Empty Suits

The Curse of J-Pop: Part One



Much as I enjoy living in Japan, after seven years in this fascinating nation I’ve remained entirely immune to the phenomenon of J-Pop. In all that time, only one song has made any appreciable impact on me. It was a delirious slice of disposable girlie pop whose title and performer have long since faded from memory.

It’s not just that J-Pop is forgettable pap. That in itself doesn’t distinguish it from the mountains of disposable rubbish produced by western hit factories on a daily basis.

Rather, J-Pop is a lousy imitation of the mountains of disposable rubbish produced by western hit factories on a daily basis. And no amount of ironic postmodern winking is going to deny the fact.

If you haven’t heard it, imagine watered down, saccharine versions of N-SYNC, Spice Girls, or American Idol and you’re getting close.

During its impressive post-war economic boom, Japan exploded into the modern world without taking on board the more individualist characteristics one associates with modernity: irony, subjectivism, critical thinking, a desire to subvert traditional structures.

In this sense, J-Pop is a good example of how young Japanese misinterpret western notions of individuality.

Taking its cue from an endless stream of lamentable western videos, see how J-Pop's diluted presentation of girl power and youthful rebellion is rooted in consumerism and ill-considered appeals to fetishism.

We see precious few attempts in Japan either to seriously assert individuality or to break the hierarchical structures of society, a point which J-Pop assiduously underlines. Its strictly controlled system of management and product placement - not the artists - has the ultimate say with regard to image and content.

One wonders whether most young Japanese need what westerners need from popular music - the feeling there is a deeper, better self, something hidden which defines us as individuals - what Japan expert Donald Ritchie has called “the deep unknown in their breast. “

There is little separation in Japan between the face and the mask, the crack from which westerners derive irony and satire. The painful sincerity of the Japanese makes them seem innocent and childlike, and - even as it cynically manipulates it - J-Pop reflects this in its two dimensional obsession with cutesiness and homogenization.

What it doesn’t reflect - as far as I’ve been able to tell - is the deep seated insecurity and despair lying at the heart of the Japanese psyche, reflected in record levels of depression, mental illness and suicide. There's not the slightest inkling of a social conscience among Japan’s millionaire teen idols.

Perhaps this is because, unlike their parents’ generation, most J-poppers haven’t suffered a war or a defining rite of passage. Rather they’ve become anaesthetized by consumption and passivity.

Granted, Ayumi Hamasaki, one of the biggest J-Pop idols, came from a broken home, and a few of her lyrics communicate isolation, pain and a desire for escape. But even here her words are set against a background of anodyne wimp-rock.

Reflecting and underlining - rather than challenging - the mores of a rigidly conformist society, prepackaged J-pop stars allow themselves to be commandeered as spokespeople for the machine.

Music has become commodified to such a degree that pop stars moonlight as ‘actors’, hosts of banal light-entertainment shows and during commercial breaks unashamedly peddle consumer products to their adoring fans.

I also feel the Japanese language isn’t well-suited to pop. Its somewhat monosyllabic sound tends to produce vocal cadences which sound childlike and stiff, and somewhat unnatural as J-poppers imitate the sounds they've heard in western pop.

I’ll admit that my command of the Japanese language isn’t perfect, but it’s hard to identify any profound or illuminating emotions in J-Pop, a fact which is borne out by the investigation of any J-Pop lyrics web site.

It’s not that Japan is bereft of young musical talent. On the contrary, it has a dynamic underground rock scene - as many rock fans know - and bands like Melt Banana, Guitar Wolf, Boredoms, Cibo Matto, Shonen Knife, Boris, Boom Boom Satellites and Acid Mother’s Temple have all produced great music. A few have even found success in the west. I’ll be forever in thrall to Damo Suzuki, singer with my beloved Can.

You could argue - and you’d be right - that J-Pop isn’t meant for me, a forty-something Brit earning a good living here at the pleasure of the Japanese authorities. It’s created for impressionable Japanese kids with hair wax on their minds. But in my self-appointed role as cultural critic and style guru I feel I have a duty to tell it as I see it.

When I was a teenager, popular music had so much more to offer. The sixties, despite their shortcomings, established pop as a force for meaningful social comment. Then, in the 70s, glam-rock alerted my generation to the contradictions implicit in sexual roles, while punk made us want to blow the joint apart and start over.

I realize I'm projecting my own cultural assumptions onto an unwitting mass of J-poppers here, and much modern western pop is equally shallow.

But at a time when Japan is mired in a depressing circle of consumption and social crisis, it’s unfortunate that popular artists don’t feel the vaguest urge to address, even on a surface level, the issues which are anaesthetizing their country: the suppression of individual identity through a benign authoritarianism, an unhealthy attachment to stifling norms and the lie of consumerism.

Though I am by nature an optimist, in this case I have to admit there’s little hope of change. With no history of uppity Japanese pop stars leading the rallying cry for social revolution, the overexcited waifs and emasculated girlie-boys of J-Pop are doomed to remain empty suits.

Preserved in amber, they are both victims and victimizers of a popular culture which - trapped in a vicious circle of tradition and passivity - steadfastly refuses to accept its responsibility: to subvert the notions and assumptions of the fans who are its life blood.

Shake the World

Lillies and Remains (Rock/Post-Punk)
EP: Moralist S.S. (Fifty-One Records, 2008)



On Monday nights it's my custom to repair to my favorite Kyoto restaurant for some excellent Japanese food. I thoroughly recommend Hiroshi Goto's Kura Kura izakaya if you can find it among the maze of side streets near Kyoto station.

But I digress.

Ma-sa, one of KK's servers, drums with a local rock band called Lillies and Remains. They got their curious name from a Bauhaus record. Ma-sa timidly handed me the band's flyer a few weeks ago, and yesterday I finally got around to checking their home page.

To be honest, I was gobsmacked.

Lillies and Remains are easily one of the best Japanese post-punk bands I've heard, and a welcome antidote to the insipid J-Pop which dominates the Japanese music scene. They're not entirely my cup of tea, and lyrically I'd say they have some work to do, but the streamlined, edgy goth-pop featured on their debut EP is catchy and exciting, and clearly owes a debt to western groups like Bauhaus, Josef K and especially Interpol.

The British influence also reveals itself in the vocals. The Lillies understand that Japanese ain't no language for rock 'n' roll. Even if its lyrics are impenetrable, Moralist S.S. is sung in some form of English patois.

If they can keep delivering the goods, I can definitely see the Lillies making it in Japan, if not in the west. The video of Moralist S.S. is a beautiful piece of work which shows that these guys have either some serious cash or a friend who's a genius art director.

Judging by the band's web site, confidence shouldn't be a problem. Their bio celebrates their "killer tunes" and modestly proclaims they are "most likely to be “THE BAND” of the Japanese indie rock scene." Not only that, they promise to "shake the world. "

If they're right, I have a feeling Masa may not be serving up tori karage and sashimi for much longer. That may be Kura Kura's loss, but Japanese rock fans will, I'm sure, be mighty thankful.

Artist web site: http://www.lilliesandremains.net/

VIDEO: Lillies and Remains, Moralist S.S.

Cosmic Payback

Dale Ward (Pop)
Track: The Queen of Japan (Gojo Records, 2008)

Ladies and gentlemen...Elvis has well and truly left the building. By that I mean: my Japanese queen has departed the scene.

I loved her, and still do, though our passion finally burned itself out atop a cathartic bonfire of recrimination.

She did me wrong, folks. But in most respects I don’t feel so hard done by. I always knew she needed to run away to find her. Maybe in the grand scheme of things it’s cosmic payback. I’m the first to admit I’ve caused my share of emotional woes.

Perched on my barstool I observe myself - as if in a dream - broken and rudderless, searching in all the wrong corners for meaning and diversion.

Hostage now to the whims of the pub jukebox, I muse how funny 'tis that familiar songs take on new meanings as they reflect yer splintered emotions.

F'r instance, The Beatles’ Rubber Soul - a record I’ve delighted in thousands of times - assumes shattering, surprising nuances.

Each lyric is, as Ringo would say, an absolute arrow to the brain: “Baby I love you," because “If I needed someone, you’re the one that I’d be thinking of.” But now “I’m looking through you,” wondering “What goes on in your mind?” I’m angry and hurt, so “You’d better run for your life if I see you with another man.”

Most woundingly, “I once had a girl. Or should I say, she once had me?”

I suspect it may well be the latter.

Then Bono - of all people - comes crooning over the tannoy with valuable advice: “You gotta get yourself together/You’re stuck in a moment/And you can’t get out of it.”

Ouch.

I suddenly become aware that I'm babbling incoherently to myself, and the barmaid eyes me warily from behind the beer pump. "They say it's the first sign of madness," she admonishes.

It all fits in with the words of Kyoto popster Dale Ward - late of San Francisco's Handsome Poets - and his engaging ditty The Queen of Japan. This transplanted Brit places a dark obsession at the center of his universe and learns a hard lesson along the way.

Ward warbles and wah-wahs, and receives able support from Kyoto bluesman Alec Roberts - who steals the show with some atmospheric harp - and Canadian Scott Hoover on space guitar. If you have ever believed in a heavenly lie, or a red sky morning that's home and dry, this one's for you.

Listen: Dale Ward at Virb.com

Colossus

Live: Sonny Rollins
Osaka Festival Hall



Tonight my friend Andy and I attended a concert by tenor sax legend. Sonny Rollins. Sonny has enjoyed a long, prolific career and is now, aged 77, truly one of the grand old men of jazz.

As Andy and I approached Festival Hall we were excited at the prospect of seeing this jazz titan in the flesh.

If anyone represents the mainstream tenor saxophone tradition, it’s Rollins. He’s the archetypal post-bop improviser with an inventive, resonant sound which has never gone out of favor.

Sonny’s resume reads like a who’s who of jazz. When you consider he has played and recorded with luminaries such as Coleman Hawkins, Lester Young, Thelonius Monk, Charlie Parker, John Coltrane, Miles Davis, Max Roach, and Art Blakey, you realize that tonight you are in the presence of jazz royalty.

Tonight Sonny is appearing with his longtime band featuring his trombonist nephew Clifford Anderson, drummer Steve Jordan, percussionist Kimati Dinizuli, guitarist Bobby Broom and bassist Bob Cranshaw.

The opening number Sonny, Please has a loose Miles Davis Bitches Brew feel, with Bobby Broom contributing some tasty McLaughlinesque touches and Bob Cranshaw holding down a simple but effective bass line. It’s hypnotic fusion vibe is right up my alley and I wonder if we are going to be treated to more of the same.

Actually, no. It soon becomes apparent we’re in for an evening of straight-ahead jazz as the band trot out a succession of crowd-pleasing standards: They Say it’s Wonderful, In a Sentimental Mood, Someday I’ll Find You, Nice Lady.

Sonny prowls the stage like an amiable bear and occasionally stands sideways to the audience, holding his sax at arms length as if urging his band to join him on a journey of musical exploration.

But they never really take off. The band is, as you’d expect, highly accomplished, but the smorgasbord of overly polite post-bebop mixed with calypso-inflected rhythms feels a bit safe.

To make matters worse, the dourly cavernous Festival Hall hardly lends itself an intimate, jazzy ambiance. The overall feel is of a recital rather than a gig.

There are some highlights, though. Playing tenor sax requires great physical exertion, and at 77, Sonny rips off several of the fleet, expressive solos which are his trademark. The band are tight and tasteful, fashioning a nicely deconstructed version of Serenade which features some exquisite guitar/bass interplay.

Sonny’s best-known composition St. Thomas, elevated into a jazz standard on his classic Saxophone Colossus album, is predictably hauled out as the final number and the crowd equally predictably goes bananas as its famous signature melody echoes through the rafters.

When Sonny steps out for his encore, for one delicious moment Andy and I think he’s going to treat us to a solo piece. Alas it’s not to be and the band join him for a spirited version of Why Was I Born?

There aren’t many be-bopping septuagenarians - Ornette excepted - who can hold a crowd’s attention like Sonny, and the Japanese audience gives him a rapturous send-off, showing a deep affection for Sonny the man and the musician.

Maybe they were thinking the same as us - that this jazzy genius, who has made a vast contribution to America's greatest art form, may not be around much longer, so let's enjoy him and pay tribute while we can. We saw the legend, and for that we’re all grateful and appreciative.

I Can See Clearly Now

Track: Unidentified Ambient Music
Baptist Eye Clinic,
Kyoto, Japan.

One week ago I took the plunge and had LASIK eye surgery. Although in the week leading up to the operation I was excited and confident, on the day of the procedure I was pretty nervous.

As I lay on the operating table with green lasers burning my cornea, my knuckles tightened and I was thinking, “I sure wish they’d play some relaxing music!”

Right on cue a calming ambient piano etude came wafting through the room.

Under normal circumstances that style wouldn’t have been my bag – it was a tad too George Winston/Wyndham Hill for my tastes – but under the circumstances I was prepared to cut some slack and the music's bland, spacey vibe definitely helped bring down my stress levels.

It provided a suitable accompaniment to the awesome and slightly daunting laser light show which was erupting on my retinas. Fiery sparks of green mingled with flashes of red, and I almost forgot the fact that I was undergoing a life-changing and slightly risky medical procedure.

Lasik surgery isn’t something which should be entered into lightly. I did a great deal of research - over a ten-year period - before making the decision to go ahead and I had a fairly realistic set of expectations. So far I've been impressed with the professionalism and support of my caregivers.

It’s now been a week since my operation and my prognosis is excellent. My eyeglasses are history and, as Johnny Nash sang in his 1972 pop-reggae classic, I Can (for the most part) See Clearly Now.

VIDEO: Here's Johnny Nash giving a fine vocal performance on his classic hit. He's also sporting some splendid leather threads. The backing orchestra doesn't seem entirely comfortable with the reggae vibe.

Heart and Soul

Film: Control (2007)
Directed by: Anton Corbijn



Anton Corbijn’s riveting movie Control brings it all back.

Like how Joy Division meant everything to us back in '79 - '80.

We ardent young lovers of culture were painfully earnest about our music, and Joy Division's dark romanticism suited us down to the ground.

Progeny of Burroughs, Ballard, Lou Reed and The Doors, their records were the perfect existential soundtrack for the dreary Thatcher years.

But the suicide of singer Ian Curtis woke us from our indulgent stupor. Shocked into the cold light of day, we saw how we had failed to apprehend our idol. Just as we were too callow to grasp the tragedy unfolding before us, Curtis was too emotionally shattered to survive it.

Projecting our mad, post-adolescent angst onto a confused, sensitive young musician, we foolishly imagined he represented us. The truth was that, trapped in a profound personal crisis, he could barely represent himself.

Though Curtis insisted that Joy Division’s music had no message, the meaning and impact of their art are inseparable from his own tragic fate. Joy Division were compelling chiefly because of the way their frontman confronted his psychosis.

The most miraculous part of the Joy Division story is how four scallies from the darkest north managed to weave such eerie magic. Peter Hook’s plaintive bass, Bernard Sumner’s stark, minimal guitar and Steven Morris’ robotic percussion perfectly framed Curtis’ poetry of crisis and despair.

If that wasn’t remarkable enough, producer Martin Hannett veered the band’s sound sharply away from punk’s sonic conservatism, sculpting an austere tribalism which elevated Joy Division’s music to another dimension - an alien, emotionally strangled interzone.

Even today a sense of disturbance comes over me whenever I hear Joy Division. It feels almost voyeuristic to listen to music of such fragile beauty. Each song is a shocking, visceral jewel delicately balanced on the abyss.

The triumph - if there is one - lies in the music's uncompromising confrontation with the human condition. Frightening in its beauty, it bequeathes a cruel epiphany, like a dying star which shines all too briefly before consuming itself with blinding intensity.

VIDEO: Joy Division "She's Lost Control"

Roger Kaputnik

Rob Jones
1959 - 2008

One of the most memorable musical performances I ever saw was given by avant punksters Roger Kaputnik at the Boy Scout’s Hut in Nuneaton, Warwickshire in summer 1976.

That’s because it was where I first met my dear friend, the teacher, artist, traveler, bon vivant and spiritual seeker Rob Jones.

How appropriate that our first encounter should have been a musical one, since in all the adventures Rob and I had together - in the UK, Italy, USA and Japan - music in its many forms was always part of the equation.

That evening at the Scout Hut couldn’t strictly be called a performance. As I look back I recall it as a wonderfully ramshackle affair.

The Kaputniks were scattered in various positions around the hut, with the “audience” - there were about ten of us - wandering about and chatting with members between songs. But I remember being mightily impressed that my schoolmates had a band, and they inspired me to form my own group in those heady days of the DIY punk revolution.

Of all the Kaputniks I was most drawn to Rob, whom I recognized from my history class. He had shoulder-length hair, wore a blue shirt, jeans and desert boots, a combination which soon became known as ‘the Rob Jones look’. This eventually gave way to the 'late-period' Jones anti-image of short-sleeved shirt and khaki shorts - during even the coldest winter!

As time went on, Rob and I became great mates. We attended the same university, and when I graduated and moved to Italy, it wasn’t long before Rob visited me. I went to meet him at the train station and was a tad bemused when he didn’t show up. When I got home, there he was sitting with my roommate polishing off his first glass of vino rosso, smiling and saying, “Hey, where ya been?”

That night we ended up getting sloshed and playing guitar in a bar in Siracusa's ancient quarter. Rob soon moved to Italy himself, developing a lasting fondness for its people and culture. We drank wine in Sicilian bodegas, admired the beauty of Verona, and crawled around on the floor in Novara with our friend Neil - worse the wear for honey grappa - looking for dogs in the linoleum. 'I pazzi Inglese.

When I moved to California it didn’t take long for Rob to track me down. We had some wild times in Hollywood and Santa Barbara, listening to gangsta rap and catching a lot of great shows - including Lou Reed and the famous Echo & the Bunnymen gig where the singer fell off the stage and broke his ankle.

.

On Rob's visits, we would lock ourselves away in my home recording studio and jam on our weird free form creations. We concocted bizzarre washes of sound, gentle pop odes, or mad ditties that could mean nothing to anyone but us and a small circle of friends.

As a guitarist, Rob had his own style - a minimalist slash which could cut straight to the heart of the matter. And he had a unique way with a keyboard too. Though he didn’t ‘play’ in the strict sense, he would devise hilarious off-kilter sounds and rhythms which usually had us collapsing in gales of laughter.

But the real artist in Rob was to be found in his paintings, which went through numerous stages reflecting his state of mind and how he saw his place in the universe. They ranged from wild expressionistic portraits to charming Italian landscapes or swirling droplets of abstract color. The paintings which Rob gave me are very precious belongings, including a small portrait of myself which he composed.

I think Rob’s later abstract works somehow reflect his philosophical pursuits. In the quietest, least-assuming way he was one of the most spiritual people I’ve known. He was devoted to Zen meditation, which he practiced and studied for many years.

Rob introduced me to Zen, and though I eventually abandoned my practice, its teachings changed my life profoundly, particularly as they related to the notion of non-attachment. Rob helped me to see that for Zen students the most important thing is not to be dualistic, since this inevitably leads to transformative feelings of compassion.

Rob had incredible empathy for others, including - no, especially - for those who caused him pain. His spiritual practice informed his life in every regard, including the fun side. As a committed 'party animal' - one of his most endearing character traits - Robbo fully appreciated the detox benefits of meditation! He understood, perhaps more than anyone I’ve known, that life is a journey, and it’s the trip rather than the destination which is most important and most revelatory.

Rob lived in many countries - Italy, Sweden, Hungary and Japan among them - and traveled in many more. As he continued on his seemingly never-ending world tour he had friends on every continent, all of them invariably delighted to have him as a house guest.

This was due to the fact that Rob was one of the mellowest, kindest, most genuine people you could ever wish to know. Frankly, I was incredibly honored and proud to have him as my friend, and in thirty years I don’t think I ever heard him speak an ill or unkind word of anyone. This lovely man delighted in his friends and treated them with gentleness and respect.

I’m writing through selfish tears now, because I don’t want to say goodbye to my friend and I don’t want to believe I won’t experience those moments of fun and enlightenment again.

When I catch up with him I hope he has the guitars tuned and ready for action, because we haven't finished our album yet. I'll also have the pleasure of watching Rob stride down the road with the distinctive swagger familiar to all his friends - the left arm pointed to the ground at a 30 degree angle as the right swings madly in the air from side to side.

Till then, I know that if Rob were here, he would tell me - with that smile in his eyes, with that lilt in his voice - to carry on, and always to appreciate what I am doing. My thoughts right now are of course with his sister, his family and the countless friends who survive him and miss him.

You left us too soon, Robbo. But for all the love and all the laughs, we’re truly grateful.