J-Pop

J-popcon posts have been updated

Kaijuu — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 23:04:00 GMT

The cosplay report.

And to avoid to have this post serving only as an announcement, here's a video of Trio de DS-10.

Cheers, K.

Web radio again

Kaijuu — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 00:12:00 GMT

Oh, almost forgot; since Big B Radio J-Channel went off the air for some reason, I've been scouring the digital airwaves for a new fix, and I think I found something for now.
It's called Radio Progressive House, and it plays a constant mix of old and new stuff. Not particularly Japanese, but quite OK for now.

Cheers, K.

The All Cast Special Live DVD of a-nation; a short review of the Tokyo gig

Kaijuu — Mon, 19 Jan 2009 22:12:00 GMT

Tonight, I had a peek at the All Cast Special Live DVD of a-nation I wrote about earlier, and while it's still a great DVD, there are some things that irk me.

For starters; the starting acts (acts at the beginning of the festival) got only one track on this DVD, including Do As Infinity and the very fine performing hitomi. Quite a shame to compress them into 6 tracks.

Moving on to the larger acts, favourites Ai Ootsuka, Every Little Thing and TRF are blessing this disc with two tracks, along with boy band Toho, but due to this, we are missing out on the fun performance of Ai Ootsuka's "Smiley" together with the audience.
Fortunately, ELT's "Dear My Friend" is there in all its glory, but they did more songs.
They make up for 8 tracks on the DVD

Koda Kumi has been granted 3 tracks, thus excluding her cover of Shocking Blue's "Venus". Must be a copyright thing.

The acts described earlier are vouching for 17 tracks all together. Now, the DVD has 25, which means that the entire 8 track act of Ayumi Hamasaki made it to the DVD, including the reprise of "A Song for XX", "Hanabi" and "Boys & Girls" on the trip through the audience.

Now don't get me wrong; Ayu's music is nice to listen to, I can't deny that she's one hell of an artist and her performance in the pouring rain is stunning.
But I'd rather see more of the entire festival instead of snippets from a few artists and a mini concert off of Avex' diva.

Still, the DVD is good enough to be played many times, bringing back a few of the fond memories I have of the holiday in August 2008. It also holds the special acts outside the main event; check out Alan when you have time.

Cheers, K.

Internet radio

Kaijuu — Sun, 04 Jan 2009 18:04:00 GMT

Being on the receiving end of not one but two Christmas hampers, I am now the proud owner of a Revo bLik Wi-Fi Radio. A nifty and good-looking gadget, enabling me to listen to a host of radio stations available on the web.

I used to listen to internet radio all the time, and even had a radio show on one for a few years through IceCast. Later on, new and more expensive obligations made many stations go off the air, and I switched to my mp3-collection.
With this thing (and my newly-built wireless network) I can listen to Japanese stations, without having to muck about and leave my computer running for some radio tunes.

I'm currently listening to Big B Radio J Channel, playing a nice mix of J-pop songs, varying from familiar artists like Ayumi Hamasaki and Ai Ootsuka, to really unknown stuff, but still enjoyable.
A nice feature of my new WLAN is that I finally managed to update the game consoles and have a butcher's at on-line play.
So far, so good.

Cheers, K.

a-nation on DVD

Kaijuu — Mon, 03 Nov 2008 06:06:00 GMT

In addition to yesterday's post, I'm happy to see that the a-nation 2008 DVD is going to be released this month, enabling me to relive the a-nation festival I visited this summer.
The Wowow-broadcast didn't show the bumpers leading into each act and left a whole bunch of songs out, so here's hoping the official DVD has those.

Cheers, K.