Half of 2007, best albums

[photo from NY Times, "Hidden Tokyo"]

I can't believe it's June. My first June in 20 years which hasn't been preceded by a school year and followed by a summer vacation. The only vacation I'll have this year is an indefinite break from Japan––I go back to America at the end of July. Until then, I have a trip to Hong Kong, numberless goodbyes, a sayonara party or two, and several pictures to take. I will really miss this place.

I've documented my life voraciously over the past 10 months here. Now is the time for lists. Making "best of" lists may seem like a trivial way of responding to my personal history, but it's the most efficient way of remembering all the stuff that I ate, listened to, saw, etc. So first, what I listened to.

Here are some of my favorite albums from 2007 ( a few released in late 2006)


LCD Soundsystem –– Sound of Silver
Since LCD released the iTunes-only mix for Nike, 45:33, it has been the only music that can consistently get me running fast early in the morning. Luckily, Sound of Silver includes a piece of the mix, redone with lyrics and a longer song format. It's called "Someone Great," and is my favorite song from my time in Japan. [Art by Shinro Otake (see previous post)]


The Field –– From Here We Go Sublime
The above picture is the landscape I think of when I listen to From Here. Well, it would be better if there was a little more light. [The photo is by Todd Hido.]


FabricLive 33 –– mixed by Spank Rock
Any dance mix that planks Yes and Rick Ross within minutes of each other will always be worthy of my praise. In this Fabric mix, Spank Rock whips over 30 songs into a frenzied hour and 10 minutes of dance floor mayhem. [picture of South African Swankster, brilliant article from Vice]

Gui Boratto –– Chromophobia
A few weeks back I took a 30 minute train ride after school to Fukuoka. I listened "Beatutiful Life" about six times. Like Kompakt bro The Field, Chromophobia is only suitable for a nice pair of headphones, and sounds best while moving to passing scenery. [The photo is by Todd Hido.]


Deerhunter –– Cryptograms
I was walking late at night, alone, no one in sight, with my headphones on, staring at the rows of vending machines that dot the town, listening to "Strange Lights." [Photo: Chien-Chi Chang, Magnum Photos]

Optimo –– Walkabout
Panda Bear –– Person Pitch
Devin the Dude –– Waiting to Inhale
Dungen –– Tio Bitar
Boris with Michio Kurihara –– Rainbow

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I'm going to Hong Kong

This photo is from Micheal Wolf. His projects show the cramped life in Hong Kong, one of the most densely populated places on earth. This Saturday I'm flying there. I'll be there for just 3 days, plenty of time to eat frog legs and pig feet. Other than trying exotic Chinese food, I want to do three things:

1. See the city at night and take a really good picture
2. Go to the mid-levels, an entire neighborhood navigable by escalators
3. Buy some cool shoes

And, see buildings clustered like this. I know it's dirty, cramped, dangerous, and not conducive to human living––but this architecture fascinates me.

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Barcelona Graff

This is Dub-Hei & New Chanel, 1999 by Shinro Ohtake. I don't know much about him, other than he's Japanese and has been around for a while. Look him up.

This is a video on graffiti in Barcelona. I know, I know, the link is from the Lonely Planet video stream, which in most cases would automatically qualify it as vapid nonsense. And, to add insult to injury, the shots are taken from a skateboard. But, whoever did it was smart to mesh the graffiti with skateboarding, not just for the similarities in street culture, but for the shots that can only been seen from a board.

A few years back, when I was roaming the streets of Barca, I took pictures of many of the same mural-covered walls. The public art and graffiti there is the best I've seen. I didn't feel the need to enter any of the city's numerous museums because I saw all I could digest walking the streets.

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Kyoto, hours 4-6

A few weekends back I took the bullet train to my sister's hood in Kobe. From there, Osaka and Kyoto are both less than an hour by train. We spent a Saturday in Kyoto, eating, riding rented bikes, and getting lost as shit.
To someone not acquainted with Japanese food, this must be strange at best. They're all daikon radishes, pickled in several difference concoctions and marinades. Most Japanese meals are followed by orange half circles of daikon. In Kyoto, the capital of traditional Japanese cooking, the pickles cover every color of the spectrum.

This was inside the Nishiki market, an institution for Japanese gourmands. Stretching 5 city blocks, the market is a single, too-narrow lane, bound on either side by stands selling everything from pickles, tempura, fresh fish, cakes and sweets, to rice, fresh produce, tea, and knives. The oldest knife shop in Japan, since the 15th-century, has an enclosed space in the market.
That is not my bicycle. In Gion, the sun sets as tiny lights––hanging from the front of wooden dining dens––flicker on. This is one of the "most authentic" places in Japan––or so must say the tourist books. This secluded maze of alleys quickly becomes a nightly rush of those eager to swallow Japan whole. Still, walking along the surgically clean sidewalks, alongside centuries-old, slatted houses, one might glimpse a geisha or meiko-san slipping down an all-but-empty alleyway. And think about who lives under the painted mask.

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decadence & decay in Bangkok

Bangkok. The city's a behemoth, a concrete monster. Horrible pollution, little green space, and empty crumbling buildings that compete for space with cranes for new construction. The Asian economic boom of the mid-1980s spurred furious, directionless growth. Now, there's no city center, public transportation is a joke, and traffic some of the worst in Asia.
The shiny new airport is 30km outside of town, a 45 minute cab ride at 5:00am (the only time there's no traffic). A sky rail is being constructed to connect the airport to the city. It won't be completed for years. The flashy new airport has rankled Bangkokians since it's opening last fall. The old airport was old, yet fully functioning. And, it was connected to the city's nascent subway system. The new one is built over acres of lowlands that were once a mass cemetery.
The three above pictures were taken near Chinatown. Ah, rampant development in poor Asia.

Despite the abominable architecture and city planning, I love Bangkok. The people and the food are enough to have made me come a 2nd time. The juiciest, least fibrous mango ever to touch my tongue. This is my friend/Thai uncle Chanin cutting it for a plate of sticky rice and coconut milk. In addition to food, he serves pocket-fulls of wisdom with a side of shrewd common sense ("you have to find out where you come from and why you're on this planet–this is the most important thing for Buddhists").
And the strangers. "If I only knew more Thai," was the regret floating in my head as I walked around. Still, most times I could get by with the few phrases I knew. I stumbled upon a dozen old guys gathered around equally old marble tables, passing the stuffy afternoon in the shade...
Life in the shade, or under highway underpass. That's where this family spends most of their time. Amid the incessant roar of cars above, two of the children play the same game as the old guys in the shade (above).
Leaving Thailand on a Sunday morning, I knew I probably wouldn't come back, at least not for a while. Flying by gargantuan billboards advertisting Japanese cameras and European-owned hotels, I thought how the tourists is a parasite in Thailand. Take, take, take...take the white sand, the fake fashions, pirated CDs, cheap sex and massages. Take products, not culture. Not faces and the stories behind them. I took pictures, and no one asked me for money once.

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Gursky in N. Korea

I first saw these images in April's edition of Wallpaper magazine. The article explained that somehow, the German-born photographer got permission to attend a military ceremony in Pyongyang–not once, but a few times, since the first batch of images were too dark. In the large format photos, thousands of military personnel and state dancers become specks. They're static in front of giant murals of state propaganda.

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Takashi Murakami's Daruma

This is Daruma, the patriarch of Zen Buddhism. Overgrown eyebrows and mustache, terrifying stare–this is a common face in Japanese traditional painting. But this rendition by Takashi Murakami is the most vivid I've seen. Dubbed the "Warhol of Japan," Murakami has made name on both sides of the Pacific with his eclectic mix of graphic and fashion design, manga, and silk screen prints. “Tranquility of The Heart, Torment of The Flesh - Open Wide The Eye of The Heart, and Nothing is Invisible,” is the name of Murakami's exhibition going on now in New York.

Back to Daruma. This guy's story is worth telling: an Indian monk who brought Zen Buddhism to China around the 5th or 6th century A.D. He began meditating in Shaolin monastery and 9 years later hadn't blinked his eyes, much less moved. His arms and legs atrophied, withered and fell off. But he attained enlightenment. Damn.

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& Skraps [TOKYO]

I'm in my sweats, ready for bed. It's silent in my apartment, cold outside. Two towells are blowing in the wind, hanging from the clothesline outside. Will it be sunny when I wake up tomorrow? What am I doing in Japan?

These are the two questions I'll sleep with. The first isn't up to me. The second one...I feel like the towells flopping in the wind. Directionless. Not sure where it will take me. The memories from Tokyo, they're the stove that miraculously keeps me warm tonight.

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TOKYO videos

John Tejada, at Yellow




DJ Frankie (Franky?) at Hatos party in Nakameguro


Tsukiji Fish market live auction

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...7 to 11–––window dressing

These pictures aren't all of windows. I don't mislead. But they are symbolic of my week-long peek into the desert of electricity and concrete that is known as TOKYO.

I'm in OSAKA now, looking out of my window. BBC News in the background–bombs in Palestine, the idea of global warming coming to fruition. OSAKA castle–white walled and mint green roofed–stares me down through the rain and fog. It's reinforced in the front by a huge oval stadium, at back by a thick patch of forest and the OSAKA skyline, and to my right by a string of cherry blossomed trees along the river. A subdued blend of grey, pink, mint green, moldy green–and a kaleidoscope of umbrellas. It's raining, but not in my heart, Roy Orbison.

Here we go:

"Watch TOKYO wake up" window. Peace and bracelets from the sunrise over TOKYO. This is Thursday, around 5:30am, in our room at the Mandarin Oriental hotel in Ginza. We were listening to PANDA BEAR. I didn't pay for this hotel. I'm happy about that.
"What do you think about this issue" window: A walk along Omotesando Ave–Tokyo's answer to 5th Ave–found us participating in a magazine survey. The question: "The income gap in Japan is widening. What do you think about this, from your experience living in America?" You can see my mom's answer below. Maggie's struck a similar note (need for equal pay/opportunity for women). I said the gap here in Japan is the smallest in the world, but if change is needed, it's got to be a reduction of the extreme hours the corporations demand from their employees.
"This smoke blesses" window. Senso-Ji, a Buddist temple in Asakusa. It was completed in the 7th century, which makes it the oldest in Tokyo.
"Which way is up" window: Prada store in Omotesando.
"Shot from the shoe" window: Kabuki-cho looking on Shinjuku. Contrast is apparent, is it? Or is it that the business district (shinjuku) isn't so distant of a cousin to the male entertainment superplex (kabuki). The sleaze of Kabuki's sex district is concentrated to the point of self-parody. The same goes for Shinjuku's enormity, and disregard for the human need to see the sky. These guys stand outside the parlours and give averted eyes. Foreigners are told not to approach. It's one of those things that, if you knew the culture and the language, walking around there at night would scare you, and you definitely wouldn't take pictures of them, from the street, behind their boots.
"Too much money, 1980s architecture" window: "How do we tell the world that we have more money than we have time to spend it," the corporation asked the architect. "Hmm....how about a topping the structure with a giant turd plated in gold?"

Magic WINDOW––come to Japan and peer out there with me.

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Hatos party (& the DJ Franky)

Friday night:
REI and Blunt from the Hatos crew in Tokyo (see previous post) invited us to their private party at the studio in Nakameguro. When we got to the top floor, we took to the open-air deck and saw this...
In the long room serving as the dance floor, Blunt played first. He mixes all kinds of samples over dub drum tracks. Skateboard decks and record decks; the room was lined with book shelves on the other side. Every shelf stuffed with magazines. We could imagine those guys camping out up there for days at a time getting high off art and other drugs.
Free alcohol. Priceless view. "The best sound in Tokyo," said the guy who worked at a sound company sound. He's next to Blunt in this photo.
So, about Franky. You just have to hear him to believe him, or to believe me. As you can see, he looks like John Belushi swallowed Kim Jong Il.
But on the decks he's not a drunk or dictator. He's a technician. He's a crate digger, for the most perfect dance music on the planet. He's from outer space, just came down to earth to rip up the dance floor for that Friday night. If you're out there, Franky, please give me your contact.
Luckily, it wasn't until Franky had finished that the cops decided to crash the party. This is from the deck on the morning. That person asleep in the foreground had been asleep throughout the entire party.

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YELLOW with John Tejada (& Sri Lankan G)

Where to begin? How about with...this city can't let me down. It just can't. It's because of you, Tokyo. You're that great. I love you, I love sweet you, everything about you. I'm drunk and high off shit you can't buy. It's 8 in the morning. I'm all over the keyboard. The last 24-36 hours were a month of living squeezing into that time.
I'll save Friday night's recap for another time. Tonight was at Yellow. The DJ: John Tejada. We got there at 1:30. It was packed; one in, one out. We got in. We got in. Met people from England and Japan and France and Germany and this girl who sounded and looked German but she wouldn't tell me where she was from and an electro band from London who had been in Austin the past week for SXSW (check 'em: Spektrum)...
... and a guy from Philly and a photographer from Manchester who had been commissioned by KSwiss to shoot the festival with Lauren Hill earlier that day and a guy from Detroit who told me about going to see Theo Parrish weekly and being one of three white guys there and a girl from Toronto and a crew of lads from London who were jawing out of their ears and a bunch of Japanese people who were super super nice and a guy from Canada who had organized the party that night. He invited me to the DJ booth with John Tejada. So I met JT and watched him cut up white vinyl, at 5 am, in front of 800 people.
In the best soundsystem in the world. Above you can see his hands, only his hands.
"They long to be close to you," says Isaac Hayes. Closer, closer, to you, Tokyo, that's where I'll be the next 5 days. Maggie is asleep. I'm eating a Starbucks sandwhich (I temporarily ended my lifelong boycott because it looked that perfect). I wish I could tell you about the last 24-36 hours in live, in person. For now, I have pictures, and later video.
Oh yea, earlier, before we went to the club, we saw the restaurant where the fight scene in Kill Bill was filmed. You know, where the shy Japanese girl with balls and chains tries to slice up Uma Thurman, and the 6, 7, 8's are playing 50's rockabilly in the background. We went there and walked around. "Never gonna say goodbye," says Isaac, "no matter how hard I try."

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