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Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, by pitching his economic policies to his fellow leaders at the Group of Eight summit in Northern Ireland, has put himself in a bind with the need to show a blueprint for achieving both growth and fiscal rehabilitation. The just-completed ...
About 45 minutes from Tokyo’s skyscrapers, resting in the hinterlands of Tachikawa there is a land of mist and dragons. It’s a place where rolling hills tumble toward an Aztec pyramid, and children bounce on clouds. The place is called Showa Kinen Koen, and ...
Edward Snowden, the fugitive former CIA employee and NSA contractor who leaked secrets about America’s spying operations, often hung out online with foreigners in Japan who shared his interests in anime, video games, martial arts, the stock market and the expat lifestyle. Snowden, who ...
Sophie Calle is an enigma. She is an artist, writer, photographer and filmmaker yet doesn’t work exclusively in any of these areas. She has become famous for her work in photography but her objects and later films have drawn equal attention — work that ...
During his three years as Japan manager, Alberto Zaccheroni has generally kept it dry, remaining a cool customer when speaking to the media. But on the eve of Wednesday’s Confederations Cup match against his native Italy, the normally reserved Zaccheroni admitted to being overwhelmed ...
Thanks to their jaw-dropping live act and the danceable nature of their techno-rock tunes, Boom Boom Satellites are one of Japan’s top festival draws. Having already headlined the second stage at Fuji Rock in 2007 and with a clutch of foreign festival appearances under ...
The line between alt-country and just plain country music can be a thin one. And while Jenny Lewis’ vocal and guitar duties in ice-cool Las Vegas indie band Rilo Kiley might cause her to be labeled the former, there’s really very little difference between ...
The line between alt-country and just plain country music can be a thin one. And while Jenny Lewis’ vocal and guitar duties in ice-cool Las Vegas indie band Rilo Kiley might cause her to be labeled the former, there’s really very little difference between ...
Bugy Craxone, whose name is a twisted mash-up of the English words blue, easy and klaxon, formed in Sapporo in 1997, relocating a year later to Tokyo. Their pop-infused, female-fronted hardcore sound won them a deal with Victor Entertainment within a year; but whereas ...
Is Kimura Kaela trying to bag Harry Potter as a boyfriend? First she dresses up as a pixie for the sleeve of 2006′s single “Magic Music”; then a year later she names a single after Samantha Stephens, the foxy sorceress from American sitcom “Bewitched”; ...
Yes, Jitterin’Jinn are still going. Arguably the definitive Japanese rockabilly pop band, Jitterin’Jinn formed in 1986 in Yamatokoriyama, Nara Prefecture, capturing national attention when they appeared on the audition show “Miyake Yuuji no Ikasu Bando Tengoku” (“Yuuji Miyake’s Rising Band Heaven,” which also exposed ...
There’s an old punk maxim that you should never trust anyone over 30. And yet as Sonic Youth rapidly approach the big three-oh, their music is on an upward curve. It’s ludicrous to think that a 29-year-old band can still be making vibrant, spirited, ...
‘In Croatia, we played in a huge club and we were the only band, but around 200 people came along to see us and went totally crazy. Everybody there loves alcohol, and so the toilets were filthy!” laughs Miyoko Yamaguchi, drummer with garage-rock band ...
While the sentence “I’m a fan of the solo albums by the drummer from left-field Japanese electronica artist Cornelius’ live backing band” might come across as almost artfully pretentious, mi-gu’s third album of unconventional studio-play is actually her most accessible to date. Recording with ...
While Hikaru Utada boasts the No. 1, 4 and 8 biggest-selling albums in Japanese history, and despite her New York upbringing and strong English, her 2004 stab at Western success fell embarrassingly flat. That album, “Exodus,” was a flawed masterpiece — sonically original, but ...
While Hikaru Utada boasts the No. 1, 4 and 8 biggest-selling albums in Japanese history, and despite her New York upbringing and strong English, her 2004 stab at Western success fell embarrassingly flat. That album, “Exodus,” was a flawed masterpiece — sonically original, but ...
If ever a pop group deserved a tribute, it’s Judy and Mary. Somehow managing to pull off the rare feat of being both chart-friendly and terrifyingly talented, between 1993 and 2001 the band (none of whom were called Judy or Mary) birthed hit after ...