Japan 2009
It’s a little odd, but I think of going to Japan for the sake of some live performances, shopping and hanging out with friends just like what I do at an anime convention. I might or might not bring my camera; I might or might not go to a maid cafe; I might or might not see cosplayers; I might or might not care about any of that.
However, I will definitely try to eat my way around. I guess that part is something unique to international traveling. Food culture is something integral to the human life experience. It’s diverse, nourishing, and a great way to appreciate culture using most of the sensory perception methods you have. It’s one place where America is on equal grounds with Japan, that both incorporates foreign culinary concepts and spin them into strange, delicious but nonetheless interesting eats. While I can’t really say who does it better, but this is one free market exercise that make us all winners.
Putting 2 and 2 together we get…Japanese food con in America? Seems like a good idea to me! Someone’s done this already, right?
Breaking bread among friends is one of the larger guilty pleasure I share, even if they’re just random guys from the internets! Over Anime Expo this weekend I hope those who are going will take that opportunity as well. People looking to replicate the same thing at Otakon? Looks like the Anime Diet guys are trying to do something. At least one of them anyways.
If there’s a point to this post, it is that if for some reason you read an Evangelion 2.0 review on this blog, you’d know it was because I was somewhere out of town catching a film of said thing. Same with going to a certain concert. Or maybe even this other one… And (more likely?) if you don’t see anything, you know what’s going on.
Watching Crap Anime for the Actor
There are a lot of actor fans out there who would watch every film or TV show with their favorite actor in it.
That is basically the same as your average seiyuu-ota types. The difference is that in Japan they’re all into brand management and the like, and for some of these seiyuu types, they make the fans run through all sorts of hoops, thanks to Japan’s developed idol scene.
Of course, it’s not the whole story. Many prolific voice actors, working in the background, do not get all that name recognition if they don’t run their careers in that direction. A minor fan favorite, Satsuki Yukino, is probably a good example of a female voice acting type who has been in a ton of shows as secondary roles, dabbled a bit in doing songs and what not, obtained some recognition, but ultimately lived as a straight-up seiyuu. On the other hand you get people like Kikuko Inoue who is playing it totally like an idol celebrity with everything from fan club events to selling DVDs of her eating lunch. She maintains her popularity to some extent even after starting a family. It’s weird, but that’s what some people want I guess.
And there are many more Satsuki-sans than Kikuko-sans in the industry (to pick on some ex-Animazement guests). A glimpse at far most male voice actors beyond the age of 40 will reveal to you how many that toiled, even in great roles, are just getting by like a normal person. Basically, even if these folks have fans (and they do), it’s very difficult to watch every single show your favorite actor is in, just because voice acting is that kind of a profession versus stage or film or TV acting. Plus, sometimes you’re just an extra or a 1-liner. In other words, unless you’re like Nana Mizuki or her ilk, only your very true fans will bother with a show that otherwise stunk, with a notable number that makes a difference.
So what happens when you take a bunch of voice actors that have steady following and stick them in a crap show, hoping people will watch it? Does it work? I don’t know. The Japanese did it for Dragonaut. Funimation will too. Or at least try. It would be interesting to see how much “brand” power these American dub actors have. All that convention touring must do something for them as individuals! Do they sell DVDs, or do DVDs sell them? It is a mystery.
Space Bio DUH or the Greatest Journey I’ll (Probably) Never Make
I like anime music. I like Yoko Kanno’s anime music, very much so. I read Mai’s very excellent Kanno blog regularly. So why did my mind “click” just only now?
Let me elaborates some. I like live music a lot–thanks to my proximity to one of the best music scenes in the world, I can actually catch a lot of interesting acts playing live. It’s not cheap to go to them, but I find myself increasingly preferring a more consummating experience like a good concert rather than buying a CD of the same band. Occasionally I even forgo buying the CDs completely and do lives instead. There are various reasons for this, but let’s just generally chalk it up to my affinity to live music.
Yoko Kanno is one of the gateway drug, so to speak, for my mild addiction to anime music. It’s not just soundtrack stuff, as you know, because Kanno is prolific at making pop and all kind of weird stuff as well. Over the 20+ years she has produced, scored, played, conducted, performed or otherwise got associated with favorites after favorites, that it has gotten to a point where I set her apart from everyone else that do anime music. It’s gotten so ludicrous, that I don’t even find her all that fascinating, adorable or worthy anymore, but outright like a force of nature. It’s like the sun–it sustains life, but we take it for granted far most of the time. Her work in this landscape of modern, JapaneseAsian visual culture is something that will always be a defining factor personally. Even if it’s a small, relatively quiet corner of it all.
So comes Space Bio Charge. If you didn’t know, it’s a “best-of-Yoko Kanno” 3-disc set that has basically one or more favorite piece from nearly every anime piece she scored, ever. Why the best collection release?
Supposedly, the best collection CDs are to go with the 7/7 show. Yes, SKUs to promote a show. It is a part of a blitz campaign for a concert on July 7th. The concert is going to play songs lifted from Space Bio Charge…?
There are some other strange marketing ploys for this show, including a weird promotion video with Tim Jensen in it, the funky Seatbelts website, and all the numerology. It ties in also with the CMYoko promotions as well, which are two other CD compilations (available on iTunes, actually…) from Yoko Kanno’s commercial music portfolio. The second disc came out just a couple months back, and the first disc came out about end of last year.
So, back to clicking. It just occurred to me this might be the most awesome anison event of…the past 20 years. Those Animelo anime summer lives and the new Lantis Fest are great and all, but the 7/7 concert is going to be so much more. Just look at the list of performers for yourself. Factoring the fact that Kanno just hasn’t done any tours or anything like that for her own work, this show is probably an once-in-a-lifetime event.
And there won’t be a DVD of this. What a grave sin!
Anyone got a spare ticket?
New Anime Song Tie-Ins from Abroad
Anison or anisong? Anyways–
So it’s a spur-of-the-moment question, but what are some new acts in Japan that are western transplants? What kind of a list I can come up with just through westerners who consequently moved to Japan and got signed up by a label there? For the sake of simplicity I’m going to ignore Japanese acts that were born in Korea, China and other East Asian countries. And while the likes of Hikaru Utada would fit in this category, let’s just stick with newbies for now. More fun and challenging IMO.
- I wrote about HIMEKA earlier. What makes her a little bit more buzz-worthy than others is that she engaged in the whole fandom thing, online and at cons, before she headed to Japan. But I think she’s also the newest in this bunch. Props for being able to publish a cover of a song you like, you anison otaku you.
- I found Kylee through Xam’d. It seems she’s only 15 years old. So much talent and so young! I guess we have to stay tuned to see if Pedobear gets a hold of her or not.
- There’s Becca, who’s a little bit under the radar but I guess people like Kuroshitsuji or something (and not UV044). Also she seems to be somewhat more of a full-fledged musician, having spent time working the Pacific Northwest scene, among others.
This thought exercise is brought to you by pre-con fever. I’m not going to suggest that this thought exercise helps with anyone with that little contest but it’s something to do. Especially if you’re also interested in this other little club thing. Two plugs in one!
Anime Boston 2009 Wrap
Keeping this one simple. So I can spend more time cropping and uploading pics, more time sleeping, and less on writing. I also added title pics from, lol, my phone cam, to the old Anime Boston posts:
Wow, I did almost a full coverage of this con, barely even blinked. And I’m not even done yet. What’s in store is at least one full TL;DR article on Aniplex, and probably some re-writing of the stuff so it’s more link friendly. I can even write about Surat’s moe nonsense. But anyways let’s get it going…
