http://v1a2904.shiftweb.net/ music reviews, event and record label from Tokyo ja Nucleus CMS v3.2 ｩ Weblog http://backend.userland.com/rss http://v1a2904.shiftweb.net//nucleus/nucleus2.gif http://v1a2904.shiftweb.net/ http://v1a2904.shiftweb.net/index.php?itemid=393 Something Gold
Social Alienation (2010) Something Gold is either the first, second or third album by this Chiba-based garage punk duo, depending on how one views their scattershot approach to delivering their material. This time coming via French label Social Alienation, it's at least the first that the band have got together to record all at once, and despite some curiously murky printing on the jacket, it's a rather nice package, comprising both the album and a DVD, as well as a handy lyrics booklet.

Upon first listen, the most obvious comparisons that Puffyshoes evoke are likely to be other quirky girl double acts like the recently departed Afrirampo, or eternally pregnant conceptual art creatures Kiiiiiii; however, this does Puffyshoes an injustice. They may have adopted cute monikers like Neko (cat) and Usagi (rabbit), and like Shonen Knife, they have a habit of singing cute songs about food, but in Puffyshoes' case, it at least doesn't appear to be the essential component of their appeal. For one thing, there's a faintly unhinged fierceness underpinning these songs that transcends the tedious "come, marvel at our totally unprecedented juxtaposition of cuteness and punk ethos" that self-parodies like the Sister/Benten label have come to trade in. The melodies and harmonies that Puffyshoes employ are uniformly of the 1960s girl group variety, like someone locked Phil Spector in a cupboard suspended over a construction site, with nothing but a coffee machine for company, and when you sing something like "For seventeen years I've been loving you / You are my imaginary lover / You are so good to me / You know everything about me" against a tune that drips from the speakers like a particularly melodramatic species of honey, how can it not sound sincere? Tellingly, it's the more melodic moments like "Happy Birthday to Me", "Good Girl" and the aforementioned "Imaginary Lover" where Puffyshoes most obviously eclipse not only their genre peers but also wide swathes of the Japanese pop scene as a whole.

And that's why, while the recording quality is uniformly horrible, which one imagines is at least partly intentional in service of the duo's lo-fi aesthetic, Something Gold is such a striking album. It's a masterclass in the ancient arts of pop songwriting, delivering occasionally barbed diatribes on the minutae of teenage life, or at least teenage life as reimagined by two twenty-somethings through the prism of retro pop culture, with a refreshing distance from the extremes of calculated postmodern cutesiness that this sort of thing can often become trapped in. Ian Martin 10.Jul.10 ]]> reviews - album http://v1a2904.shiftweb.net/index.php?itemid=393 Sat, 10 Jul 2010 23:32:38 +0900 http://v1a2904.shiftweb.net/index.php?itemid=392 now up on CNNGo, but due to space constraints there was a lot of stuff I had to leave out, so I'm posting a more complete transcript of the interview for anyone who wants to get a bit further beneath the surface.

What's the deal with the hardhat?

This? This is part of the costume for our stage performance. We have this construction worker kind of image, but it's deformed with lots of balloons underneath the clothes.

So where does that image come from?

In about 1985 I think, Rei Kawakubo from Comme des Garcons, she designed these kind of ugly fashion shows. Usually women's fashion just looks so tidy, and elegant, and beautiful, but she destroyed those kinds of images, and she designed a kind of nasty, ugly fashion style. Round '85 I think, she designed so many things, with these kind of hunchbacked designs and that kind of image. So people in Paris were kind of surprised, and actually hated it, but I'm understanding Rei Kawakubo more and more, although at first almost no one could understand her. So our image concept is quite similar to the kind of thing she was doing in 1985. We have things like the Michelin Man. That's pretty, such a pretty character, but so tidy. I want to be quite different from that. More complicated, more distorted, ugly.

Tell me about the background of the Plastics.

Right at the beginning we had an ordinary drummer and bassist, kind of an ordinary punk band, round about '75 or '76. But, talking about The Sex Pistols, they looked great, and their music was great, but the important thing is to understand their style and their philosophy, if people couldn't understand the Pistols style and philosophy, people still have to play music just like The Sex Pistols, wearing seditionary style clothes, still now. Even if people don't understand their philosophy, so many kids are still playing music just like The Sex Pistols. It's almost 30 years, so if people could understand their style and philosophy, they would never play music just like The Sex Pistols or wear clothes like them. The Plastics too; at first we were just an ordinary punk band, but we thought, "This is wrong. This is not London, we're not so poor." The social environment in London and Tokyo were so different, and just the time was changing back then. In 1980 all the discotheque culture changed into club culture, and all the live houses like CBGBs, Bottom Line, they were all changing into clubs. Plastics also wanted to change. We were looking for something new, and what we found is "Tokio". After World War 2, "modernising" meant "Westernising" so everyone tried to chase Europe and America, but always the real thing was outside Japan: music, design, industry, fashion, everything was outside Japan, so we had to watch these things and copy. But at some point, round about 1980, we were able to pass theme, and this is where we found "Tokio" rather than just "Tokyo". For us, finding "Tokio" was like rock & roll for us. Like rock & roll, not classical. With classical music you have to follow the score, and classical musicians have to just follow the notation. Classical music doesn't think about revolution, no need for something new, but rock music is always searching for something new, something wild, something cool, and rock music can bring in anything. African beat, Hawaiian music, ethnic taste, Chinese taste, and other Asian tastes, we can bring verything in, and it works. We can find a book about Jimi Hendrix, and look at his guitar tabs, but you can't make a Jimi Hendrixs score: it's impossible to make a score of that kind of thing. So "Tokio" is just like rock music: it can bring in anything and it works. In London, in Paris, talking about architecture, there's a style, but it's not like that here. A long time ago Tokyo was called Edo -- Kyoto still has some of that style and spirit, perhaps in the gardens.

Isn't part of this connected to the way Tokyo was destroyed so totally during the war?

Right, so after the war the idea of modernising was tied up so closely with Westernising, which was kind of a tragedy for Japan.

You mean people tried too hard to copy European and American culture and the 1980s saw Japanese culture reaching a more mature balance?

Exactly.

I feel that some of the ideas in the Plastics' music connect in some ways with the subseuent popularity of the postmodernist philosopher Asada Akira, who became a sort of literary star in the 80s. The idea of the copy and the lack of a guiding cultural history.

Right, so that was about the same age. Akira Asada, Shinichi Nakazawa, and those kind of "New Academics". I mean, take the copy. Copy again and again, this is so different from this. The first original was this, one time is just like this, but copy a hundred times, copy a thousand times, and this is something new. This is what "Tokio" is like.

Some people belive that Japan's attempts to copy Western culture are part of what makes it interesting, because there's often some misunderstanding that perhaps unintentionally reveals something uniquely Japanese.

Yes, so image is misunderstanding. To misunderstand something is creating something new we might say.

Why decide to restart the Plastics now?

We gathered because we thought we could make something new, "Just do it!" Round about '81 we unfortunately broke up, but each member tried new stuff, each one was really nice with so many followers. Right now, each member realised something important about life: love, friends, music, relationships -- those kinds of important elements of life. At that time, when we were young, we didn't realise those things. We didn't know love, we didn't know friendship, human relationships. And this time, putting on a rock show now and in 1980 feels the same. People often ask me what's different this time round, but really there's no difference. Same sound, same instruments, so it's not only fresh, but also new. We thought we had everything back then, including love, friendship, but it was very superficial.

It also seems like there was some irony though. Like you knew it was superficial and were celebrating that fact.

That's a good point. We were really so superficial, so stupid really. That's why we could make music like the Plastics. If we were so clever, if we knew real love, maybe there would have been no Plastics. It was very superficial, very... very plastic, very cheap. Not so academic, not so serious.

But that was the image of the '80s, right?

Yes. Before 1980, in Japan people paid money only for things that they could see and touch. If it was a big, heavy thing, they would pay for it. But unique ideas, "Oh, that's a very good idea, thank you. Bye!" You know the story of the blue LED and the court case. Shuji Nakamura was just a salaryman basically, but he invented the blue LED, made lots of money for his employer, but not for himself, so he had to sue them. That kind of situation wasn't unusual before 1980. The style of the Plastics is important. The costumes as well as the music are important. The superficiality is also important. The same as with The Sex Pistols, people have to understand our style and our philosophy. Take secondhand clothes -- not antique, but just secondhand. They weren't such a good image for our parents' generation. "Don't wear such poor stuff," but these days young people are wearing secondhand stuff quite naturally. Famous fashion designers are using those kinds of secondhand clothing in their ideas and materials. But before 1980 it wasn't like that. Our parents' generation thought secondhand stuff was no good. It was after 1980, after the Plastics, that this started to change, people started paying for the idea, not just the big, heavy thing. We just wanted to see our style and our philosophy. Music and fashion are important, but the more important thing was our idea, our philosophy of style.

So what is the Plastics' philosophy?

We just wanted to show people in Japan, in Europe, in America, that there were young kids with new traditions and new consciousness here in Tokyo, as new Japanese. Before the 80s, there were some artists and musicians performing outside Japan, using koto, shamisen, wearing kimonos, wearing kabuki wigs, using those kind of traditional image. Plastics brought to Europe or America something that wasn't traditional, it was more "nichijou-teki", more contemporary. Kabuki is very traditional, great culture, but not always around us. We were playing just electric guitar and synthesiser so brought a more typical contemporary Japanese image rather than a traditional one.

Has youth culture changed in any important way since then? For example some other musicians from your generation have suggested that young people lack some of the cultural urgency and anger that drove people in the late 70s and early 80s.

I understand that point of view. In the 60s and 70s music and fashion were quite anti-establishment, but these days young kids just want to join the establishment. When I was young, we hated the etablishment, we wanted to destroy those old customs and culture. We liked some parts of our Japanese traditions and customs -- we loved them -- but unfortunately had to change. We couldn't keep all these good things. After World War 2 Japan was so miserable, so poor, so in the 60s and 70s young kids wanted to destroy some of the bad changes. "Are we living in a colony of America? This is wrong!" so we wanted to destroy those kinds of things, we loved our traditions but we had to change our lifestyle. There was a post-war establishment that we wanted to destroy. Nowadays young kids just want to be rich. "I want money, all I want is money. All right, if I want to join the establishment, I'm gonna use music, fashion design, just use it." These people, you can't feel their anger because they just want money, so they're smiling and singing something like, "I hope you can make a good life, so keep on moving, keep on doing, we're gonna be with you, come on!"

Of course there are nice new Japanese songs too, but most music people are singing at karaoke is quite empty.

You can sing the Plastics in the karaoke box.

Maybe just Copy, I think. Sometimes we go to karaoke. We like it very much.

What do you sing?

I go to karaoke with my best friends so I want them to enjoy themselves. So I sing kind of unexpected songs. No Beatles, no Stones, no Sex Pistols. For example, Petit Moni. I like the song Baby! Koi ni Knock Out! very much! I think that is the best production of Tsunku. Much better than Love Machine.

I think the second Aya Matsuura album is Tsunku's best work.

Oh, yeah, haha! Sometimes I like J-pop a lot, but fundamentally I'm not interested in Morning Musume and AKB48. No interest, but sometimes, I don't know why, but sometimes, "Oh, this is nice! Fucking crazy!"

Who do you rate these days?

Do you know Yann Tomita. He's maybe the same age as us, and in performance art what he's doing now is quite fantastic.

There also seems to be some nostalgia for new wave. The popularity of Perfume, and the emergence of Soutaisei Riron.

Yeah, Etsuko Yakushima from Soutaisei Riron is going to play before us on Wednesday. Pizzicato 5, Polysics, Soutaisei Riron, D.V.D., all of these seem like they're to some degree followers of the Plastics.

Any new plans for releases?

We're recording the show on Wednesday for a new live album and video which we're going to release as an application for the Apple iPad. No CD or DVD, nothing like this. Maybe one song, 100 yen, that sort of thing. I like the iPad a lot.

Seems like the Japanese music industry's had some resistance to online music.

I think so, yeah! But these days there are so many ways to distribute our music, design, clothes, so many ways. If I've got an iPhone we can do Ustream just right now, here, broadcast this discussion live. Everyone is a publisher, record company, radio station. Major labels' resistance is something to do with J-pop and the major market, but I think I'm outside that, so I have access to so many ways to distribute. What do you think?

With the iPad? I'll probably wait for version 2. I'm not sure it's quite found its role yet.

Exactly, exactly. That's the Apple way.

I think major labels are probably quite happy about the iPad though, because of the huge amount of control that Apple leverages over the content that users download.

Right now major labels aren't a big thing. Big Brother is now Apple. Apple is worse than Microsoft. I think Apple are going to be sued in one or two years because they control their content so much.]]> features http://v1a2904.shiftweb.net/index.php?itemid=392 Fri, 04 Jun 2010 14:50:10 +0900 http://v1a2904.shiftweb.net/index.php?itemid=391
Steven is interviewed on Anusaya here, and his tour's web site, Next Music from Tokyo, is here. I strongly recommend following the link to check out the bands and tour dates. They will be in Canada, starting in Vancouver, from the 22nd until the 29th, with four shows in total, finishing on two (with one an all-ages show) in Toronto.

As someone who has tried booking Japanese bands abroad (in much less ambitious circumstances) and who knows a lot of the problems that can come up, I demand that anyone in a relevant part of Canada, with any interest in hearing something different, check these shows out and support this worthy enterprise.]]> journals http://v1a2904.shiftweb.net/index.php?itemid=391 Thu, 20 May 2010 03:38:16 +0900 http://v1a2904.shiftweb.net/index.php?itemid=390 CNNGo, with Nakata Yasutaka. I met up with him at Studio Ghibli's Ebisu office, where they keep a radio studio near the top of a fancy apartment building. As before, his comments about his own music weren't particularly illuminating, but his comments on fashion were, as usual, delivered with great enthusiasm and at great length, which is in itself an interesting revelation about his inspiration and creative process.]]> features http://v1a2904.shiftweb.net/index.php?itemid=390 Thu, 22 Apr 2010 00:48:05 +0900 http://v1a2904.shiftweb.net/index.php?itemid=389 The Japan Times now. I didn't have space to say half the stuff I wanted to about it. To summarise, the idea's more interesting than the result, but it's still far less annoying than it could have been. ]]> reviews - album http://v1a2904.shiftweb.net/index.php?itemid=389 Mon, 05 Apr 2010 18:46:52 +0900 http://v1a2904.shiftweb.net/index.php?itemid=388 here.]]> reviews - album http://v1a2904.shiftweb.net/index.php?itemid=388 Mon, 05 Apr 2010 18:43:15 +0900 http://v1a2904.shiftweb.net/index.php?itemid=387 check it out.]]> features http://v1a2904.shiftweb.net/index.php?itemid=387 Mon, 22 Feb 2010 16:56:34 +0900 http://v1a2904.shiftweb.net/index.php?itemid=386 read it here.]]> features http://v1a2904.shiftweb.net/index.php?itemid=386 Mon, 22 Feb 2010 16:49:46 +0900 http://v1a2904.shiftweb.net/index.php?itemid=385 Read it here. ]]> features http://v1a2904.shiftweb.net/index.php?itemid=385 Mon, 22 Feb 2010 16:48:02 +0900 http://v1a2904.shiftweb.net/index.php?itemid=384 Japan Times review I wrote last December for "henachoco"'s new album. ]]> reviews - album http://v1a2904.shiftweb.net/index.php?itemid=384 Mon, 22 Feb 2010 16:40:47 +0900