music-related links

Wow, thanks to the music presentation group, this blog is becoming a great resource site on popular culture!

I will add some links.

Oto

Stop Rokkasho

(From “Hear” category, you can download “Before Then” by Norma Field and Oto. )

Ian Condry’s website (author, Hip-hop Japan) – You can see a music video by King Giddra with anti-war theme.

Japan Times on Hip-hop in Japan

youtube – Toshiko Akiyoshi “The Village” performance

More on our presentation

Just to briefly add to what my group-mates have already done concerning our presentation on Japanese pop music since WWII;

 

One of the main themes is the interplay between imported American styles of music and their adoption by a Japanese audience. With this, as we also saw in both Blue Nippon and Hip Hop Japan, came a desire for validation of the music as both an “accurate” expression of whichever musical genre as well as an expression of Japanese-ness, or rather that a Japanese twist was put on it.

 

I have a couple of mp3s that I thought might be a nice addendum to the work my group-mates have done before me:

 

Sakamoto Kyu: “Ue o muite arukō” often referred to in the US as “Sukiyaki”:

http://download.yousendit.com/20666EEC3F620BED

 

The Happy End: “Kaze Wo Atsumete” from the earl 1970’s:

http://download.yousendit.com/5C23E32D5A920882

 

Zeebra: “Untouchable” an example of more hardcore hip hop:

http://download.yousendit.com/2CDD4E6F6EDA39F5

 

The Pillows: “Crazy Sunshine” a recent rock band

http://download.yousendit.com/61BB2F104A08F5C4

 

Boris: “Farewell” a fairly recent noise/doom/sludge release:

http://download.yousendit.com/C62BF84223FA32DF

 

Utada Hikaru: “This is Love” One of the most famous J-Pop artists from her 2006 release:

http://download.yousendit.com/EC835E844E3DDA0B

-Julian

Artists from the Presentation

Here is a list of the artists we mentioned/played from our presentation. The list isn’t quite complete – but it’s close (Julian, Alex, or Tiffany can fill in the gaps if they so desire). If anyone was interested in any particular artist/style, feel free to inquire.

-Sean

J-POP AND BEYOND!:
50s: jazz and the beginnings of rock ‘n roll
Key artists: jazz musicians (see Blue Nippon); Kosaka Kazuya & the Wagon Masters cover Elvis’ “Heartbreak Hotel, heralding in the rock age for Japan; Sakamoto Kyu scores an international smash with a song known in America as “Sukiyaki”, which translates to something like “beef soup.”

60s: cover pop and karaoke; the rise of Western pop and English-sung lyrics

70s: rock & pop continued; rise of “New Music,” a singer-songwriter type of approach that emphasizes personal expression over social messages
Key artists: Happy End, a rock band noted for singing in Japanese; Toshiko Akiyoshi, internationally-acclaimed jazz musician; Yellow Magic Orchestra (which includes one of Happy End’s original members) bring Kraftwerk-ian influence to their electropop offerings; Yosui Inoue and Takruo Yoshida are some of the more prominent “New Music” artists.

80s: citypop/wasei pop – the beginnings of J-Pop as we know it today
Key artists: Ryuichi Sakamoto, former member of the Yellow Magic Orchestra, pioneers Japanese electronica; Eikichi Yazawa is one of the decade’s most prominent rock stars; female pop stars like Yoko Oginome, Seiko Matsuda, and Moritaka Chisato tackle the charts; Chage and Aska are considered “Asia’s most popular rock group;” meanwhile, Shibuya-kei godfathers Flipper’s Guitar (Keigo Oyamada and Kenji Ozawa) hit the scene in the late 80s, taking liberally from the English twee-pop scene, and later the British Madchester rave scene, as well as combining sounds of 60s French pop, and other international (primarily European) sonic styles.

90s: Shibuya-kei! – Translated to “Shibuya-style,” in reference to where it originally took off (thanks in large part to the well-stocked record stores of the Shibuya area), Shibuya-kei artists combine the best of 60s French pop, bossanova, lounge, hip-hop, rock ‘n roll, electronica, and most every other major musical movement of the past 20 years to create a swirling, kaleidoscopic pop sound both immediately familiar and distinctly Japanese. Most Shibuya-kei artists would receive huge success in Japan; many found success outside of Japan as well, inspiring Western artists like Momus and Bearsuit to imitate the Shibuya-kei sound.
Key artists: Pizzicato Five, the icons of the Shibuya-kei scene, received widespread international acclaim and success-I have a ton of their stuff, so if anyone is interested, let me know; other Shibuya-kei artists include Cornelius (ex-Flipper’s Guitar’s Keigo Oyamada), who’s lately gone on to more experimental/”rock” electronica (to use Kiku’s terminology) – he’s playing Park West in Chicago on May 7 if anyone’s interested; also see Takako Minekawa, Kahimi Karie, and others. Meanwhile, Japan becomes known for its burgeoning noise-rock scene as well, consisting of bands like Acid Mothers Temple (sprawling pysch), Melt-Banana (hyperspeed metal with helium vocals), the Boredoms (noise-chaos, but their later stuff is surprisingly organic and coherent), and the mother of all noise artists, Merzbow (layers upon layers of chaos listened to at unreasonably loud volume). Bands like Peatmos represent the lighthearted, lo-fi pop side of things. Basically, if it’s a genre in the West, you can find it represented somewhere in the highly diverse Japanese music scene.

00s: More J-Pop, hip-hop, and doom/sludge
Key artists: Utada Hikaru and Hamasaki Ayumi, the two behemoths of the J-Pop scene. Bands like L’Arc en Ciel and the Pillows take the sheen of J-Pop and add guitars, continuing in the J-Rock tradition. Hip-hop, after years of underground struggling, finally begins to crack the mainstream; continuing the 90s split between “real” rap and “party” rap are artists like Zeebra (real, “street cred” rap) and Scha Dara Parr (party rap; their breakthrough hit was actually produced in tandem with the other member of Flipper’s Guitar, Kenji Ozawa in the mid-90s). Also, Japanese band Boris revitalizes the international metal scene with their breakthrough album Pink, shedding light in the process on the doom/sludge movement that has risen in prominence as of late.

Phew! Most information taken from the books we read, wikipedia.org, allmusic.com, and our own personal stores of music knowledge (WHPK represent, w00t!)

Nori’s visit – thoughts

In regards to Nori’s visit, I have to admit that I was disappointed by the way he just stuck to the surface level of what happened; not only did he not really explore any of the possible underlying reasons for why he’s been received the way he has in Japan, but he didn’t even really go into his time in Iraq at all. Granted, I got a bit of a summary from the interview and other articles, but it would have been nice to get more of his direct opinions on the Iraqi people, and some of his viewpoints on the larger issue as a whole. He also didn’t really say anything about DU, except that it’s bad and so he went to Iraq – but why? What did he hope to achieve? Overall, I wish he would have gone into the issues and his experience more, but at the same time I understand how hard it must be for him (and his limited knowledge of English probably didn’t help much either). So regardless, I am very glad he came, and it was a great opportunity, especially to spend time with him as a person and not just as a celebrity activist, or an untouchable figurehead. His visit has been much appreciated.

-Sean