Harajuku in peril?
Tokyo's most flamboyant shopping district may be threatened by high-street retailers
Ok. My crochety and alarmist Andy Rooney-style piece about Harajuku is in today's Japan Times. Thanks to Marxy, Keet, and the %6DOKIDOKI kawaii gumi (above) for support. Link here.
Nipponia is a free magazine published in multiple languages by Heibonsha given away at Japanese embassies around the globe. Inside the new issue (46, for those of you counting) is a profile piece in which I am formally charged with the heinous crime of...
Surely there are others more worthy of the blame, but here is my mug shot taken in my preferred seating spot in Nakano Broadway, playing "monsters" with a vintage Marusan Kanegon and something limited-edition from Godzilla Final Wars. But I'd give it all up to be Baolimo Lombo (below), who was born in the Congo, who now gets to work at the LaOX Duty Free in the AKB...
Got some new PM product on the Japan-only tip...
The September issue of STUDIO VOICE is a super-sized special with a cover feature on former YMO and Happy End musician Haruomi Hosono. There's a long interview with Hosono himself, along with testimonials from the likes of Maki Nomiya (P5) and Tadanori Yokoo and a look at his production and soundtrack work which extends into anime like Night on the Galactic Railroad and EX MACHINA. Also included: a conversation between Toei sexploitation king Norifumi Suzuki and Machine Girl helmer Noboru Iguchi...and last but not least, my monthly Paranoid States of America column!
Also, I never be writing fo no Kinema Junpo publications before, but I finally slipped through the cracks to contribute to their Yoshiaki Kawajiri Madhouse Plus 02 book (01 was about Satoshi Kon). My chapter is on the popularity of the Ninja Scroll writer/director in the USA and how he all blew our minds with that shit back in the day. Tomo Machiyama translated while Gilles Poitras and Daryl Surat were interviewed for this piece which I guess I'm sorta proud of!
My Speed Racer blow-out is featured in today's Re:view section of the Japan Times. Interviewed: Ippei Kuri; Speed's co-creator and founder of Tatsunoko Pro, and Peter Fernandez; mastermind behind the US version of the show.
'Speed Racer': drawing on an anime legend
'Americanizing' a cartoon classic
Why Speed Racer and why now? Well, スピード・レーサー finally opens in Japan this weekend...
And by the way, I liked it!
Various versions and incarnations of APPLESEED: EX MACHINA go on sale on home video in the US today. I'm featured pretty heavily in the extras included on the Blu-ray and the two-disc set talking trash about a whole lot of stuff in the basement of Other Cinema. Also among the mighty heroes who come catapulting out of your television set are Carl Horn (who I appreciate taking the the effort to put copies of Ikegami-Kokie's Starving Man in the frame) and brand spanking new OTAKU USA contributor Gilles Poitras.
What I remember about the filming: weird audio problems caused by the unseen-but-real Mole Men who live under 992 Valencia street. The cameraman saying that the basement looked like the inside of a U2 spy plane. Col. Baldwin eating a bento.
I make a series of sure-to-be accurate predictions about the future of the otaku-sphere in my new "Otakool" column in today's Japan Times. Link here.
About.com: Manga has just handed out "Best of 2007" honors to a handful of books I either wrote, edited, or contributed to last year.
Best Book About Japanese Pop Culture – Japanese School Girl Inferno
(I wrote this book. Izumi Evers did the graphic design and research.)
Best New One-Shot Manga – Town of Evening Calm, Country of Cherry Blossoms by Fumiyo Kouno
(I edited this one, and my company jaPRESS handled the production for publisher Last Gasp, as we also did with Chronicle Books on Schoolgirl Inferno. )
Best Book About Manga - Manga: The Complete Guide
(I wrote some reviews for it, but you better believe that this is Jason Thompson's baby, through and through.)
Town of Evening Calm, Country of Cherry Blossoms is also nominated for the About.com: Manga 2007 Reader's Poll for Best New Josei Manga.
Update: Anime Genesis Awards 2007
Blog Of The Year
Winner: An Eternal Thought in the Mind of Godzilla
The new issue of "Multi-Media Mix Magazine" STUDIO VOICE be out in some Japans. The cover story is Creators of 2008. Otaku related people to keep tabs on next year include anime director Seiji Mizushima (Gundam 00), and manga-ka Naoki Yamamoto (Dance Til Tomorrow, Red) and Keiichi Arai (nichijou). The cover boy is actor Shota Matsuda. His dad was Yusaku Matsuda, aka Golden Wolf.
As usual, STUDIO VOICE is also running my paranormal and conspiracy column "Paranoid States of America". This time, I'm on about the California Drones.
My new column, entitled "American Otaku Densetsu", is now running in Japan's Weekly ASCII magazine. Expect profiles and interviews on some of the hardest hitting star-spangled nerds in the land including Kokujin Tensai, Jason Thompson, and me!
What the heck is Weekly ASCII? Think hardcore Akihabara style magazine full of the latest electronics, idol pictorials, manga and AKB in-jokes (maids, kigurumers, and instant foods feature prominently). I'll scan some pages for a virtual tour soon. In the meantime, pick up the new issue next to a huge pile of blank DVD-Rs down on Chuo-dori.
Patrick Macias (L) and Patrick W. Galbraith (R) plot the destruction of Akihabara.
My new Otakool column is happening in today's Japan Times.
Akihabara's awful truths
While the Establishment packages Electric Town as a mecca for manga and anime obsessives, and a magnet for camera- toting tourists, the reality differs: 'Akiba' is alienating the geeks who once made it great
Read it (and weep) here...
My second "Otakool" column is in today's Japan Times. This one is about legendary from MySpace-to-Japan rapper KOKUJIN TENSAI ("Black Genius"). The interview is here.
Also, the hard copy is pretty hilarious. Pics of Quentin Tarantino, Kokujin Tensai, and me all on the same page...basically the three best arguments against ever becoming interested in Japan!
(From the cover of Tone magazine)
Imagine the drink tab at this party...
Thus have I contributed to BFI’s Sight & Sound magazine’s “75 Hidden Gems – The Great Films Time Forgot” feature for their August issue. I was asked to pick one “forgotten and overlooked film” and wrote up the only sane and logical choice, The Phynx (1970).
Happy hunting.
I have an article about the San Francisco experimental film scene in the new issue of STUDIO VOICE. Crazy Craig Baldwin does most of the talking and the story revolves (mostly) around the inspirational and creatively-fertile Other Cinema scene.
It’s the “Movie Guide for Dissatisfied Audiences” issue. Here’s how the Editor in Chief explained the concept to me.
“It is based on the idea that the recent "Japanese movie bubble" is shit. We are trying to find out how we can come across the truly interesting films (commercial/independent/Japanese/American/etc) which are not made with TV money.”
He’s right. Anime films have been really strong lately, but I can’t think of the last live-action Japanese movie I’ve seen that blew me away. The last one was probably Godzilla Final Wars back in 2004, and I think it may have been good for all the wrong reasons. I'm not bitter...but I'm also not impressed by the "Japanese movie bubble" one whit. Any of you lot feel different?
The definitely amazing DVD box set of Sonny Chiba’s SHADOW WARRIORS (Kage no Gundan): THE COMPLETE SERIES is on sale now and such. I wrote the 12-page booklet of liner notes and the episode guide that comes with this 7-disc, 27 episode wonder. But even if I didn’t, I’d be completely comfortable with calling this one of the best things ever shown on television. In fact, considering all the female nudity and grindhouse splatter in every episode, it’s hard to believe this could have ever been shown on tee vee at all (typical episode title: "Intrusion! 24 Hours in the Woman's Bath")! Lotsa ninja magic, Japan Action Club superstars (Etsuko Shihomi, Yasuaki Kurata), rib-tickling comedy, and Sonny Chiba lording over all as Hattori Hanzo in between. Trust me on this one...
Cheapest price I could find was here, and no my brother, youz gots 2 buy your own!
I contributed a little something to the March issue of Asia-Pacific Perspectives: Japan + magazine. Their English-language “Manga Mania” issue is pretty nice and includes interviews with Moyoco Anno (Sakuran) and gag manga-ka Kotobuki Shiriagari. Leiji Matsumoto gets a shout out, as well as Detroit Metal City. Not bad for a publication produced with the support of the Cabinet Office of the Government of Japan...
You can read my contribution here.
(Note that my views on Ikegami’s Spider-Man and Devilman do not necessarily represent the opinions of the Cabinet Office of the Government of Japan).
There's a scary big two-page interview with me in the new issue of Japanese music magazine TONE.
It's the '90s retrospective issue, with Damon Albarn and Paul Simonon on the cover. My feature is called "The Rise, Prosperity, and Decline of American Otaku" - a typical rambling brain dump that covers (in no particular order): Nirvana Vs. Teenage Fanclub, Jellyfish, ELO, Satanic Majesties Request, Danzig, and how I pretty much only listen to anime and tokusatsu symphonic suites nowadays because Myspace and MP3s killed the music.
I recently recorded an interview with research-journalist Kent Daniel Bentkowski for Studio Voice magazine about his pretty astonishing interpretation of Stanley Kubrick’s EYES WIDE SHUT.
Bascially, Kubrick was a member of a secret society who was killed for revealing too much in his final film.
Unbeknownst to me, Kent also taped the interview, transcribed it, and recently put it up on his blog! None of my scribbling for Studio Voice has been available in English until now, so anyone interested in my growing patch of non-overtly otaku work might want to check it out. The actual article will run in the April issue of SV.
Link to the interview is here.
Kent's original essay, EYES WIDE SHUT: OCCULT SYMBOLISM, is here.
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