you can work out for yourself what's what, ok? I had amazing buta-don (pork rice bowl) from Obihiro, which is apparently famous for the stuff. I had a menchi-katsu (minced meat cutlet) burger from Eniwa that was pretty good, and an amazing jumbo scallop burger (pictured both pre and post bite) that kind of blew my mind. There's also a deer-cutlet curry there that came with a free carrot! Other things I tried that aren't pictured included potato and crab balls, sausages, sea-urchin rice and sea food curry.

I went quite a lot.

So, another great festival in Sapporo and yet more great food. Can't say fairer than that.

Elite Japanese Cuisine

2011-09-28T14:23:00.000+09:00

Oh! Did I say 'Elite Japanese Cuisine'? I meant stuff I found in convenience stores and vending machines! I... suppose there is a difference?

This first one isn't all that interesting. I think it's a Family Mart exclusive Sapporo soft drink, but I mostly took a picture because it's melon... cola? That and I never get tired of drinking curiously-hued beverages. In Japan of course, green melon soda is commonplace, but melon cola? To be frank I couldn't really tell the difference. It was good though!

McVitie's Sweet Mint Digestive Biscuits! Aw, now you're talking! These are one of those products that, although it's a Western company, I doubt you'll find these available in the West. That happens a lot (see for example whole blogs dedicated to the baffling array of Kit-Kat flavours they have here) and not just with food, but with clothing brands and other things too. Eastern and Western tastes vary, y'know.

But in this case, my tastes don't vary that much at all. I adore chocolate and mint flavoured stuff, but when I first came to Japan I never saw anything around, and when I told people I liked that taste they looked at me funny. Well, y'know, funnier than usual. But in the few years I've been here chocolate-mint flavoured items have been popping up more and more, and this summer was a veritable choco-minty feast for me, with all sorts of limited edition snacks and ice-creams on offer. I mean, when I saw this latest one I almost thought they'd designed it just for me. Until I turned over the packet...

I mean, she doesn't look like me at all. Oh well. Also, I'm pretty sure that the Japanese companies are treating choc-mint flavour as a summer thing, so now it's cooling down I won't find it anywhere, but it was good while it lasted.

Next up, vending machine awesomeness:

Walking through Sapporo Station I saw a DyDo vending machine selling pancake drink. I mean, pancake-flavoured milk drink, but... I mean that is either going to turn your stomach or turn your head. I think you can guess which it did for me:

Mmmmm, look at that melting butter. And there's definitely a hint of butter in the taste too, but it really wasn't too gross at all. From what's written on the can, it actually looks like this is more of a retro, nostalgia exercise than a bold new experiment in flavour. This pancake milkshake mix used to be available from the chocolate company Morinaga as a Nesquik-style stir-in powder. You'd add it to milk and - voila - drinkable pancakes. Morinaga are collaborating with DyDo on this... perhaps to get it back out there? Anyway it was pretty nice, probably too sweet for most people but I didn't have a problem with it. And yes, it did taste like pancakes. And in the end, isn't that what's important?

The Book of Mansion Names 7

2011-09-27T14:44:00.000+09:00

Well, it's been almost two years since I've done one of these. The names of apartment buildings in Japan that in some way I think speak of the aspirations and dreams that all of us keep in our hearts. Imagine, you could one day live in a building with a name like this!

Sapporo Food - Medicineman Soup Curry

2011-09-26T14:26:00.000+09:00

Inconvenience leads to discovery! Cafe Zill, where I used to go pretty regularly for lunch has closed for a refurb until later this year, so I've been forced to wander the streets of Yamahana looking for something else to eat. Luckily one rainy day I found a well known soup-curry shop called Medicineman!

It's great, and I'll recommend it right here at the start as a great, and rightly popular Soup Curry 'shack'. It's not really a shack, don't worry. The curry is delicious, and their slogan "A Good Medicine Tastes Hot!" is very apt. As with most soup curry places you have to select a spice level when you order. The first time I went I had 'HOT1' which was great, but their menu says that 'HOT2' is apparently the best match for Medicineman's soup flavour, so next time I tried that. It was pretty hot, but it was eff-ing great soup curry.

As with all soup curry shops (perhaps all small restaurants in general) the decor is a little eclectic. A lot of places go for a weird mish-mash of Jamaican, Indonesian and Indian art and objects, but Medicineman goes for a bit of Americana and a lot of early Hanna-Barbera looking native American characters.

Here's a snap of their pork curry, which has big chunks of 'kakuni' style pork in it. The pork, also, is excellent.

I'm not sure if there are other Medicineman shops around, usually for these established places there are two or three stores, but the one I went to was probably most easily accessed by streetcar from Odori or Susukino. It's clearly very popular too, since I've been there at lunch time and after work and it's always busy. They have a board at the entrance where you can put your name down if they don't have any seats free too. I have placed it on my map, and it comes with two thumbs up and a smiley face saying "Good Soup Curry!"

Sapporo Food: Calcio D'Angolo

2011-08-04T18:23:00.001+09:00

I have no idea why I'm blogging so much. I think there's something wrong with me.

Calcio D'Angolo is one of the many places in Sapporo that I went to one time, years ago, and thought - 'Oh, I'll have to bring people here and blog about it coz it's really good' only to never do that. It's an Italian place near the East end of Tanuki Koji, facing the Sosei River, and it serves great food in a simple, stylish, chilled atmosphere. Possibly I missed a trick because this Ziptipz site and the Marriott hotel site, both using most of the same copy, say that it's a place that specializes in handmade deserts. I think that they have handmade desserts, and they look good (though I didn't try them) but I don't know that the place specializes in them... I think it's a (mostly) Italian restaurant. Then, the place is celebrating it's 10 year anniversary this year, so perhaps it started out that way and, maybe you should check out the deserts! And then again, the ZipTipz site does recommend that for cheap food you can go to family restaurants like Denny's, Jonathan's or Skylark when to my knowledge there are no Denny's or Jonathan's in Sapporo. So maybe take the info on that site with a pinch of salt.

Anyway Calcio D'Angolo also comes recommended because they play the best music I've heard (for a restaurant) outside of Cafe Nesco in Kita 24 Jyo. Sinner Cafe in Susukino also plays good music, but every now and then they play RHCP, so that costs them points.

Worst music is anywhere that plays Nouvelle Vague or any CD of bossanova covers of 'unlikely' songs.

I digress.

Calcio D'Angolo used to look out onto the flat temporary cover that they put over the Sosei River while they were not working on it. This year they've unveiled really quite a nice narrow little river park which makes the whole area seem really quite relaxing. Inside, though Calcio D'Angolo is even more relaxing, with super-comfy low chairs (that I can't imagine are good for the digestion, but who knows the Romans always lounged when they ate and everyone says they're smart), low lighting and nice vintage furniture.

I have a feeling that when I went years ago they had a pretty small Italian-only menu. I could be remembering it wrong, but either way they now have a pretty extensive menu that covers Italy, Spain, France and... Japan. That's a little bit of a cop-out guys. Not much of a stretch for you. Above, in a slightly over-exposed photo, you can see the lasagna (LASAGNA! Yuki was super-excited to find anywhere that does a half-decent lasagna in Sapporo), and below is our starter - an avocado and shrimp potato salad thing that was wonderful.

We also got their recommended pizza:

Everything was good, the avocado thing was exceptional and we both really want to go back to explore more of the menu. It's tucked away a little, under an over-hanging roof, but it's not hard to find. And besides, it's on my map! Check it out!

Sapporo Food: Suriyothai - Thai-Style Curry

2011-08-03T13:35:00.000+09:00

Found this place by just walking around randomly, trying to get from one place to another by going in the wrong direction. I like it when it works like that. It was a Monday, and the sign said the place was closed on Mondays and yet nevertheless:

That, I think, is incredibly rare. I have lost count of the times I've tried to go somewhere because the internet, or the flyer says it will be open only to find that it's closed (Maruyama Drill Hamburger Shop, I'm looking at you). So to find somewhere that says it'll be closed only to be open is an early Christmas present.

Suriyothai is in a building that looks fancy from the front, but to get to the restaurant you have to go through to the back where there's a little hidden line of bars and shops which looks far less glamorous. They do mostly Thai curries in the well known "Traffic Light Arrangement" (red curry, yellow curry or green curry) and a bunch of other Thai influenced food. I got the impression that if you went for something spicy at this place, you'd really get something spicy...

We got the green curry and a rice dish that was apparently a drier Thai curry to be eaten with rice. Since the place doesn't look at all fancy, and yet has a 'Top 100 restaurants in Hokkaido' sign outside from a few years back, I wasn't all that surprised to find that the food was excellent. Like I said, I think things might get spicy if you want them too - I don't mind that with some things but I've had bad experiences with Thai food so I didn't push it. Oh and there's a terrifying looking pot of extra spiciness on the table should you feel so inclined.

Looking this place up I found that there was a Japanese youtube channel devoted to Thai restaurants. They basically just walk in and spin around a bit, but here, so you can experience it all the more powerfully, is their video of Suriyothai:

Awesome. Suriyothai is very close to Kita 12 Jo station, and if you like Thai food than absolutely check it out. It's on my map!

Japanese Beverages with Alex - Pepsi and more!

2011-08-02T16:00:00.001+09:00

Me, I'm all about the traditional stuff - you know that. Those tastes that speak of Japan's rich cultural heritage, and demonstrate the gulf in philosophies that separates this proud island nation from the proud island nation of which I am...

No, wait. I'm not interested in that stuff at all.

Here's a couple of gimmicky summer soft drinks that I picked up recently:

After the- let's say utter failure of Pepsi Dry to be either palatable or interesting, Pepsi Caribbean Gold is a massive improvement in the field of Pepsi Limited Time Flavours. The description says that it's a "Refreshing cola with the feel of a high class Caribbean resort." That is fucking aspirational, but unsurprisingly it doesn't really taste like that. It also says it's 'White Sapote' flavour. Now, I, like I expect most people, had no idea what white sapote is so I look it up on Wikipedia. Apparently it's a Central American tree whose fruit is thought to have narcotic properties, especially inducing drowsiness.

I mean, of COURSE Pepsi Japan would choose to make a White Sapote flavour drink. Because they're insane.

Sadly, no narcotic effects were in evidence, but Pepsi Caribbean Gold is actually a really nice, unidentifiably fruity cola. There's a little pineapple maybe, a little coconut - I guess it is a little tropical after all - but overall it's really pretty good. And properly the most normal tasting Pepsi variant that's come out over the last few years.

The other drink I just picked up because the name sounded disgusting, only for it to be surprisingly delicious is Kirin's "Sekai no Kitchen kara: Salt and Litchi", based on a desert made by mums in Thailand.

This one really does taste of lychee (I'll spell it my way, though I think almost anyway is fine). I couldn't get any sense of saltiness, but perhaps it's a counter-balance, in that the concept of lychee juice is a little odd, and this just tasted great. I know some people don't like lychee, so don't bother if that includes you, but this was no where near as odd as it first sounded. Two good summer drinks, what are the chances?

Oh, and if you've noticed Coca-Cola's Mello Yello around, don't bother. It's pretty bad.

Sapporo Food: Kopitiam - Singaporean Restaurant.

2011-08-01T17:40:00.001+09:00

Oh hey! It must be summer in Sapporo because everywhere is a beer garden and no-one wants to sit inside!

Kidding, people were sitting outside because it was full inside. But still, I think the reason there were so many people outside (more people kept rolling up and they just kept adding more and more tables so that it stretched further and further into the arcade) is that Sapporo's 'Beer Garden' festival in Odori kicks out at 9 now. So there are a lot of drunk people, every night, looking for somewhere else to drink.

So, that photo there is Kopitiam, a Singaporean-style restaurant at the far West end of Tanuki Koji in Sapporo, that seems to be popular, since it's crowded whenever I've been there. They serve a selection of foods from Singapore and I would say, countries near Singapore (since, in our order the Indonesian 'gorengs' were well represented), and everything I've had there has been excellent. It's not very glamorous, and the lighting runs the gamut from red to dark yellow, but it's really worth visiting.

Here's some food. You'll have to excuse the yellow tint - like I said, very atmospheric lighting. Crispy Tofu Salad:

Nasi Goreng:

And Mee Goreng, which as far as I can tell is basically Nasi Goreng with noodles instead of rice:

Both the Nasi Goreng and the Mee Goreng have a fried egg on the right hand side that you have to pay extra for, but which is worth every penny. With the spicy sauce they drizzle over it that egg is just amazing. Everything is nicely spicy but not crazy and I haven't had a bad dish yet there.

It's hard to miss if you walk down to the end of Tanuki Koji, but it is, of course, on my map too. Good summer food, yo!

Sapporo Food: Raw Food Cafe LOHAS

2011-07-29T12:43:00.001+09:00

So there I was, heading back into town after work and making the stupid decision to walk, in the sun, in the summer. I haven't been blogging much this year, but my hatred of the summer remains unabated. Damn you, Summer. Damn you to the hell that shares your searing heat.

Anyway I was thinking 'burger', that a burger would be good, but when I got to Treasures in West Odori it was gone! They're refitting the place now, and I don't know if it'll be Treasures part 2 or something else entirely, but whatever - it wasn't open for burgers that day.

But as I kept walking I went past a place I tried to go to a long time ago, only to find that it only opens at lunch time: Raw Food Cafe LOHAS:

That's the big ol' arch of the building, and if you go up those stairs here's the cafe itself.

From burger to the healthiest of healthy foods. I don't know exactly what LOHAS' philosophy is, but it looks vegan and when I ordered Raw Veg & Avocado rice bowl, that was exactly what I got. It was healthy and delicious, with brown rice and a little side dish for soy and wasabi (I was advised to dip the avocado into that, like sushi, since the avocado didn't have a very strong flavour).

From the place itself and this website, it looks like LOHAS is something of a 'raw foods', vegan and organic hub. I found a link for it on this Japanese Vegetarian and Macrobiotic food navigation site. And in other news, there's a Japanese Vegetarian and Macrobiotic food navigation site! Who knew?! How great is that?

Anyway, LOHAS is only open from 11am to 3pm, which makes it annoying to get to for a lot of people, but apparently you can arrange for them to open for you in the evening if you have enough people. The food was healthy and great, and there was some kind of nut maki-sushi that sounds so odd I really want to try it. It's just at the end of Tanuki Koji, and pretty easy to find, but do check my map out.

Sapporo Food: Sandal Diner

2011-07-17T21:11:00.000+09:00

Sandal Diner is a small, cozy little restaurant in Kita 24 Jo. I don't think it's spectacular, but the menu is varied (carrying everything from burgers and curry to sushi, pizza and a terrifyingly large selection of onigiri) and everything I've had there has been good, and mighty satisfying. Also, and this would be the key point for me, it stays open pretty late.

I work evenings sometimes, and my girlfriend works evenings all the time, and recently we've both been frightfully reluctant to actually cook anything so we're eating out more than is healthy. But eating out late, while more possible in Japan than I reckon it is in England, is still kinda hit and miss depending on where you are. I mean, wherever you are, you can ALWAYS eat ramen late at night, and probably yakitori too, but for more choice you're often left pretty bereft of options. So sometimes I want a half decent burger, and Jacksonville in Kita 24 Jo, which I love, closes at 9 and so thank God for Sandal Diner.

That's the mexican salsa burger, with avocado, and I believe some kind of locomoco lurking in the background there. An esteemed colleague of mine from the states was once left not all that impressed by Sandal Diner's burgers when we went there, but beef-pork mix (I have no idea if it is or isn't) or not I'm getting to really like them. This thing might look monstrous:

but it was pretty bloody delicious. Also the potatoes, which come in that chunky wedge-type variety were way better than I expected. I've had badly cooked potato wedge-chips so many times that I didn't have high hopes, but they were great too. I haven't tried the pizza, which I'm always curious about due to the crimes against pizza that I've witnessed in Japan. So I can't vouch for that. The other food I've had there hasn't been flashy, but it has been tasty and satisfying and it has Ebisu beer on tap and a nice, relaxed, warm atmosphere. Oh, pretty terrible Nashville country music, but it makes a change at least.

Oh, I found another picture. Same burger last time I went, and that looks like sausage curry to me. Yeah

It's a good place and you should check it out, especially if you live in Kita 24 Jo and haven't been there yet. It's in the little car-park area around the back of one of the tall buildings on the main street - you have to walk around the block to get there basically. Confusing directions, I know, but that's why I have the map. So have a look at that why don't you.

SAPPORO!

2011-07-14T19:22:00.001+09:00

There was a horrendous disaster in March, and an ongoing situation with the Fukushima No.1 nuclear plant, and unsurprisingly these things have had a massive effect on tourism in Japan. In that no-one wants to come here anymore. And, to be frank, it seems to me more and more that the government have the efficacy of a plywood baseball bad when it comes to confronting this problem. Not least because no-one believes them anymore.

Sad emoticon.

Still, from what I can tell people fearing radiation damage a ways away from the Fukushima plant are over-reacting somewhat. Lady Gaga did her bit, assuring everyone that Japan is safe to come to and as beautiful and awesome as always, and now, impressively the Sapporo City tourism people are doing their bit too with this website:

http://www.sapporo-now.com/en/

A design that actually looks quite nice? English and Chinese full functionality? Holy balls, I think I just dropped the crab-leg I was gnawing on! It's a nice website, and what with the updating radiation chart, it's as clear as it can be that Hokkaido is free of carginogens and mutagens and I'm really very impressed with it. Good show Sapporo council.

And Google are doing their bit too, with in-depth street-view things for big Japanese tourist attractions (the cynic in me would say - well if their panoramic shots are that good people might not actually bother with the trip, but that's just silly). They've done a whole bunch of Sapporo things that you can see here:

Google's Sapporo Galleries

I like it, but with the best will in the world Maruyama Zoo is not all that impressive. I mean, it's not even the most impressive zoo in Hokkaido - so many people stay in Sapporo and take the train to Asahiyama Zoo in Asahikawa (a couple of hours away) that they have a themed train with special animal seat-covers. But still it's the thought that counts.

Anyway, come to Sapporo because we're not radioactive and the summer is bearable, as opposed to the rest of Japan.

That is all.

Sapporo Food: Orion Kanazawa-Style Curry

2011-07-13T23:58:00.002+09:00

First, I'd like to say that I'm losing count of the number of cafes and restaurants that I'm finding because of my iPhone. Apple, you have your problems, and your iTunes for Windows software is still like new-strain incurable gonorrhea on my computer, but the crazy world of apps you have begotten has something going for it.

On Sunday we went up a mountain, and on the way down used the iPhone to find first a cafe, for coffee, and then this place:

It is Orion and it is apparently the only Kanazawa-style curry restaurant in Hokkaido. Kanazawa curry? What's Kanazawa curry I hear you ask? It's the way they eat curry in Kanazawa city in Ishikawa-ken of course, which is like this:

Now, if you are familiar with basic Japanese-style curry, you may be looking at that and thinking... well... that doesn't look all that different from any other curry. But you are WRONG. SO WRONG. And here is a bullet-pointed list why you are so wrong:

Allow me to roughly translate these points, which set Kanazawa style curry apart from the dross they serve in the rest of the country:

- Served in a stainless steel dish

- Served with shredded cabbage

- You can't see the rice (my note: because it's hidden under the curry, not because it's invisible)

- Fork

- The topping (i.e. the meat) is served on top of the curry (as opposed to the other way round)

- The katsu (cutlet) has Worcester sauce on it

- The curry is thicker and richer.

And then to the right of that is the stuff which I thought really defined the difference between Kanazawa curry and regular Japanese curry, which is that you mix the cabbage in with the curry and more importantly that you add mayonnaise to the curry and mix that in too. Now that's an interesting (if in terms of Japanese cuisine, not unusual) variation - adding mayo to your curry. But the bullet points seemed to be, really, trying too hard. I'm sure many purists would disagree, but when you're emphasising the serving-ware, the cutlery, and the layering order of the food, you're kind of reaching.

And to be honest in the end the curry wasn't all that different from other Japanese curries. It was like curry+ or curry with a twist. What it also was though, was delicious and that's the most important thing! It was rich and thick, the tonkatsu was crisp and good, the Worcester sauce was only a little thing, but it added to it too, and I could dig the mayo concept. It was a satisfying, hearty meal and I'd recommend it to any fan of Japanese curry. You're also encouraged to add as many toppings as you feel like to the curry, and the place has a whole other half-a-menu devoted to potato noodles and pasta if that's what you feel like.

I'm a huge fan of B-gourmet (simple, cheap food done really well) and I'd say that this place is something like that. I dug it and I'd recommend it to anyone in the area. Oh, coz it's in Fushimi, pretty far out towards the mountains in the South-West of Sapporo. Car or streetcar would be the best way to get there. Check it out on the map here.

Sapporo Cafes: Cafe ZILL

2011-05-31T18:01:00.001+09:00

Posting more than once a month? What is this, Wikipedia?

That doesn't make sense, does it?

Anyway, here you are: Cafe ZILL.

ZILL is on Gyokei Dori which is a nice shopping street that cuts through the - what I like to call - null zone in the middle of the street car loop. Is that a bad way to put it? I'm sure there's all sorts of awesome stuff tucked away in that area (Yamahana, I guess?) but the fact that it's off the subway line (Horohirabashi on the Namboku line is the closest station) and hemmed in by the street car line makes me always think of it as a kind of 'heart of darkness' or perhaps a 'dark country' whose borders it is perilous to cross. It is neither. It is a nice suburban neighbourhood nestled up next to the city centre and now I work there one day a week.

And on that day I go looking for somewhere to eat lunch, and it didn't take me long to find ZILL. ZILL seems to be subtitled both "Soul Soup Shop" and "Creative Lounge" which should give you a good idea what it's like. It's a cozy little cafe, heavy on the dark wood and vintage furnishings (perhaps a little too dark? that doesn't seem to be a problem around here - every branch of Miyakoshiya Coffee feels like they've carved the walls from the darkest of dark chocolate), and the kind of place where you can buy handmade bags alongside the regular cafe stuff.

It's a divinely relaxing place, a lot like Nesco in Kita-Ku, and as such perfect for a slow lunch on a crazy day. Unlike Nesco though, their music kind of sucks. The guy at Nesco plays an amazing mix of down tempo contemporary indie, most of which I don't know, whereas ZILL tends to play those annoying CDs of lounge and bossanova covers of pop and rock songs. Fuck, I'm coming to hate those CDs. Well, clearly that's an exaggeration, because the music never stops me enjoying reading a book in ZILL.

I've been there quite a few times now, and I almost always get something that looks like this:

That's the lunch set. They offer soup, sandwich and rice-ball, and you can choose whichever you like and if it comes to more than 800yen they throw in a free tea or coffee. That's really not bad, and the food is really great. That's a squash potage and cheese omelette sandwich there and both were far better than anything I normally eat during my working day. One criticism would be that their sandwiches are great, but really difficult to eat. One time I got a full sized sandwich and it was HUGE, and so impractically constructed that I made a thorough mess of myself trying to eat it. Chalk that one up to some places in Japan making fancy sandwiches following some theoretical concept of 'the sandwich', that end up as something involving bread and filling that falls into this void between 'closed' and 'open-face'. I've given this too much thought, but then, I give everything too much thought.

So I don't like the music and their sandwiches are tricky, but those aren't serious criticisms and ZILL is a weekly godsend for me. All of the food is delicious, the coffee that I tried was good and it's a really nice, warm place to relax. It's out of the way of most people I would imagine, but if you're in the area, check it out. And of course it's on the map!

Japanese Junk Food Times - Pepsi Dry and Kit-Kat Zunda

2011-05-30T10:34:00.006+09:00

Oh! I didn't see you there! Let me just put my gourmet hat on, and then tell you about my journeys in the realm of... flavour.

I don't need to go into how the Japanese snack food market retains its vim and vigour by trying out new flavours of existing products all the time, do I? I've read about a zillion other blog posts explaining the concept recently, so let's just say that I am thoroughly down with the concept. It reminds me of Grant Morrison's Seaguy a little, and also makes me think of white suited cowboys of the lab - pouring bubbling test-tubes into each other in search of the essence of... pistachio nut shells or something.

Above you will see Dry Pepsi. What is Dry Pepsi? It is non-sweet Pepsi. It makes no claims about being especially healthy on the bottle (though you would assume the lack of sugar is a good thing) and instead talks about being light and refreshing or something. I don't like Pepsi really, weirdly it is a little to sweet for me. So I figured that non-sweet Pepsi might be something worth checking out.

It was not.

It is not less sweet, as I was foolishly imagining, it is not sweet at all. In fact, it doesn't taste like Pepsi, it tastes like soda water, and I soon found myself wondering why it existed. If you like the bitter tang of soda, try it, or better yet JUST BUY SODA. After Shiso Pepsi, Azuki Pepsi and Montblanc Pepsi... this was a let down.

Better, but not incredible was, Kit-Kat Zunda - Zunda-Mochi being soy-bean rice cakes from Sendai. A quick google reveals that Pocky Watch - based in Sendai - reviewed this back in 2009. Tohoku was devastated by the tsunami in March of course, and now it looks like they're rolling out this flavour nationwide and giving 10yen from every bar to support the rebuilding effort. Good stuff.

The bar itself was nice, faintly bean-y, faintly rice-cake-y, but nothing to write home about. Wait, what am I doing here? Is this more effort or less than writing home? I'm lost. Anyway it was ok, but as usual they nail the scent a lot more than the actual taste - which comes out a little bit like funny white chocolate.

Anyway, that's my traditional Japanese food post. You're welcome.

Sapporo Food - Dominika (Soup Curry)

2011-05-29T20:13:00.003+09:00

A soup curry shop so good that I went there twice in one week? That's... that's... well, not unheard of actually. Anyway, Dominika was good.

And it's in Odori, where it's always nice to find good Soup Curry. Sadly last order is at 8.30, and I need victuals later than that sometimes, but that's the way the disk of fried cheese crumbles I suppose.

Yeah! Check that bad boy out - a circular cheese wonder that you can break up or allow to melt into your soup as you see fit. Amazing as that is I did actually find I preferred the pre-melted cheese, but this fried cheese topping is apparently the most popular so you should really try it at some point.

Dominika was recommended by a friend, and it's a little tucked away on the ground floor of an office building thing just along from Tokyu hands. I must've seen that bloody wooden elephant outside a thousand times though, and that makes it pretty hard to miss.

You have a choice of four soups, should you choose to go to this place. Yellow is the regular soup, delicious and with a pretty sharp, strong flavour to start off with. Black is a richer soup, made with beef stock I think the dude said, and that was certainly the impression I got from it. These are the two I've tried so far, but there's also white - which is made milder with added soy milk - and red which involves tomatoes in a way that me, Yuki and the very, very chatty dude who works there couldn't get to the bottom of. Like - not a tomato based soup, not like tomato soup, not soup with added tomatoes... he just told us to try it next time.

The dude who took our order by the way - worth mentioning. He is very chatty, eager to explain everything about the menu and to crack jokes (or he was with us when he worked out our Japanese was ok) and quick to weigh in with advice while you're making your mind up. A lot of warnings about the spice-level of the curries, let's put it that way. I had a five both times, and it packed a punch but it was ok (the regular actually seemed a little hotter than the black one). Some other Westerner in the guest book had picked a number eight and it sounded like tough going. Anyway, the Dominika guy - best intentions in the world, but he rubbed one of my friends the wrong way, and it was kind of difficult to chill out at times with him buzzing about. It was okay by me, but... I cannot speak for all of humanity.

The top photo is the black soup with pork. The soup and the vegetables were strengths, coz while the pork was good, I've had some sensational pork curries using buta kakuni (slow-cooked pork) that have raised my standards unrealistically high. When I went back I had the tontoro (pork neck) which looks like this:

And actually feels like two dishes, since the pork comes in a wonderful teriyaki sauce that means you're not meant to transfer it into the soup. Whatever though, because that tontoro was absolutely delicious. Strongly recommended sir!

So, the best soup curry I've had in Odori. Oh and free salad! Check it out. It's on the map.

What's with the manga?

2011-04-28T17:55:00.000+09:00

I have been reading manga recently. I say reading, but really I apply that verb with a variety of degrees of accuracy, considering I'm reading in Japanese, and my Japanese remains not-great. So what's with this stack?

Well Joe-Bob, it's a funny story. Yuki was selling an old mobile phone, and got a 500 yen voucher for the used store. But there was nothing either of us wanted to buy, so I picked out five first volumes for a hundred yen each and now I have a bunch of extra manga that I might not read.

Was that a funny story? Not really. Sorry, Joe-Bob.

Anyway there are some manga that I'm reading pretty seriously. Lets see - working down from the top...

Deathnote Vol. 1 - Everyone knows Deathnote, right? Popular enough to spawn three movies, a forthcoming American remake and the Manga's available in English too I believe. This was one of my 100 yen purchases, and that only one I've started so far. There are sections where the Japanese is beyond me, but everything has furigana - small characters telling you how to read the kanji - so it's easy to look stuff up if I don't know it. Looking anything up takes time though, and I can understand Deathnote pretty well so far so I haven't bothered. The story of a boy who finds a notebook with the power to kill anyone whose name is written in it, I'm not all that far into it, but I like how it doesn't take long at all for the boy to become a budding sociopath and start killing people like crazy. It might be a crude reduction, but I'm guessing that, like Evangelion and Gantz to some degree, Deathnote is another smash hit series aimed at somewhat antisocial insular folk who hate the world, with the underlying message that it's not good to hate the world. Could be wrong about that.

Drop Vol. 1 - is another 100 yen snap. It's a yankee manga about delinquent youths, and it looks like it has a slightly cartoony style, which I kinda like. I haven't read any of it, but a movie of it came out just after I came to Japan, so I'd heard of it before.

Touch Vol. 7 - is my most serious manga reading project. Recommended by the wonderful Yukiko, it's a 1980s high school, sibling rivalry, love-triangle, baseball story by Adachi Mitsuru. It has furigana spelling out the kanji, but the dense 80s high school slang makes it a little tricky to unpick the grammar at times, and I'm told that some of the phrases used are dated to say the least. But it's a fun story, and with Touch I'm looking up and translating everything. It takes a while, which is why I'm only on volume seven, after reading it forever, but it's kind of worth it, and I like Adachi's drawings too.

Gantz Vol. 14 - So, I started reading Gantz when the first film was coming out, because... I don't remember why. The concept piqued my interest or something. Anyway, I care about missing things in Touch, and I take care reading it, but Gantz is basically high-concept trash so I've just been blazing through these volumes like anything. In fact the only thing slowing me down has been the fact that the series is so popular now it's hard to find the volumes in used stores when you want to read them. There's no furigana, which makes it irritating to look things up and so I haven't bothered. There are fan translations online, and at first I was reading both at the same time to test my understanding. Then I realised that in Gantz there are often action sequences that are two hundred pages long, and that most of the dialogue in those is "GODDAMNIT!" and "AARRGH!" and "IT HURTS!" and most often, "OH SHIT! OH SHIT! I DON'T WANT TO DIE!" And it's much more fun to read comics on paper than on a screen so now I just blast through the Japanese books and if there's something really important that I think I'm missing I look that bit up online. I half like / half hate Gantz. The writer, Oku Hiroya, said that he had the idea for Gantz in high school and boy does it feel like that. People die, but instead of dying they're sent to a mysterious room where a mysterious ball gives them crazy future-tech weapons and sends them off to defeat 'aliens' that are hiding on earth. After that they're free for a while until the next 'game'. There's insanely gratuitous violence, nudity and sex, and for a while it really did feel like a very well rendered 16 year-old boy's wish fulfillment project. But the internal logic of their tasks and the problems they face are so really well done, and I did want to see where things were going enough to keep reading at the start. Then after a while I guess I became inured to it, or it just got better, and certainly the main character developed a lot, and I was thoroughly enjoying the big arc that I just finished, which had some amazing action pieces. Now there are some vampire dudes and I'm not digging it so much though... I'm halfway through the whole run thus far though, so I reckon I'll still keep going.

Hana Yori Dango Vol 1. - This is a super-popular high-school romance manga. I haven't read any of it yet, but I will! I need an antidote to Gantz.

Rideback Vol 1. - I don't know anything about this, but I liked the colours on the cover, and I liked the loose illustration style inside. It seems to be a girl and robot motorcycle vs. facist state thing? Or a race thing? No idea really!

20 Seiki Shonen Vol 1. - I already know the story to this, and I love Urasawa Naoki, but I've never read the manga. So I figured, I really should start. After all, James read the entire bloody thing.

So that's too much rambling about manga. Next time more food, or possibly music. Depends on how lucky you are.

Sapporo Food: Senraibou

2011-04-19T17:17:00.002+09:00

Not a vegetarian restaurant, but a restaurant which leans heavily on vegetables and has a lot of veggie dishes. Senraibou is in the sparkly, fancy G-Dining building, and while it's a little pricey it was worth every penny.

Finding this place, by the way - totally the result of me getting an iPhone recently. Using one of the GuruNavi apps we just threw out our restaurant gathering net into the inter-ether and this is what it came back with. I mean, a coupla hundred years ago we would've had to use real nets to eat! Ah, livin' in the future.

Senraibou is an intimate izakaya-esque restaurant that specializes in veggie dishes, tomato nabe for example.

This was so, so, so good. I really can't express properly how good this nabe thing was. It was GOOD. Perhaps italics too on that? It looked nothing like the picture on the menu amusingly enough, but it didn't need to because it was so damn good. It was a Japanese style stew meets a rich Italian tomato soup in the best way possible. After we had eaten the seafood and vegetables in it they took the rest of the soup away to make rice porridge with it, and that was incredible, but it was so hard to stop eating that soup that I was worried they wouldn't have enough soup to work with. It was incredible. Also this:

...was incredible. Baked tofu with kimchee and cheese. Oh holy crap yes. The last thing we had was sadly the worst of the three, but it was interesting in a different way at least.

Kabocha (squash) soba noodles. They didn't really taste of kabocha, but they were thick and wholemealy. They were good, but they weren't up to those other two heavenly dishes.

As I said, Senraibou isn't the cheapest place, but it isn't crazily expensive. Our meal plus drinks ran us about 5000 yen for two, and it was really, really good. I recommend the place, and of course there are tons of other fancy eateries in G-Dining too, so that's on the map now! Eating! Yes!

Japanese Music: Scraps

2011-03-22T18:52:00.000+09:00

I wanna blog, so here's a post about random Japanese music I've been listening to.

It's getting to be a pretty hard and fast rule that I like about a third of everything Kreva puts out. When he's focussed and forceful and working with good beats (which mostly err on the glittery 'futuristic' side) he's got a good flow and I can get into it. His last single 挑め (Idome) is pretty ace:

But when he's doing the modern pop R&B thing he sucks atrociously. The B-Side to Idome for instance. Yuck.

Monobright, now including Hidaka Tooru from Beat Crusaders have put out a really decent Mini-Album and a really decent double A-side already this year. He hasn't really done much to change their sound, although the new releases are generally more consistently upbeat, which he might have something to do with. The double A-side was some insane triple tie in, whereby one song was being used by the J-League, and one song was the theme to a new movie with Yoshitaka Yuriko and was also being used in a Pocky commercial. Tie-in-a-licious yo, and it's a fun song. I got myself a Nico-Nico Douga membership so that I could post this video. It looks like the movie is about Yuriko choosing between a bunch of boys, so they went for the same thing in the video, with all the members of Monobright:

The new single from Kuriyama Chiaki (of Kill Bill and Battle Royal fame) works for me too, because it was written by Shiina Ringo, and performed by her band Tokyo Jihen. In other words, it's a Ringo-chan song sung by someone else, which, since her voice is so unique, is pretty dumb. The song still manages to be pretty good though:

I also picked up an album that came out last year: Jim O'Rourke's 'All Kinds Of People Love Burt Bacharach'. Jim O'Rourke is, of course, not Japanese, but he's working with predominantly Japanese singers and musicians on this covers record and as far as I'm aware it's only available here. I figured that with O'Rourke it could go one of two ways - restrained and perfectly performed covers or out-and-out experimentation, but I wasn't sure what to expect. It's the former for the most part, with excellent drumming from Glenn Kotche keeping the whole thing simple and light, and generally good vocal performances in variously accented English from the singers. Thurston Moore adds a faint wash of fuzz to 'Always Something There To Remind Me' and Yoshimi from the Boredoms and OOIOO puts some random percussion on her track, but other than that it's nice and straight (as you could probably expect from listening to his Bacharach-fueled Eureka album). I do really like the twist in the opening track though, where Haruomi Hosono from YMO sings an altered version of 'Close To You' which starts out "Why do birds suddenly appear every time I am near? Just like me, they long to be, close to me." It's very 'Insignificance', very, 'Halfway To A Threeway."

There's more but I've sated the blogging urge so let's leave it there. I'm digging the new Polysics album title - "Oh No! It's Heavy Polysick!" so I really hope I can afford to pick that up soon.

Sapporo Food: Cheese Cheese

2011-03-08T21:03:00.001+09:00

Cheese Cheese, located on the ground floor of the somewhat unbalanced Norbesa Building in Odori, does not (luckily or unluckily) serve only cheese. It is instead a good Italian restaurant. I suppose that cheese is an integral part of Italian cuisine, and is pretty alien to Japanese cooking so emphasizing the presence of cheese in the name of the store is probably justified. Still, it's not that cheesy.

I've been to Cheese Cheese a few times now, and I really like it. Not just because it does Italian food that's a sight more satisfying that most Italian restaurants in Japan, but because they seem to have a nicely showy approach to serving some of their dishes that makes things look all the more delicious. The salad we ordered was mixed and spun in a massive bowl-within-a-bowl thing, and then we were given a choice of cheeses and told to say when. We left that girl grating for a pre-tty long time.

They mix some of their cheese-based dishes inside a massive, hollowed out cheese for maximum cheesiness, and when the dude ground our pepper, he did so in a somewhat scatter-shot way. Plus they give you coloured pencils and a big white paper place mat that you're encouraged to draw on (hints of our work can be spotted throughout these pictures). That's just plain fun.

That pasta was delicious, and I can't resist ordering a pizza when I go there because decent pizzas are a thing to be cherished in Japan. I think the chef won some international pizza competition - anyway, good pizza. Of course with a somewhat Japanese bent, but then... this is Japan.

So I like the place and I recommend it. It's in Norbesa, which has a bloody great ferris wheel on top so you can't miss it, and I've marked it on my map too. Speaking of pizza though, just a quick shout to say a while back I finally thoroughly enjoyed a delivery pizza in Japan. It was from Pizza-La, and after unsatisfactory orders from every other chain I can think of, I'm gonna stick with them from now on.

Moments from Opera (1987)

2011-03-04T21:43:00.000+09:00

Sapporo Food: Grabstri

2011-02-12T16:13:00.000+09:00

Oh boy, pretty soon every trendy, somewhat bohemian bar and restaurant in Sapporo is going to be owned by the Meer Lounge dude. I wonder if he could be described as 'shadowy'? That would be cool. Hot on the heels of World Japanese Foodin' EN, that I blogged about last year, January saw the interestingly monikered Grabstri open in Kita 24 Jyo.

I'm really not trying to plug this little chain of bars too much, honestly. I was in Kita 24 Jyo and picked up a flyer for the place, then didn't know it had anything to do with Meer Lounge or EN until we went there and saw the menu. The flyer, by the way, features their slogan - "Let's Tacos", which I would hope a lot of people will find grating (the common "Let's [NOUN]" construction of Japanese ad copy tends to grate on most native English speakers) but for me just shows how inured I've become, in that it didn't bug me that much. Also I kinda fancied Tacos, which really aren't common in Japan.

Well, turns out that much like EN, Grabstri offers a contemporary Japanese take on the dish. All the food we had was great, and I'd certainly recommend the place, but I don't think their tacos are all that taco-like in anything other than basic construction. Then, I'm English! What the hell do I know about Mexican food? Only Americans know about Mexican food. Eh, Mexicans too probably.

Grabstri is a smaller, more humble looking place than EN (though it shares a few quirks of decor), less of a restaurant, more of a bar with food, but they had a pretty big menu to choose from. The tacos (soft or deep fried) are the centre-piece, but we also had these deep fried shrimp cakes that were just incredible.

It's located really centrally to Kita 24 Jyo, about a minute from the North exit of the subway, and I've marked it on the map too! Good food, perfectly good beer and a nice feel to the place, so go check it out.

Moments from Inferno (1980)

2011-02-11T22:07:00.002+09:00

Japanese Music: Shinsei Kamatte-chan

2011-02-07T18:16:00.001+09:00

This is what you miss out on, not having Tower Records in the rest of the world any more, suckers! I went to Tower Records in Sapporo, I forget what I went for, but I was wandering around listening to pretty much everything that looked interesting and there was a pretty big display for the two new albums from Shinsei Kamatte-chan. I had no idea who that was (despite them getting an assload of press last year, I don't keep up with everything, though I've been working on feeds and readers to make keeping up with anything easier recently) but they had albums by Midori on the same display, who were great but split up recently, so I gave them a listen. And then I bought both of their new albums

I cannot remember the last time I've been sold, so completely after the first few tracks of an album. It turned out I was listening to Tsumanne ("Boring"), their major label debut, but that they'd also released an album on their original indie label on the same day at the end of 2010. TWO ALBUMS ON THE SAME DAY? It's been done many times before, but let me tell you I cannot help but eat that shit right up. It hits my 'artistic follies' sweet spot just 'so'. Also it brings their total for 2010 to three albums and a separate single, which is a more than respectable output.

Another awesome, ridiculous thing they do is hidden tracks. Their debut has an unlisted track, their single (which is two tracks, one being an instrumental of the other) has more music stuck on the end of the second track after a silent gap. Best of all 'Tsumanne' has an unlisted track that's actually THREE more songs put into one twelve-minute track. It's so stupid, but it's so great.

A lot of people seem to like to flail around trying to describe Shinsei Kamatte-chan's music, and if that's good enough for everyone else, well... anyway. They're a noisy, messy, arty, avante-ish punk pop band, with good tunes and a chaotic approach to... pretty much everything it seems. They've got a massive youth following from live-streaming, uploading shitloads of videos and generally working the internet for all they're worth. And the videos often seem to be entirely different mixes of the songs to the ones they end up releasing (like the one at the top there). The frontman doesn't give interviews, and a lot of their songs pitch-shift his vocals so much that I really did assume that they had a female singer too at first.

Wow, this sounds like an utter puff-piece so far. But, I mean, they're not the best thing ever in the world. Just calling their albums 'Tsumanne' ("Boring") and 'Minna Shine' ("Everyone Fuck Off And Die" as jrawk.com wonderfully translated it) makes me want to not like them, even though it's almost important to have somebody taking that approach to things. I can see why their first album, 'Tomodachi Koroshite Made' was so popular: it's catchy and aggressive and crazy and fun. But when they lean on the piano for songs it makes me think of Midori - but less-so (the single is probably the worst offender for that I suppose). I think it's a good album, so's their other indie record 'Minna Shine', but I don't love either of those records.

I fucking LOVE 'Tsumanne'. For me, musically it's like a quantum leap forwards. It sounds like nothing else, despite bringing to mind a load of music I like. There's still shreds of that simple, snotty punk sound, bits of Midori, but it's drunk, woozy, smothered with deranged, over-chorused vocals and stranger melodies than before. Oh, ok, when I first put it on and was blown away I thought - Holy shit, it's the punk-rock Yapoos I've been waiting for. And now, jrawk says (in the review linked above) that they've been hanging around with Togawa Jun of Yapoos? Makes perfect fucking sense. Then, the best thing is that in the end after living with it - it doesn't sound like Yapoos. It's entirely its own thing, but it has that same, weirdly other-worldy vibe to it. Maybe it ate a bunch of Yapoos vinyl before it turned up to the party, I don't know, but I do love it.

And for all I know whatever they do next will be completely different and that will be awesome too. They're a great fucking band and I think I've been paying too much attention to pop music recently. Time to pick up another free zine and check out every band in it again I guess. Also, check out all the albums on jrawk's best of 2010.

Sapporo Food: Daruma Jingisukan

2011-01-07T15:39:00.001+09:00

I was um-ing and ah-ing for a while over the best way to write jingisukan in roma-ji, and I'm delighted that my straight phoneticization of it is the same way that wikipedia went. Since wikipedia is never wrong, I think I'm probably on safe ground.

So yes, I've probably mentioned it before: jingisukan is basically mutton barbecue (named after Genghis Khan, of course), cooked on a dome-shaped hotplate and accompanied with a special jingisukan sauce that's a little different everywhere. It's a local speciality in Hokkaido, and - as meat seared on hot metal is wont to be - it's generally delicious.

Daruma's jingisukan is especially delicious.

Daruma has three stores around Susukino and is, I think, one of the more famous jingisukan restaurants. The meat is good, the sauce is delicious and it's really worth going if you like meat and/or smoke.

Because the Daruma that I've been to twice (the one I'm going to mark on the map - not the original store but one nearby) is one smoky-ass place. There are so many burnt sheep particles floating around above your head as you eat that - under the same probability laws that say a million monkeys bashing away on typewriters will eventually write the complete works of Shakespeare - eventually the billions of sheep atoms in the air there will spontaneously align in such a way as to recreate a whole sheep. Seriously, if you're going then be ready to throw your clothes in the wash straight after. Or invest heavily in Febreze.

After we went there we ended up in some shops, then karaoke and all the while leaving this miasma of burnt sheep everywhere we went. It's a small store - just one bar, no tables - and it's been packed and full of people waiting to eat both times I've been. I think their extractor fans do their best but they just can't keep up.

Doesn't help that apparently lamb is a stinky, smoky meat to cook.

But all that's really by the by because it's a great place.

I always love places with menus that don't mess around (witness Hamburger Risa's entire menu: Hamburger) and this place has jingisukan... and then side dishes such as rice and kimchee. And that's it. Their kimchee was very good too, but not exactly the point. You can also get those great dai-jockey beers (as illustrated above) that are about the size of your head. In that photo everything looks pretty small, but it's really not, it's just that the beers are comically large.

It's famous for good reason, it's the best jingisukan I've had and I've stuck at least one of their stores on my map so off you go. Go stink of dead sheep like I did.

Sapporo Cafes: Cafe Morihiko & Wallpaper City Guide - Sapporo

2011-01-05T19:45:00.000+09:00

Well, a very happy new year to all of you. I trust you have had a healthy and profitable holiday season? Everyone? Wonderful.

Cafe Morihiko is a wonderful looking place. A beautiful, old-fashioned house converted into a cosy, intimate coffee shop; I'd strongly recommend it to those who like to hunt down good coffee, or who like almost meditatively beautiful little cafes.

No photos of the inside I'm afraid - I just didn't think I could do it justice. It's so snug and enclosed and partitioned into little areas that it wouldn't look right in my amateur photos. It's really something though, and while the assorted fancy bric-a-brac might be a touch too much (a stack of old books and an antique sewing machine in the middle of our large table for example) it's nothing you can criticise considering how comfortable the place feels.

It was busy too, and we had no choice of where to sit when we arrived. Then again, it is a very small place and even though it's split over two floors I doubt they have many seats at all. We shared a large table with the aforementioned sewing machine and a guy who seemed to be working on some kind of complex diagrams, which should give you a clue about the kind of clientele the place attracts.

As you can probably guess if you check their website, they take coffee very seriously too. I had a good rich number which was really delicious. It should go without saying that it's an expensive place, but really it's about par for the course for this kind of place - 500yen and up for a cup of coffee. Their cake cabinet looked bloody delicious too, it's a shame I wasn't in the mood for any.

Morihiko might be a little off the beaten path for some since it's in Maruyama, but if you're around there or fancy the trip it's the kind of place that guidebooks might refer to as a 'gem'. Here it is on my map.

Speaking of guidebooks (oh, see what I did there? like a goddamn blogging ninja I am) the whole reason I found the place and went there on the way back from the shrine (this year's omikuji - kichi, a big step down from last years dai-kichi) was that I found it in this little Christmas present from my Dad:

That's the kind of guidebook that booksellers might refer to as a 'gem'. The Wallpaper City Guide for Sapporo was published very recently, and while it is far (far!) from an exhaustive guide to the city it's a great list of some of the lesser known, cooler areas and nicer shops.

I don't think the Wallpaper guides are aimed at the casual, budget traveller, you know? This book is full of high-end design shops, restaurants that only serve five customers a night and cafes that are also art galleries. However it is also full of the kind of cool, fun, friendly, awesome places that are never normally mentioned in guidebooks.

It certainly won't tell you everything you need to know about Sapporo, but it's a very classy little book, well written and very heavy on the super-stylish photos that make everywhere look awesome and like a place that you want to visit. Also, since it pretty much eschews most of the big places and the chains it's well worth picking up by people who live here. It made me a little smug to find that I know a bunch of the places in here (and that I'd blogged about a few too) but it's also giving me a lot of other great-looking places to check out in the future.

Most of which I will probably blog about in turn, which is how the world works. Don't worry! I'll give credit!

Good Grief Next Thing You Know I'm Going To Do One Of Those 'Best Albums Of 2010' Posts

2010-12-24T19:25:00.002+09:00

This is my 'Best Albums of 2010' post.

TOP 13!

That's right! My lucky number's up, y'all. Now, then, in no particular order, and with vids from youtube whenever I could.

Nina Nastasia - Outlaster - I cannot foresee a time when Nina Nastasia releases an album that isn't one of the best albums of the year. I just cannot believe how good it is. And by 'it', I mean everything she does. Her position as a cult artist is one of those things that makes me look around the world and wonder why the heck all these people are taking stupid pills. SERIOUSLY! PEOPLE! THEY'RE CALLED STUPID PILLS! They ain't gonna make you any smarter! Stop taking the damn things already.

Kimonos - Kimonos - I wasn't sure that I was going to like this, despite the fact that it's a side-project of Mukai Shutoku, leader of my favourite Japanese band Zazen Boys. It's really good though, a fun electro-pop album which sounds like a whole bunch of great 80s groups, and having Leo Imai sing most of the lyrics makes a nice contrast to Mukai's voice.

Sleigh Bells - Treats - It's just a button pushing riot, this album, and most of the time they're just hammering on the button marked 'rock'. It also has one of my favourite ever 'proper' versions of a demo, where 'Infinity Guitars' sounds pretty much identical to the demo until the end when they just TURN THE VOLUME UP AND ADD MORE GUITARS. YES.

Sufjan Stevens - The Age of Adz - I finally just stuck my neck out and decided that I really like Sufjan.

Kanye West - My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy - Almost every track on the album is over five minutes I think, and yet it never drags. How is that possible? Pop masterpiece. Also the GOOD Fridays stuff was really, really, really good too. Goddamnit, Kanye was so good this year! Except this new Christmas song... that's... mmm, okay.

Janelle Monae - The Archandroid - Holy wow, this is a great album. It would have been great without the sci-fi concept, but of course the sci-fi concept makes it even better. A sci-fi concept would make anything better.

Big Boi - Sir Luscious Leftfoot - I think possibly I like this album more than anything by Outkast that I ever heard. Not sure, but maybe. Maybe I need to listen to more Outkast. Almost certainly I do, but this is fantastic.

Tokyo Jihen - Sports - Again, a couple of so-so singles meant I wasn't sure I was going to dig this record. But the singles grew on me and it turns out that almost all the other tracks on the record were much better anyway.

Buffalo Daughter - Weapons of Math Destruction - Buffalo Daughter are still more advanced than you. However there are no videos of their new music on youtube.

Mass of The Fermenting Dregs - Zero Comma, Iro toridori no Sekai - It's like this keening, longing rock music that's both fighting and punching and staying detached from the fray at the same time.

Wovenhand - The Threshingfloor - I'm not sure what you thought life was like, but actually it's hard. A hard, cruel life, and the harvest this year is going to be even harder, and even more cruel and all the time a vengeful, cruel, hard God is breathing down your neck, and the only thing you can do is get right with God and somehow that makes a great album of hypnotic depth. I'm regretting not putting the last Wovenhand album on my end of year list last time.

Deftones - Diamond Eyes - Bills has been banging on about them for years. So I picked up the album, didn't like it after one listen and somehow ended up listening to nothing but for like two weeks now. Actually it does that same brutal physicality + dreamlike transcendence that Mass of The Fermenting Dregs do, except while sounding completely different. And like I said, it doesn't sound like the Cure, it sounds like Tears for Fears, but metal, and that's excellent.

El-P - Weareallgoingtoburninhellmegamixxx3 - I spent a while hunting for this earlier this year, and then found only recently that I could pay to download it from the DefJux website. Which of course, would be the easiest option. In a way I wasn't sure I should put it in here because on first listen it just made me hanker for a vocal album, not just an instrumental one. Then I realised that it's still one of the best albums of the year, so.

Honourable Mentions

Albums that each had three amazing songs on them, but sadly that isn't enough to get in the hallowed top 13:

Kele - The Boxer

My Chemical Romance - Danger Days

EGO WRAPPIN' - Naimononedari no Dead Heat

Stuff that isn't albums but then why should that matter in this, the world of the future?

Ash - The A-Z series - It was released on CD too, but I'm pretty sure it worked better as a track by track thing. Many, many great songs, and so fun to get a new one every two weeks.

Kanye West - GOOD Fridays - That was some good shit to be giving away for free every week.

Perfume - Fushizen Na Girl / Voice / Nee - All three singles from Perfume this year were amazing, all three were from commercials and none of them are on an album yet. That'll probably be one of the best albums of next year I reckon.

There you go! Good year for music! More good music next year please, thank you, good night!

Sometimes I listen to music. Japanese music!

2010-12-06T17:48:00.000+09:00

Sometimes I listen to music, and sometimes I write about that experience. This will be one of those times. You have been warned.

It being December and all I'm starting to think about 'Best Albums of the Year' which always depresses me. Not because there are no good albums mind you, but because I can never remember when albums come out. Who really can? How can you judge an album that you've lived with for ten months in the same way as an album that has only just come out? Ah, but I'll end up doing it anyway, you'll see. For now though - recent listening. Oh, and I'll make it about recent Japanese music shall I? Yes I shall.

I am, as they say, 'in the bag' for Mukai Shutoku - the brains behind Japanese indie royalty Number Girl and (for my money the best band in Japan right now) Zazen Boys. But I wasn't totally sold when I saw he was doing a more electronic two man side-project with Leo Imai, a Japanese-Swedish singer. I needn't have worried. Kimonos first album is a really solid, enjoyable electro-pop album with roots in a lot of great 80s synth-pop. There are elements of Zazen Boys' recent, more spacey stuff, but mostly Kimonos are doing their own thing, and I've got to admit I kinda like Leo Imai's voice. It certainly works well having his voice and Mukai's higher, more neurotic voice together on some of the songs.

Also, geek point here, although it's Mukai playing drums in the video there it's actually the dude from Deerhoof playing them on the record. Then, I think that's the only song with live drums on the record, so he's not really a major part of it.

The new Perfume song is pretty awesome. Yeesh, there's a lot of crap in the charts at the moment and Perfume are one of the few groups that keep me sane when I (as I repeatedly do) sit down to immerse myself in the various top 40s. I think the last three singles from Perfume have been separate from their last album, Triangle, and they've all been terrific. Also, they may all have been used in commercials, make of that what you will.

A friend lent me the 1997 Denki Groove album A, which is the first time I've properly sat down to listen to that Japanese electro institution. It's a helluva fun album, kind of oddball and off the wall without being annoying, and it's a pretty good mish-mash of every electronic-type genre you can think of from that deliberately tooth-achey loved up stuff above, to more ambient tracks, to more hammering, shouting tracks. They're a pop band, basically, which is why they're so popular I suppose! And why Pierre Taki is on the Febreze commercials in Japan.

I was also listening to a bunch of Monobright stuff, coz they're pretty awesome. The new album is much like the second one - the singles are by far the stand-out tracks but the rest of the album is fun too. No good videos on youtube though, hence, nothing to accompany this paragraph. Hum something to yourself, doesn't have to be Monobright because chances are you don't know who they are. The guy from Beat Crusaders joined them now too! What the hell's going on with that?

Other than that, the march of the '48 Series' continues - soon there will be nothing in the chart but Johnny's boy-bands and AKB48 affiliated girl-groups. Seriously, it's getting to the point when I cheer to see someone like AAA having a top ten single because they aren't Johnny's or AKB. I don't know where my priorities lie anymore. I'm all turned around, and better go lie down if I want to come up with a Western music counterpart to this post anytime soon.

Sapporo Food: World Japanese Foodin' [En]

2010-11-11T23:37:00.000+09:00

Again, on the way to somewhere else entirely we found somewhere new!

Apparently World Japanese Foodin' [En] (I mean, possibly just 'En' would suffice, but then on the menus it's just World Japanese Foodin' with no sign of the 'En', so...) has only been open for a few months, so perhaps it's still finding its feet. That said, if it is, it's doing a damn good job of it. It's a stylish, fancy bar-restaurant place that's a little pricey (though not too bad at all, especially for the quality we got), and done up in a so-trendy modernly minimal retro style. You'll know what I mean when you see it. Or perhaps you won't.

Look at that craziness, and up there in the background is a private room that can hold more than 20 people and can be separated from the rest of the restaurant.

It's owned by the same people that own Meer Lounge, which is a great little subterranean bar in Tanuki Koji, but it's not just an above-ground, more restaurant-y version of Meer Lounge. I've eaten at Meer Lounge a few times, and it's good but nothing to write home about - it's more of a bar than somewhere to eat. The food at En on the other hand was really fucking good.

It's still mostly medium sized, sharable, izakaya style food, but - wow. We left thoroughly satisfied. The California Dragon Roll was amazing, seriously, and I'm no great fan of American-style sushi. We also got some raw spring rolls with smoked salmon off the specials menu - that were great, a big caesar salad - that was great and a Japanese-style pizza - that was great. It was, basically, all great.

Please note that is was Japanese-style pizza though, and I know a lot of Western people get all out-of-joint about pizza in Japan. I'm not comparing this to pizza you can get in the US or Europe, but at least at En they make the point of calling it "Japanese pizza" on the menu, so you know what you're going to be getting. I liked it anyway.

It was all good, the beer was good, the staff were super-friendly and I can basically recommend the place whole-heartedly as a great place to eat out in Odori. It's just a little to the West of the main drag and, going by my experience, so worth a visit. Is it on my map? Why of course it is.

Moments from House (1977)

2010-11-09T10:10:00.002+09:00

Sapporo Food: Jacksonville

2010-11-08T17:01:00.000+09:00

Well I'm kinda late to the party on this one. After it gets shout outs on the Hokkaido Insider mailing list (twice!), in that lovely What's On In Sapporo newsletter and in Sapporo Source last year, I thought - y'know, I probably should write about the hamburger shop Jacksonville. Hell, it even got an article in the Southern Oregon Mail Tribune! All that, plus I go there pretty damn regularly already.

Now, as to why I haven't blogged about Jacksonville, a damn fine hamburger joint not ten blocks from my apartment, before - well, it's down to stupid self consciousness. I go there pretty regularly, the owner knows my face and I chat with him, so for me to whip out my camera and start taking bloody pictures of his food (something I feel I have to do if I'm going to talk about a place) seems... well a) awkward and b) bloggerish in a way that I find irritating. I like writing about things, and I like having a blog, but I'm also a big fan of not writing about things and not having a blog and just sitting back and enjoying things. Letting the moment pass unrecorded for the pointless posterity of the internet. One polaroid a day and all that. I wonder to what extent that feeling was stoked up by the guy from Hamburger RISA who told me it pisses him off when people take pictures of the burgers before they eat them.

All this by they way - nothing to do with Jacksonville, and separate entirely from those people (like my sister) who, for reasons of art or possibly insanity, take pictures of every single meal they eat. She's gonna have a helluva photo album one day.

SO ANYWAY! Most people I talk to who know places in Sapporo, now seem to know Jacksonville, which is awesome, and so I thought: "just take a picture of the burger before you enjoy it for once and write about it and then maybe more people will go." So I did:

The first time I went to Jacksonville I think I liked it, but I wasn't blown away. There could be, of course, a million reasons for this and I'm not a hundred percent sure why that was, but every time thereafter I've been thoroughly impressed with the burgers there. Good bread, good meat, good toppings... just great burgers. At the moment I'm digging the American Teriyaki Burger (teriyaki sauce and pineapple), but I try the monthly special every time (except this month which is mushrooms, which... nah...) and they're always fantastic. He does good homemade coleslaw, and good onion rings, and while the fries are the very thin, very crispy kind, I think this means they don't distract from the burger as much as they do at other places. They're good too, by the way.

It has a nice atmosphere (I really appreciated them playing Back To The Future 3 on the big TV when I had lunch there once), great food, it's not too expensive, and the guy that owns the place is incredibly friendly and speaks excellent English. It comes fully recommended, and while I can't call it my favourite burger place in Sapporo (because that's a very difficult question to answer), if you like burgers and live in Sapporo, you really have to go there.

I mark it on the map: thus. And hope that you will go and eat hamburgers there. And after this, who knows I might write about the Soup Curry and Chinese places that I go to all the time near my house too.

Sapporo Food: Ease Cafe

2010-11-04T13:33:00.003+09:00

Ease Cafe stuck in my head with some strange, delayed-reaction device attached to it. About ten minutes after it was suggested that we go there, and after I'd said 'yeah, sure, anywhere's good' it suddenly clicked that I knew the place, that I'd gone past it a bunch of times and noted - oooh, looks like a cozy cafe. Shame it's not exactly central.

There is however, a very good reason for its location - in that the place is on the ground floor of what looks like a ruddy great student dorm. I don't get the impression that it's exclusively the stomping ground of students, but I'm guessing they more than help the place stay afloat.

Inside it's relaxing and welcoming in that... kinda stock contemporary-rustic feel kinda way. That sounds both damning and snooty, but it's meant as neither - just saying that there is a style that a lot of small independent cafes kinda go for. That style of decor and atmosphere works really well for the most part, and is certainly infinitely preferable to the place we ended up in last week which... I mean I didn't write about it for a reason. Yuki's comment was that she didn't know what part of the place she would change first, since absolutely everything was horrible. Ease Cafe isn't like that at all, everything is great, the interior is perfectly executed and since the only thing I'd change would be the lounge covers of punk and new wave songs they were playing, and which I'm sick of, I guess I wouldn't really change anything at all.

They look to have won some kinda local coffee award, which made me regret not ordering something fancy. The blend coffee I got with my meal was fine, but nothing special. I think they build up to special. That said, it's worth bearing in mind that the coffee at almost any independent shop is better than anything you'll get at any of the standard chain shops, and this was no exception. We both got chicken something, which was their recommended dish and which was pretty great.

It's rice and chicken and someother stuff mixed up with some cheese and demi-glace sauce and was perfect for the miserable rainy weather we were escaping from. It looks like they're awfully proud of their range of pancakes, so I'd say you really ought to try those if you go. I would've loved to but I was kinda full.

Ease Cafe is thoroughly recommended as another preferable alternative to all those chain stores. It's a little far North of the city centre, but you should go there if you're in the neighbourhood. It's on the map, so you can do just that.

Moments from Suspiria (1977)

2010-11-02T22:40:00.002+09:00

Gourmet Delicacies of the Far East: Pepsi Mont Blanc

2010-11-01T15:46:00.000+09:00

Y'know in some ways I think Japan has turned me into a real foodie, a gourmand, an aesthete of the palate - a connoisseur of farcial flavours. I mean, you get Kit-Kats coming out in everything from "tea" to "glitter cherry-blossom" and how can I possibly resist when I see shit like that? When they go dipping random corn and potato snacks in chilli and then in chocolate - I mean, I think it'll tast foul but there's just a chance that they'll blow my mind!

I'm always delighted to see what the lunatics of Pepsi come up with too. This season we have:

Pepsi Mont Blanc! Mont Blanc, for those poor, ingnorant heathens who are still just tearing open paper sticks of sugar and pouring them down their throats in search of sugar, is a French dessert which has a wikipedia page that I just linked to. It is, as they say on wikipedia, very famous and popular in Japan, which makes this somewhat less bizarre than it might first seem to Western readers.

Review: it really does taste kinda like Mont Blanc - i.e. a kind of sugary chestnut confection. Mixed with the bitter acid burn of a soft drink of course. I don't find it as refreshingly strange as Pepsi Shiso, but it's probably better than the Pepsi Azuki that came out after that. In fact, I'd say this is a perfectly servicable soft drink that, if I bought more soft drinks, I'd probably try out from time to time.

As it is, I still derive childish satisfaction from drinking melon soda and feeling like I'm drinking radioactive goop that's gonna give me super-powers. Still, thanks for brightening up my shopping trip, Pepsi!

Suburban Sapporo Food: Halsanchi

2010-10-18T18:05:00.000+09:00

This one probably won't be of much use to anyone, but it was a nice place and it seemed worth mentioning because, who knows - maybe there are English speaking residents of Shin-Kotoni that don't know about the place!

Shin-Kotoni being a suburb up North from Kotoni itself, about half an hour from the centre of Sapporo and on precisely no-one's list of 'must see places' in Sapporo. Nevertheless it's not a million miles away from where I'm sitting right now and so, driving back from someplace or other, hankering for nasi-goreng, we went to Halsanchi.

Halsanchi is a nicely shabby (I trust that isn't an oxymoron to anyone) bar/restaurant that looks to have been named for the owner's dog, Hal. The name is a compression of Hal-san's House, and there were dog pictures and knick-knacks all over the place, along with a zillion other pieces of decor that looked to have accumulated on the walls with minimal consideration given to design. There's a hand-painted portrait of Hal on the wall and, sadly it dates from 2000. I'm no good with dog years, but I'm thinking that if he was full-grown in 2000, Hal probably ain't with us anymore. It's sad, but the restaurant is a nice memorial for him.

I would recommend Halsanchi to people who like home cooked food from practically any country in the whole damn world. Their slogan is something about food from many different countries and they aren't kidding. Chinese, Italian, Mexican, Turkish, Vietnamese, Indonesian... a whole bunch of national adjectives from all over the world basically. Hell they even had fish and chips. For the most part it's the famous dishes that they serve, but the sheer variety of the menu made me want to make multiple repeat trips just to see, for example, what their pizzas were like.

We had a Thai chicken soup thing, that nasi-goreng we'd been craving, some kind of Korean chijimi and fried chicken done in the style of some Asian country or another (I think it might have been Thai again). It was all good, satisfying food, done in a simple home-cooked style. Everything was made by the incredibly harassed-looking Master who was running the entire place single-handedly when we arrived. Oh! I just remembered they had carrot cake too! Carrot cake! The first time I think I've ever seen it in Japan, although to be honest, it wasn't much like any carrot cake I know. It was, however orange, and that must count for something.

I'll mark it on the map, and I'm curious to see where it actually falls - y'know geographically. I don't reckon many people will be making the trip out there, but I liked it, and I'll be going again.

Trends in Japanese Beer Commercials

2010-10-12T21:53:00.004+09:00

I, like probably ninety seven percent of the heterosexual male population of Japan, kind of dig Dan Rei in those Suntory Kin-Mugi commercials.

(Rough translation: she's running, running, RUNNING through the park to tell you something, but when she reaches you she forgets what she was going to say.)

At first I thought I liked them because it was a beer commercial and she was actually acting drunk. I mean, that should be a no brainer - it's gotta play a pretty big part in motivating people to drink beer - but it's incredibly rare to see anyone actually acting believably drunk in any kind of alcohol advertising. From acting tipsy it's a slippery slope to vomiting and vehicular manslaughter I guess.

(An aside now to point out that Kin-Mugi isn't even, actually beer, but happoshu, something that wikipedia describes, mouthwateringly, as a "tax bracket of japanese liquor", and a "beer like beverage." It's cheaper than beer, that's for sure, but my main feeling whenever I'm drinking happoshu is: man, I could really do with a beer. I tried to like Kin-Mugi, for both Dan Rei and my wallet, but... no dice.)

Then of course, I realised it was because she was drunk and talking directly to the camera as if you (the viewer) are her boyfriend. Or date. Or at least some dude she's willing to flirt with in the park. Of course this isn't new, but I do think that the fun, light, and... somewhat inebriated tone of the Suntory Kin-Mugi CMs is pretty eye-catching and, in a way, unique.

That is, until Asahi noticed how succesful the commercials were and got smart to advertise their new happoshu, Kutsurogi-Jikomi <4VG>:

(Rough translation: "Want a kutsurogi?" Short and to the point I suppose.)

What was it that Bill Hicks said about gum ads? If you want, you can check out the accompanying Asahi website too, and pretend that you're actually in that appartment... ah... I mean your appartment, with Kitagawa Keiko. I warn you though, there are no pictures of you, only her, which is kind of vain when you think about it.

Really though, the top rated youtube comment on that advert says it all. I'd translate it for you but I don't want to be needlessly crude and... it's pretty much stating the obvious.

Sapporo Food: Cous Cous

2010-10-11T11:28:00.000+09:00

Well this is how it went: we were going to go to a restaurant recommended by a friend of hers, that was meant to have really great nasi goreng. But when we got there we didn't really like the look of the place, plus there was no nasi goreng evident on the menu stuck to the wall. So we thought, well lets go to Stanley Market, the popular pan-Asian place near here (we don't talk like that, this is just an efficient summary of events, with added colour, for spice). But Stanley Market is popular, so when we got there they could only seat us at this tiny, tiny table and the smoke was so thick that it positively stung the eyes, so we thought: fuck it, let's just go somewhere we always go, and left.

But on the way there, in the drizzle we spotted a couple of weird restaurant things wedged down an improbably narrow alley, so we went to one of those instead and it was really, really good.

Cous Cous is in Odori, South 2, West 5, hidden down a dark alley and yes, they serve cous cous. That might not sound so exciting, but really - the dearth of cous cous in Japan has been a constant puzzlement to me. What!? They have rice so they don't need cous cous? Well, y'know, blasphemous as it may be I prefer cous cous, lovely little cloud dust that it is.

The place was great, small and welcoming and intimate, and while we had to wait a while for our food, I can imagine that's because they're making everything back there to order, in a pretty cramped little kitchen so I didn't begrudge it for a moment. Plus they had this great Shel Silverstein book to read while we were waiting, and when the food came (we shared the above lamb curry and cous cous, a sea food chijimi - korean pancake - and great tuna & avocado maki sushi) it was all delicious, satisfying and unpretentious. Which is kinda what I look for in a restaurant.

Pretty cheap too, so if you're downtown and don't mind a little searchin' I recommend the place. My map might (no promises) help.

Sapporo Short Fest 2010

2010-10-10T21:25:00.001+09:00

"In Dome!" As they like to say here from time to time.

Yet again I was trying to remember that Sapporo Short Film Festival was on its way, but utterly forgot about it 'til the whole thing had started. Ah well, I'm kinda sick and exhausted and so-on this year, so I might have to settle for the one selection I saw last night. It was a pretty strong one, and unlike previous years there was nothing that made me think - God I wish this guy hadn't decided to make a short film, but since he did, couldn't he have made it a little... shorter?

But that dome! Yeah, check it out:

This year's main program is going on in that white geodesic business there in front of the TV tower. I was, let's say sceptical. A big, big part of my enjoyment of going out to watch a movie is the actual ambience of a cinema building, and I've gotta say while the dome setting certainly didn't suck... it wasn't as good as previous years which were mostly in the TOHO Plaza in Tanuki Koji. Then again, how often do you get to watch movies in a screen that has actual trees growing inside?

The sound was great, and though the picture wasn't from time to time, some of that might be down to the problems with film quality that I assume comes along with some of the submissions they recieve. I really don't know what made them use the dome, perhaps they couldn't use the TOHO Plaza and this was their best option (I'm pretty sure it's the same thing they use for the Jazz Festival). So, I don't want to be too harsh, but... I was kinda looking forward to being in a cinema. That's just me being pouty though. It wasn't too cold, or too uncomfortable or anything, and the selection of six films, while being bookended by pieces I didn't much care for, was really pretty strong.

I would guess that when you set about making a short film, a short, comedy thing with an obvious punchline would probably be the most reliably... pull off-able. And certainly the most crowd pleasing. So I feel a little guilty that I thought the two best films in the selection I saw were the two short, sweet, comedy ones.

That was 'Born and Raised' directed by Eelko Ferwerda, which was great, probably especially for music makers, and the other was 'True Beauty This Night', directed by Peter Besson:

Two trailers there of course because, since they're short flicks putting them on youtube, while tempting, would be like... Well actually I don't know what it would be like. The world of short films is a fascinating enigma to me. I presume none of the festival fare kinda movies end up on the big video sites like youtube because the directors don't want to give their work away entirely for free, and thus cheapen it or whatever. Plus there is a trade for short movies that... I mean I have no idea about that either though, but there's a short film market going on to coincide with the festival, so I guess people are buying and selling them, but I have no clue where they end up. It doesn't seem to me that there are vast, unwashed mobs clamouring for the latest 5 minute Norwegian thought-provoker, and yet put one of these movies on youtube and it would reach a far, far (far) greater audience. But then, it would just feel like a five minute diversion and not... a 'film'. I really can't be bothered to think my way out of this little intersection of ideas, but I'm almost curious enough to do some research and find out what the short film world thinks about their future.

I have spent even longer ruminating on video art, believe me, and I'm pretty sure I'm never gonna make any.

Anyway! Sapporo Short Fest! Fun again, I wish I had the time and health to see more. But the Norwegian '2023' wasn't very good.

Sapporo Food: Shindofuji (organic vegetarian restaurant)

2010-08-25T14:25:00.000+09:00

Not only back, but attempting to use my blog for the power of... good? I swear someone slipped something undetectable into my juice this morning, either that or this festering, blighted summer is finally coming to an end.

I mean, the blogger software seems to be doing its best to actively discourage me from blogging (in entirely new ways!) but that's just like getting in touch with an old (not-too-bright) friend, and to be expected. Almost every online service I use seems to have seen some kind of overhaul recently, and to my jaded, well practiced fingers, every single one of them has become more difficult to use. Gotta hang in there and wait for my muscle memory to update so I can stop swearing at things I suppose.

Wait! A post about a fooderie in Sapporo! That's right, here's the place, or rather here is the blue sign marking the stairs down to it:

It's called Shindofuji （身土不二） and is hidden under the AU store just North of Sapporo Station (diagonally opposite Yodobashi Camera, very central). Miraculously, for a country in which the concept of vegetarianism is baffling to the majority of the population, it is not only a vegetarian restaurant, but an organic one too. I'd like to add something to the effect that it also serves macrobiotic, or microbiotic food, but I... really have no idea which one of those is correct, if it's even true, or what it would actually mean if it were true. Let's just stick to the facts I established when actually speaking to the nice women who work there.

Shindofuji was probably one of the first restaurants I went to after I moved to Japan - I just happened to be invited along with a group of people who were going there - but it took me a hell of a long time to find my way back, partly due to the opening hours. I'm not sure if it opens in the evening, but in the day it only opens for lunch, from 11am to 3pm, which means I've headed there a bunch of times only to find it closed.

The food is great, although I don't know how much that comes down to the fact that it tastes and feels so damn healthy. I almost always go there at lunch time, and get the lunch set with brown rice (Genmai Teishoku) which is essentially a fantastic bowl of brown rice, miso soup and a variety of small pickles, vegetable and tofu dishes. Man, I love that rice, really. They put some kind of crushed sesame or pepper or something on top... Oh boy.

Here, I blushingly (ah, such a terrible adverb for a guy to use) admit that I've sadly never taken a picture of the kind of food they serve down there. Either no camera, or I just wanted to eat, or just plain didn't want to look like a tourist there. So here, I supply a link to a Japanese food blog indexing thing, there's a bunch of photos if you click around links there: GO! Ah, someone on there says that it's macrobiotic, so there you go.

I like the simple, hearty (and very Japanese) flavours, but I don't think it'll satisfy people who don't usually have much time for vegetarian food. That said, I've only really tried the lunch set, and they have a whole menu with a veggie curry that my sister tried when she came, and a lot more besides. It's all bound to be pretty good, and healthy as hell. Plus, for real vegetarian places, you are certainly not spoiled for choice here, so it's worth checking out. I really like the place, and the people who work there are incredibly nice, so if I hear about any of you lot putting your feet up on the tables or causing a ruckus... there'll be trouble.

Also, y'know, it's macrobiotic apparently! Whatever that means.

It's going on the map of course, which is nice, because the only thing I've been able to do to my map recently was delete Half Dime from there because the place closed down. It was this crazy enormous sci-fi mining colony thing and we were driving past as they were pulling the whole thing down with bulldozers the other day! I almost cried.

Back in Blog / A Solution to the Case of the Non-Existent Centenarians

2010-08-24T18:15:00.002+09:00

Whuh? There's still a blog here you say and people occasionally stumble across it in (what I assume to be) their drunken, lurching quest for distraction on the internet? Shit, balls, expletives, I better start writing it again. Eight months off is probably enough.

PEOPLE! Have you heard about 'The Curious Case of the Non-Existent Centenarians'? I'm sure you have, my folks knew slightly more about it than I do when I spoke to them yesterday, including the juicy tidbit about the dude who was carrying his mother's bones around in his backpack. Aliens have abducted a significant number of the elderly in Japan!

Eh? Not abducted by aliens? Merely shuffled off this mortal coil undetected by local authorities, or had their passing covered up by their offspring due to social security fraud? Oh - well that's a lot more believable. Although rather shabby.

But fear not: Japan listens, observes and finds a way to make things better. Or rather appliance manufacturer Zojirushi does with the Mimamori Hot-Line range of hot water pots:

Some of you may not be following so well, in which case I direct you to the TV commercial on their website here. That too, I admit, is rather confusing, so let me break it down for you. The pot sends an email to a designated address when it's used, thus you know that your granny is still at least alive enough to make tea. In the advert the middle aged son at home checks his mail to find that his mother hasn't used the pot today. "Oh, she must have gone out," he sings (horribly) and of course she's come for a surprise visit, bringing his wife to attention because that whole Mother-in-Law thing is universal.

At work today someone also told me about a town in which these kind of human 'dead man's handles' are attached to TVs in elderly households, so if they don't push the button every day someone will come round and check on them. It's all remarkably smart, and while it doesn't solve Japan's elderly problem it certainly helps to have an idea of extactly how many of them there actually are...

Alex vs. JUNGLE LIFE February 2010

2010-02-15T16:56:00.004+09:00

Every now and then I think I'm gonna grow out of music. Like, I'm just going to suddenly not feel like finding out who's popular or who's any good anymore and then I'll just keep up on the bands I like and let the rest just wash over me. Hasn't happened yet though. While I've missed out on a zillion new bands from America and England I try to keep up with whatever new Japanese music is out there, and after watching a bunch of music shows over the weekend I was all geed up like "OK! That swas all shit!" (it was) But there's got to be lots more good stuff out there, right?

Thus: In a coffee shop on Sunday I picked up the February 2010 edition of JUNGLE LIFE a free indie music magazine (basically UK's The Fly in Japan, right down to the format).

And now, I'm going to go through every single band, listen to 'em write about 'em and give you a myspace link. To be perfectly honest my hopes are not high going into this, but I'm willing to be surprised and there is at least one band with cute girls, so there's always that. I'm limiting myself to bands with features or interviews, and I'm not gonna face the myriad albums that are reviewed at the back, for the sake of my own health. Consider this a State of Japanese Indie, Feb'10 bite-sized sampling. Here we go...

HY - HY are a big indie band. They had a Music Lovers showcase on TV the other day introduced by manzai rising stars (still rising? they had a shaky period but they're hanging in there) Audrey, and I've seen them promoting their new single and album on many TV shows. Of course, they suck. They suck... mightily. The kind of soft droning indie that is perfect for when you don't really want to listen to music, but you just want a few hooks which sound like other hooks that you used to like. Ugh. Their myspace puts them under rock/J-Pop/Hip-Hop and if they have anything that actually approaches hip-hop I will kill and eat the surviving members of Run DMC. They have some songs sung by their female pianist, and some sung by their male guitarist. That's as good as it gets. From the looks of things, all their album covers suck too.

STANCE PUNKS - Are a well established punk band, and they make that very authentic melodic punk that many bands make in Japan. I mean they do it well and listening to them now, if I had to make some kind of ranking of Japanese trad-punk bands, I'd put STANCE PUNKS pretty high on that list, but unless you're a huge punk fan... you don't need for there to be so goddamn many of them. Still, if you like punk music, like good old fashioned double kick drums and shouty vocals - check this lot out.

aobozu (藍坊主) - Up-tempo J-indie rock. Going by their myspace not too bad... and in fact might grow on me. When Chris came to stay with me (soooo long ago now!) he commented that he couldn't get into the vocals on a lot of Japanese bands because they were so studied and uninvolved, or sounded so to his ears. You could probably say that about this lot... but I kinda like them. On their myspace go for Gymnopedic - it loses me at the chorus, going for the key-change sky scraping chorus that is just massively over-used in Japanese pop music, but it sounds pretty good. On reflection this lot aren't great, but they've got something going on.

Flower Companyz - This lot have been going for twenty years! Their (possibly 2nd) Best Of... is coming out and they don't have a myspace, so I went by youtube. Fun pop-rock. Didn't bug me but didn't really grab me, middle of the road and kind of cheesy at times, but you can't really hate a band for that. Man, that makes it sound like I'm going through this trying to hate these bands, when in fact the opposite is true... sigh.

kariyushi58 - The first song of theirs I listened to was exactly the same as the last song by Flower Companyz that I listened to, which was a little surreal. Again, happy pop-rock with that faux-reggae beat that pretty much guarantees you a summer hit in Japan and goes down pretty well in the US too. We Brits don't get it because it only works on people who come from a place with real summers. Kariyushi58 are not very good. They sounds a little bit like Weezer at times.

Takeuchidenki 竹内電気 - Again, no myspace (which means that this project is already three times as hard as I thought it would be) so going by youtube. Again with the upbeat pop-indie. This lot are better than the last two though, but still have that energetic good-times vibe that doesn't sit well with the sour British disposition I'm saddled with. I kid, but it's a very American sound - these bands would do well over there. Takeuchi Denki clearly don't take themselves very seriously, which is always a good thing, and I kinda liked some of the songs. But not all of them. By any means.

My Way My Love - Oh wow, My Way My Love are one of those big indie-ish bands (in this case a kind of psych-punk, noisy as hell rock band) who I've never bothered checking out because I didn't get a good vibe offa what I knew about them. Turns out they're pretty good! In a good way. I'll check them out for real sometime! Looks like they've got an album out in the UK too...

The Back Horn - The Back Horn are a big deal rock band that I caught a little of at Rising Sun two years ago. Not terrible by any means, but the kind of professional stadium rock (Japanese style) that I'm not all that interested in. Check 'em out though, by all means.

Fact - Wow these guys got it going on in American and Japan already! English language lyrics and pretty typical American emo (mid-stage emo, that is). Super-professional, very accomplished, I'm sure they'll be huge. I hate it, but I'm happy to admit it's a personal thing and yr mileage may vary. When did Myspace start doing this thirty second sample length thing? I mean, it's perfect for what I'm doing today, but it would probably bug me if I actually wanted to, y'know, listen to music.

General Head Mountain - Chart friendly indie-rock from this lot. Their hearts are firmly stiched to their sleeves, their BPMs are cranked and they sound very earnest, if not all that interesting. Not a thumbs down, would have been good for a sixteen year-old me I reckon. Now, I'm old and cynical and I think they suck, but what do I know.

soulkids - Basically it's pretty easy to come off as sounding ok when you make that slightly angsty emo-ish radio rock. But to step up from there to being a really, really good band is really, really fucking hard. That's why I dismiss most radio-friendly rock out of hand, and it's only occasionally that I spot something that really chimes with me. This lot aren't bad at all. They're not up there with the best and I'm not sold, but they're one of the bands on this list worth checking out if you like kinda popular indie-rock.

Tokyo 60 Watts - Phew, after those last few fast, rocky bands it's a relief to find a more classy, mid-tempo indie-pop outfit. Nicely crafted songs, foot off the accelerator... that's better... ONLY JOKING! I don't like the sound of this lot much, but they do sound like they can take you on a hammond-driven rocket to a very nice dinner party. If that was where you wanted a rocket trip to. Seems like a waste of a rocket trip to me.

Good Dog Happy Men - I still think it's quite nice that there's a Japanese group named after a Bill Frisell album, but these guys (from their one track on myspace) sound like snivelling curs, rather than good dogs. See what I did there? I exaggerated to make the joke work! But really, they do suck. My least favourite band so far.

Taro Kobayashi - Wow again, much more 'rock' than I expected from a solo artist, but Myspace's 30 second clips pretty much stop me from forming much of an impression. His first "album" has four tracks... does that mean the tracks are really long? Or is it not really an album? Doesn't sound too bad, kinda big, catchy rock music... not what I'm looking for though.

Soul Junctions - They look like very nice boys, and they seem to be playing very nice jangly pop music.

Kinoco Hotel - Oh my god. At least they're girls. The sheer indie-boy-ness of the list so far was getting to me... And they're a retro-psych-pop outfit too. And wearing marching band uniform things? Frank Zappa on their friends list? Kinda awesome. The music's not too bad either, and since they're one of the few bands stepping outside of the indie-rock spectrum so far (in order to go back to the 60s admittedly) I'm going to give them a gold star. Check-them-out-why-don't-you-do-that-very-thing.

The Cokeheads - Oh God. What a horrible name (worth noting that there's also an ad for Cokehead Hipsters later in this very issue. What?! Japan! You don't even know what a cokehead is!). I like that it's sloppy, punkish indie without being the kind of trad-punk I was rambling about earlier. Possibly even worth checking out! And I like that they aren't limiting you to 30 second snippets (I realise now that it must be the band's choice, not myspace, sorry myspace). Adorably they still have "Tom" as their friend on myspace. Awww... Maybe they were too busy doing cocaine to change their friends list... I DON'T THINK.

Jina - Oh my God! Kula Shaker are up at the top of their friends list! Crispin Mills, you'll always have fans in Japan. Indie rock that isn't bad, but I don't feel compelled to write home about it. Perhaps you will feel differently.

DOES - Ah, back to the... 45 second clips this time. More radio friendly than the last two, in a way that I find predictably boring. I like their album cover, but their music gives me the "Mehs".

Spank Page - Spank Page's page in JUNGLE LIFE is a picture of some phone booths and a poetic message that I kinda liked. Their music is reverby indie-rock by the book, but one of the bands that I would slap a 'not-too-bad' sticker on, were they being stocked in my farcically judgmental record shop.

Half-Life - Indie-rock, again the heart-on-sleeve always reaching for the most dramatic, emotive button they can push. They have an '80s Version' of a song on myspace that sounds not at all 80s. Anthemic might be a good word to describe them, but I've already heard them three times already under different names on this list.

wash? - Fairly spacey, but not as spacey as you would think to look at them. I was expecting noisy, psychedelic-ish music, which you get a little, but not too much, to their credit. I mean, it's not too far into navel-gazing psychedelia - it is pretty noisy. I liked the slacker chant track and SLOWDANCE and you can listen to whole tracks on their myspace which I'm starting to love them for. If you know Japanese music, a bit like HiGE maybe? Maybe? I'm not sure. Final justice = GOOD AND GETTING BETTER WITH EVERY LISTEN.

Supe - Metal! Nu-ish, but not terribly so. Still - not my bag now. The vocalist has a perfect American accent, so I'm sure they travel well.

KiLLKiLLS - Emo-punk-metal thing for kids. They look about fourteen and sound pretty catchy to be honest, but... you know.

Haysay Josay 平成女性 - Another one of those bands that was irritating to track down, look 'em up with the kanji on youtube (this video is fun for the way the kick drum is so loud it makes the camera lose focus). I never know what to call this music - not primitivist, but really simple, untaught, rock by people who just decided to start a band without learning any instruments (I assume!). Sometimes I'm really in the mood for this and sometimes I'm not. I can't decide with this lot, but of course I like 'em a lot better than 90% of this list. Fun.

Andou Yumi - I'm a little thrown as to why Andou Yumi is in amongst this clutch of indie boys, she sounds very MOR... almost easy listening... Is there an anime connection? To be honest it was kind of a relief, even though it's not my thing at all. Oh wait... are we getting into the nods to pop and the mainstream now?

Okumura Kyoudai 奥村兄弟 - Oh my God it is the pop section! This is a band with two brothers who have to still be in school. The kind of thing that you can't criticize for fear of crushing children's dreams. The elementary school kid on the tea-box drum thing is pretty awesome though, and I assume they don't have a myspace because exposing kids like this to the depravity of myspace would be unthinkable.

Saru Da Concrete (猿ダコンクリート) - Yeah, I'm not sure how to romanize that one. Is it 'Monkey The Concrete'? Saruda? Is that a word? I was hoping for something a little weirder, but like Ogre You Asshole their names promises more than they actually deliver. Complex, sophisticated indie-rock to be sure, but the kind of thing that doesn't grab me so much. Worth a look perhaps. I'd put 'em in the same box as Sakanaction, but I like Sakanaction more.

The Royal Sweetest Embalming - Look at that name. Imagine what it takes to transpose that into Japanese phonics. Can you imagine what kind of music they make? No, it's not very subtle, but it's not as cheesy as I expected, which is something at least. Pop-rock like GLAY or L'Arc-en-Ciel but not as bad... probably. Did I mention that I shout at the TV every time L'Arc-en-Ciel come on recently? Christ, I hate them.

FLiP - I'm starting to think there's actually a reason that Japanese bands drop to lower-case for 'i's beyond a mere stylistic choice. It happens pretty often... does it mean something? A group of four girls making poppy alt-rock. Not bad, but again, not all that great. There's a touch of early Shiina Ringo in there that I like, but it's just a touch and it's the more traditional side of her rock music, rather than the magic that I love about her. So-so.

Wait... that was the last one? Obviously, there are harder things to do, like competing in the Moguls in the Winter Olympics, or wrestling a bear, but that did actually take longer than I thought. Then again, I did find an indie band I liked - wash? - and I did catch a few others - Kinoco Hotel, My Way My Love, The (shudder) Cokeheads, poooossibly Takeuchi Denki - that I'll keep an eye on.

And you read it! Didn't you?

Sapporo Cafes: Cafe Sahabi

2010-02-05T20:08:00.003+09:00

Ugh, I thought I wasn't going to write this thing anymore! Look, the whole place is so dirty I'm going to have to clean everything up before I actually get back to blogging. Or I can just pile the lot in the sink I guess...

Well y'know, don't blog because you have to, blog because you want to. Words to that effect.

I stumbled over Cafe Sahabi randomly one time, and have dragged a few people there for the coffee, the amazing donuts and the atmosphere. Here are two of those people:

Ignore them. Pleasant though they may be to look at, the cafe is the point. It's a retro-styled cave of pop-culture ephemera with the standard manga library, several cabinets worth of characters and action figures, heaps of CDs and even an old NES you can play. It's a little tricky to find I guess. I've marked it on the map, but it's inside the building on the ground floor, not actually facing onto the street. There's a sign outside with a camel on though, it should be easy to spot and it's well worth the trip if you don't mind spending a little more for your coffee and actually enjoying the experience. It's pretty central too, just a couple of blocks off Eki-mae Dori next to Tanuki Koji

And they make fresh donuts, really fucking good fresh donuts. Donuts that make you think - mmmm, Mister Donut donuts are just donuts. These are Donuts. They're really good.

Matt got some kind of paprika based rice-bowl dish which he said was good but small (which is par for the course at this kind of place). I myself have only tried the donuts and can, as above, recommend them thoroughly. The drinks are served in "Fire-King" mugs, which I guess must be something of a big deal since it's mentioned on the menu. I'm not sure if it makes the coffee taste better, but it certainly helps you caffeinate in style:

Mmmm, retro-tastic. So, if yer in Odori and want a coffee that isn't from a chain (frankly it goes without saying that the coffee here, while not spectacular, is better than any chain I can think of... could have done with a little more though) I really recommend this place. We stumbled in there after wandering around the Snow Festival in a -10 blizzard and it was a little bit like heaven.

It's 2010

2010-02-03T00:24:00.004+09:00

Whoa! Where am I? What day is it? Did I miss the last season of Lost? Who's the Prime Minister?

No, don't answer that last one. No matter at which point I wake up in the year I probably won't like the answer.

So hey! It's 2010 and what have I been doing? Working! Working and watching awesome movies like:

Crank: High Voltage that is, and District 9 which was exactly as good as everyone and their dog has been telling me. I've been listening to lots of music too, and more importantly working on some 'projects'. Mmm-hmmm, projects.

One of those projects, which I've been working on for about... eh, half and hour as of now is a tumblr (aka a minimi-blog!) that I'm just gonna dump links and stuff at, and we'll see if I post there far more often than I post here! We will see. Anyway it is:

The Suplex Index

And please to look, though there ain't much there yet.

I'll come back and post the stuff I should really post at some point too, but that'll hold the baying masses for now I dare say.

Happy New Year

2009-12-31T23:37:00.000+09:00

Ok, so first of all my New Year's Resolution this year is... to not write this blog daily!

Woo!

Yeah, so 568 posts in and over a year of daily posting (barring a couple of vacations) I think I've kind of proved... whatever it was I was trying to prove to myself. I'd rather use my brain for other, more creative things in 2010, so I'll just post here randomly, like any other sane blog and not fit one post every day like I have been doing. I promised Andy I'd do another post about Girls Aloud and I want to do one about the Kouhaku Utagassen, and I hope I can keep adding stuff to my Sapporo Map, so I'm certainly not done here completely. But output will be sporadic to say the least. If you've been reading while I spout off every single day then thanks a lot but it'd be better for me to spend some time writing more songs or maybe even finishing one of the many novels I've started.

Also, David Foster Wallace's Infinite Jest is a huge book, I really need some time to get cracking on that.

And I need to get a job.

Still, I'm very optimistic about this year. Why? Because of my omikuji.

That's me in the freezing wind and snow outside Hokkaido Shrine where I went on New Year's Day to draw omikuji - divination by lots (check out the wikipedia link there, it tells you all about it). You make a donation, take a piece of paper and it tells you how your future is going to be. For the last two years on New Year's Day I drew Shou-Kichi - small blessing, which is probably the most common one. Nothing too bad, nothing great this year. This year though - Dai-Kichi - Great Blessing! That's as good as it gets. It comes with a lot of reminders to give of myself, my wealth and my strength; to be aware when I am blessed - but it also has nothing but good messages about my future.

Using it even only as cognitive fuel I hope to have a great year, and I hope you will too.

Happy New Year!

The January Sales Breakdown

2009-12-30T23:49:00.000+09:00

So clearly the January sales didn't start on December 30th, again I am projecting my post back in time in order to give you filler that's all killer. Or something like that. How can I describe the January sales in Japan? With an image:

I think that what has happened there is that the tussle for sale goods was so violent that somebody punched a fucking mannequin in the face. Hard core. So what you need to know about the January sales in Japan is the following: that although January 1st is one of the most important holidays of the year, it's also fukubukuro (lucky bag) day and all the big shops, department stores and malls open to sell discount bags full of random goods; and that the sales proper start on January 2nd (along with the smaller stores fukubukuro sale). This year, as last, I went shopping both days. I didn't get a lucky bag this year since I have no money and couldn't justify it to myself. I found it remarkably easy to justify the purchase of the following though, part of the Spring Bape drop that came out on the 2nd... I couldn't resist:

I know what you're thinking - but what would Kanye West look like in that? Luckily he wore it in the new Bape lookbook:

Have you seen Kanye's new year post on his blog? I love that guy.

My favourite albums of 2009

2009-12-29T23:54:00.000+09:00

So this year I had more time and thus found more music. It seems to be as simple as that! I read a bunch of people saying that 2009 was a crappy year for music, but, y'know, those people are idiots. It's never a crappy year for anything, it's just impossible to be exposed to everything that might possibly be good. Give yourself a break, give the world a break, just... can't we all just get along?

Anyway I got you seven albums that I loved, ten albums that I really liked, a couple that I know sucked but still kind of liked, and a few that I haven't decided about yet. Some of these I've written about before, and I'll try not to repeat myself but... hell I repeat myself enough in real life so that would just be an accurate reflection of myself. Once you have an actual thought in your head you owe it too the world to get as much mileage out of it as possible, right? Right? Don't leave me hanging here.

Themselves - Crownsdown

It's like they set out to make a real hip-hop album, but they've accidentally evolved beyond musical genres, so for all the references and put-downs they throw in - they've kind of already won because they've transferred to a different league and are kind of on their own there. The hip-hop references are delicious though, and while it didn't blow me away at first (I was still pretty impressed) it was a massive grower, and I really love the record now. Just writing about it makes me want to listen to it again, and this is one of my favourite videos this year:

Converge - Axe To Fall

Every now and then I go back to this album and think - do I really like it or am I in awe of it? The answer is probably both. I'm not exactly a die-hard hard-core fan, so I can understand some people thinking that they're either a) stuck in a rut or b) moving too far into the mainstream (though it's kind of surreal that those two criticisms - the main ones I've read - come from completely opposite directions) because they probably know more about hard-core than me. But I like this album a lot, it's my favourite thing I've heard by Converge and it sounds like terrible, powerful things being given form.

The Flaming Lips - Embryonic

So basically, and quite surreally for a band who put on one of the most stunning stage shows ever, I totally lost interest in the Flaming Lips after Yoshimi Battles The Pink Robots. That album, to sum it up, sucks, and I figured that all the craziness and invention that I had loved about them until that point - and especially a certain demented flame that always seemed to drive them - had gone for good. This album was not just a return to form but sounds like they've evolved into a whole new strange, wonderful, disquieting band. It's just so fucking exciting to hear a band that's been going for so long metamorphose so powerfully and convincingly into this kind of monster. The levels, the sound, the songs, the structure, the album - everything is too much, and it's amazing.

Charlotte Hatherley - New Worlds

I reckon in the end, I just like the way she writes songs. I really, really like the way she writes songs.

Jay-Z - The Blueprint 3

I think I said before I don't know why there's people running around saying that this was a let down. The last track - Forever Young - is a travesty, contemplating the existence of which upsets me greatly, but the rest of the album is impressively strong. Well worth the hype.

OneOne - Aooooon

Beautiful, folky music, and I really like everything that Tenniscoats and Deerhoof put out, but this one captured my imagination a lot more than I expected it to.

Future of the Left - Travels With Myself And Another

Like some deranged, musclebound dictator of the land of half-forgoten pop culture who's angry. Angry! Always angry! And churning and riffing and spitting and grinning and occasionally calming down enough to make you think it's making sense, but really it's still half out of its mind on pop-tarts and real ale.

Those albums, I loved. These ones I liked a lot, but not enough to really gush about them.

Chuck Prophet - Let Freedom Ring

Shiina Ringo - Sanmon Gossip

Health - Get Color

Young Fresh Fellows - I Think This Is

Eyedea & Abilities - By The Throat

Luke Haines - 21st Century Man / Achtung Mutha

Grand Duchy - Petit Fours

Monobright - 2

Boredoms - Super Roots 10

Annie - Don't Stop

And the ones I know kind of suck, but I liked anyway were:

Kid Cudi - Man on the Moon : The End of Day

Teriyaki Boyz - Serious Japanese

And the few that I picked up at the end of the year, and dug to varying degrees but don't feel good about properly rating were:

St Vincent - Actor

Gallows - Grey Britain

Clipse - Til The Casket Drops

Ah, music. Bring the hell on 2010 already. Give me more. MORE! MY HUNGER CANNOT BE SATED!

Movies: Juno and Inglourious Basterds

2009-12-28T23:46:00.000+09:00

Again, apologies - posting from the safety of January 4th. And now that I come to think of it, I watched both of these movies after New Year, so it should be impossible for me to make comments about them on the date this post was made. That my friends, is either me being psychic, time travel or... blog magic. I'll let you decide which.

Juno was wonderful - funny and touching and better than I expected. The plot was interesting, the characters were just... implausibly likable and the dialogue (which I'd heard so much about) was playful and witty without being smug. I mean, it was smug at times, but it was meant to be smug within the banterous little universe they'd created there. It's not perfect by any means but I really liked it, and it had the best performance I've seen Michael Cera give yet. I mean, come on, I'm willing to be proven wrong here but so far in his burgeoning career Michael Cera seems to be a terrible actor. He gives exactly the same super-geeky performance in everything I've seen him in, and while that generally works and I like it well enough, it's only because the film makers are crafting the parts specifically for him. In Nick and Nora's Infinite Playlist he was really fucking pushing it, playing the kind of romantic lead where the relationship - cute though it was - didn't ring true for me. I'm kind of worried about him in the upcoming Scott Pilgrim adaptation, because everything else about that seems utterly awesome.

Enough about Michael Cera. Juno was really good and the worst thing about it is the smugly twee faux indie films that have probably been green-lit because of it.

I liked Inglourious Basterds too, having finally had a chance to watch it, but I'm fairly bemused at the praise it has recieved. I mean, I liked it because it was a kind of demented pop-culture mash up - just Tarantino watching a bunch of second world war movies and thinking - man I'd love to make something like this, with Jews hiding from the Nazis and commandos in the French countryside and the tension of The Great Escape and the camaraderie and like... something to do with The Dirty Dozen... And then he just mixed all that up and slapped it together into a series of tight, very Tarantino-esque scenes and the whole thing is really kind of fun if you like Tarantino's directorial voice.

But by any kind of objective standards that I can think of, it's a terrible fucking movie.

I mean none of the characters were believable, likeable or interesting in anyway. They were mostly annoying in pretty deliberate, entertaining ways, but that doesn't really count. One would think that a lot of the drama of WW2 movies is symbiotic with the idea that the people are in real danger within... well, within World War Two. Inglourious Basterds is famously cavalier with historical facts, and I have no problem with that, but it just makes the slow boiling tension that Tarantino is trying to capture in most of the scenes seem cheap and pointless. The characters are cartoons, the setting is a cartoon... there's no reason to care about anything so it all becomes really uninvolving.

And even more absurdly by the time the finale has come around the ending is so clearly signposted that there's no tension at all! It's just a kind of Nazi bashing free-for-all which... y'know, is fine. But I didn't really like any of the heroes, and I didn't really feel like those Nazis were real Nazis so much as random baddies dressed up in Nazi uniforms, so I turned off completely.

The movie is divided into a small number of long scenes that act like mini-plays for Tarantino to basically play around with war-movie tropes. They're each kind of fun, but they make the whole thing seem very stilted and they sap any momentum the movie might have as a whole. Again, I'm sure the structure and its pros and cons were very deliberate choices that the director made, but... it really kinda sucks.

The one thing that I was technically impressed with was the way in which Tarantino moved the plot along. He used the stilted, extended-scene structure and in every scene gave you exactly what you needed to know to get to the next 'vignette', cutting away all the exposition inbetween. That - paring it down to just the long, tension building scenes that he obviously wanted to get cracking on - was a really nice way of telling the story. It's just that the tension seemed to be pointless since I didn't care about any of the characters, the whole thing seemed utterly contrived and it certainly never seemed to bear much resemblence to the actual historical conflict.

Also the music was interesting but terribly used. Really awfully used.

And despite all that griping I still liked it, but mostly because I like car-crash art, and entertaining, interestingly-bad art and there were plenty of bits that I just plain loved. All the typefaces and text throughout, the main bad guy, Mike Myers (why?), the Bowie track - all awesome. But the movie? Appalling.

I recommend it.

Comics Stuff : More Goon!

2009-12-27T23:36:00.003+09:00

What can I say about this? I was a little burned out over Christmas and New Year? I wasn't really, I just wasn't really in the mood to blog. These posts then, all from January 4th with small notes of apology attached to each one. And with reference to that please read the post dated December 31st! I'm going to be blurring the laws of time on these few post-Christmas / pre-New Years posts so events might not occur in order. I'm also padding a little with some book, comic and movies stuff. Just so's you know. Today = Comics.

The Goon#33, no dialogue just pictoral thought bubbles. Eric Powell is a bleedin' genius.

Someone should give him a big gold medal or something. Maybe just a lot of money. Whatever makes him happy. Then again he already has his own Girl's Roller Derby team - what else could a man want?

Alex's Book Club - The Road by Cormac McCarthy

2009-12-26T23:12:00.001+09:00

Ah yes, just to bring you down from Christmas with a bump, a quick post about a notoriously depressing masterpiece:

In fact I found Cormac McCarthy's The Road (coming soon with extra Mortensen to a cinema near you!) to be not nearly as depressing as I'd feared. The story is bleak for sure, but it's so beautifully written as to be almost uplifting. It's a wonderful book and I would certainly recommend it to anyone who can avoid getting hung up on the apocalyptic nihilism of the story.

Moments from It's A Wonderful Life

2009-12-25T23:16:00.002+09:00

Well, that's just one of the best movies ever isn't it?

God damn you Frank Capra - playing me like a man-sized fiddle.

Merry Christmas everyone!

Moments from Elf

2009-12-24T23:15:00.002+09:00

I love Elf. And Jon Favreau's career as a director is constantly fascinating for me. I just always think of him as he appears in Swingers, no matter how many great films he directs.

Also Zooey Deschanel is so much better when she's underplaying the Manic-Pixie-Dream-Girl role.

Moments from Bad Santa

2009-12-23T23:14:00.002+09:00

Actually, according to the DVD case I was watching "Badder Santa: The Unrated Version". Having never seen the original I guess the difference was lost on me - I guess it was a highly profane piece of cinema, maybe there were even more F-words in this one? There certainly were a lot! Fuck!

It was good, if not great then certainly unique and entertaining enough to get a big thumbs up from me. And when Sheriff John Bunnell there turned up - that added a whole extra star on for me.

Ash - Doin' It Right

2009-12-22T22:12:00.003+09:00

Consider this an online music commerce post. I just wanted to mention, again, that Ash are really impressing me with their A-Z subscription (y'know pay less than fifteen quid and get a new song every two weeks for a year). They're making it easy to buy their music online (that's me saying 'If You Like It Buy It'), but if you want a physical copy you can get a cool seven inch, and they're providing what I... hesitate slightly to call... fan service. This week I got a bonus track they recorded earlier in the year and a link to a podcast of Tim Wheeler's honeyed tones introducing a selection of some of his favourite music. More of that and I'll be feeling like I haven't paid them enough money and want to buy my subscription all over again.

And the songs have been remarkably strong too:

Forgive the video, that kind of cut up thing from old videos gives me a headache. No it doesn't, sorry, it just looks shit and pisses me off. Just stick it over a picture of the cover you wankers.

If Ash can make money this way, by selling things online through their own label then that is a very good sign for the future of bands making music. Not for major labels but... for the future of people making music for a living. Because Radiohead and NIN have done it but with the best will in the world, Ash aren't Radiohead or Nine Inch Nails. They're kind of... on the next level. From them the next step would be seeing a band start from scratch with that kind of model. Somebody's probably already done it, and I'd imagine it's hard work but - y'never know.

Special shout out to Carina Round too, whose US major label daliance has, I guess, come to an end, and who is selling a new EP with a bunch of super-special bonus business (e.g. you can buy her ep for like a thousand dollars or something and she'll throw in a performance at your house) to finance her next album. That's how more and more artists will be working, and I really hope they can make a go of it.

That and the fact that people look at the charts and talk about album tracks charting now as if it's always been that way makes me very happy. But of course - there are a lot of horror stories about how the big record companies are paying out on online royalties so... y'know "Albini Was Right" and all that on a red tee with a picture of his buzzcut instead of Magneto's helmet.

The Good Stuff

2009-12-21T23:12:00.002+09:00

Well, I wasn't going to gloat, but this was something I had pegged for a blog post for a while. We've had a lot of snow here:

That was like, over a week ago, and there's been a lot more since then. So while it's got dirtier, it's also got higher. And of course in Sapporo, nothing stops. Everything just carries on as normal - sorry England! This is my third winter here, and actually I think there's been a lot more snow this December than in the last two years, it just came very, very late. There was almost nothing for the first two weeks of December (which is unusual) and then... it's just been snowing every day since. Therefore this has been the whitest Christmas I've had here. It was pretty awesome.

Snowboarding at Rusutsu

2009-12-20T23:59:00.001+09:00

Rusutsu resort offers you a wonderful blend of pretty high-end facilities, many runs spread over three mountains, great snow and hideous, nightmarish animatronics and carnival rides.

That tree thing was right there in the lobby, and all I ever heard were people saying "kowaii!" (scary!) I felt kind of sorry for the resort for splashing out on it - and then I remembered Dogs and Demons, the book I finished recently, and then I got a little depressed.

Bumper Christmas 8tracks!

2009-12-19T23:28:00.000+09:00

Hey, I don't know about your advent calendar, but my advent calendar says there are only three sleeps until Christmas! (Ahem, as usual, I'm posing this... from the future, so let's just skip over any confusing about 'day counts' or whatever, ok?) And you know what I love? No, not that, something else. I mean, I love that, but I love something else too.

That's right! Christmas!

So I put twenty Christmas songs on a playlist for you to listen to!

And trust me when I tell you that they are all solid gold and shot through with the spirit of Christmas. If you don't like any of those songs, then I would ask you if you had ever been in the same room as Ebeneezer Scrooge before, and if not, then perhaps it would be clement for you to perhaps start questioning your own identity because it may be more than possible that you - yourself - are Ebeneezer Scrooge!

Or possibly The Grinch!

Moments from Southland Tales

2009-12-18T23:59:00.003+09:00

Man, I'm not afraid to tell you that I was waiting to see Southland Tales for a lo-o-ong time. As one of the many people who fell head over heels in love with Donnie Darko, when I heard that Richard Kelly's second movie was going to be a crazy ensemble piece about the end of the world, starring The Rock, Sean William Scott and Sarah Michelle Gellar, that would be prefaced by three graphic novels I was 100%-no-refunds sold.

Then it got mauled at Cannes, scaled back, recieved what might charitably be called "mixed reviews" and most people seem to think that Kelly pretty much blew it. The only review I've read of his latest one has been bad too.

Well, y'know. I finally picked up the DVD for cheap when I was back in England and finally sat down with it this week. And of course it's awesome.

I mean, it's a mess, but it's awesome.

I've read two of the three prologue graphic novels (could never seem to track down the last one, and wasn't even sure that it came out, but now I see that it has) so the insanely rushed synopsis at the start actually jogged some memories for me and then I could pick it up pretty well, but I can understand why a lot of people might not. He just tries to pack so much stuff in there, and yes, the story is told in an confusing way, but Jesus there are two strikingly different cuts of Donnie Darko and this was easier to follow than both of them. It's just that Donnie Darko was hung around a 1980s coming of age movie, it was an underdog movie, and people were lured in by that a lot I think. Southland Tales is an apocalyptic sci-fi farce (and there was far more straight comedy than I expected) starring an ex pro-wrestler, an actor known for peurile comedy, a pulp TV actress and a pop star. Unless you like the willfully eclectic (like me, and probably a lot of other people too) it's a pretty hard sell. Worth noting that I thought all the performances - and yes, a lot of the time it seemed like people were acting in entirely different movies - were perfectly pitched for this movie.

I really did love it. I kept thinking it was going to take a nose dive into the unwatchable, but it never did. The weakest point was that terrible opening, where a whole other movie was summarised in voice over and via faux news reels. In the end that stuff played out and was essential to the story, but even I've gotta admit you're asking a lot of your audience to follow that and then jump right into part four. But once it got going the way the story played out, tricky as it was, became a real strength. Kelly wasn't sloppy in telling the story, he was just asking the viewer to keep up, and that's never a bad thing.

Comics Stuff: The Sublime Genius of Brandon Graham

2009-12-17T23:18:00.001+09:00

Ok now, seriously. Everything Brandon Graham does makes me happy to be alive, and just... makes me feel like making stuff. He's like a five hundred mil bottle of inspiration whenever I need one. I've bookmarked his livejournal on the right here, and I've read this issue of King City about five times already:

It was the only one I could find when I went back to England, but I'm desperate to get everything I can. I want his babies basically.

Alex's Book Club - Dog and Demons by Alex Kerr

2009-12-16T23:58:00.001+09:00

Started several years ago and recently rediscovered on my trip back to Mother England, I just finished Dogs and Demons and boy was it depressing.

If you don't want to like Japan, Dogs and Demons is the book for you. No, that's a little uncharitable - overall it's a fascinating, well written treatise on the way modern Japan has completely (and in almost every respect) lost its way. Alex Kerr, who is American but seems to have spent most of his life in Japan, goes through almost every aspect of Japanese life and explains why it sucks, and how Japan has sold out its land and its traditions in desperate, misguided bids for industrial power and some mistaken view of modernism that passed away in the 70s.

It is very readable, but if you currently live in Japan, it is not exactly an easy read. Y'know, what with the painting nihilistically depressing portraits of the country in which you currently reside.

I believe Kerr received some stick for being so critical about almost every aspect of Japan, as a foreigner - and to an extent he tempts it. Non-Japanese, when they pop up in the book, are never responsible for the erosion and corruption of Japanese values. Kerr's point is that the Japanese have done that themselves. Foreigners are the voices of reason, who have helped the developing economies in Thailand and other Asian countries advance in a way that respects their heritage, and the foreigners in Dogs and Demons are almost invariably bemoaning the changes they've witnessed, or fighting to preserve some part of Japan that the Japanese government wants to turn into a pachinko parlour. I've gotta call shenanigans on that - it may be the case that some foreigners are like that, but there must be a lot out for a quick buck too, and Kerr's examples are so one sided that he starts seeming patronising to the Japanese pretty early on, relying on a series of Japanese traditionalists and academics to keep him from sounding absurdly one sided in this.

When he turns his attention to modern culture he hits a fair few wrong notes too. He bemoans the infantilising of modern pop culture, the dominance of cutismo and so on, while saying that in the west those trends are only popular with children, never with more important demographics. Even when he wrote the book back in 2001, that would have been crazy. Japan's popular culture, it's 'soft power', is one of the biggest things it has going for it now. In fact I was reading last year about how people were criticising the Japanese government for not taking advantage of that more. Kerr comes across as basically out of step with the times in those areas; and a few other times when he relies on anecdotes rather than facts he seems far too subjective - ranting about things that piss him off rather than real problems.

But that said, when he backs up his points with figures, facts about the hideous knots in which Japan has become bound due to its rampant, corrupt beauracracy (which he does for the vast majority of the book), and the central 'Dogs and Demons' premise (that Japan loves to build gimmicky 'Demons' because they're more eye-catching, while the basic 'Dogs' of everyday services are neglected)... I can't argue against any of that. His story of Japan - basically that it is sick from the roots up and that there's nothing anyone can do about it - is pretty much spot on.

Depressingly enough.

Alex Listens to Every Girls Aloud Album For You

2009-12-15T23:23:00.005+09:00

So, Girls Aloud - the TV manufactured girl group of (I suppose) debatable talent, the majority of whose oeuvre has been written and composed by the sugar-pop-warlock-surgeons at Xenomania. Their songs being so good that they gave a "Get Out of Authenticity Free" card to almost every indie listener in the world. Myself, of course, included. But still you bump up against the ugly wall of prejudice: Girls Aloud? No! Manufactured! TV show! Pop music! MUST DISMISS!

Gah, some people can take no joy in life, can they?

Should I mention that I'm delighted that Rage Against The Machine got to Christmas no. 1? Putting aside every other issue and purely based on the fact that the song they chose for Joe McElderry single to sing was so utterly shit. If he'd been doing a Xenomania track I'd probably have been in his corner.

And while I'm digressing... did he fuck Cheryl Cole? Because the video seems to be narrating some kind of torturous love story between Joe and Cheryl, lots of eye contact, tearful hugging, begging for their lives in front of a massive audience and finally being granted a reprieve. I don't know, maybe I was misreading it.

Anyway, astonishingly they hit five albums this year, and I finally decided to step up my love from listening to The Show and Biology on repeat and actually listen to each of their five albums from start to finish. Many times over. Interestingly while I admit my love is mostly based on those unstoppable melodies I hadn't thought much about the members themselves. I mean, not being in the country for a couple of years means that I don't really get to see them perform or appear on TV, and my impression before I left wasn't so great - they were just the faces the songs I liked came out of. That said, listening to a lot of their music together... their voices don't sound autotuned or post-polished to death (I mean, not as much as some other pop artists), and that actually adds a lot to the whole.

Anyway, I did not regret my undertaking for one second, and I'm sure neither will you.

1) Girls Aloud - Sound of The Underground

What an oddly cheap looking album cover! Mummy, is that what the underground looks like? Is that the resistance? The first album was a strong start but is by no means the peak of their career so far. The singles are great, but my favourite track here must be Some Kind of Miracle, which didn't even get picked as a single. That, my friends, was the kind of gold I was mining for. It's worth noting now, early on, that while occasionally there are clearly different voices singing (as different girls pick up the mic for different verses) I have absolutely no idea who is singing what, and while there are five girls, there are only two or three different voices that I've been able to discern... I mean at least they aren't Exile though, where you have two singers and twelve dancers. Also worth noting that titling a song "Girls Allowed" on their first album really... wasn't necessary. We... we get it.

2) Girls Aloud - What Will The Neighbours Say?

Oh, now I see what they were going for with that cover but I'd say they probably failed in... everything? The type is quite nice I guess. The second album, featuring as it does The Show (one of my favourite Girls Aloud songs) and Love Machine (one of everyone else's favourite Girls Aloud songs), is where things get really good. The first album is solid, occasionally inspired, but wouldn't have been enough to make me a staunch defender, y'know. This one starts (with some assist from a couple of covers) with a straight five track blast of brilliance. And after that there's still Graffiti My Soul, which just... wow. A song so good that the tyros of youtube have been compelled to slap the music on top of every other Girls Aloud video in some cack-handed attempt to magic a Graffiti My Soul video into existence.

3) Girls Aloud - Chemistry

Probably their best cover, which tells you how shit their covers are in general. Honestly, making cover art for Girls Aloud should be like hitting the ground when you fall over, and yet time and again... Anyway this makes two classics in a row. It starts with a trifecta of ass-kicking, and still the structure and majesty of Biology gets me every goddamn time. So good. It's difficult to pick between WWTNS and C (hmmm... abbreviations not working quite so well there), because while I think the second album has better highlights - the lesser songs on Chemistry are greater than those on 'Neighbours'. Anyway, best non-single is probably the track that kicks the album off - Models. Wow, I should watch more Girls Aloud live stuff on youtube, then I can see who sings what!

4) Girls Aloud - Tangled Up

Ah, the classy album. Actually, probably just as good as the previous two now that I think about it. This was one of the albums they released after I'd left the country so I have no idea about the singles, the promotion or the videos - I just listened to the whole thing as an album and it was interesting to see that minimal (still crappy) cover art and hear the (slightly) more mature, restrained sound that they aimed for. The first track, Calling The Shots, is especially impressive for capturing a kind of longing that they had occasionally aimed for on previous albums but fallen far short of, landing in kind of emoticon territory. Close To Love could be an Annie song at the start (while the Xenomania tracks on Annie's last album could have been Girls Aloud songs) which is nothing but good. Sexy! No No No... is amazing, and even the slow single Can't Speak French is a killer on this album. Wow, and then there's Blackjacks and Fling and the insanely awesomely titled (sadly not all that awesome) Control Of The Knife... Let's just say that on reflection this one is up there with the previous two.

5) Girls Aloud - Out Of Control

Well, I don't want to be too damning here, after all it might be a grower, but this still feels like their worst album so far to me. I guess it's tough (as a chart pop act) to keep up the insanely high level of quality that they'd displayed until this point in this career, but whereas before their songs had stomped you to the ground and demanded your attention, on this album they're just kind of... ok. The album cover is even not-bad, in a hideous way, but the music... I was disappointed. In a way, despite the title, it's even more classy and restrained than Tangled Up, there are no truly up-beat singles even! Love is the Key is worth a listen, but feels pieced together from bits of other, better songs. I'd probably pick Miss You Bow Wow as my favourite track on this rekkid (the live version behind that link is actually better than the album version), and even then it only really sparkles in the chorus, and thinking about songs like Biology where every part individually shines... that's quite a step down. I don't know, the whole thing sounds... a little lacking.

But still! I have hope and they might have a new album "Back in Control" next year? Not sure about that but... that might be a return to their previous standards? Here's hoping. In the mean time Girls Aloud are awesome and if you find you don't agree with that, I can only encourage you to check yourself... most thoroughly.

Sapporo Food: Gombei Spice Soup Curry

2009-12-14T23:42:00.003+09:00

Slowly but surely keeping my promise to talk about my favourite soup curry restaurants (as opposed to the ones that I remember to take my camera to, which invariably end up somewhat lacklustre it seems), today I present Gombei Spice:

I used to go to Gombei Spice in Asabu all the time - like at least once every two weeks - partly because it was about twenty seconds from my front door. Oh, but that wasn't the only reason! Their awesome, life-giving vegetable soup curry was probably the main reason.

Now, Gombei Spice is not for everyone, and I can't just wholeheartedly recommend it, but it's definitely worth visiting for a number of reasons. Firstly - organic vegetables. Gombei Spice use just the best vegetables of any soup curry place I know, and I find the selection they give you in the vegetable curry very satisfying. Secondly it has a very unique curry base. It's a lot less... aromatic than most places, and a lot more blunt and harsh. That's why a lot of people I know aren't too keen on the place - it's a much darker, more intense soup in general, and that totally isn't for everyone. They have four different kinds of soup base to choose from, but they're all pretty formidable. Which brings us to the spice level - it's great providing you've got the constitution for it. Last night I choose a level two out of ten and my nose would not stop running. When I first went there, picking my level with reference to the only soup curry I'd had before, I had a level four and was left shaken and beaten. Like Lavi Lavi - I can only imagine what the upper echelons of the scale are like.

The other big issue regarding Gombei Spice is that I've been there so many times and yet almost every time I get the exact same thing, because their vegetable soup curry is by far the best thing on the menu:

In fact, I'd go so far as to say I would recommend the place a lot less without this one dish. It's amazing, and I know a couple of other people who agree that the vegetable soup curry at Gombei Spice is what makes the whole place great. That's avocado tempura topping too (you have to order it separately, but it's completely and utterly worth it). So what I'm saying is - go to Gombei Spice and order the vegetable soup curry and you won't regret it. I don't know how healthy it really is, but it sure feels healthy to eat a bowl of spicy soup full of organic vegetables.

Gombei Spice is another place that has an original branch in the suburbs and then a city centre branch too - and again I have no idea where the inner-city restaurant is. I'm happy to assume that it's just as good as the Asabu one though, and strongly recommend it. The Asabu branch has been slapped on the map.

Snowboarding at Kiroro Resort

2009-12-13T23:59:00.000+09:00

Insured and semi-ready. Back on the mountain - back in the snow:

I was delighted to find that I hadn't forgotten much, and that I could pick things up again fairly easily. Today however, is a pretty painful day for me.

Excuse me if I don't get up. I'm sure you can see yourselves out.

Sapporo Cafes: Fabulous Cafe

2009-12-12T22:34:00.000+09:00

I went to Fabulous Cafe the other day, and thought... wait, have I actually blogged about this place? Or put it on my map? A search of my site says no, I haven't, so I will now.

Fabulous Cafe is a really, really, trendy cafe near to Bus Centre Mae Station, just over the river from the TV Tower (y'know, at the point in Sapporo where there is actually no river, just a road with a river under it, even though the river is still marked on maps). It's actually more a combination cafe/design boutique/men's clothing store - which should give you an idea what it's like. As should this photo:

Sadly I don't seem to have more photos, and it's the kind of place where snapping away might make you feel a little gauche. It's a fantastically cool place where they play nothing but cool music, stock nothing but cool design innovations and cool men's clothes, and you can go and sit in there feeling just... cool.

Of course, it's incredibly expensive.

Well, not so bad really, not like - wincingly expensive. But I know many people who would blanche at the prices for coffee there, and the servings are never what you would call 'generous'. Everything's good though, I took my folks there and I seem to remember my dad saying that the cheese toast (read: cheese on toast) was amazing. He'd have to confirm that though. The coffees are all great though, and I always find the staff there to be incredibly nice too, although, obviously, hipsters. The photo I took up there was from a while ago, and that guy's afro is now long, straight and cool in a totally different way.

The place looks amazing, always, and I think it's really fantastic if you're after a high-end cafe, or just a cool, interesting place to go. They stock D-Bros. stationery, which I love too. But I want to be utterly straight here - it is pretty darned expensive. I never have a problem dropping a little more than usual to go somewhere like this from time to time, but your mileage (as they say) may vary.

I have stuck it on the map, and not before time.

Uchiyama Naohito live at Tower Records

2009-12-11T23:24:00.000+09:00

In a slightly surreal turn of events today I caught an awesome live electronic set from Uchiyama Naohito and... another guy whose name I shamefully forgot at Tower Records. I was just popping in there and got collared by Ryuta, who owns the awesome bar Provo and is now in the business of releasing music. "Do you have time?" he asked, to which... y'know what? I did. So I got a coffee and came back to see a really fucking impressive set of downbeat-but-danceable house-inflected electronica (I hate describing electronic music, I have no concept of genres beyond "S'good!" or "M'nah..."):

Tower Records Christmas tree there of course. No one was dancing, but there were quite a few people watching and bobbing their heads. It was fun to see this kind of music in a brightly lit place too of course, coz I could go upstairs and really see how they laid things out:

Fass-kinating!

Guys... I think God just moved in down the street.

2009-12-10T23:17:00.000+09:00

Oh no, wait - it's a pachinko parlour.

Playland Happy Asabu just opened up just up the road from me and... it's pretty eyecatching. I mean, it's lit from within and without by blinding white lights, so can you blame me for thinking that maybe it might be where God lives? I mean, this is probably what the Kingdom of Heaven looks like, right?

That's the view from one of my windows, and holy shit am I glad I don't live opposite that thing. Or under the rooftop billboard that they've erected opposite, where the lights seem to shine down on the appartment building itself just as much as onto the billboard.

And that is how you do light pollution!

Sapporo Food: Lavi Lavi Soup Curry

2009-12-09T23:39:00.002+09:00

I was going to post about a couple of places in Sapporo and then I thought: no, hold on, surely I've posted about those before!? A quick search of my own blog revealed that I had not. More than that, I've barely blogged about any soup curry restaurants at all, and those that I have written about are the so-so ones! (For more info about soup curry, a fairly self-explanatory Sapporo speciality, feel free to search my blog for yourself)

This madness stops now.

Ladies and Gentleman, at the present time the best soup curry I have ever had - Lavi Lavi:

Lavi Lavi's honten (main store) is in Kita-ku, maybe ten or fifteen minutes walk from Kita 24 Jyou station, and the soup curry there is incredible. I cannot recommend the place enough, and there are a few other branches around Sapporo which I'm sure are excellent too. The flavour is rich, the ingredients are fresh and delicious, the menu is interesting and varied, and they deal in a frankly incapacitating range of spices. You can choose a spice level for your soup from zero to fifty, so the first time I went I looked at the descriptions and went for an eight. I was in a great deal of pain. If you like moderately spicy food then maybe a four would be good. Five was pretty much spot on for me, and I cannot imagine anyone surviving an encounter with the upper end of the scale, but I'm sure there are some brave souls out there happy to try.

That's a borscht-style soup curry, this month's special, and it was delicious. The soup at Lavi Lavi is generally very aromatic and full-flavoured, and the idea of making that a little more sour and adding sour cream as a topping was inspired. I've been there several times though now, and nothing I've had has been anything short of fantastic. I really love the place, and it's been sorely missing from my map so far. So now it's on there.

Actually I thought about tracking down the other locations of Lavi Lavi (and some of the other small chains I've written about) and marking them on the map too, but I've found that the quality can vary quite a lot between stores when they're a small independent chain. I've been to three different branches of Spark, for example, one of the larger soup curry chains, and each one felt like a different restaurant, and the quality certainly varied massively (from good to awful - I don't really rate the place that highly). So I'll just stick the kita-ku branch down and you can do your own research. It's worth it.

The Book of Mansion Names 6

2009-12-08T23:03:00.001+09:00

I haven't posted an entry in "TBOMN" for a while:

Further enlightenment will be available via the tag below.

Art! Turner! Wright!

2009-12-07T23:30:00.002+09:00

Well, I wrote about going to the Turner Prize 2009 exhibition before, and they just announced the winner:

Richard Wright, whose exhibition mainly consisted of the amazing Gold Leaf wall piece above, and whose work is always painted over once the exhibition has finished. He was my second favourite after Roger Hiorns, but I think he was the deserved winner.

It really was a beautiful piece, and the temporary nature of it, and the way the space inspired it (taking cues from the Tate Britain itself) was really interesting.

Sapporo Food: T-Bird Cafe - the American Diner that isn't.

2009-12-06T23:00:00.000+09:00

Coming back from Sapporo Factory we stopped in at a common used book emporium, and after having sated Yuki's thirst for paperbacks we were about to head home when we spotted this place, and, since I generally like Japan's take on American food, we thought: Why not?

And I'm very glad we stopped in, but not for the reason that I was expecting. Y'see this restaurant blog isn't really recommending the place for it's amazing food (although the food was fine) but for the somewhat surreal experience of finding an American Style Diner with Elvis on the stereo and all the standard Americana decorations... that serves absolutely no American food at all.

We were baffled - they seem to have whole heartedly embraced the decor of an American Diner while just offering the standard Japanese lunch menu. You can get teishoku (lunch sets) some tonkatsu stuff, Japanese curry and Spaghetti in a very Japanese style. Nothing American about it at all. Except, perhaps, the size of the portions:

That was a hearty meal, and delicious. We didn't even get the large sized meals, and I certainly felt like I got my 750yen's worth. Just... not at all what we were expecting.

I've stuck it on the map, it's really near Ario and the Sapporo Beer Museum, and if you're in the area it would be great if you want a big, simple Japanese meal (everything really was good). But it's not really worth the trip out there by itself. It's just kind of... a surreal experience. Then again, I would love to try the same thing. Open a restaurant with stereotypical Indian restaurant trappings that serves only pizza for example. Perhaps the juxtaposition of food and decor makes things taste... better somehow?

Christmas at Sapporo Factory Once Again

2009-12-05T23:29:00.002+09:00

So it's December somehow or other, and you know what's in December? Andy's Birthday! And another birthday! Jesus's Birthday! To be honest I was gonna try and avoid harping on about Christm... AH WHO AM I KIDDING I LOVE CHRISTMAS I LOVE IT.

And I love almost everything about Christmas - even Christmas shopping in busy shopping malls. Maybe it's nostalgia for the classic tearjerker Jingle All The Way, but whenever I'm looking at larger-than-normal mall trees and fairy lights... all's right with the world.

I'm not even joking y'know. I'm putting together a Christmas playlist right now, so watch your asses.

Since I've come to Sapporo I always make sure to check out Sapporo Factory, where they have a big tree that plays music and does a light-show every hour. I'm not gonna deny that it's tacky and gauche, but there's no real need to defend it either.

Now, to be honest (and I need to go back and check the reference photos from last year) the Factory tree looks a fair bit smaller than last years. Looked pretty enough when the lights were on though.

Christmas. Commerce. Capitalism. And other words beginning with C.

The Genius of Neil Hamburger

2009-12-04T21:59:00.003+09:00

My recent brush with British stand-up's had some kind of knock on effect whereby I went and hunted out a bunch of American stand-up. Not quite sure how that works, but still: Paul F. Tompkins' live CD is awesome (there's nothing to match in on youtube though, sadly), and it also helped me remember America's Funnyman - Neil Hamburger:

That I sat through a whole hour of a comedian being deliberately unfunny, is a sign of some sort of twisted genius. Also:

Ah, jokes.