Japan Expo 2011: Gems digged up from dirt of mediocrity. Impressions, Loot and more

“It certainly has been a very long while I didn’t make any blog post, hasn’t it?”
Quite a familiar sentence isn’t it? Well I guess this kind of post once in a while is always fine, so long I enjoy doing them. Anyway folks, this is yet again a little report of what I’ve been doing at the Japan Expo of this year.

Content: description of my little adventure during 4 days at Japan Expo (France, Paris, Parc des Expositions), goodsmile company booth, tsubameyado, loot and many more. Also, I’ve got my camera this time!

Japan Expo 2010: When Hell meets Heaven. Impressions, Loot and more

It certainly has been a very long while I didn’t make any blog post, hasn’t it?
I feel a bit guilty about that considering all the crap I had to take care of, for like a full year, but I guess this event should be at least covered.

Content: description of my little adventure during 3 days at Japan Expo (France, Paris, Parc des Expositions), conference with Tamura Yukari and Mishima Akio about Magical Girl Nanoha The Movie 1st, loot and many more.

Gundam Tribute (First You Modernize The Mecha And Then You Modernize The Music)

Modernization of Gundam…..I talked a bit about the idea yesterday in the comment section for ghostlightnings article on Gundam 00’s final battle and how I thought the show might be an attempt to update Gundam for the 21st century paradigm we live in now.  Gundam Tribute I think has much the same idea in mind, only now it is about the Gundam sound rather than the core concept itself.

First off I bet some are asking “what is Gundam Tribute exactly”?  Well simply put it’s a collaboration between Sunrise/Bandai and Lantis and some of todays most popular music artists and idols in Japan to cover some of the classic Gundam songs and make an album out of it.  This is of course part of the 30th anniversary celebration for the franchise, but as I mentioned to the ghost yesterday I think it’s also a further example of Bandai’s current strategy of branching out and trying to bring new fans into the fold.  How exactly does this work with the music?  Well when you have the likes of Jam Project, CooRie and Little Non the latter two of whom are popular in the moe and eroge branches lending their status to Gundam songs (and vice versa) it may just help to bring the fans of their music into a greater awareness of Gundam and may even legitimize it for them as well.  Idol status goes a long way in Japan and while Gundam is an established tradition it’s not popular with all.  Gundam Wing branched out to female viewers and Gundam Seed branched out to a younger generation, but I think Bandai is always looking for new opportunities, and that’s an interesting thing.  I guess we’ll see what’s what, but for now I’m kind of eager to do some cross comparisons of the song covers on this album with their originals and to go over what they did with the pieces and what I as long time Gundam fan liked and disliked about these updates.

This article is going to be a little youtube video heavy so just bear in mind when you load the rest that it might take a little bit longer than normal.

Cast In The Name of God, Gundam F91 Ye Guilty (Now Apologize To John Williams Already)

Normally I have nothing but good things to say about the Gundam franchise, be it about it’s music, it’s mecha, it’s animation or it’s vision of the future, but today I’m going to hit it up a bit about something I’ve always found extremely irksome about one of it’s entries…namely Gundam F91.  This might actually be something that most people aren’t aware of or perhaps not, but the nerve it has in labelling it’s music as an Original Soundtrack when it’s clearly not visited me again last night while I was playing a G Generation game with my friend.  

What The Hell Happened With The Fall Season And How To Survive The Rest of 2009 (With A Curious Leadoff)

Ugh those tracks you just can’t stop repeating but you don’t care because they are so damn good you might as well let them stay playing for a week.  It’s that Senju Akira again and his dastardly slow building music that just keeps on building:

I could listen to that all day and perhaps maybe I’d rather listen to that all day then watch any one of the new anime series we have coming out this season.  And that’s what I’m really here to talk to you, but by all means let the song be a mood setter.  ghostlightning states “FFFFF We Hate the New Season” and calls it fail fall 09, but he doesn’t necessarily ask the question.  What is the question? Is there a question?  Well I certainly have one and it’s a certain “what the hell happened?!” as far as the last couple of seasons we dealt with actually.  Last season gave us a certain gem in Bakemonogatari and I’m sure people found something to suit their interests as well, but for mecha fans like the ghost and I it’s been pretty slimpickings.  There don’t seem to be any particular heavy hitters for the remainder of 2009, and in fact it’s arguable that the entirety of 2009 slipped by without any of the heavy hitters we’ve had almost every season from 2006-2008.  Have we been spoiled, or is the boom over so to speak?  Finally is it just me or have the bigshot companies just suddenly decided to collectively say, “2009 isn’t looking so good, let’s wait until 2010 before we spring the big stuff on them” and if so could the crash at the end of 2008 had something to do with the anime industry playing so conservatively this year?  I don’t pretend to have all the answers and hate to leave people hanging, but if indeed this is already it as far as the big 2009 titles go I wouldn’t mind sharing my survival strategy with everyone instead.  It’s a fairly simple one that should be adaptable to most people’s standards:

Straight Up Saturdays (Congratulations)

Hey, so guess what, I actually have a positive entry for this weeks Straight Up Saturday which may or may not provide you all with a glimpse into what actually still manages to touch my cold hard blackened soul.  Some people might know I like music, but they may not know I have a soft spot for Techno and Electronica.  Well I’ve just been blindsided by something I attribute to that genre and it’s completely made my night.  I told Klashhikari this was going to be big, but he doesn’t really care for it.  Me however, I think I may have just found a potential candidate for opening of the year.  Want to know what it is?  Have you guessed yet?  In any case here you go:

Higurashi Opening – Superscription Of Data

MAN!  Right at the get go with the build up it’s just impossible for me to resist a head jerk, it’s just so infectious.  Then the vocals kick in and it starts to feel more like a Higurashi song.  I’m blown away.  I can’t even think of any other opening out there this year that is anything quite like this either.  So catchy, so powerful, such good vocals, it’s just unbelievable to me.  People who know me know that I rarely have such words to attribute to much, but this song is one of those rare times.  Join the eternal playlist Superscription of Data….join the eternal playlist, you have made it.

Kaioshin’s Top 5 Gundam Image Songs

Oh my god, what is this, I Kaioshin Sama am actually writing something.  Has anybody checked the temperature in hell lately.  Is there still war in the holy land?  DID THE SUN RISE FROM THE WEST THIS MORNING?!

Actually, I just feel like it tonight for whatever reason after chilling to some Gundam music and thinking about new ways in which to share it with the rest of the internet.  I’ve already gone over a top 10 openings and endings list that was slanted heavily towards Gundam music, and I’ve already done a Top 10 OST’s post that was chock-full of Gundam music, but I haven’t done a post about Gundam Image songs, of which not all series feature them, but of which those that do have them, do the concept justice.  That ends now, and I bring you my favourite amongst them.

Ali vs. Halcali (Duel of the Duos)

One of the hot topics in the past couple of days on the Animesuki Forums has been about the new Ali Project sung opening theme for Sora Kake Girl and whether the duo has shown that they are lacking in originality and the ability to refine and vary their (at this point) rather infamous style.  Both sides of the fence have given their views on the bands music from statements such as a critic’s, “Each song they do is like the same beat and off-key notes every. single. time.” and a supporters, “Quirkiness is as quirky does. And in that weird off-key manner, they do seem to have some otherworldly sense of rhythm to it”. 

The band will almost certainly continue to be a controversial one in the future when it comes to their contributions to anime music, but I figure why not present a few of their more recent contributions here and let people decide for themselves whether they are truly rehashing or if it’s all  just a part of our imagination.  Then I would like to invite comparison and contrast of Ali Project to another female duo that I have been following on and off in Halcali.  I’ve found that Halcali shares a comparative style with Ali Project in how they like to rap their lyrics (and not to mention a little in the type of wardrobe they like to wear), but that they also provide a stark contrast to Ali Project’s own style in terms of the duo performance.  I won’t offer up any more words or take any sides in this debate from here on out, but instead I will let people decide through a poll what they think of the two bands and their respective styles and whether one or the other, both, or neither are in need of an image overhaul.  Play them over each other, compare, contrast, do whatever you like….

Gundam 00 Second Season Opening 2 Quickie Impression

Namida no Mukou – by Stereopony

Yeah, sorry but I’ve gotta give the new opening the big ol’ thumbs down. Again I can’t help but feel this comes down to an issue of (and it pains me to have to make the comparison) the song not fitting with the flow of the video (moreso towards the last 1/3 of the sequence) much like with the case of Gundam Seed Destiny’s Wing of Words.  Although I will say that the mixture does work out to a better degree then WoW did with GSD’s fourth opening video.  Now I’ve personally got nothing against the nudity in the opening and I tend to think that anybody who professes to take offense to such a thing is just being silly, even if it is a little gratuitous, but really it’s a shame because this could have worked out better. 

Yoko vs. Yoko – Great Composers All Out Attack (Part 5)

I fall behind on this series of articles yet again because Final Fantasy XII managed to catch up on me.  Turns out the reason I was having trouble progressing was because at some point between my sporadic attempts at playing it over the past couple of months I neglected to realize that I was something like 6 levels behind in terms of raw character building and 2 levels behind in terms of basic equipment.  It really makes a difference in a game that has such a clearly tiered system of equips.  2 hours of power grinding later and some major loot gathering and selling to finance the massive cost of getting my equipment up to speed I am now owning the game and plan to continue doing so later on.

Anyway, anyone ever notice how I tend to refer to “Yoko Kanno tribal beats” from time to time while doing my OST reviews?  Well tonight I finally get the chance to show off an example of just what I mean by that.  Oh and Shimomura get’s to join in too.  Huzzah…..