Economy | ANALYSIS
Households to take hit from tax hike
by Tomoko Otake
The consumption tax increase will hit every household in Japan hard, with many people’s financial future hanging on whether their wages rise enough to offset the hike's impact.
Music | Strange Boutique Oct 25, 2012
Western stereotypes may explain Japan's Psy-lence
by Ian Martin
Amid all the excitement, analysis and general horse-dancing hoo-haa over Korean musician Psy’s smash hit “Gangnam Style,” one story that has provoked a certain amount of head-scratching among fans is the song’s relative lack of success in Japan. Brian Ashcraft produced a good summary ...
Music | Strange Boutique Aug 30, 2012
The customer is always right, but that's what's wrong in Japan's live-house scene
by Ian Martin
The roundly despised pay-to-play system in place throughout most of Tokyo’s live-music scene, and to a slightly lesser extent in many other cities, is something I’ve written about in this column before. A typical complaint from a band might go, “Why should we have ...
Music | Strange Boutique Jul 26, 2012
Fuji's Rookie A Go-Go stage holds an antidote for the same-old rockers
by Ian Martin
The Fuji Rock Festival kicks off tomorrow with its dependable mixture of ageing rockers from abroad, a handful of predictably chosen Japanese acts, and just a smattering of blogged-about buzz bands. This year in particular, the joy I felt upon the demise of Oasis ...
Music | Strange Boutique Jun 28, 2012
Japanese acts still find wonder in Can's 'Lost Tapes'
by Ian Martin
It’s rare that a band whose most celebrated recordings were originally released almost 40 years ago can generate excitement among classic-rock fans, prog-hating punks and musicians whose parents were still in elementary school at the time — but then Can were no ordinary band. ...
Music | Strange Boutique May 31, 2012
Perfume needs to walk a fine line on its path overseas
by Ian Martin
As Japanese pop culture is increasingly dominated by insular subcultural groups with little interest in what’s happening outside Akihabara’s otaku haven or Shibuya’s gyaru mecca, the news that electro-pop trio Perfume had moved to major label Universal and made its music available online to ...
Music | Strange Boutique Mar 29, 2012
A tale of two paths to indie success
by Ian Martin
Tokyo postpunk quartet Otori is an archetypal product of the city’s underground live-music scene. The band’s sets feature a machine-gun rattle of drums, slashes of guitar that explode in fierce climaxes, and bursts of scattershot vocals that teeter on the brink of hysteria — ...
Music | Strange Boutique Feb 23, 2012
The not-so-odd coupling between noise acts and J-pop
by Ian Martin
From mod rockers The Who covering the “Batman” theme, through punk pranksters The Dickies taking on The Banana Splits, to former Megadeth shredder-in-chief Marty Friedman’s transformation into J-pop svengali, there has always been a flirtation between the fiercer and heavier outposts of music and ...
Music | Strange Boutique Jan 26, 2012
Shibuya style with an Akihabara twist?
by Ian Martin
Shibuya-kei was one of the defining features of the music and fashion scenes of the 1990s, and it helped spawn the idea of “Cool Japan.” The genre’s sound was eclectic and openly embraced Western musical influences such as ’60s lounge music, bossa nova, French ...
Music | Strange Boutique Nov 24, 2011
Late-night dancing should not be a crime in Japan
by Ian Martin
Imagine a town where playing rock music is under a curfew and police crack down on unlicensed late-night dancing. Are you thinking of the town from the film “Footloose”? Or are you thinking of Fukuoka? Kumamoto? Yokohama? This unbelievable scenario is the result of ...
Music | Strange Boutique Oct 27, 2011
Cruel to be kind: Does noruma work in bands' favor?
by Ian Martin
One of the first stumbling blocks you’ll probably come across starting up a band in Japan is trying to book gigs. You’ll explain to the booking manager about your music, give them a demo CD or a link to a place they can hear ...
Music | Strange Boutique Jul 28, 2011
Tis the season for some girl-pop classics
by Ian Martin
In Japan, observation of the seasons is an ingrained cultural trait that not only forms the basis of haiku poetry and many classic works of art, but also marks the calendar for cultural ephemera from special-edition Kit Kats to alcoholic drinks to pop music. ...
Music | Strange Boutique Jun 30, 2011
Every day we're schaffeling: What Girls Generation are doing right
by Ian Martin
A big part of what has made the current wave of South Korean idol pop so successful in Japan is obviously the image. K-pop’s often crass objectification of young women makes for a welcome break from J-pop’s often crass objectification of barely pubescent girls. ...