Take me, take me

Chocolate Disco

New Perfume album in July!

Ta[c/k]o

Taco and takoyaki party today!

Post Script

The passage to the roof has been locked!

I go out on Friday and I come home on Friday night before Saturday morning. Star Trek tomorrow!

クリボウじゃない

Very few things annoy me more than the DJing of a party by concensus of the masses. The average person has horrible taste in music, and more often than not, no one else wants the DJ's dope funk mix interrupted by that one Coldplay song that Jane just can't stop listening to, nor the burned Gwen Stefani CD that Mary brought with her. At a party, one should let the host of the party, or the host's designated music dude handle the music selection, and just enjoy the party for all of its many other merits.

This annoyance also extends to John's decision to bring congas to the party. There is a certain energy to be felt by drumming with your friends, but everyone else who is slouching in the couch and trying to talk over your tribal fusion really wants you to shut up and put the Stevie Wonder back on.

Here's to more parties!

Rooftop BBQ, anyone?

Well, I'll be...

On a rational level, Obama's election to the office of President was a happy occasion, but it didn't really do much for me on an emotional level. Of course, I would've been really bummed out if he'd have lost. It would've just been more weight put on to the pile of stress on my back that I have learned to ignore. Luckily, he won, but I still went about life like it was any other day. My mom wrote to me shortly after his election about how excited she was about everything Obama was doing, but it all seemed so distant to me.

Halfway through reading an article today about Obama's proposal to push wind-power I suddenly started feeling really happy. It only just hit me today that he really is the real deal. FOR REAL! There can't be any way that he's pulling a fast one us. He is actually a real good dude, and that's that. All the little things that he's doing to counteract the countless years of awfulness that I've witnessed are just too real to not smile about.

Nice.

Rejected Band Names

Stringer Bell & The Drells

Deli

Tonight I heard Less Than Jake's "My Own Flag" playing as I walked through the mall. For a variety of reasons I've written off Less Than Jake for years, but something about hearing that song tonight really struck me and had me feeling all sentimental and melancholy, especially since hearing Less Than Jake's first album in a Japanese mall is about as unexpected as it gets. I'm not really at a loss for Americana here in Japan, since food and entertainment and everything else American has pretty well infiltrated life out here. I am at a loss for the community and context that would've made Less Than Jake meaningful to me. Maybe that's why hearing this band again brought back the feelings of discovery and excitement that I felt when I first heard Pezcore and stuff of that sort as a teenager.

I came home and found this:

http://www.thetraintracks.org/track.php?id=39

I'm glad that Andrew Jackson Jihad is still around, since they're one of the only groups going these days that really can make me feel music in the same that I would have as an impressionable young dufus.

News From the Homeland

Well...

Forbes Magazine just named one of Mexico’s most notorious drug cartel leaders, Joaquin “Shorty” Guzman, as one of the world’s richest people. He’s worth an estimated $1 billion, ranking him as the 701st wealthiest person on Earth.

I can understand why Obama said that legalizing weed wouldn't be the best way to create jobs. I mean, how many stoners do you know who are motivated to do anything, let alone work??? But, seriously, we ought to give it some thought...

Current music:

I love it when you make me some saaaaalsa

This is the first recorded appearance of the Notorious BIG, but of more note is the insane way that Puffy is rapping. And this 3rd Eye guy... I kind of like his flow...???

Nerdcore Rising

As if my credibility isn't already shot by my unabashed love of 30 year old Japanese pop, I am now listening to MC Frontalot, the man who coined the term "NERDCORE" hip-hop.

Skate or Die!

Guts Man

Here's a video of one of the better records I picked up while in Tokyo last week:



NIIIIIIIIICE!

Just Like Jimmy Carter

In defense of Jimmy Carter:

"In a nation that was proud of hard work, strong families, close-knit communities, and our faith in God, too many of us now tend to worship self-indulgence and consumption.... But we've discovered that owning things and consuming things does not satisfy our longing for meaning....

Little by little we can and we must rebuild our confidence. We can spend until we empty our treasuries, and we may summon all the wonders of science. But we can succeed only if we tap our greatest resources – America's people, America's values, and America's confidence."

Read more HERE

Back to stage one

Here's a hip-hop mix that I made for a friend who is learning how to breakdance!
http://phatnphunky.com/mp3/blog01-hiphop.mp3

Let it be known that I am aware that this isn't fast enough for breaking, but she specifically requested slower jams so that she could practice slowly. NICE NICE NICE!!!

Thanksgiving

My friends the Dorseys invited a bunch of folks over for Thanksgiving festivities last night. Somehow, a turkey got cooked in a microwave oven, there were mashed potatoes and cranberry sauce, pumpkin pie, falafels (?), and I brought 10 cans of rare ROOT BEER. Sure enough, the Brits in the house that night thought it tasted like some sort of toothpaste. We also treated ourselves to several boxes worth of KFC, the next best thing in a country seriously lacking in turkey (though that microwaved turkey was actually really good!!!).

Today, through a twist in circumstances, I went to get some curry with some Australian and American friends, and 3 exchange students from America, Sweden and Germany respectively. The American girl smiled and exclaimed halfway through the meal, "Oh my god! This is my Thanksgiving!" A strange cast of characters and an odd setting for one's Thanksgiving, but good times nonetheless.

Following the meal, a necessary Thanksgiving tradition was upheld as I napped away the day.

What's in store for Christmas?

Dream Fighter!!!

I have no explanation or excuses, but here is my latest discovery in the pop music world:

Vote Bob 2016

With every nutjob across the United States trying to stop Obama from becoming president, the claim that he was born outside of the United States was only one of many ridiculous attempts to do so. But, did you know that John McCain was actually born on a naval base in Panama? I heard, however, that a senate resolution was passed to just let him be and not trifle over the definition of a "natural born citizen" as one must be to be eligible for the presidency.

I remember having heard from my high school history teacher, Mr. Hicks, that a certain George Romney had run for president back in 1968, despite having been born in Mexico. Both of his parents were American citizens however, so he was born a citizen as well. Also, Lowell Weicker, a former Connecticut Senator, Representative, and Governor, was born to an American father and Indian-born British woman in Paris, France. He entered into the presidential race in 1980 but dropped out of the running before the primaries even happened.

Under the Act of 1795 it was noted that "the children of citizens of the United States that may be born beyond sea, or outside the limits of the United States, shall be considered as natural born citizens of the United States: Provided, That the right of citizenship shall not descend to persons, whose fathers have not been resident in the United States."

I guess the only difference between me and Mr. Weicker up there is that I was born to an American mother and foreigner father in a foreign country, so I might be ineligible to run under those crazy old 1795 laws. The odd thing is that there have been other Supreme Court cases wherein children born to American fathers and foreign mothers have had their citizenship revoked because their fathers' paternity had not been proven (Miller v. Albright [1998] and Nguyen v. INS [2001]). In my case, my mother is the American, so my American lineage isn't in doubt at all.

Under one precedent I'm iced out of the presidency, but under the others I'm more of a natural born citizen than Weicker, NO DOUBT! (An unnecessary usage of hip slang if there ever was one!) Looks like I've got my constitutional arguments ready when the time comes for my presidential run to begin.

Consumption pt. III

I think that Weezer's "Buddy Holly" is one of the greatest songs ever. Simple, sweet, sincere, and with a rippin' guitar solo to boot! It popped into my head out of the blue while riding my bike to work, and I was singing it out loud as I passed grannies out for a morning stroll and school kids with their bright yellow hats. There's an understated sense of urgency, or desperation, perhaps, that I think isn't necessarily so apparent in the lyrics, but is really brought out in that brief wailing guitar solo that still sends shivers up my spine to this very day.

I feel like expressing your love of Weezer is like saying that you think Barry Bonds is the greatest baseball player of all-time. You know... they would've been the best, if they hadn't gone and mucked things up for themselves halfway down the line.

Sigh...

Consumption pt. 2

You didn't think that consumption only referred to that of pop-culture, did you???

My friend Rob, who also watches a lot of the Wire, was inspired to start eating/drinking raw eggs with his beer by the dockworkers in the program who down a beer and egg together in the 2nd season. The first time that he did this was at the mall next door to my house, in the food court, with an egg that was meant for his beef bowl, and he just ate that one straight from the shell. The 2nd time he did it was with me and our boy Randy outside of a convenience store in Sakae at about 2 or 3 AM, each of us downing two raw eggs straight from the shell. We were soon treated to a show 10 feet away as two drunks started to scuffle.



The cops came to break up the fight, only to let the instigator walk away and give the erstwhile victim a stern talking-to.

The point is that the tradition had spread to more people.

A few weeks back a few of us finally decided to try those eggs in our drinks. The good news is that the drinks kill the taste of the eggs, which would get a -1 on the -3 to +3 via scale, but it is much less conducive to swallow those gooey lumps of egg out of a glass than it is straight from the shell.

Just this last weekend, at that same convenience store, again at 3 in the morning or so, I ran into some other friends out of the blue. I enjoy the fact that I constantly am running into friends, even just acquaintances, everywhere I go these days. Whether I'm riding my bike back to my apartment and it's my neighbors on the way out to dinner, or arriving at the train station at 11 PM only to see my friends waiting there, people I know grabbing a quick pre-made lunch at the supermarket the same night as I am, or people who are pulling another all nighter in Sakae because they've missed the last train, it's super comforting to know that you'll always have someone around the corner waiting for you.

Yesterday, I brought my new best friend, Tiny Boy, back from the hospital.



Tiny Boy was suffering from a bad case of bad intonation, so my dawg down at the Melody Shop hooked a brother up with a free repair job!!! Yes, Tiny Boy is bright pink, and, yes, that is a koala on my pillow case (fabric courtesy of Joa, case courtesy of Yumico). I almost got hit by a car while bringing Tiny Boy home, holding Tiny Boy in one hand and steering my bike with the other. The gangster-looking Brazilian dudes driving probably would've been mad at me for riding in front of them if they hadn't been laughing at some fool with a pink guitar riding by them.

And now some only half-ancient J-pop for your viewing/listening pleasure: