So much I want to blog about, so little time!!!!
I do actually spend quite a lot of time with my digits attached to my laptop, but more often than not get distracted from blogging by the gazillion billion gamillion things out there on the internet.
Anyway, I guess a whirlwind chronology would go something like that:
-Went to the zoo to take my mind off housing woes (more on this in a bit!!)
-Finally had my cheap cheap massage. 68RMB (roughly £8 I guess?) for 90 minutes. Mmm.
-Acrobatic shows depress me. I don't see the need for young kids to abuse their bodies to unnatural extents so they burn out before their 30 and are left with no other way of life. Just to make people go 'Oh my god!'
-Solved mystery of 'not so friendly anymore black cat'!! There're actually TWO of them!!! I think they're siblings. Friendly black cat was still as friendly as ever when I last saw it.
-First day of class and meeting my new classmates. They seem pretty cool so far. It seems like I'll actually have to put in effort for this course, though. Haha!
-FINALLY moved!!! \(^o^)/ I love my new place!
-Went to see a jazzed up Chopin piano recital by this Japanese jazz pianist, Ozone Makoto. (No, it's not a strange 'asian' sort of English name as in 'Ozone layer', but his actual surname in Japanese - 'oh-zoh-neh' Haha! I have to admit I rolled my eyes when I first saw his name, assuming it was the former)
Anyway, it was brilliant! So much fun! I was squeeing inside when he played his version of Polonaise in A 'Military'. Ahhh, bliss!
The National Centre for the Performing Art here has got to be one of the most fucking impressive buildings in the world.
My jaw dropped in awe when I entered the dome. The effect from the inside is just stunning!! Too bad they didn't allow cameras to be brought in. Not that it stopped people. I have a few pictures from my crappy phone camera.
But yes, most definitely probably the most impressive piece of architecture I've been in!!!
-OMGOMGOMGOMG!!1 Joe Hisaishi will be conducting in Beijing in November!!!!!! Ahhhhhh!!!!!! And I got front row tickets!!!!! AHHHHH!!!!
Yes yes, not the prime seat in the house, but I want to be as close to the god as possible! Hahahaha. Was so hyped up!! Couldn't get tickets the day I found out about the concert, as the box office had already closed, but I legged it back to the theatre the next day and secured my butt and ears a spot in the presence of a god.
He's the composer for pretty much all the Miyazaki Hayao Studio Ghibli film scores, and has done a lot of other film scoring work as well as his own compositions. I have to admit I'm not well-acquainted with most of his non-Ghibli work, but this is the man I've worshiped since the age of 14, so seeing him conducting in the flesh will definitely be a dream come true! I really hope he plays the piano tooooo!
About the zoo, I'll just dump there videos here:
These long-legged elegant beauties are called Maned wolves. Have never seen them before!! They loped around so gracefully! They seem more like deer than canines.
In this video, they're not being so elegant and are being rather intimidated by the common wolves in the neighbouring enclosure. One of the Maned wolves actually walked into a bush. Smooth.
Shocking case of animal abuse by a zoo. Those poor chickens!! Musn't be very pleasant for the foxes too, having temptation so close and yet out of reach.
And finally!! My beloved red foxes!!!! Spent ages staring at them the last time I went in December, and spent a long time staring again this time.
Ahhh, they're so incredibly lovely!!! <3333
The zoo was slightly depressing, though.
There was a lot of fist-whamming of glass, kicking of rails, chucking of sweets and other food into enclosures, poking and whacking (I kid you not) of animals when it proved possible, blinding flash photography, and general appalling behaviour from the creatures on this side of the glass.
And these acts were mostly committed by the adults. The kids didn't quite have enough brute strength to effectively slam the glass partitions with suitable force.
Sigh.
Showing posts with label music. Show all posts
Showing posts with label music. Show all posts
Wednesday, September 15, 2010
Wednesday, September 1, 2010
Ramble Bramble
[This post was copied and pasted off my LJ]
Shuffling my V Kei songs on my new iPod nano on the bus. ^w^
'Togurou' is my favourite GazettE song!!
But anyway, to rewind a little, I'm back in Beijing.
The air is just as polluted as ever. But thank goodness the temperatures of 40 deg cel seem to have gone away. It's around 28-30 deg cel now, and it feels cooler than it was back in Singapore as there hasn't been any scorching sunlight (yet?) and there isn't that deathly humidity.
Anyway, just to chuck a few pictures out here.
The sunrise from my dining room back home. I practically never am up early enough to see the sun come out, but was seated rather dazedly clutching my cup of tea at a ridiculously early (for me) hour to leave for the airport.
I bought three macarons from the patisserie Canele the night before and got the air stewardess to bung it in the fridge for me.
My favourite Passion Fruit and Milk Chocolate, Coffee, and Violet. They actually managed to last about 24 hours in Beijing.
The Violet macaron is so pretty! ^^;
I thought Singapore changed rapidly enough when I went back after being away for 4 and a half months and found so many new shops and buildings that sprung out of no where.
It turns out this city is faaaar worse. Which isn't surprising.
In about a month and a half, there's been quite a lot of change!
Went to Zhong guan cun, an area with many office blocks and huge-ass malls. Found a Haagen-Daz and a branch of a Taiwanese restaurant that does the most amazing desserts, which made me happy.
One of the hulking developments had a lot of open public spaces, and people were skating, remote-controlled car racing, or just chilling. Was nice to see amongst all the concrete and steel and glass.
Went to register at the university. Then wandered around the campus. Which was monstrously huge.
My university in London was basically two buildings facing each other across a teeny square which is barely large enough for protests (haha) and another barren building that served as another 'campus' "a 17 minutes walk away" (according to a testy, just ever so slightly neurotic Swedish lecturer of mine).
University in Tokyo had more buildings (whee) but being smack in the middle of the city meant no rambling grounds either.
So. This is quite a change.
I walked around the South West section, which seemed to be a succession of secret garden after secret garden in various states of abandonment.
Then I started getting hungry and my legs started to hurt. I seem to have developed varicose veins or something. >_< Probably from walking waaaaay too much too fast. Eek.
Anyway, I did finally extricate myself from the tangled vegetation and buildings eventually. Last night I took the bus here for the 2nd time in my life. Haha. I usually rely on the subway, my legs, or taxis for moving around. The subway is the best, but requires a lot of cooperation from the legs and transfers between lines are ridiculously far apart, and things are often pretty far from existing stations.
The first time I took the bus was rather traumatising. Was going to one of the hills in the outskirts for a walk and picnic with friends on a Saturday in early summer, and the bus was absolutely packed and of course the roads jammed as well. Stood pretty much the whole way packed in like an unhappily dead fish in a can.
Last night the bus was empty-ish, but traffic wasn't that smooth for the really short distance that I use to walk in about 20-30 minutes.
I really like 176BIZ, but sadly only discovered them after they disbanded.
Love their sound. I like how it has quite a lot of groovy bass, and I like their vocalist's voice too.
Aaand, lastly, my silly kitty cat! (^ω^) Looking silly in my room. (^人^)
I took some videos of him with my iPod nano, which I will probably put up when I finally transfer them to the laptop. Along with the alpacas I mentioned in an earlier post! Haha!
Boo, I want my silly black blob!
Tuesday, July 20, 2010
Pretty Plastic and Sugary Creations
Lookie!! The goodies I bought off Etsy arrived when I wasn't back yet, and I was just given the package. Haha.
What you see above is a strap for handphones, or whatever you wish to dangle it on. But look!! It's a mini merry-go-round!!! Wow! I placed my order quite a while back, before that post on merry-go-rounds! I sort of forgot what charms were on the strap, so my subconscious must have been sending images of pretty painted wooden horses going up and down and round and round to the fore of my consciousness.
Anyway, I also got this necklace:
The creator describes the range as "Gothic Sweets Jewelery".
I sort of know the creator from LiveJournal, and found the link to her Etsy shop, Chocobanana. Actually, I came to know of Etsy through this shop!
She has some pretty interesting ideas, and some of her creations are really adorable and pretty.
I really like this Natural Layered Bracelet, but didn't get it as I practically never wear bracelets. The Chinese coins are a nice touch.
This Eiffel Tower Crochet Chain and Lace Necklace is pretty too, but I felt I had too much in my shopping cart already.
A really nice touch is her packaging. My goodies came in an adorable Cinnamoroll bag with a Rilakkuma paper note. ^-^ She also threw in two plastic ribbon charms and a cute little black Anna Sui-esque plastic comb (which has lost itself in the clutter of my room and hence is unable to make an appearance v.v ). Thought that goes into packaging is appreciated!!
I've preciously shopped there before, and the highlights of that order are:
This wonderfully pop and shiny pin! With a carousal horse!! Haha. It's in need of some superglue now, though. Eep.
And my absolute favourite!! You've probably seen me wearing it before! A Whipped Cream Mini Barrette! xD I love it muchly!
The goods arrived nicely packaged as well that time, with adorable macaron tape, sweet pink tissue wrapping, as well as a free chocolate bar-shaped mirror! ^^
It has been raining all afternoon, which is lovely, especially since I was out and about in the morning and got home before the skies opened up.
I love rainy days.
And I especially love them when I have nothing to do but stay indoors and listen to the sound of the rain.
I'm also listening to some Dvorak, pilfered from the father's CD collection. I chose this disc because it had a Cello Concerto and a Polonaise, and was surprised to recognise the tunes when I popped it into my redeemed-free-with-petrol-station-points Hi-Fi set.
It's mostly like that with classical music for me - recognising the tunes but not knowing what it is or who the composer is. Haha.
There was tea and cupcake earlier on.
Mmmmmmmmmm.
The cupcake is obviously half-eaten, as I brought it back from brunch when I couldn't eat another bite. Haha.
From The Marmalade Pantry, which has now moved to the swanky new shopping centre, the ION, from the stalwart old tai-tai (rich wives with naught to do but go shopping, have high tea, and play mahjong) hangout that is Palais Renaissance.
The smoothie was a Fail - if I wanted an ice-blended, I would have gone to Coffee Bean or Starbucks, my friend.
The burger was disappointingly unimpressive.
But, the cupcake was really pretty good!
The Geisha. Pandan with coconut and..... other stuff I can't really remember. Haha. No matcha (Japanese green tea) involved, though, so named solely on based on colour.
I love pandan and coconut! Pandan chiffon cakes are an old childhood favourite of mine! Must write down in my notebook to have some before I leave the Spore again!
But yes, the Marmalade group's cupcakes do not disappoint. Which means I should probably just go back to frequenting Toast, their cafe, which has pretty pink tiled walls and floors. Ho-hum!
Perved their cupcakes on my way out.
The one in the middle is the Red Velvet, which I've had before. Coconut and rose chocolate, if my memory serves me right!
This one was the prettiest one, and all the patrons who judge cupcakes by their covers picked it! Tsk! I think the three lurking behind are Limonettas (or some other lemon-based name). That's good too!
My old favourite's got to be the chocolate one, whatever it's called. Mmm. Brings back good memories!
Seems like they've expanded their range of cupcakes. New ones like the Geisha and the pretty strawberry one. Yum yum!
Friday, July 16, 2010
Rainy Day Blogging
I keep meaning to blog, but have been distracted by other corners of the internet whenever I get online. Well, to beging with, being back has rather cut down the number of hours I spend with my digits being glued to the keyboard. I'm still ill and so have not gone into full 'I'm back!!!!!' mode, but there're enough engrossing diversions and delightful distractions to be had within under my roof and within the confines of my room. I rather enjoy conducting what I like to think of as self-archaeological digs - sifting through my drawers and going through the material goods that are now remnants of the years I've spent taking in oxygen and consuming resources on this planet.
But anyway, there's much that I'd love to write about on this blog! I keep blogging in my head, but never actually get down to doing it. Let's draw up a little list and see how much I can get through..... eventually? Haha.
♣ Impressions on China.
-This is something I really want to do, but don't feel quite up to the task just yet. Hmmm.
♣ More on hutongs.
-I have some pictures from a sunny afternoon spent traipsing around the hutongs of Beijing. Would like to put some up. Or I could just dump them in a Facebook photo album. Haha.
♣ Tianjin
-Took a day trip to the city of Tianjin a while back, but never got round to writing about it and putting pictures up.
♥ Two years ago.......
-London, Norway, Paris, Iceland. I miss Europe so!
♠ Uniquely Singapore
Haha! That's our tourist promotion tagline. Right. Haha. But yes, it'd be nice if I could actually get down to posting about places I like in the Spore. I don't think I've ever done that before. Heh. ^^;
♦ NicoNico Video music!!!
Remember when I complained about not having new music to explore? Well, all that has changed now!! Whoo! Haha. Lots of lovely cheesy electronic Vocaloid music, and Utattemita ('I tried singing it') music. Nya~! =^.^= Happily spinning!
Mmm. I think that's about it? For now? Heh.
Anyway, I need to gloat!!
I am now the proud new owner of happy, happy, shiny, colourful hair!!! Whoo~! о(ж＞▽＜)ｙ ☆
Or as the speshu Shu puts it, I have shanny, colourful hair!! xDDD
I was getting so sick of my old hair and one of the first things on my list to do after getting back was heading to the hairdresser's.
Have I mentioned how much I love my hairdresser??? If not, I am now!!!
She did a much more amazing job than I would have hoped for!
It's this old, pokey place in a sleepy neighbourhood with interior designs straight out of the 80's. It's like stepping back in time.
I sat there for four hours with the classical channel on the radio piping into one ear, and a cheesy Chinese period drama on the TV into the other, with the sweet fumes of chemicals drifted through the blocked clogness of my nose as she put aluminum into my hair and we talked about Europe and Monet, Millais, and Munch.
The final result had me grinning like an idiot!
Four colours - red, brown, blue, and purple.
The last two will fade into pink and copper with time. Wow! It's like magical changing hair! Two for the price of one!! xD
And she charged me a really, really reasonable price - no, it's actually really rather cheap!!
I can't stop looking at my own hair. Haha. Apologies for the pic-spam!!
The last time I did anything fun with my hair was over two years ago. Wow. o.o
Good times, good times. ^.^
Anyway, the poor long-suffering Shu had to put up with my silly real life spazzing over my hair (and other various spazz-spasms. Haha.) when we went out for Ramen and sweets.
Was very glad to set eyes on the Singapore River again. This is one of my favourite mainstream Singapore places. Haha.
The Japanese Ramen boom shows no sign of slowing down in Singapore.....? This one's Santouka, which hails from the northern island of Hokkaido.
On to Canele for desert!! Oh, my Passion Fruit and Milk Chocolate Macaron! How I have pined for you!!!
Haha.
The other two I went for were Mandarin Orange and Black Forest. Good stuff! Though they still can't knock Passion Fruit and Milk Chocolate off its throne. Haha.
Evil thing about Canele is that now they "only serve still and sparkling water". No more normal (tap) water provided. Money-grubbing bastards. This would be against EU regulations, right?
Ah well.
In other news, more stations on the new MRT (Mass Rapid Transport - our subway/tube) are now open, and I felt like a mountain tortoise (Chinese/Hokkien expression that sort of means 'hick' or er..... Too lazy to wrack my brains to come up with a good explanation for it. It can be used as a noun or an adjective, if that helps. Lol).
They also started saying 'Please mind the gap' on the TV screens on the train platforms, which is just weird. Haha.
Anyway, it's been a nice, rainy morning so far. A veritable tropical storm which has now mellowed into a patter with distant rumbles of thunder. I'm on to my second pot of tea (LUPICIA peach-scented Darjeeling). The cat is cosily curled up on the chair under the table in the yard, and I haven't the heart to disturb his soporific state with a camera in his nose.
So what I'm going to do is throw you a Vocaloid song instead. Haha. 'Yowamushi Mont Blanc' (Literally - 'Coward Mont Blanc'. Mont Blanc here isn't the mountain, but that cake you see in the video with oodles of spaghetti-looking cream piled on top. It's made of chestnuts. I'm not a fan, as I don't particularly delight in the taste of chestnut confections.)
Composed by DECO*27, featuring the Vocaloid GUMI, who uses the voice of Anisong singing sensation (at least in 2008? haha) Nakajima Megumi.
It's a wonderfully cute song with a cute video too. If you listen to it with good(ish) speakers or earphones, you'll hear that the arrangement is actually pretty good as well! Love the string-instrument-like melody. (Fails at musical description)
I also like how GUMI sounds. I'm not a fan of some of the other Vocaloids as their tone is too shrill or cutesy sometimes. But GUMI sounds good here. A bit husky and not grating on the ear!
Well, after so much typing, here it is!! Enjoy!!!
My song of current loop, both in soundwaves and in my head. Heh. ^-^
The best kind of rainy days are those when you have nothing to do but laze around the house with the sound of raindrops providing background music to all the lazy lazing you do.
Sunday, June 27, 2010
Merry-Go-Round
Mmm, it's been a few days since I last posted here. But it feels like it's been ages, for all the wrong reasons. Haha.
Anyway, to blow and scatter away the unpleasantness of the week (see the picture below for the image I have in mind), I'm thinking of Merry-Go-Rounds and looking at pictures of them.
The Merry-Go-Round. Carousel. The Galloper. Roundabout. Flying Horses.
Probably the most representative of all fairground rides.
It conjures up images of magic and whimsy.
I especially like them by night when more sparkles of magic and mystery are sprinkled on them by their fairy lights. Even higher scores on the magic-meter if they're by the sea. Like in one of those old-world seaside amusement parks.
The picture at the top of this post was taken by me when I was in Kobe, Japan, last year.
It was in a fairground complex by the sea, in an area of multiple shopping and entertainment developments. It was pretty late by the time I'd finished poking around the Sannomiya area in the north that I was staying in, but since it was the only night I was spending in Kobe, I was determined to make it down to the seafront and see the Ferris wheel and Merry-go-round illuminated by night.
How did I come to know of it, you ask?
Well. A few days before I left for Japan, I read a post on one of my favourite blogs to stalk, that of the Ayabie bassist, Intetsu, which had this picture:
His blog is a real visual feast, with many pretty pictures to accompany the posts. He blogs about places he's been, while on tour or in Tokyo, adorable cafes he's been to, delicious-looking food (mostly sweet. Haha) he had and dishes he made, nice-sounding tea he's had, cute cats he's stalked, and so on. He also posts selections from 'photo walks' he's taken with camera in hand.
When I saw that photo steeped in magic, I really wanted to see the place for myself. After getting directions from the hotel front desk (I kind of just went 'I want to go to the place by the sea with the Ferris wheel' haha), I hopped on the train and after a walk through the shopping complexes, I rounded a bend, and lo and behold, there was the Ferris wheel flashing its neon down on me! Crossing a few roads and climbing a flight of stairs or two finally unfolded the sight of the merry-go-round nestled at the foot of the Ferris wheel.
A moment of breath being taken in and camera shutter clicking.
I didn't ride on the merry-go-round. Don't think the idea properly entered my mind. Even if it did, I doubt I would have. Just a tad pathetic, don't you think, a girl hopping on a merry-go-round alone at 9pm? Haha.
Anyway. I can't clearly remember the last time I was on a merry-go-round, though. There is an enlarged and plastic-framed picture of six-year-old me riding the merry-go-round in Tokyo Disneyland at home, though. I've definitely been on a few since then. But somehow just can't recall my last ride.
But anyway, even though the thoughts of merry-go-rounds have been flickering onto and off centre-stage in my brain recently, mainly due to some pictures I found (more on these in a little bit!!), the impetus for sitting down and actually typing out a post is this picture that Intetsu (again!) posted up:
It's of the merry-go-round in the LaQua complex, the website of which states 'Spa Shopping Restaurant Attraction' in English. Another place I never heard of until I left Japan. It seems like a huge entertainment development by the sea, and has its own giant Ferris wheel and roller coaster as well, by the looks of it.
Seeing the picture made me think about the fantasy and magic of the merry-go-round again, and so I'm finally putting up these images of merry-go-rounds I found a while back.
First up, a wintry merry-go-round:
And then one with a Spring-like feel:
I love the colours in these two pictures for different reasons. And! I've just noticed that the merry-go-round depicted in the second picture is a Double Decker!! A term I've just picked up from skimming through wikipedia's article on merry-go-rounds/carousals. It's a fascinating article (did you know the earliest known depiction of a carousal dates from about 500 A.D. in a Byzantine bas-relief? Or that many carousal connoisseurs feel that the Golden Age of carousals was early 20th century America?), but I don't feel quite up for reading it all right now.
Anyway. When I think of merry-go-rounds, the first song that leaps into my head is Joni Mitchell's 'The Circle Game', in which she sings about "the carousal of life".
From there, it's a short leap away to 'The Merry-Go-Round of Life', by the genius composer, Joe Hisaishi. He often collaborates with the preeminent director and animator, Miyazaki Hayao, the man behind Studio Ghibli, and of 'Spirited Away' and 'My Neighbour Totoro' fame.
'The Merry-Go-Round of Life' is the main theme of the Ghibli film 'Howl's Moving Castle'. I personally thought both the film and the accompanying soundtrack were not the most brilliantly spectacular of both men's works, but I did find this amazing video of Joe Hisaishi playing the piano part and conducting 'The Merry-Go-Round of Life'.
Lovely.
Seeing Hisaishi live was one of the dreams I had before going to Japan, but one I didn't get to fulfill. But there's always 'wait' and 'hope', eh?
After watching this video, I now regret not buying the DVD of the concert commemorating 25 years of collaboration between Hisaishi and Miyazaki. It's still sitting in my Amazon wishlist! Hmmm.
And when I think of merry-go-round music, my mind goes to the compositions of Yann Tiersen. I suppose he's most well-known for the 'Amelie' soundtrack?
And wasn't there a carousal in the film as well? I can't really remember. Only saw it once many years ago. I have been meaning to see it again for the longset time ever, but have no idea where the DVD is now.
Here's one of the tunes in the soundtrack with a clip from the movie:
Seeing Hisaishi live was one of the dreams I had before going to Japan, but one I didn't get to fulfill. But there's always 'wait' and 'hope', eh?
After watching this video, I now regret not buying the DVD of the concert commemorating 25 years of collaboration between Hisaishi and Miyazaki. It's still sitting in my Amazon wishlist! Hmmm.
And when I think of merry-go-round music, my mind goes to the compositions of Yann Tiersen. I suppose he's most well-known for the 'Amelie' soundtrack?
And wasn't there a carousal in the film as well? I can't really remember. Only saw it once many years ago. I have been meaning to see it again for the longset time ever, but have no idea where the DVD is now.
Here's one of the tunes in the soundtrack with a clip from the movie:
I really could do with more Yann Tiersen CDs! Think I only have 5? Hmm.
Oh, I also wanted to post this screen-shot up:
It's this silly online game I play, in which the player keeps a pet and can dress them up and decorate their rooms. I love my little merry-go-round of pixels. Whoo.
And it's about time I put an end to this post that has taken off in a few different directions around the central focal point of the merry-go-round.
Here's another picture of Intetsu's to bring things to a close. The LaQua merry-go-round again, but taken roughly a year ago, when they held the event commemorating the band going major there. I like this picture the best out of the three of his I've posted here.
Tuesday, June 22, 2010
Endings Over Openings
What's Up Ahead:
• My current favourite song, the ending theme of an anime I'm currently watching.
• Introduction of some anime series by delightfully bizarre production studios.
• A little insightful, though possibly erroneous, explanation of Japanese room-size unit of measurement.
• Foray into describing the Japanese online amateur made music scene.
• What a Vocaloid is.
• Vocaloid videos.
• Final Goal!!!
Have been lamenting my lack of musical exploration lately.
I can't properly recall the last musical discovery that set my enthusiasm leaping with delight. I have been listening to the same, limited collection of tracks stuffed into my tiny, decrepit, but still valiantly functioning iPod Nano for goodness knows how many months.
However, I have had little moments of 'oooooh, nice!' on the musical front, and most of them have been coming from the Opening and Ending themes of anime series.
(Yes, I'm still watching anime. Yes, I'm fast approaching the mid-twenty mark. Yes, I'm still escaping from reality.)
What I've been really quite in love with is the Ending theme of the Spring 2010 anime series, 'Yojouhan Shinwa Taikei' (四畳半神話大系). With the assistance of my trusty friend, Jim Breen's, online dictionary, I've rather clumsily translated the title into 'The Four-and-a-Half Tatami Mat Compendium of Myths'. Possibly messed up the order of the words, hence scrambling the meaning, but please try to overlook the translate fail.
'Four-and-a-half tatami mats', is I'm pretty sure, considered the size of a small, poor-person's room. I haven't actually looked this up, but have seen enough references to it to come to the conclusion. Japanese rooms, especially traditional ones, are measured by the number of tatami (traditional straw flooring) panels it takes to cover the floor. So sometimes on the websites of ryokan (traditional Japanese inns), they tell you how many 'jou' (the counting verb for tatami panels) large the room is. Since I've convinced myself I'm hopeless at numbers and figures, I shan't bother looking up just how large one tatami 'jou' is.
Coming back to 'Four-and-a-half', the namesless protagonist of the series lives in a boarding house of 'four-and-a-half tatami mat' rooms in Kyoto. It's produced by the studio Mad House, which sort of accounts for the delightfully bizarre and unique animation, storytelling, and atmosphere.
(Note the use of a 'four-and-a-half tatami mat' floor plan to form the character for 4!)
I could ramble on and on about the anime, despite having only seen 4 episodes so far (I believe about 8 of a total of 11 have already been aired). But will restrain myself here and bring myself back to the main purpose I had in mind when starting on this post. Music. Specifically, anime ending and opening themes.
I rather love the ending theme for 'Yojouhan Shinwa Taikei',
AND, I have to add that I really love the ending sequence animation too!! It makes use of the 'tatami room floor plan' idea and has some rather nifty animation.
Here it is!!
Surfing around on youtube also brought me to a more electronic version of the song. This one on youtube is different from the one that came with the single, somehow! And I actually like it better! Reminds me of old-school video game sounds. Lovely.
Another anime theme that I'm rather in love with currently is the one for Bakemonogatari (化物語). The title of the series is rather neat - in Japanese, the three characters can be split into two words, 'bakemono' ('monster') and 'monogatari' ('story') by sharing the middle character, and it can be translated into English as 'Ghostory'. Pretty cool playing with language that is wonderfully translated, huh? ^^
'Bakemonogatari' was produced by the studio SHAFT, which exceeds Mad House in terms of bizarreness and creativity, I feel. 'Bakemonogatari' has very gorgeous animation, with great colours, the highlight of which are the beautiful red outlines. Also has very strange imagery and words being flashed on the screen, that I just allow to wash over me in a mind-boggling celebration of wonderful strangeness. The background music is a delight, the voice work excellent (exercising herculean self-control not to go down this tangent). I can hardly keep up with the puns and humour, even with subtitles, though, which makes me feel really quite inadequate.
Right. The ending theme. 'Kimi no Shiranai Monogatari' (The Tale That You Don't Know) by supercell. It's a very pop-ish song. I rather prefer the full lengh version to the anime ending sequence version, but am going to post the latter as I rather like the ending animation. Again. Heh.
supercell is rather interesting. It has its origins on Nico nico video, which can be called the Japanese youtube. I haven't really explored this area of the world wide web, so forgive the inaccuracies, misguided assumptions and/or statements spawned from ignorance that may result from my insufficient knowledge and web-surfing.
It seems that 'doujin music' is quite the phenomenon now. 'Doujin' is used to refer to 'amateur made' products, (the most famous example would be 'doujinshi' - 'amateur made manga'). This flourishing of the doujin music (I'm not even 100% sure if that's how they refer to it...... -.-) scene seems to be a result of two wonderful pieces of technology.
Firstly, the tool of the Vocaloid. These are singing synthesizing software. Wikipedia can probably do a better job explaining. Even an ignoramus like me couldn't help but notice the word 'vocaloid' being bandied about with great frequency in the Japanese-loving corners of the internet. And now I can name a few, like the Kagamine twins and Gackpoid, which uses the voice of legendary (to some I suppose) singer Gackt.
Anyway, so basically Vocaloids allow people to put in vocals to compositions they've created, and the whole composition and production of a song can be completely accomplished on a computer. No need to be able to play any instrument or sing, or have to enlist the assistance of people able to do so. This, as you can imagine, enables a lot more people who are talented in composition to realise their creations in audio.
The second piece of technology is the platform of NicoVid. I say it can be called the Japanese youtube, but I think it has one added feature that makes it really quite different. I think it's the function that allows viewers to comment on a specific moment in the video played. It also scrolls these comments from viewers across the video when it's being played (yes, this can be switched off, thank god!!). Can't put up a screen capture as my laptop is now running on 'Zero' disk space, but I think this function adds to a sense of, how shall I put it? Participation? Community?
A lot of the comments are just exclamatory, such as 'cute!!' or 'hot!!' or just the Japanese version of 'lol' or 'haha', 'wwwwwww' (the w looks like a smile, doesn't it? like ^w^ ).
Even though they're just simple comments, I think the commenting and viewing of comments as the video runs definitely puts in an added-dimension to the video viewing process, and that's what makes NicoVid different from youtube.
And, coming back to my point, I think this more participatory video site hosting these 'amateur made' songs does enhance the popularity of the scene.
Oh, I forgot to add that another key characteristic of 'doujin music', apart from using Vocaloids, is the accompanying animation or visuals.
Take supercell as an example. The group (or 'circle' as they're called) has one key member, Ryo, who does the composition and production of the music, and I forgot how many other members who are in charge of providing the illustrations and animation. I think there're about seven of them??
Anyway, now that we're back on the topic of supercell, what I want to comment is how it's rather impressive that a web-based amateur music composer is now signed on a major label and releasing music. They no longer use vocaloids, though. What you heard in the video above is a real flesh and blood singer. However, I read that she, too, has her roots in the online self-produced NicoVid music world.
So, now, I'm going to end my own little amateur foray into describing and dissecting doujin music with three Vocaloid videos!
This song was my initiation into the world of Vocaloids. I came to know of the song as it was covered by a couple of seiyuu (voice actors). (Yet another piece of evidence of the power of the doujin music scene! Usually, wouldn't the order of covering be the reverse?)
'Iroha Uta', composed by Gin Saku, featuring the Vocaloid Kagamine Rin.
What do you think? I took some time to get used to the electronic voice. But I think it's a good, catchy song.
Next up, 'Karakuri-shi to Ao' ('The Marionette Master and Green') by Machigerita, featuring Gackpoid and Hatsune Miku Append (which I'm assuming is another version of 'Hatsune Miku').
This one is nice and creepy.
And finally, something a little different. 'Hello Again' by mayuko. A duet by the twins Kagamine Rin and Len. Really quite lovely. If a tad too long. ^^;
So what do you think about Vocaloid singing and doujin music?
I also heard that quite a lot of these tunes are available at karaoke places as well. Not very sure about the details, but it really is quite some thing, isn't it? For amateur created products to make their way into the commercial sphere like this. Definitely something worth looking further into, but I'm not sure if I can spare the time and effort!!
Anyway, I actually planned to post more anime opening and ending sequence videos, but I think I'll leave the onslaught of youtube videos at this for now. Am getting rather tired, and I'm sure you, dear reader, are too.
Right. Last obstacle to clear!!
The ending sequence with credits removed of the anime series 'Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei' (Farewell Teacher Despair). Produced by the superbly strange SHAFT, and starring the wonderful seiyuu (voice actor) Kamiya Hiroshi, a mini-festival of whom I'm currently having. The art styles and animation forms they whisk the viewer through is even more varied and strange than that in 'Bakemonogatari'. Not going to delve too deeply, as apparently I've already spent 3 hours on this post.
There we go!!
If you managed to make it through this entire clunking descendent of Frankenstein's monster post AND watched all *counts* 7 videos, as a reward, you can claim a big Badge of Approval from me. Hahahaha.
But remember, no cheating or lying!
Haha.
• My current favourite song, the ending theme of an anime I'm currently watching.
• Introduction of some anime series by delightfully bizarre production studios.
• A little insightful, though possibly erroneous, explanation of Japanese room-size unit of measurement.
• Foray into describing the Japanese online amateur made music scene.
• What a Vocaloid is.
• Vocaloid videos.
• Final Goal!!!
Have been lamenting my lack of musical exploration lately.
I can't properly recall the last musical discovery that set my enthusiasm leaping with delight. I have been listening to the same, limited collection of tracks stuffed into my tiny, decrepit, but still valiantly functioning iPod Nano for goodness knows how many months.
However, I have had little moments of 'oooooh, nice!' on the musical front, and most of them have been coming from the Opening and Ending themes of anime series.
(Yes, I'm still watching anime. Yes, I'm fast approaching the mid-twenty mark. Yes, I'm still escaping from reality.)
What I've been really quite in love with is the Ending theme of the Spring 2010 anime series, 'Yojouhan Shinwa Taikei' (四畳半神話大系). With the assistance of my trusty friend, Jim Breen's, online dictionary, I've rather clumsily translated the title into 'The Four-and-a-Half Tatami Mat Compendium of Myths'. Possibly messed up the order of the words, hence scrambling the meaning, but please try to overlook the translate fail.
'Four-and-a-half tatami mats', is I'm pretty sure, considered the size of a small, poor-person's room. I haven't actually looked this up, but have seen enough references to it to come to the conclusion. Japanese rooms, especially traditional ones, are measured by the number of tatami (traditional straw flooring) panels it takes to cover the floor. So sometimes on the websites of ryokan (traditional Japanese inns), they tell you how many 'jou' (the counting verb for tatami panels) large the room is. Since I've convinced myself I'm hopeless at numbers and figures, I shan't bother looking up just how large one tatami 'jou' is.
Coming back to 'Four-and-a-half', the namesless protagonist of the series lives in a boarding house of 'four-and-a-half tatami mat' rooms in Kyoto. It's produced by the studio Mad House, which sort of accounts for the delightfully bizarre and unique animation, storytelling, and atmosphere.
(Note the use of a 'four-and-a-half tatami mat' floor plan to form the character for 4!)
I could ramble on and on about the anime, despite having only seen 4 episodes so far (I believe about 8 of a total of 11 have already been aired). But will restrain myself here and bring myself back to the main purpose I had in mind when starting on this post. Music. Specifically, anime ending and opening themes.
I rather love the ending theme for 'Yojouhan Shinwa Taikei',
AND, I have to add that I really love the ending sequence animation too!! It makes use of the 'tatami room floor plan' idea and has some rather nifty animation.
Here it is!!
Surfing around on youtube also brought me to a more electronic version of the song. This one on youtube is different from the one that came with the single, somehow! And I actually like it better! Reminds me of old-school video game sounds. Lovely.
Another anime theme that I'm rather in love with currently is the one for Bakemonogatari (化物語). The title of the series is rather neat - in Japanese, the three characters can be split into two words, 'bakemono' ('monster') and 'monogatari' ('story') by sharing the middle character, and it can be translated into English as 'Ghostory'. Pretty cool playing with language that is wonderfully translated, huh? ^^
'Bakemonogatari' was produced by the studio SHAFT, which exceeds Mad House in terms of bizarreness and creativity, I feel. 'Bakemonogatari' has very gorgeous animation, with great colours, the highlight of which are the beautiful red outlines. Also has very strange imagery and words being flashed on the screen, that I just allow to wash over me in a mind-boggling celebration of wonderful strangeness. The background music is a delight, the voice work excellent (exercising herculean self-control not to go down this tangent). I can hardly keep up with the puns and humour, even with subtitles, though, which makes me feel really quite inadequate.
Right. The ending theme. 'Kimi no Shiranai Monogatari' (The Tale That You Don't Know) by supercell. It's a very pop-ish song. I rather prefer the full lengh version to the anime ending sequence version, but am going to post the latter as I rather like the ending animation. Again. Heh.
supercell is rather interesting. It has its origins on Nico nico video, which can be called the Japanese youtube. I haven't really explored this area of the world wide web, so forgive the inaccuracies, misguided assumptions and/or statements spawned from ignorance that may result from my insufficient knowledge and web-surfing.
It seems that 'doujin music' is quite the phenomenon now. 'Doujin' is used to refer to 'amateur made' products, (the most famous example would be 'doujinshi' - 'amateur made manga'). This flourishing of the doujin music (I'm not even 100% sure if that's how they refer to it...... -.-) scene seems to be a result of two wonderful pieces of technology.
Firstly, the tool of the Vocaloid. These are singing synthesizing software. Wikipedia can probably do a better job explaining. Even an ignoramus like me couldn't help but notice the word 'vocaloid' being bandied about with great frequency in the Japanese-loving corners of the internet. And now I can name a few, like the Kagamine twins and Gackpoid, which uses the voice of legendary (to some I suppose) singer Gackt.
Anyway, so basically Vocaloids allow people to put in vocals to compositions they've created, and the whole composition and production of a song can be completely accomplished on a computer. No need to be able to play any instrument or sing, or have to enlist the assistance of people able to do so. This, as you can imagine, enables a lot more people who are talented in composition to realise their creations in audio.
The second piece of technology is the platform of NicoVid. I say it can be called the Japanese youtube, but I think it has one added feature that makes it really quite different. I think it's the function that allows viewers to comment on a specific moment in the video played. It also scrolls these comments from viewers across the video when it's being played (yes, this can be switched off, thank god!!). Can't put up a screen capture as my laptop is now running on 'Zero' disk space, but I think this function adds to a sense of, how shall I put it? Participation? Community?
A lot of the comments are just exclamatory, such as 'cute!!' or 'hot!!' or just the Japanese version of 'lol' or 'haha', 'wwwwwww' (the w looks like a smile, doesn't it? like ^w^ ).
Even though they're just simple comments, I think the commenting and viewing of comments as the video runs definitely puts in an added-dimension to the video viewing process, and that's what makes NicoVid different from youtube.
And, coming back to my point, I think this more participatory video site hosting these 'amateur made' songs does enhance the popularity of the scene.
Oh, I forgot to add that another key characteristic of 'doujin music', apart from using Vocaloids, is the accompanying animation or visuals.
Take supercell as an example. The group (or 'circle' as they're called) has one key member, Ryo, who does the composition and production of the music, and I forgot how many other members who are in charge of providing the illustrations and animation. I think there're about seven of them??
Anyway, now that we're back on the topic of supercell, what I want to comment is how it's rather impressive that a web-based amateur music composer is now signed on a major label and releasing music. They no longer use vocaloids, though. What you heard in the video above is a real flesh and blood singer. However, I read that she, too, has her roots in the online self-produced NicoVid music world.
So, now, I'm going to end my own little amateur foray into describing and dissecting doujin music with three Vocaloid videos!
This song was my initiation into the world of Vocaloids. I came to know of the song as it was covered by a couple of seiyuu (voice actors). (Yet another piece of evidence of the power of the doujin music scene! Usually, wouldn't the order of covering be the reverse?)
'Iroha Uta', composed by Gin Saku, featuring the Vocaloid Kagamine Rin.
What do you think? I took some time to get used to the electronic voice. But I think it's a good, catchy song.
Next up, 'Karakuri-shi to Ao' ('The Marionette Master and Green') by Machigerita, featuring Gackpoid and Hatsune Miku Append (which I'm assuming is another version of 'Hatsune Miku').
This one is nice and creepy.
And finally, something a little different. 'Hello Again' by mayuko. A duet by the twins Kagamine Rin and Len. Really quite lovely. If a tad too long. ^^;
So what do you think about Vocaloid singing and doujin music?
I also heard that quite a lot of these tunes are available at karaoke places as well. Not very sure about the details, but it really is quite some thing, isn't it? For amateur created products to make their way into the commercial sphere like this. Definitely something worth looking further into, but I'm not sure if I can spare the time and effort!!
Anyway, I actually planned to post more anime opening and ending sequence videos, but I think I'll leave the onslaught of youtube videos at this for now. Am getting rather tired, and I'm sure you, dear reader, are too.
Right. Last obstacle to clear!!
The ending sequence with credits removed of the anime series 'Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei' (Farewell Teacher Despair). Produced by the superbly strange SHAFT, and starring the wonderful seiyuu (voice actor) Kamiya Hiroshi, a mini-festival of whom I'm currently having. The art styles and animation forms they whisk the viewer through is even more varied and strange than that in 'Bakemonogatari'. Not going to delve too deeply, as apparently I've already spent 3 hours on this post.
There we go!!
If you managed to make it through this entire clunking descendent of Frankenstein's monster post AND watched all *counts* 7 videos, as a reward, you can claim a big Badge of Approval from me. Hahahaha.
But remember, no cheating or lying!
Haha.
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