Last week I ate lunch with some of the students I teach. We talked about Japanese music and then the topic changed to the kids telling me the American musical groups they knew. The first artist out of there mouths? The Backstreet Boys. They all loved the Backstreet Boys. And High School Musical, but that’s…
AKB48 “桜の栞” – Rejoice rejoice! We’re only a few figure skating finals away from Winter being over with. That means warmth! And flowers! And, in Japan, cherry blossom season. Which also means it’s time for Japanese artists to release songs about the country’s prettiest part of the calendar year. The small mercenary army of AKB48…
Rarely do I say these words but…good work Seth MacFarlane. The dude behind Family Guy and American Dad somehow found a way to work in Japan’s premier tech-disco outfit Perfume into the latest episode of the latter. All without resorting to a “remember the time…” gag! Sorry, sorry. Though the group never gets named (it’s…
It’s officially the weekend (at least on this side of the world) so I’ll keep this brief…Sweet Vacation have a new single out called “ラブカメラ~セカイが恋するメッセージ~” and it’s a fun little piece of bouncy retro J-Pop. With congas! It’s a nice Juicy Fruit piece of pop to carry you to next week. Here a little bit…
You thought AFLAC wouldn’t milk the hell out of the popular “Maneki Neko Duck” song? Commercials for this terrifyingly cute concept are still going strong in Japan, as evidenced by the latest dose of dancing animals shilling insurance. Now the duck and cat entertain at a wedding. Watch below, and lets take bets on what…