the Shiina Ringo thread

Incidents Tokyo, which has provided us five tour-de-force albums around the theme of television channels, ‘Education,’ ‘Adult,’ ‘Variety,’ ‘Sports,’ and ‘Discovery,’ put an end to programming with this album, ‘color bars.’

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aMLhJTM3xDk&feature=related

Once again, it's amazing just how perfect they sound in live performances. Yes, I guess I mean that in a muso way. The weakest link here is Shiina's belting which I'm not really enjoying much. I do find myself like this performance more than the studio version, even so.

I know someone who is going to Kyoto (next month I think) for an international studies program. I got her to listen to some SR/TJ and the one thing she really liked was the Dynamite Out version of "Sounan." She didn't say anything about the solo SR stuff. I'm tempted to throw some more recent things at her, but I'm holding off in hopes that she'll come back and say: hey, that band you were telling me about was all over TV and radio. The timing should work out that way, I think, with their recent break-up, but going out with the Color Bar EP and so on.

Hata sounds particularly amazing there. His sound is a bit different than usual in a way I can't put my finger on at the moment.

I notice she says "thank you" in Japanese here, which somehow jumps out at me since she almost always seems to say it in English.

But yeah, the belting is a bit like the worst live performances of "Killer Tune" all over again. Sorry, I am just not into it. And given the other ways she is sometimes capable of singing, I don't know why she falls back on it so damn much.

There's all sorts of new live stuff up on youtube, but I haven't been keeping track. (I continue to be pretty preoccupied with politics (not particularly in the horse race sense, though some of that as well) and "current events," and getting off the internet a bit more and reading books again. Meanwhile, more casual about music.)

Somehow I thought their last concert was due in March or even April. I didn't realize it already happened in February.

This sounds good, but still doesn't redeem what is basically kind of a boring song:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=donSJaDkbQc

Re(a)ding and ignorance: Poetic constraints of lyric
Theisen, Nicholas; Ramirez-Christensen, E.. University of Michigan, 2009. 2009. 3382459.
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As an exercise in comparative poetics, this dissertation brings together lyrics in various media and language traditions (Greek, Latin, English, and Japanese) in an effort to refigure lyric reading practices. I argue that the interpretation of lyric involves simultaneous acts of reading and writing and redefine the practice of reproducing the text of an interpreted work within the interpretation itself as reding , from an archaic spelling of the verb read , i.e. rede .

The first chapter defines what reding is, namely the recomposing of a text within criticism, and uses Heidegger's "A Dialogue of Language" to demonstrate that reding involves an act of willful ignorance, where the reder uncovers something new in a text by completely ignoring problems of accuracy. In the second, I examine how Anne Carson's multiple translations in If not, winter ; Eros the bittersweet ; and other texts serve at once to dis- and re-integrate the fragments of Sappho. In chapter three, I use Tawara Machi's translation into contemporary Japanese of Yosano Akiko's Midaregami to reconfigure reding itself in an etymological analysis of the Japanese verb yomu (at once "to read" and "to compose"). Chapter four tries to understand how redings have become almost seamlessly inscribed in the Latin text of Catullus and to make sense of his textual silences. Chapter five returns to Yosano Akiko to see how when a poet abandons any specific responsibility for or to her text that both she and her reader/reder are freed from the trap it can become. The final chapter is a coda in which Shiina Ringo's various lyric media are used to show that while reding carries with it the possibility of a greater poetics of interpretation, it also bears the risk of being rede in kind.

This dissertation contributes to a broader understanding of reading practices in the critical reception of poetry, to comparative poetics, and to lyric theory by using philological methods to bring popular song back into discussion with lyric poetry, particularly in using its intrinsically multimedial nature to reflect not only on song itself but on lyric as a whole and the problems of subjectivity therein.

Poor Tokyo, though. I don't think the population of Tokyo is going to make it. How many deaths are we going to see in ten or twenty years (assuming no big catastrophe before that--which is something that can't be assumed).

Fans only, the last six minutes of the Electric Mole DVD (the final solo-era release before the mole-wiping Jihen-era)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZVFNsPbjvZY

A bit spooky. I hope it doesn't give me weird dreams. Not that it really matters as I've reached an age where when I have weird scary dreams I tend to just step back and say: yeah, whatever.

basically agree with rudi's opinion on that video above

the first track and ukigumo's track from color bars are great, the rest ehhhhh.

is the first song from Tokyo Collection new? dope stuff

Just to be clear, I actually liked that segment from Electric Mole. I genuinely was thinking it might give me unpleasantly strange dreams though.

oops, not that video, the concert video above it

That live Atarashii Bunmei-kaika Milton posted has grown on me a bit already, belting not really bothering me so much.

Near typhoon strength low pressure system headed for Fukushima. :(

Storm, I should say. They are saying "typhoon strength" actually. I'm not sure what keeps it from actually being considered a typhoon (or what exactly qualifies as one).

that's not good. credible rumors say fukushima has hardly stablized and we don't need more h2o sweeping through an irradiated plant and then leeching back into the ocean. sometimes I feel like I really need to move away from the pacific coast.

you heard 'Tokyo Collection' yet? I'm just baffled by it, I honestly don't understand this track selection, it just doesn't make any sense unless they were consciously trying to bore us to tears. for a band which rearranged the studio versions of their songs into completely different pieces for concert, a compilation which basically replicates the studio versions of their tracks makes just about no sense to me

I haven't heard Tokyo Collection yet. I'm just getting around to listening to the Discovery live concert. There's a lot about Tokyo Jihen and the decisions they make that I just do not get. That hasn't changed. It could be that some of their seemingly odd choices are simply commercially driven, but the cultural distance makes it more difficult to suss out.

credible rumors say fukushima has hardly stablized and we don't need more h2o sweeping through an irradiated plant and then leeching back into the ocean.

I think the first part of this is an understatement (or maybe that was intentional). It's likely that the at least some of those nuclear cores (or whatever the precise terminology is) are out underground on the loose, completely outside of any man-made containment. Unit 4 in particular is structurally unstable, with lots of spent fuel rods left (at least according to official accounts), waiting to crash down and cause havoc if the building collapses. And like you say, they are pumping tons of water into these things, but they found hardly any water in unit 2. So most of that water is going back into the environment one way or another. Even the NYT is partially talking about some of these things. I find these sites useful (in rank order, I suppose):

http://enenews.com/category/japan
http://ex-skf.blogspot.com/
http://fukushima-diary.com/

Plus the indefatigable Arnie Gundernsen at Fairewinds.

It looks like this typhoon may have come and gone without notable incident, however.

sometimes I feel like I really need to move away from the pacific coast.

I'm afraid that might be true. (I admit I am starting to realize just how much I tend toward being an apocalyptic pessimist and alarmist, but there are at least plenty of facts to bolster a dark view of the situation.)

Incidentally, while I'm going off topic, it's snowing in Albuquerque this morning.

(Or we could all consider moving to another planet entirely.)

New Shiina Ringo single: Jiyu e michizure

I'm still trying to hear it.

Ah, it does come on after the commercials:

http://v.youku.com/v_show/id_XMzk0MDY5NzA4.html

Very big throwback to her past, but some of the moves here are not things she would have written back then.

I guess I should watch this blog, since this is where I heard about it (from the Sayonara Amerika guy):

http://bourdaghs.com/blog/category/j-pop/

hey it's a total throwback to muzai moratorium

so i'm totally into it!

I don't know music theory, but I think the bones of the song actually fit with the sort of things she's done since forming Tokyo Jihen. Yes, the overall sound harks back to the first two albums (and I guess I'd agree Muzai Moratorium in particular), but there's also something different.

Incidentally, have you ever seen this advertisement for KZK:

http://v.youku.com/v_show/id_XMzYwODU4ODQw.html

Fantastic.

Featuring creepy puppets moving to snippets of songs from the album.

I don't know music theory, but I think the bones of the song actually fit with the sort of things she's done since forming Tokyo Jihen. Yes, the overall sound harks back to the first two albums (and I guess I'd agree Muzai Moratorium in particular), but there's also something different.

i mean, i agree, but there's something to the guitar tone that reminds me of the sped-up "koufukuron" from muzai

also it's a lot hookier and less busy than (especially the recent) tj stuff

pretty much agreed. i dig it.

Is this out yet?

I've never seen this before. At first, I thought it was someone else covering the song. It looks/sounds like she's singing live, but everything else is pre-recorded. Very awkward looking "band."

Kabuki-chou no Joou

thanks for posting, rudi; never seen that one either

Off topic: the cooling system for Fukushima Spent Fuel Pool 4 is shut down, and TEPCO is going to try to get it working again later today (Sunday, in Japan). If they can't get it fixed by some point Tuesday, temperatures are projected to reach unsafe levels, which of course could result in a catastrophe on a much bigger scale than anything that's happened there so far (that we know about anyway). I think similar things have happened at SFP4 before. But every time something like this happens, until the spent fuel rods are removed, is another opportunity for disaster.

(I almost never post to ILE these days, but it seems kind of funny that there is no Fukushima thread.)

This door will not be pulled out
That tower will not fall down
That heaven over there will not be destroyed
All of that smells like a lie

Paging Milton. . .

http://www.myspace.com/rosco419/music/songs/a-song-of-apples-83904723

It will be worth it to click on it, if you haven't heard it already.

wait. what?

<iframe src="https://embed.spotify.com/?uri=spotify:track:6cgdLt8fKgB33PSVEZCwH1"; width="300" height="380" frameborder="0" allowtransparency="true"></iframe>

Well that's not going to work I guess. Was really just looking for a link, but maybe it has to be a playlist to do that. Found while searching for "Sheena Ringo" in Spotify.

From this album:

http://ec2.images-amazon.com/images/I/61QzdBQxZmL._SL500_AA300_.jpg

no i mean... some guy just decided to cover Ringo No Uta on violin?

The melody for "Sounan" really is as great as I think it is.

WTF? Somehow I missed this Shiina-involved EP completely (not that she's performing but you will recognize the jazz band that comes in toward the end):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A-XOoPKfvBo

Sorry, "Tokyo Jihen - "Konya wa Karasawagi"" was deleted at 5:50:57 Thu Jan 24, 2013.

Vimeo has removed or disabled access to the following material as a result of a third-party notification by Recording Industry Association of Japan claiming that this material is infringing: Tokyo Jihen - "Konya wa Karasawagi".

Keep shooting yourself in the foot, Recording Industry Association of Japan.

I'm still not going to buy your repackaged previously released albums with a little new material added all wrapped in a boxed set.

It's like some insane cartoon Japanese music villain is rubbing his hands together, saying: "Now nobody will ever find out about our music! Hahahahaha!"

Is this a new box set Rudipherous? Shiina or TJ? Sorry but I haven't the patience to wade through Electric Mole.

There's some kind of box set collecting the TJ albums but it sounds like it's going to include a lot of unreleased songs. The way people were talking, it sounded like they are SR songs, but I lost patience with wading through the thread myself. However, yes, definitely some kind of box on the way.

I think it's out in February. If I get details before anyone else posts them on this thread, I'll post them.

Oh cool thanks! I only got the TJ B-Sides thing through yesterday and the TV appearances DVD which has really great artwork.

Tokyo Jihen has revealed that they will simultaneously release a complete CD box “Hard Disk” and a video clip collection “Golden Time” on February 27th.

Tokyo Jihen disbanded after their concert at Nippon Budokan on February 29th of this year. These new releases will mark a year since their disbandment.

The complete CD box will include every album they’ve released as well as a bonus CD called “Recovery Disc“, which will include 9 unreleased tracks.

Meanwhile, the video clip collection will be released in both DVD and Blu-ray forms. In addition to their single tracks “Gunjou Biyori” and “Killer Tune“, it will contain videos for “Konya wa Karasawagi” and “Tadanaranu Kankei“, which have never been released in physical form, as well as a new version for “Senkou Shoujo“.

http://www.tokyohive.com/2012/12/tokyo-jihen-to-release-complete-cd-box-video-clip-collection/

There's something.