neomarxisme

—Okay, I like this idea of taking karaoke out of the nighttime snack bar and putting it into "boxes" all around the country. Like a franchise.
—Right. I think it's going to be big.
—One little question though: what are we going to do about the visuals?
—Yeah.
—I mean, the rooms are going to be all colorful and fancy and loud, and then you'll look at the screen...
—The screen and...
—Yeah, and it will just be text on black.
—No, no. We are going to make videos for the songs.
—Videos?
—Videos.
—For each song? There must be like... 5,000 songs out there.
—No, no. Not for each song. Like we will make, I dunno, 100 videos. Maybe 200 over time, and they will be attached to the songs in a pattern so that you never really see repeats.
—But they won't fit with the theme of the individual songs.
—Who cares?
—I dunno. If it's a song about the sorrow of losing one's love while fishing, you can't have some guy playing guitar in Washington Square Park.
—Washington Square Park! I love it.
—No, you can't do Washington Square Park.
—Not for that one. But we could probably use that for a lot of videos. No, no. We will have "sad" videos and "happy" videos.
—But we are going to have to replace these videos all the time. Like very few years or so when the styles get outmoded.
—Nah. No one will care.
—What do you mean no one will care? Stuff from five years ago looks ugly and old.
—Look. We live in the richest and therefore best period in Japanese history. No matter what happens, these videos are going to look great forever. And if they look terrible in a few years, we will be so rich that we'll just make new videos.
—I just can't imagine someone in 2007 singing some 2006 song with a video from 1989 in the background.
—I can. 1989 will look great by then!
—I'm sorry?
—That's 18 years from now. Think about 18 years before now. 1971. That's a classic year. I would happily sing songs to videos from 1971.
—I am not sure you could fit an Onyanko Club song to a video from 1971.
—Ha ha. You crack me up.
—Seriously.
—No, seriously, these videos...
—They'll be expensive. There is already a significant capital outlay for the real estate and construction...
—No they won't be expensive. They're a sunk cost. We make 200 of these things, shoot a bunch of random footage in New York and San Francisco on BetaCam, and we can use these forever.
—I can't imagine you'll be right, but...
—But what? We're the industry, and if we are still saying in 2007 that videos from 1989 are what you should be singing to, we will be right! TV won't even be 2-D anymore by then. I don't see why you are worrying so much. There probably won't even be a Washington Square Park. People will want to remember what it looks like.

Fun being in Tokyo and all (figuratively speaking), but I gotta go back to NYC for less days than I have fingers on one hand. Then I will be back in Tokyo, and I will start blogging like a real-life blogger.

Oh, I am hearing final mixes of my record in NYC while I am there.

I'm not sure, but I think all these uyoku soundtrucks outside my office window are screaming, Welcome back to Japan, Marxy! Either that or anti-China slogans. The audio moves too much into the red to really decipher the content of their declarations. Judging by the amount of voices, there must be exactly 176 men inside these four vehicles. They do little performances of that old "lots of clowns in small car" gag for invalid kids when they are off duty.

For whatever reason - the rain, the high-profile American guest at the New Otani Hotel, a change of heart in the government acceptance of right-wing terrorist organizations - there are a dozen cops at the crossing right before you reach the Prime Minister's residence (the "Kantei") who block the intersection with a retractable gate and move a huge bus perpendicular to the road just in case the ultra-nationalists take the big gamble and charge ahead. The Contemporary Mob-backed Fascists must be miffed that this boulevard - normally an exclusive playground for their flavor of political extortion - is closed, but they know in their hearts that PM Abe down the road in his heated mansion can hear their message loud and clear.

In light of the obstacle, most of the vans end up making a wide U-turn and go back towards Akasaka-Mitsuke station. They swim a lap in this municipal pool of asphalt and arrive back up to the blockade in fifteen minute shifts. They hate China, but not enough to run over cops to get their point across.

Police vans and motorcycles follow the parade with lights flashing, but evidently this sort of social disruption is not an arrestable offense. If they get one decibel louder... then there'd be trouble!

My Chronicles of Uyokia are repetitive, yes, but the protagonists' power lies not in surprise but in the chilling constancy of dark-hearted protest.

Day Two of Uyoku Trucks vs. China Premier Wen:

Blockades stop traffic and the cops draw out their sound meter.

Photos by Sean Wood

Just when arrests look imminent... the uyoku call it quits for the day!

(1) April 3 saw the second hearing in the civil case between music business ranking chart provider Oricon and freelance journalist Ugaya Hiro. At the time of the first hearing, Ugaya announced that he was counter-suing Oricon for infringing on his freedom of speech and abusing the legal system, so now these courtroom hearings actually regard two cases rather than just one. The following quotes come from the Oh My News article that covered the event.

At the hearing, Ugaya's lawyers stated:

「オリコンの訴えは『報道・言論の自由』の侵害であり、狙いは損害の補償や回復ではなく、烏賀陽個人を疲弊させ、発言を封じることで、訴訟そのものが訴訟権の乱用にあたり不法である」

"Oricon's lawsuit infringes on the freedom of the press and the freedom of speech, and their aim is not to recover or compensate for damages, but to impoverish Ugaya as an individual and prevent him from speaking. This litigation itself is illegal in its abuse of the right to sue."

Oricon's team countered with.:

「名誉棄損訴訟である以上、抑止的効果を及ぼすことはある意味やむをえない。また、烏賀陽氏は個人ではなく、個人事業主である。力は看過できぬほど大きいものである」

"As this is a defamation suit, we cannot avoid a certain amount of exerting an effect of restraining him. Furthermore, Ugaya is not an individual, but an individual entrepreneur (individual at helm of commercial enterprise). He has a power that is too great to be ignored."

From looking at the case, Oricon's real complaint seems to be less with the Cyzo article and more with Ugaya's 2003 AERA piece on industry doubts about the ranking company's accuracy. The three-year statute-of-limitations for libel/defamation claims, however, has expired on the AERA piece making the Cyzo piece the only article available for legal action.

The next hearing will be June 12.

(2) The new Japanese site oriconcase.jugem.jp provides the latest updates on the Oricon vs. Ugaya case for those who want constant news. With little mass media coverage, the internet is still the crucial source for information on this landmark lawsuit.

(3) The federation of Japanese mass media labor unions MIC (Mass Media, Information & Culture) presented Oricon with a written demand that the ranking company withdraw its lawsuit against Ugaya and also presented a proposal seeking to find a quick solution to the conflict.

(4) Since nobody in the Japanese music industry has had any kind of comment or criticism on this court case, My News Japan did an interview with freelance political journalist and Oricon co-founder Watanabe Shoujiro. Watanabe acted as Editor-in-Chief for the magazine that would eventually become Oricon - 総合芸能市場調査 (Sougou Geinou Shijou Chousa/General Survey of the Entertainment Market).

Here is my translation:

Both the media and the music world have been silent about the Oricon case. What do you think about that?

Nobody is going to support [Ugaya]. Those guys in the music industry are all connected with the rankings.

Why doesn't the mass media write anything?

Because Oricon manipulates the rankings.

Has it always been that kind of company?

It's an industry paper! Industry papers get money from the industry. You don't get general advertisements. So it's natural that this happens.

When you were editing Geinou Shijou Chousa, did you go out personally to check exactly how many copies of records were selling at the stores?

No, no. For those rankings, I just made up the numbers at will.

The "A rank" meant it sold about 150 copies in a week. "B" was 130. C was 100. I just assigned the ABC ranking as I liked!

At that time, it's not like stores were really checking their inventories.

Well...

It was like...
"Did you have the data?"
"Sorry, Mr. Watanabe. We've been busy and haven't done it yet."
"Well, shoot. Today's the deadline, so please do it."
"Just please make up appropriate numbers, Mr. Watanabe."

"We made this record the #1 seller at that store" - "Oh, that! That's selling well at our place too. Please make it #1."

It was exactly like that!

(5) Oricon has issued an English statement on their side of the case. Their explanation for not suing the publisher of Cyzo strikes me as having a strange logic:

In this lawsuit, the comment based on apparent misinterpretation of facts is the cause of the claim for damages by libel and the point of issue. We were concerned about spreading the point of issue across the entire article and making it obscure by suing the publisher of magazine, INFOBAHN Inc.

With nine-year old girls in thong bikinis currently leading the march of eroticism in Japan (or at least grabbing the most real estate in der Zeitgeist), refined culture magazine for urban professionals Brutus has decided to come out and remind its readers that "adult" women can also be beautiful. The idea is a bit of radical contrarianism, for sure, but such sensational headlines are known to move copies. Relatively young and over-make-up'd Kashii Yuu graces the cover, but the main feature exhibits portrait shots of various older and professional Japanese women that buck the recent infantile gravity of beauty standards.

From the Brutus website:

As seen in the rush of new women's magazines starting publication, this is an era of diverse ways in which women can "shine." From catchphrases such as "You've graduated from trying to attract boys (mote)" and "Adult, but cute (kawaii)," more focus is being put on "adult" women. Beauty comes from refinement, intelligence, and a strong will. The keyword for the charming female image is "adult" for men - and maybe for females as well. Our sessions with famous photographers are full of charming beautiful women. In this special feature, adult women are beautiful!

Japan these days is a bit SCREAM - Socio-economic Class Rules Everything Around Me - and we therefore are best seeing Brutus as a media representation of the taste culture of professional, well-educated upper middle-class Japanese men rather than as just as a magazine. Brutus is "kachi-gumi" (Winners) media and not targeted towards either middle-range salarymen in the "make-gumi" (Losers) without proper cosmopolitan taste or artistic freeter who have chosen passion for individual creation over a high income. Mr. Brutus is drinking champagne at the opening of Tokyo Midtown in a slim navy-blue pin-striped Super 120s suit with slant pockets. He is not playing pachinko within a dirty cloud of nicotine and J-POP Trance Best 2005.

Sexual attraction and social class are not independent of each other, especially seeing that a specific attribute underlies both career success and interest in "adult" women: self-confidence. This is starting to read like the script to one of those businessman LPs of the 1960s, but the self-confident man has no need to fear women who may challenge him in the realm of ideas or even, gasp, on the income ladder. A sophisticated man needs a sophisticated women on his arm. James Bond does not dote after 16 year-old girls - at least while the camera is rolling.

But whether self-confidence is a source of business acumen or just an inherited privilege of the wealthy, lusting after little girls under the guise of appreciating "genki" or the "blossoming of youth" does not match the chic Brutus lifestyle. The relative newness of the Under-15 boom suggests that it is a sexual desire born of contemporary social conditions: men are attracted to these girls' innocence as a retreat from a harsh reality in which they are completely emasculated. The "make-gumi" man lacks self-confidence, and extremely young girls (or in more mainstream cases, hostesses/prostitutes) symbolize a desire to create fantasy moments in which the man can regain a sense of control and dominance. Adult women are no good, because they are a reminder of the fall in stature rather than a cure for the failure itself.

Brutus smartly reminds us, though, that "adult" is not just the key for men, but also for women. Japanese analysts posit that women in contemporary Japan pay attention to their style primarily to meet and secure upwardly-mobile men (or at least, self-confident without necessarily the economic motive), and if so, the woman herself must now move towards "adult." A man's affection for the immature is a sure sign of low earning potential. This means young women must eventually abandon the simple algebra of "mote" (being cute in the way that boys like --> a boyfriend) for a more complicated calculus of following your own will as a means to attract the sophisticated man (who may just happen to possess a bulging pocketbook.)

I had doubts on the fairness of putting "adult" sophistication on the same continuum as the pedophilic tendencies of the otaku, but I just went to the bookstore to check out the issue, and much to my surprise, the intro paragraph of the Brutus feature specifically name checks the "Junior Idol Boom" as proof of infantile sexuality taking over modern society. And they too see the fear towards adult women in the communal lack of self-confidence. Without saying it specifically, Brutus does seem to be asking, are you enough of a Winner Man to take on a Winner Woman?

The State had lost the war, and international pressure forced the State to abolish a few recreational services like prostitution and amphetamines that had previously been legal.

The Black Corporation, Ltd. essentially took over these markets with tacit government approval, and in order to carry out its extra-legal mandate, BlackCorp had implicitly attained the right to ignore all of the laws that the State had created for its companies and citizens. Working outside of society, the Black Corporation needed its own security services and built up a small private army complete with firearms. The State was sometimes weary of this arrangement, but when the State had problems with rioting youth and anti-State protests, the State knew they could call upon the Black Corporation to provide manpower to squash the rebellion. The Head of State and some of the Directors of the Black Corporation Board knew each other in their youth and arrangements were easily made.

Eventually, the Black Corporation realized that it did not have to solely operate in shadow businesses. Actually, with the threat of violence, they could charge high prices for totally uncompetitive services and products and vendors would have no choice but to participate in the transaction. Despite no interest in pursuing innovation or superior performance, the Black Corporation was guaranteed payment on almost all public works projects through their large share of the construction industry. The Black Corporation even had subsidiary organizations that controlled the art, music, and entertainment worlds that boomed from the 1980s. In whatever field you looked, there would be a subsidiary of the Black Corporation involved at some level.

BlackCorp also decided to form business alliances with similar organizations around the country, buying some out forthright and leaving others to pay yearly management fees to the central office.

In order to maintain a political presence, BlackCorp would align, back, and partially staff a political wing of extremist activists who would intimidate and threaten those with anti-State views or the kind of liberal ideology that opposed the existence of the Black Corporation. By being determined "stewards of the State" and financial beneficiaries of the Party, Black Corporation made sure the State would never push to break up their business activity.

One day, an executive of the Black Corporation's local subsidiaries - Water Heart Co., Ltd. - gunned down a local mayor. As far as we could speculate, the mayor had not given beneficial business terms to Water Heart. The police opened an investigation into the executive as an individual actor, but Water Heart was untouched as an organization. And it goes without saying that the central offices of BlackCorp were in no fear of being shut down. "We cannot be responsible for all the actions of our subsidiaries."

Threats of violence are both the reason behind Black Corporation's success and the ultimate products they supply to society, and yet, the State feigns surprise when BlackCorp goes through with the violence that is fundamental to its existence. Now why would the State not go ahead and shut down Black Corporation when clearly the Black Corporation has overstepped their mandate? The State's inaction in eradicating the Black Corporation almost appears to suggest that the State needs this violence or the threat of violence. Or maybe the Party that has run the State since its recent formation needs the services of an organization with the ability to circumvent its own laws.

The executive from Water Heart will be punished as an individual, and the State will go back to accepting a "peaceful" co-existence of Black Corporation - ultimately, a huge unproductive conglomerate with monopoly power that has a founding mandate of working outside of the legal system. And when the next politician or writer or business leader gets attacked by the Black Corporation for not agreeing to appropriate transactional terms, the perpetrator will be punished. But they will never dismantle his employer.

Thesis

Radio MXUT returns to the Internet, this time as an experiment upon a new methodology rather than the latest installment in the mega-mix series.

Background

As preparation for the labor-intensive creation of an hour-long mega-mix dragged on, projections for the completion date became intolerably late. Looking for a temporary solution, the creators behind MXUT - Marxy and U.T. (Kiiiiiii) - stumbled upon a much more radical procedure for creating an original podcast of musical content, one which any person with a computer and a library of songs could make.

Necessary Tools

a very large mp3 library
iTunes (or equivalent mp3 players with library features)
Audio Hijack Pro
Pro Tools LE (or any other WAV/AIFF editor)

Methodology

1. Open up iTunes.
2. View "All Artists" (and "All Albums")
3. Organize song list by "Time" in ascending order.
4. Select all songs under 0:30 (thirty seconds) and place them in a separate playlist. Keep songs in ascending time order.
5. Remove doubles.
6. Turn off crossfader playback and make sure gapless playback is active to assure no space between tracks.
7. Turn up volume all the way.
8. Re-launch iTunes within Audio Hijack Pro.
9. Start hijacking and record the output of the playlist as an AIFF/WAV file.
10. Edit AIFF/WAV in Pro Tools (especially if using sample version of Audio Hijack Pro that only allows 10 min sessions.)
11. Bounce out final AIFF of mix and convert to mp3/aac.

Note: No songs in this mix were edited to match the length requirements!

Observations

1. Radio MXUT Vol. 3 - Under 30 is 186 songs in 50:53.
2. The mix begins slow, but builds in pace.
3. The mix is very heavy on 8-bit NES soundtracks, which form an exoskeleton to the other songs.
4. There are relatively few full songs that have been cut off either through ripping mishaps or download problems.
5. The mix is like a cross-country journey through stereophonic space. The listener visit different recording techniques, mastering technology, and timbres along the way. 6. This MXUT is best enjoyed in large headphones with no distractions of multitasking.

File: mp3
Feed: .rss feed

Credits:
marxy - iTunes operation, 8-bit tracks
u.t. - Jackson-family tracks

In my professional opinion, I am not sure "GASH" is the best name for a Maid Cafe.

CanCam Stats for June 2007 Pages: 556 Pictures of Women Modeling Distinct Outfits or Makeup: 842 Pictures of Ebihara Yuri (Ebi-chan): 164 Pictures of Yamada Yu: 29 Pictures of Oshikiri Moe: 0

Commentary: With the departure of Oshikiri Moe to AneCan, Ebi-chan and Yamada Yu have had to up their pace to cover the court as a tag-team. That being said, Yamada's performance can be said to be marginal at best - winning only 29 points against the powerhouse Ebihara at 164. Shooting that many distinct pictures for a monthly magazine qualifies as first-tier modeling hustle. Bench-warmers Maki and Naoko also seem to be getting quite a lot of face time. The two girls are making themselves out to be the new star players, ready for their rightful place on the starting team. Rookie Mine Erika also makes some big plays towards the end of the game.

On the plane bound for Nagoya in Summer 1996, my friend Dennis - who had been to Japan many times before - mentioned that there was a Japanese brand called Bitch Skateboards and the logo mark involved the international bathroom door symbol for Men pointing a gun to the head of the international bathroom door symbol for Women. To my seventeen year-old ears, this was the Holy Grail of Engrish: a whole host of products not only emblazoned with a "bad word" but a totally politically-incorrect logo to match. I spent a lot of time during my three weeks in Gifu Prefecture searching for Bitch goods, and for my first two weeks, my closest encounter involved snapping a blurry photo of a tiny tag on a backpack. I finally hit the mother lode/motherload one day in a neighborhood clothing shop targeted towards teenage girls and soon became the proud owner of a Bitch Skateboards lighter and a ridiculous Bitch Skateboard retractable umbrella. (I liked the idea of using the latter in the U.S., because seriously, who is going to stop you on a rainy day to voice a complaint against the offensive language and imagery on your umbrella.)

In hindsight, I somewhat wince at the idea of brandishing Bitch goods, but I can promise you that my early endorsement was completely ironic. I was very confident that the brand was a misguided and unconsciously-misogynistic commercial venture dreamed up by non-Anglophones in Japan. Much to my chagrin, I later learned through the product tags that Bitch was based out of a city called "Los Angeles, California." So now the joke was not linguistic mishap as much as licensing gone amuck. Now as the humor has faded to black, there remains the enigma of how Bitch Skateboards came to take over the second-rate shopping centers of rural Japan in the mid-90s.

The Internet is very good at solving these kinds of history mysteries, but a simple search came up with very little in the way of thorough explanation. This "Bitch Skateboards" is not the decks we're looking for. The rise and fall of the brand unfortunately happened in the 1990s Black Hole of Japanese internet coverage.

Judging from the logos and some simple induction, I am pretty sure Bitch started as a hostile parody to Girl Skateboards, and The Net seems to name Sal Rocco, Jr. at World Industries as the original prankster (He's the guy who gave the name "Wee Man" to "Wee Man" of Jackass for those who like trivia). How this low-key parody ended up being licensed to CROWN F.G.CO., LTD in a deal brokered by TENACIOUS LTD. and then distributed through YUBISHA SANGYO CO., LTD is an amazing commercial adventure novel waiting to happen.

My guess is that somebody in Japan saw the graphics in an issue of Big Brother back in the day and immediately snapped up the license. The decision to use the logo on an extremely broad product line is odd - especially with so much targeting girls out in the countryside, and not, urban skaters. The products were generally cheap. My umbrella rusted through within a year of use. (Karma probably also took its toll.)

Back in Tokyo in 1998, Bitch was still around, but rumors indicated that some controversy (Feminists!) caused the brand to rethink their offensive use of symbols. Unless I am imagining things, I saw one Bitch product with the man giving the woman flowers instead of a firearm. (Maybe, there is still some aggressive subtext here in the masculine discomfort with boyfriend duties.) This relatively recent logo looks like a censored and deconstructed version of the original.

I can't remember the last time I saw Bitch on shelves, but I certainly have not seen it in a very long time. Besides the Yahoo! Japan Auction pages, the t-shirts only pop up on some dubious European commerce sites. I certainly will not bemoan its absence from the market, but boy did that brand succeed wildly in Japan for being essentially a one-off joke on a rival team of skateboarders.