Sakuma Masahide: Renaissance Man of J-Rock
Sakuma Masahide (佐久間正英) will be appearing with Hayakawa Yoshio in a free public concert here at the University of Chicago at 7:30 p.m. on October 18, 2013 (details here). A few words about Sakuma’s...
View ArticleThe Music of Hayakawa Yoshio (5): “Music”
(In anticipation of the October 18, 2013 concert by Hayakawa Yoshio and Sakuma Masahide at the University of Chicago, over the next few weeks I will be posting a series of entries here introducing...
View ArticleLast Friday’s Concert: Hayakawa Yoshio and Sakuma Masahide
Thanks to all who turned out for last Friday’s concert at International House, University of Chicago, by Hayakawa Yoshio and Sakuma Masahide. It was the keynote performance for the 2013 Association for...
View ArticleOn Lou Reed
Since the unwelcome news of Lou Reed’s death arrived yesterday, I’ve been fascinated to read many different personal accounts about how people first encountered his music. The stories all more or less...
View ArticleWakamatsu Koji’s “United Red Army”
Recently I’ve been thinking about film director Wakamatsu Kōji （若松孝二）. In part, this was because of his role as an early advocate for the music of Hayakawa Yoshio and JACKS; he hired them to provide...
View ArticleFully Human: Remembering Jerry K. Fisher
(Professor Jerry K. Fisher of Macalester College passed away on May 7. He was not only my undergraduate adviser, but also the person who first introduced me to Japan and in many other ways acted as my...
View ArticleWatch and Listen to Yours Truly
It’s become common these days for universities to videotape public lectures and make them available online. A few talks I’ve given in recent years are available for your viewing pleasure, should you be...
View ArticleYet Another Unjustly Overlooked Song by The Kinks
Do yourself a favor and take three minutes to listen to this 1971 recording, an outtake from the Muswell Hillbillies sessions.. Make sure you read Ray Davies’ lyrics, too. The song has everything:...
View ArticleWar Trauma in a Comic Novel
There’s an unsettling moment in Sasaki Kuni‘s novel, Bonjinden (The Life of a Mediocrity、1929-30). Sasaki (1883-1964) was a celebrated humor writer, as well as a translator of Mark Twain, Cervantes,...
View ArticleKuroshima Denji’s “The Two-Sen Copper Coin”
My translation of a 1926 short story by the proletarian literature author Kuroshima Denji (1898-1943) has just appeared online at The Asia Pacific Journal: Japan Focus. The Two-Sen Copper Coin It was...
View ArticleNew fiction: “When a Derelict Angel Speaks”
My short story “When a Derelict Angel Speaks” has just appeared in Valparaiso Fiction Review, Vol. 5, No. 1. Enjoy! When a Derelict Angel Speaks Michael Bourdaghs It takes a second for Steve’s head to...
View ArticleMarxist Theory and Practice from Japan
One welcome trend of recent years in my field is the wave of new translations that finally make available to English-language readers the history of Marxist and anarchist culture in modern Japan. With...
View ArticleGodzilla vs. Hegel
Yesterday afternoon, we attended a nearly sold-out screening of Shin-Gojira (Godzilla Rusurgence), the new reboot of the Godzilla movie franchise directed by Anno Hideaki (of Neon Genesis Evangelion...
View ArticleA Very Short Story
“The Day Gordon MacRae Died” Oh, what a beautiful morning. I’ve spilled coffee all down the front of my white shirt. It’s an enormous stain the shape of Oklahoma—tipped on its ass, panhandle up. And...
View ArticlePointillism and Limited Animation
Earlier this week, I had the opportunity to visit “Seurat, Signac, Van Gogh: Ways of Pointillism,” a remarkable exhibit at the Albertina Museum in Vienna (open through 8 January 2017). It was an...
View ArticleEven a Tree Can Shed Tears: Japanese Folk & Rock 1969-1973
About a decade ago, when I was writing Sayonara Amerika, Sayonara Nippon: A Prehistory of J-Pop, I had the idea of trying to organize the release in the U.S. of a series of compilation CDs of a variety...
View ArticleHosono Haruomi: The Reluctant Frontman (11/15/2017 @ Nakano Sun Plaza)
After opening sets by manzai duo Knights and the Suzuki-Suzuki brother-sister musical impersonator team, Hosono Haruomi took to the stage at sold-out Nakano Sun Plaza. The 70-year-old revealed a...
View ArticleLiterary Tourism and Letters of Recommendation
Over the past decade, I have practiced a particular form of readerly tourism. When I travel somewhere that is the setting for a novel, I bring the book along and read a few pages while sitting in the...
View ArticleWhat I Listened to in 2018
It’s that time of year: I’m enjoying reading people’s top-albums-of-the-year lists. So, for what it’s worth, here are the twenty 2018 albums I listened to the most, in alphabetical order: Courtney...
View ArticleThings You Find in a Japanese Used Bookstore
In his 1931 essay, “Unpacking My Library: A Talk About Book Collecting,” Walter Benjamin writes that to a book collector, the attraction lies not so much in the fate of a book as a work, but rather in...
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