Japanese TV Commercial Break

So, those fiendishly addictive chocolate/salt snack that I mentioned (and of which I polished off another box yesterday and today) have a fiendishly addictive TV commercial to boot:

It actually says something along the lines of "salty and chocolatey" and "once you've eaten them you'll be addicted". Damn you Chip Chop... damn you to hell.

Unfortunately Named Japanese Department Store Concessions #71

I don't know whether I should expect Japanese firms to check on the connotations of the English words they pick to name their businesses, but I do remember that car companies spend a lot of time now ensuring that their cars are dubbed with entirely fabricated names lest they accidentally call a car "shit-bucket" in Estonian or something. Perhaps these guys could have done a little more research...

Mark Mulcahy

Mark Mulcahy is one of the finest songwriters in the world, a personal favourite of mine and, I would dare to say, a genius of sorts. Thanks to the fact that every piece of news about Radiohead is headline news, I found out this week that he's having a hard time at the moment (his wife passed away suddenly last year, leaving him to raise two kids on his own), and that there's a tribute/benefit to him coming out at the end of the month.

The Radiohead connection is that Thom Yorke, smart cookie that he is, is a huge Mulcahy fan and often gives him little shout outs (I like to imagine a chain of fandom from Kanye West to Thom Yorke to Mark Mulcahy to ???). He's contributing a track to the album, among an impressive list of other artists including Michael Stipe, Dinosaur Jr. (J Mascis contributed guitar to his last solo album), Ben Kweller, Josh Rouse, Vic Chestnutt and most excitingly for me Frank Black. The rhythm section who played on some of Mulcahy's earlier records (late Miracle Legion I think, and the amazing one time band Polaris that lived in your TV) Scott Boutier and David McCaffrey (and how much of a Black/Mulcahy superfan do I have to be that I didn't have to look up either of those names) went on to be the spine of Frank Black's Catholics. Frank's gonna be doing Bill Jocko, which is one of my favourite Mark Mulcahy songs, and by chance I was just listening to it last week.


My band, Devil and Casey Jones covered the classic Pete & Pete theme Hey Sandy repeatedly and unapologetically, and I saw Mulcahy play live in the UK four times I think, one of those being a completely surreal endless gig in Nottingham where, because no-one stopped him he just kept playing long after the legal curfew. He's also one of the very few people for whom I've shouted out requests during his shows, only to have them refused both times. Here's some youtube "contentz":

I like the guy with the eyepatch in that one, and assume this next one is by the same team:

And now, a fantastic live duo performance:

So, the point being go and check out Mark Mulcahy's music (that's his label/site, here's his myspace). He's a scruffy guitar-pop God, and I myself am going to go drop money that I don't have at his web store and pick up the tribute album as soon as I can. I'm also crossing my fingers that they're filming the tribute concerts and footage of that will be coming out.

Death of Polaroid / Moment of Silence

A great photo feature in the Guardian this week alerted me to the fact that the last batch of film manufactured for my beloved polaroid camera (that I have owned for approximately four months) apparently expires at the end of the month. Since I still have two film "cartridges" for the beast I guess I should use 'em up. I'm not too fussed though, I imagine that I can push that expiry date a bit, as you can with most dry goods.

Still I took the hefty thing with me when I went out yesterday, and I reckon I'll burn through those last two films pretty quickly. Here's the end of the first film I bought:


And here's what's left to use - hungry, gaping maw and all:


The, ah, guitar isn't actually essential for taking photos of course. My appartment is just pretty messy at the moment. Ideas for projects involving twenty polaroid photos would be very welcome.

J-Pop? Actually not that pop at all...

Oh hello? How are you? Here is the Japanese music that you ordered. Yes, yes you did. I have the docket right here. Is this your signature? Isn't it? It isn't? Look again... here... look, the light is better in the back of the van... no really just step up there. Ok, a little further in, there's a flashlight. Yes, in the back of the van. Don't worry.

(slam)

(sound of engine starting and tyres screeching)

Ok now where were we?

Qolomangma Tomato are a band I meant to check out a while ago, but didn't. Instead fate waited for today and used Matt Longarini to send them my way:

I'm getting good vibes off this group, and will keep an eye on them. I'm getting Refused a little, and a nice sense of humour and DIY spirit. Good.

GreenAppleQuickStep (not to be confused with the American band of the same name, oh man, that's a growth inhibitor for you) were playing at Magical Camp when I walked past. I didn't want to drag people to a halt to watch this off-beat-atonal-psychy-blues nonsense, but I swore I'd check them out online. I have and they are good, and two years ago they played a gig in one of Sapporo's trams which is awesome:

That gives you some idea, a better one can be formed at their myspace above. Ah myspace, you're only good for bands now. You're just dying slowly, covered in sores.

青空教室 (Aoizora Kyoushitsu - Blue Sky Class) are the poppest band we'll be visiting today. Again, I saw a little bit at magical camp and there's something in the songs I like. They don't have much youtube presence, just like GAQS above, but here's an acoustic thing that might help:

Very melodic! We saw them electric though and it was probably better - so listen to their myspace tracks. And when we saw them after their set we waved and their drummer ran over and was very happy we liked the music. Very happy!

Todays last lesson begins with me watching Tokyo Gore Police, continues with Matt and I being absolute research ninjas, and ends with us finding the weird psych-prog-punk girls who contributed some tracks to the movie. Final score - Hahalemon:

That's strange and wonderful, and I can't find any info about them in English, just lots of mysterious looking business in Japanese.

Ok, that's it, class dis...missed.

Park Review! Ishiyama Park

I spotted Ishiyama Park on the Sapporo government website back when Bunny was staying with me. It looked kind a like a modernist colosseum... as a park in Sapporo? Thus I really wanted to go there, and finally got my wish last week.





It's not too far south of Makomanai, but it is easier to get there by car than by any other means (oh! maybe horse would be convenient?) and it's not really marked very well on any maps. In fact, despite the epic scale of the stone installations above, it actually feels like a pretty small community park. Though living in a community with that stuff in your park would rock like Beethoven in Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure.

Bad Boyz be Ambitious

"Boys be ambitious" is kind of the catchphrase of Sapporo. It was a phrase coined by Williams S. Clarke, one of the people who established Hokkaido College of Agriculture (now Hokkaido University) and thus made Sapporo into a notable city. It's an incredibly famous phrase throughout Japan too, I've seen it used in puns and on merchandise in Tokyo, and in national newspaper articles that had nothing to do with Hokkaido at all. It's a pretty great phrase too, the full paragraph running:

"Boys, be ambitious. Be ambitious not for money or for selfish aggrandizement, not for that evanescent thing which men call fame. Be ambitious for that attainment of all that a man ought to be."

That's pretty bloody good advice.

Anyway, with the opening of the new hip-hop clothing store Chill In Da House Sapporo's urban trendsetters show that they too, keep Clark's words close to their hearts.


Oh yeah.