Good luck at the airports !

have a blast.

You know, it's so clean and tidy over there that I'm afraid to comment, but clast is pretty awesome. It's like you shook a heavy load off your shoulders when you stopped having to justify capitalism, and stopped having to worry about offending your audience with your seriousness.
Nearly everything you've written there has been on par with your best stuff here. Thanks.

have fun marxy,
hey nate,
see, we figured it out.

Right on.

Say hi to Stereolabrat while you're there!

"4. BATHING APE

Your sweatshirt is loud. Your sneakers are pink and orange and apparently only 200 people in the world have them and they all live in Japan. Good for you. Here's a cookie. Enjoy it. What kind is it? It's oatmeal raisin go fuck yourself. Bathing Ape is currently on the list of things that are dead to me. "

http://stereolabrat.livejournal.com/

was never into the bathing ape thing, but the other day I noticed that some magazine is giving out a "bape baby" infant tshirt with purchase. Even I can spot a dead brand.

marxy enjoy gotham city for me. 2,000 Yen if you bring me back a bottle of Manhattan Special coffee soda.

Nice meeting you the other day. Your wife's band is great; I hope they take over the world.

Since we can never hype enough about Kiiiiiii, here are some photos of their latest gig in NY.

http://uberdionysus.livejournal.com/401892.html?#cutid2

Hoo boy, the whole world is on the edge of its seat waiting for the new album from Marxy! Self-financed, of course, because the labels just couldn't hope to understand his tortured artistic soul. Why don't you go for broke and aim to sell 20 copies this time? What the hell .. 25! The sky's the limit, kiddo. Next stop Tokyo Dome.

Troy: I don't know which band you saw but no human alive has ever knowingly used the word "great" to describe the group "kiiiiii", and I am sure you wouldn't want to be the first. Take over the world? Don't make me laugh! No-one wants to see them even for free.

I find it rather ironic how Mr Marx here takes great pride in skewering every other overhyped yet meritless sociocultural trend, egged on by this tiny crowd of like-minded twats .. and yet the elephant in the room they're all too scared to mention is that "Kiiiiii!!!!" fucking sucks. I cannot see a single redeeming feature about this schoolgirl joke band taken a great many steps too far. Just how successful could a couple of musically incompetent and decidedly average-looking j-girls get by jumping around screaming, anyway? Hardly the second fucking Beatles, is it? Pick any 5 seconds at random from any Halcali CD and you've got more talent than these wannabe Harajuku girls could muster in a hundred years of annoying screaming.

That's the elephant in the room. "Kiiiiii" fucking sucks. Oh but I heard they've got themselves a white roadie! Yeah, apparently some guy who really wanted a visa ...

...NPR's Brooke Gladstone?
You sound like you hate fun.

Nice, NPR. Way to rock the hate.

And to think that NPR is supported by listener contributions!

Also, bear in mind that those NPR comments are coming to you all the way from metropolitan Saitama.

I'm never listening to NPR again.

I like Kiiiiiii, myself. I think they're interesting; it's like Morning Musume does
One Flew Over the Cookoo's Nest.

You just stop that teasing and start the pleasing, Mr. NPR-whatever-your-name-is.
Those Kiiiiiii gals are a breath of fresh air! Fresh and fun!

marxy: don't you know? NPR has relocated to "metropolitan saitama" for cost-cutting reasons.

I just found it ironic, is all. In this very comment thread we can clearly see two completely contradictory, and yet sickeningly self-consistent hypocritical phenomenon:

1. Public dissing of last year's worthless "japan fad", BAPE, which all the American hipsters loooved just so much - not because it was good, but because it was "japan cool". Now the sheen has worn off and everyone's distancing themselves and secretly putting their BAPE t-shirts in the trash.

2. Public lauding of Kiiii, this year's worthless "japan fad". You american hipsters looove it just so much - not because it's good, but because it's "japan cool". You think any of you clowns would pay any attention at all if they were from, say, Switzerland?

Anyway, this vivid display of shallow, fickle, short-memory me-too hipster bullshit always rubs me up the wrong way and certainly gets me in the mood to "rock the hate" - what a nice turn of phrase, btw. Can't wait to feel the palpable awkwardness around here when the hipster tide turns away, but Marxy is still (literally!) in bed with the band. Good times ahead!

Good to see that the Internet hasnt changed in the last couple days while I was away from it.

marxy: 4,000 Yen, seriously. I aint had a fix of that stuff in years.

I'm with NPR. If there's anything that I hate, it's when people like stuff. And then they like different stuff later! It's the worst! WHAT ARE THEY THINKING??? UGG(S).

Or maybe NPR has a super big crush on Marxy, so of course s/he is going to have it out for Kiiiiiii. Anyone your crush is dating/married to is a fucking whore and/or total bitch no matter what they do. I'm pretty sure that's in the rules to the board game 'Girl Talk'.

hey NPR!

ok, thats all the energy i have for that. i mean seriously. i've already wasted to much time on this.

i like the cut of your jib though.

did you see (pictures) of the banksy show in LA. where he LITERALLY put an elephant in the room? and, then people just ignored it? (i'm not joking, this seriously happened) good stuff.

the offensive, personal tone aside i think NPR's point is rather valid and i'd like to believe that Marxy is quite aware of it. - not whether kiiiii is brilliant or crap, the other thing.

Yeah, I see what you're saying, alin. Everyone hates a hipster. And I think that no one self identifies as such, instead insisting that they are a unique snowflake who's into the new jam not because it is favored by the cutting edge, but because it genuinely *is* the shit and that’s ridiculous. *shrug*

But the personal tone totally undermines this point. How can you fault Marxy for being into Kiiiiiii? He's sort of signed on for the long haul, so somehow I think it might be more than a passing fancy. There are plenty of personal friends and acquaintances around here who also have a personal interest in being supportive. Complaining about "shallow, fickle, short-memory me-too hipster bullshit" is fine, but Kiiiiii is a bad example of this. It doesn't matter if they go out of style or whatever, Neomarxisme will now and forever be a pro-Kiiiii space and to pitch a fit about it does not make a good point - it's just rude. But such is Internet!

i've got shit to do.. and only internet access to entertain myself. this just sorta dawned on me.

"1. Public dissing of last year's worthless "japa.."
-NPR

wait wait. you just totaly nulled yourself out of any conversation.. last years fad? BAPE? BAPE was like '98's fad.. and i'm being nice.. probably earlier. and that's japan only. last i checked here in nyc.. BAPE pretty much was never cool. (once it came stateside) you can't argue about fad's when you don't even know when the fad was.

i mean skulls and cross bones are a newer old dead fad then bape even.

plus, i'm not sure on the technical aspect of this. but i think it takes like. more then 5000 people (about) being pretty into something, to make it a fad.. i think you need like a million people. and not that kiiiiiii isn't neat and all. i'm not sure they have a million people emulating their style. so, i don't think they qualify into fad territory yet.

ok i'm tired of writing.

"i think NPR's point is rather valid"

The opposition has a "he may be a son of a bitch but he's our son of a bitch" kind of thing going on.

funny, you're creating your oposition again - i don't think anyone can be bothered though.

(or to put it differently what's not univocal automatically becomes opposition - and this was the formula for neomarxisme so far).

i did actually write a quite long comment last night elaborating on what i said but it looks like it was meant to delete itself. to be honest i kind prefer reading the statement followed by round of applase kind of thing so sorry no opposition from here.

For the record:

1 I have no position on Kiiiiiii
2 Alin is still incomprehensible
3 Lauren is still funny

t.panda: you're absolutely right, that totally slipped my mind as well. It was a bad example but I hope the point still stands in its degraded state. In any case I shouldn't have used the phrase "last year's". Feel free to insert any fad you can think of, I just wanted to make a point about fads in general and especially about the hipster "circle jerk" surrounding them .. my apologies anyway and thanks for the correction.

William: I've got a question for you. Did you write this article?

http://www.chachacharming.com/article.php?id=22

Now I'm no ethics professor but even I know that if someone writing a purportedly independent review has an interest in the subject of that review, they should disclose that interest. I don't see any mention of your obvious interest in the band, and I'm wondering why.

Care to comment?

hmmmmmm.. i think i'm going to puke. to much cold medicine in me. sorta trippin' out.

NPR, have you ever thought of starting your own blog where you could attack every single trend? i'm sure it would be hard work. cause if you left any out, we'd have to assume you were bias towards that one.

but, i mean, blogs a pretty much free to start. it seems like it would be a more constructive use of energy. i would think.

and, i still stand by my technical fact that kiiiiiii is not a fad. just based in saturation. they just don't have the market staturation to be a fad..

I would very much like to tell you the circumstances behind how I came to write those particular Kiiiiiii articles and how I am happy to never write about them again, but you don't talk ethics to the guy who gleefully pukes in your living room and doesn't even have the common decency or bravery to give a real name.

Nicely, and vividly, put.

100% p0wnd.

> pukes in your living room

by the intensity of it (the puke) it looks like the guy (i don't know why i'm asuming it's a guy) might have been churning on it for a while so in that case we should try to be a bit more understanding.

the way i see it his brilliant and highly reasonable point is not whether it's bad for you praise kiiii or shut up about them, but that you're now in a great position to observe from close range and analyze and critique (which is sort of what you do, isn't it?) certain things (not kiii's performance but stuff around it) and not doing it is a bit of a cop-out.

if you choose to wear different hats that's fine but you should expect this kind of response then.
(please don't take this as opposition)

"Why don't you go for broke and aim to sell 20 copies this time? What the hell .. 25! "

I should expect this kind of "brilliant" point?

alin, if you don't want to be taken as opposition you must end each comment with a high five for Marxy. That way we know you two are still cool and we can keep chillin.

I also accept low fives. And handshakes.

t.panda: actually i do have a blog, which I write in fairly regularly. However, it's not focussed on japan or its trends, and I don't really have the time or requisite passion for the subject to steer it in that direction. Marxy's blog, on the other hand, is about pretty much nothing else, and so it's the ideal forum to air my grievance. I was under the impression that his open comments policy encourages such audience participation. Well, here's my participation!

And OK, I concede your point, they're not big enough to be a fad. However I would argue that our esteemed host is doing his level best to hype them into one.

marxy: Oh, don't be so insultingly melodramatic. Your analogy holds no water at all. If you don't like strangers "puking" in your "living room", don't open your "living room" up to the public and allow anonymous puking with the click of a mouse. And stop playing the victim - you are in a position to delete any and all of my comments, or indeed ban the entire (terribly uncool) region of Saitama - with a few clicks. Why don't you act a little more like the Party of your namesake, and silence the proletariat?

And why the insistence on a name? Do you require some personal target? I note that few, if any, of your supporters have a real name attached; with few exceptions they sign their comments with nicknames. So you're willing to accept support from anonymous donors - but not criticism?

The decision to not give my name has nothing to do with decency, and I am amused that you are self-important enough to think that attacking you could possible require anything resembling bravery. It is simply a question of economic gain or loss - I have nothing to gain by identifying myself, and there is at least the potential to lose something, so I don't - simple. The internet remembers everything, and I am very careful about what I attach my name to on it.

But enough of this rationalising. Marxy - stop whining. You placed yourself on this pedestal, and it ill behooves you to cry and stomp your feet when the crowd below starts throwing peanuts. I do appreciate your work and consider you an authority on a number of subjects - I just wish you would stop being such a smug, pretentious, hypocritical, self-important, self-promoting, unethical jerk. Oh, and you're a sellout. And a salaryman. And I hate people with beards. I could go on and on.

Anyway answer my fucking question. HIGH FIVE!!!

This guy!

Im sorry to say actually... its a little strongly put, but DAMN Ive actually been waiting for this kind of comment for a while. (NPR)

I really dont think you (David) are like this in real life ( God I hope not) but you come across as such an unlikable dilettante on your blog.

And I too cant stand the "ironic" beard. (especially with the dated williamsburg shag)

-Whitney Grant

beards can be ironic now? Whoda thunk it.

"I really dont think you (David) are like this in real life ( God I hope not) but you come across as such an unlikable dilettante on your blog."

I may be unlikable in real life too, but I only give non-Internet friends the chance to find out.

Would it make you feel better to know my sometimes beard is a makeshift solution to Pseudofolliculitis barbae? Probably not, right?

Anyway, the great freedom of the Internet is not only that you get to actively dislike me but you get my ear directly to say things that common politeness would prevent you from saying to my face. Have fun while it lasts.

Would anybody be surprised to learn that NPR was my sock puppet?

Yes, since Marxy has just insulted my adoptive homeland of Saitama, where I used to go to school and to work, I must challenge him here now for a boxing bout. I'll be Apollo Creed and Marxy will be Rocky.

A low five for all anti-Saitama people in here.

Yeah,We all gotta stand up for 彩の国Saitama.
I may even have to abandon my apartment in Musashino-shi and head back to Tokorozawa in the
near future,you know.

and NO no-more-post-on-Kiiiii thing.
You do not negotiate with the terrorist.
Your tomorrow's assignment shall be another post on Kiiiii!

"Never wrestle with a pig. You both get dirty, but the pig likes it."

Wheaton Grant, waiting for what? A pretty mean-spirited personal attack?

Basically, Kiiiiii are a blast to see live.
Whether or not their recorded material can compensate for the absence of their live-performace-charm...the jury might be out for some, but clearly not for NPR.
...
Most complaints about "hipsters" seem to belie a jealousy of people who just look like they might be having more fun than you.

NPR, personally, your opinion is welcome, but your delivery is (intentionally, right?) 100% dickweed. Your cause is not righteous. If you had a girlfriend, you would write about her band.

Sorry, but your whining is just making you sound like a real ass-hurt bitch.

hey, there's a guy named NPR! like the slightly left-leaning radio broadcaster!
wait, someone made that joke.

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