Takashi Murakami

If there's one thing that has always irked me about the art world, its that certain elements seem set on making it an exclusive, inaccessible thing with a clear line drawn between pop art for the plebs, and high art for some group of well-educated elites. I've always felt that art should be for everyone, and that's a mentality that Takashi Murakami also has.

I only recently became aware of his work after watching a Fantastic Plastic Machine video (Different Colors). The vibrant colors in the video, the strange creature that the girl in it meets, and the world it takes her to peaked my curiosity, and I just had to know who made this video. After a few quick Google searches I had my answer, and was introduced to the colorful, "superflat" world of Mr. Murakami.

By and large, what appeals to me the most about his work is the use of color, and the carefree, happy undertones in a lot of his work. The otherworldly, yet approachable characters he creates, and the strange, yet intriguing worlds the live in make me want to start at his prints for hours.

As I mentioned earlier, Murakami likes to make his art accessible to as many people as possible. Throughout his career he has strived to blur the line between high and low art. One of his most recent examples of this is the work that he has been doing of late with various companies ranging from bubble gum, to figurines, to even working with Louis Vuitton. While some may cry bloody murder over taking a commercial route with one's art, what it boils down to is that Murakami's work has become incredibly accessible to all walks of life as a result. In an interview a couple of years ago he had this to say on the matter:

You’ve done work with Louis Vuitton and others that straddles the line between art and commercial products. Do you think there are dangers to mixing art with branding and merchandizing?

I don’t think of it as straddling. I think of it as changing the line. What I’ve been talking about for years is how in Japan, that line is less defined. Both by the culture and by the past-War economic situation. Japanese people accept that art and commerce will be blended; and in fact, they are surprised by the rigid and pretentious Western hierarchy of “high art.” In the West, it certainly is dangerous to blend the two because people will throw all sorts of stones. But that’s okay—I’m ready with my hard hat.

Takashi Murakami has gotten me interested in a a very colorful, engaging style of art that very much appeals to me. Since coming across his work, I've also started to look more into other artists who have delved into the Superflat style such as Chiho Aoshima and Yoshitomo Nara, but more on them another time. Before signing off, here is the video he did for Fantastic Plastic Machine:

Ikiru - Akira Kurosawa

Like a lot of people, my first exposure to a Kurosawa film was Seven Samurai. It was an interesting mix of action, and social commentary, and the more I researched it, the more I realized its impact on film in America and elsewhere. However, I recently sat down and watched Ikiru, and that is now by far my favorite Kurosawa film out of all of those that I've seen.

The movie follows an older bureaucrat / widower, Kanji Watanabe, who has spent the last thirty years working for the government, when he is suddenly diagnosed with stomach cancer. This causes him to seriously re-evaluate his life. First he looks at his job and realizes that he wasn't so much working as he was acting like a machine rubber-stamping paperwork, or sending it to different departments. At one point Watanabe says, "I can't remember a single thing that I've done" when looking back on his job. His job was his life, but he was never really living, and this comes back to the film's title, "Ikiru" which is Japanese for "to live". Watanabe comes to the conclusion that he never really lived, and that before he dies he must now do his best to live life to the fullest.

From here he does everything from going for a night on the town with a carefree novelist, to spending time with a young female, to what would be his final, and greatest achievement: building a new park for a local community.

Following Watanabe on his quest to live is truly inspiring. He really tries to change the way he goes about things now that he knows he will die. Seeing his dogged persistence to get that park built as he gradually becomes weaker is bittersweet. Most interesting is when his co-workers realize that Watanabe knew he was dying but persevered to finish the park, then swearing to live more like he did, but ultimately failing. It showed just how difficult change can truly be. The story is such that it's difficult not to want to re-evaluate one's own life after watching Ikiru.

Takashi Shimura deserves a lot of praise for his portrayal of Watanabe. He really sold the roll throw body language, facial expression, and the way he spoke. There's this mix of sadness, and yearning to make things right in his performance that is very special. One scene in the movie where he sings an old song called Gondola no Uta about how precious youth is that is absolutely moving. Shimura did an amazing job in this role.

A lot of westerners mostly know Kurosawa for his samurai movies, but it is well worth delving in to the rest of his work. Ikiru is one such movie that should be a must-see for everyone.

Ken Ishii - Flatspin

I was perusing the local Book Off the other day, and stumbled across Flatspin by Ken Ishii, promptly snapping it up. I've mentioned before that I quite like his music with its very mechanical sound. A couple of things that I like about this album are that a number of the songs have a way of keeping this mechanical vibe going, but there's this sense of exploration at the same time. "Gap Accelerator" has one melody that and beat that stays prevelent throughout the song, while the track regularly slams to a halt, only to start up again re-invented. "Drums in Friction" has very organic-sounding drums, while the accompanying instruments are anything but (a nice juxtaposition of sounds). Both Mirage and Moonquake make nice use of pads where the first acts as a mellow mid-section to the album, and Moonquake feels like perfect night driving music. "Frozen Reminiscence" is a nice, laid back jazzy track, while Iceblink is more traditional Ken Ishii fair. About the only area that is a bit hit-and-miss for me on the album are three "Flatspinning Loop" tracks that feel more like beats that Ishii liked, but wasn't quite sure what to do with, but put them on the album anyway.

Overall, I very much liked this album, and it'll be sitting on my iPod for quite some time I think. I also picked up Sleeping Madness by Ken Ishii, but more on that in another post.

Classic Pizzicato 5 Promo

Here's an old Pizzicato 5 promo that I thought was pretty cute. It's got an old, 1960s schtick to it, and a cameo from Tanaka Tomoyuki (aka Fantastic Plastic Machine). It's all in Japanese, but even if you don't understand what's being said, it's still quite charming. I hope you enjoy it!

Miaou

I just stumbled across these guys, and feel bad for not discovering them sooner. Miaou is an indie rock trio formed in 1998, consisting of Tatsuki Hamasaki, and sisters Hiromi and Mayumi Hasegawa.

A lot of their music has a dreamy, optimistic quality to it. The songs are all instrumentals, with guitar playing a very prominent role as well as plenty of soothing synths and some organ too. There's touches of Smashing Pumpkins, and Radiohead in the guitar work, but with a less gloomy undertone to it all.

This is definitely sleepy Sunday stroll music if you ask me. It's really beautiful stuff.

Sambomaster - Sekai wa Sore Ai to Yobundaze

A quick post for this morning. Like a lot of people, the first time I heard this song was when watching the Densha Otoko tv series (it's the ending theme). I'll write more on these guys later, but I will say that I do like their melodies and arrangements. Very fun. Also, I like how they look like a bunch of regular guys that just decided to form a band, and aren't a trio of pretty boys like a lot of other music acts out there. If you want a basic rundown on what Sambomaster is about, just check their Wikipedia page. Here's the video for the song. Great stuff for starting off the day, I think. Good energy, and makes me want to get off my behind and do something with my day.

De De Mouse

Recently, I started getting into De De Mouse's work with it's unique, experimental sound. What makes it so good is how it manages to remain accessible while trying to do something new. A lot of experimental acts tend to make a mad dash for deep in left field, and create something that can be very difficult to listen to, but De De Mouse has this underlying pop sensibility that makes his tunes a ton of fun to experience.

The synths often have a nice, lo-fi, old school quality that sort of reminds me of the period when these instruments were transitioning from analog to digital. The melodies sound like something from a television soundtrack, with and innate ability to create strong mental images while listening. There is a very otherworldly quality to his music that is hard to articulate well. All the while, he makes liberal use of some very interesting vocals that sound like sliced up middle eastern samples.

He's put out quite a bit of stuff in the last couple of years, with a pair of albums and an EP. Very little of it appears to be available on iTunes, so if you want to get any of it, you'll need to look to Amazon Japan.

It's hard to describe De De Mouse's music beyond what I've already said. Just swing by his MySpace page, or check out some of his videos. Really neat stuff.

Rei Harakami

It's hard to narrow it down to a few words when describing the feeling of Rei Harakami's music. Whimsical, relaxing, and melodic come to mind, but it feels like there are a whole lot of other adjectives that are necessary yet difficult to recall. If nothing else, Harakami puts out great tunes for listening to on the weekend when (hopefully!) your time is your own.

Between the smooth melodies, and absolutely great instrumentation chalk full of pads, bells, and organs (plenty of other stuff too, but these stand out the most), I find Harakami's works extremely absorbing. Listening to his music makes me want to hop on a bicycle and lazily bike around the outskirts of Kyoto or something in autumn. He's one of the first artists that I've listened to in quite some time where I feel absolutely compelled to track down all of his work, though that may prove to be a challenge as you'll read below.

He's put out a number of EPs over the last 10 years, as well as contributed to his fair share of soundtracks, and has been collaborating quite a bit with other artists (most notably Coldcut). The one HUGE challenge, though, is tracking down his music. Harakami does have all of his tracks available on the Japanese iTunes shop, but that means people outside Japan can't get the songs. One of the few remaining options, short of making a quick transoceanic flight, is to order the physical CDs from a place like Amazon Japan, in which case it may be better to buy a bunch of CDs at once to make the pricey international shipping fee more worthwhile. Other than that, maybe you'll be lucky to have a Book Off in your city (or know someone in LA, New York, or Vancouver who can check), and you could be even luckier to actually track one of Rei Harakami's albums down.

So, is it worth all the effort? I think so, but you can give his stuff a listen over here, and decide for yourself.

YMCK

Happy Friday, folks! As we head into the weekend, lets kick things off on a cheerful, jazzy chiptunes note. There are plenty of artists out there that make nifty music inspired by the sounds of old 8-bit video game consoles, but my favorite of the bunch is definitely YMCK. Based in Tokyo, the trio consists of Midori on vocals, Yokemura handling music, lyrics, arrangement, while Nakamura works on the videos.

The group formed in 2003, and have released three albums in that time: Family Music (2004), Family Racing (2005), and, most recently, Family Genesis (2008). I was actually pleasantly surprised to see that one of Japan's biggest record labels, Avex, was willing to take a chance on them for their latest release.

What I like about YMCK in comparison to other chiptune acts is how they combine the video game vibe of their music with something a little more jazzy through their vocals. It's like combining Pizzicato 5 with an old Nintendo game console from the 80s. A very neat mix of sounds. However, I do find that their sound is drifting more towards straightforward pop arrangement-wise with Family Genesis, albeit with chiptune instrumentation.

One thing that is really cool about the band is that they've made a VST plug-in that is freely available for download from their official website, so anyone interest in writing some chiptunes of their own can go ahead and give it a shot. I've tried it, and the sounds are quite good. The only difficulty that I've run into is that I haven't figured out how to force my tracks to run in mono instead of stereo when using Ableton Live, so I get a lot of noise in the right speaker a lot. Once I get that under control, I'll be very happy indeed. ^_^

So, in the meantime, I hope you all get your weekends off to a good start, and if you want, check out some of YMCK's music over here. If you really like it, you will be able to find their Family Genesis album on the US iTunes store as of July 29 of this year, but it may take some wrangling to track down their older stuff. USAGI-CHANG, the band's former label, has the albums listed in their catalog, but they don't ship overseas, and recommend using Amazon Japan or HMV Japan instead, both of whom I also think may not ship overseas. If you decide to track down these older albums, something most definitely worth doing, you may have your work cut out for you. Best of luck!

Fantastic Plastic Machine - Luxury

I'm going to try and focus one post per week, or every second week depending on how motivated I'm feeling, to a particular album that I really like. To kick things off, I thought I'd pick the one that helped get me interested in Japan's electronic music scene in the first place: Luxury by Fantastic Plastic Machine (originally released in 1998).

This is the second full-length album released by the artist, and whereas his debut featured a lot more bossa nova, and 60s kitsch, this one started to flow more into the realm of dance music with hints of house popping in now and then. Luxury very much feels like a bridge between his early, retro-esque works, and his more poppy, contemporary pieces found on recent releases.

Electric Lady Land is a stand out track for me on the album for its catchy melody, and slightly disturbing lyrics about a girl that is ready and waiting to do whatever her master wishes. Then again, it's also following a similar persona as that found in your typical maid cafe, so maybe it's not that out of line so long as it's understood that it's a fantasy. Someone synced up the song with some anime on YouTube if you want to check it out here.

Lotto is a track with a much more futuristic feel to it combined with something I would expect to hear in a game show, all with someone cheerfully singing along in German. It's a very good example of how this album is shifting FPM's sound from old school stuff, to something a little more in the here and now. There's an instrumental, slightly remixed version of it here.

Another favorite of mine from Luxury is You Must Learn All Night Long. It's got this really great rolling beat to it, with loud horns blaring in with a funky guitar, all with kids singing over top. It's a very happy song, with a whole lot of presence. People also seem to like to mention the cover of the Eurythmics' There Must Be an Angel on the album. Personally, I don't mind the song, but I don't find it stands out as much as the other songs that I've already mentioned.

If you get the chance, try and track down this album. It is well worth adding to your collection. It's combination of 60s lounge with more modern dance music is both fun, and interesting. Before you go, here's one more reason to give Luxury a listen, the album's lead off track, Theme of Luxury: