Making Arts and Entertainment Great Again

I have posted several times about how dire the anime industry is looking in Japan these days. My current post series on 100 accessible anime tapers off hard around 2005, and there's a reason for that. As you no doubt know, it is because the industry deliberately turned in on itself and focused on shoe-gazing to the fringe audience while ignoring the wider one. Sales have been falling for a while, and things were looking bleaker and bleaker for older fans and those who used to care.

Then I stumbled across this news:

"But what is really striking is that Sasaki believes it’s time for the industry to move away from catering to otaku and instead focus on “light users.” He said that light users are young fans who love anime but aren’t buying Blu-rays, DVDs, and music CDs to due price and being raised in a digital age. Instead, they are more likely to support anime by purchasing merchandise, going to events (like anime conventions), and consume media digitally. The reason for moving away from the otaku crowd? They are way too niche and titles catering to otaku have trouble making money back."

Well, that escalated quickly. If by "quickly" you mean "it took a decade of stupid decisions, hemorrhaging overseas appeal, and flooding the market with mediocrity before we finally realized that those older fans might have had a point," then sure, it was fast.

It goes without saying that I am all for this push, and I hope Japan doublestriples down on it and refuse to let their foot up off the gas. Whatever is left of the industry needs it.

It’s only a shame that the anime and manga industry is the only one who sees the writing on the wall for allocating the majority of their time and effort for a small and only shrinking niche. And it took these people over a decade to get it. Why is this so hard?

There is a middle ground, folks.

This post should go with a disclaimer: the industry should not instead go in the opposite extreme of streamlining and sanding the edges off of their products to appeal to audiences who have no interest in what's being sold. That is not what I'm suggesting.

The modern entertainment industry is constantly caught in two extremes. They either go for the 1% of the 1% and cater their products to uber niche tastes for people who consume and dispose of the product as soon as they’re finished digesting, or they aim for Normie Joe, an imaginary human being that would enjoy their product immensely if only it talked down to him a bit more and the wild elements were tamed. The 1% of 1% will never be satiated and Normie Joe the reluctant fan doesn’t actually exist. The group that loses in both cases is the one the should have been targeted in the first place.

In case you haven’t realized, I’m no longer just talking about anime.

If the average fan is looking for your product, all they want is you to polish it the best you can. The majority of the audience doesn’t want you to satiate their every fetish and whim, nor would they suddenly decide not to partake if only you made Side Character B’s skin color different, you horrible racist. Normal fans, the majority, don't care about either. They want you to create something, put your passion into it, make it the best you can, and put it out there. The audience will come, or they will not. There’s no pattern for success.

But there’s also nothing to be gained by streamlining and dumbing down, or erecting a wall to keep everyone outside of the hardcore of the hardcore away, at the cost of the average fan. Both lead to shrinking audiences and products not worth anyone’s time.

For the best illustration of my point: take Rock n' Roll music. You might as well since no one else will.

What started as a melding of Gospel music and sped-up Blues has spun so far out of control that nothing in the genre sounds anything like it did when it started. Sure you have Punk, Metal, Alternative, which spun out from it, and all the sub genres still thriving and sounding pretty much exactly like they did when they started, but the original strand? When was the last time you heard a new band that sounded like Chuck Berry, or a singer covering a Sonny Boy Williamson song? There are Rock bands active now who have never even heard those names before.

All you have today are mainstream mopey and bland post-Nirvana bands and ironic indie groups that sing smirking songs about nothing. They’ve taken parts of Rock music and fetishized all the important parts out of the genre while typically decrying the very elements (like the Gospel itself) which allow them to even have a career in the first place. And the radio stations outright support it.

Rock music is a part of two different camps these days. There are the 1% of the 1% constantly on the lookout for the next Pinkerton (which wasn’t that good, guys) and there are the pop fans who listen to the sanitized rock radio like everything the Foo Fighters have put out since the '90s ended. You have abstract weirdness and ironic winking snark, or you have mopey millennials doing a Cobain impression over autotune and perfectly distorted guitars. Two markets which are entirely separated from each other and far from the source of where they began. Rock music has lost the plot.

For all intents and purposes, Rock n' Roll music is dead.

Don’t believe me? When was the last time you heard a new sped-up Blues song on the radio? How about an upbeat song with a stand-up bass? When was the last time you heard any Rock n' Roll artist put out a song with a piano that wasn’t a cheesy ballad or a kitsch pisstake? When was the last time you heard a rock artist, indie or mainstream, cover a Bo Diddley song and make it sound anything like the original without sounding entirely unlike the rest of their catalogue? Heck, when was the last time you heard a harmonica in a Top 10 song? The answer to all those is “decades” or possibly never. Rock music has been neutered and put in its place. It's no longer fun and fancy free, or for your average fan. The implicit weirdness of Eddie Cochran, Little Richard, and Gene Vincent, is gone. It was taken by the hipsters and the record companies for Rock's equivalent of otaku and Normie Joe respectively. And it’s not coming back.

But nobody else needs to follow that example.

As long as we remember to keep our eyes on where we came from we can continue to move forward. If Japan can realize this problem with their own industries, hopefully it won’t be too late for certain other ones. It's not too late yet.

Enough of that. Let’s have some fun.

Until next time!

Outside the Future

I've made no bones about the fact that I am a fan of Urge Overkill, specifically everything after their underrated Stull EP, which is why I tend to post so many lyrics of theirs. It might be because despite being a rock n roll band that parodied excess before succumbing to it, one of the things they got really good at with parts of Stull that continued for the rest of their career is how strong heir lyrics became.

Unfortunately, none of their albums include the lyrics in them (probably to help maintain the illusion) but the lyrics when paid attention to are often quite good.

For instance, listen to this song called "Tequila Sundae" (which is a pretty jokey title up until you read the lyrics) without looking at the lyrics below.

Now try it with the lyrics and compare how they contrast with the music:

Tequila Sundae

Music and Lyrics by Urge Overkill

Got no time for stimulation

Daylight runs and runs for hours

Heavy cold sweat under the black sun shower

Under the silicon valley sun

Flattery will get you nowhere

Oh my God, I didn't wanna hurt no one

In a false sleep, in need of stimulation

I wish the z-ball was the sun

She was gone (I believe her)

Gone (Underneath the)

A tequila sun

She was gone (I believe her)

Gone (I believe her)

A tequila sun

Now that I need her (Tequila sun)

She's off in the sun

With someone

With someone

Melt away!

Put yourself outside the future

Silicon sun rising above the ground

She was gone (I believe her)

Gone (Underneath the)

A tequila sun

She was gone (I believe her)

Gone (Underneath the)

A tequila sun

Now that I need her (Tequila sun)

She's off in the sun

With someone

With someone

She was gone (I believe her)

Gone (Underneath the)

A tequila sun

She was gone (I believe her)

Gone (I believe her)

I believe that woman

Now that I need you (Tequila sun)

Don't melt away!

Got no need for stimulation

Let the cheeba be the sun.

Not quite as simple as it first came across, no? On the surface it sounds like another rock song about glorifying self-destruction and excess, but instead becomes a lament on losing what is really important and replacing it with material things.

The usage of "Silicon Sun" and the replacement of the real sun with drink and drugs contrasts the artificial sun of the singer's desire with whoever "she is" that is off in the real sun. To me, that is the most interesting part of the song. She's off in the sun? She's in a better place? Is she dead? Did she find someone new? I guess it doesn't make a difference in the subject's mind since it's all the same to him. Now he's got nothing and fills it with substances that won't fill anything at all as the last line implies.

But to me, it's the title that is really clever. Tequila Sunrise is a well known drink, but he never once says it in the song. Tequila Sundae instead implies a desert, a treat, one that can melt away like the lyrics say. But in the song, what he wants to melt away are his memories of "her" and by the end he realizes what he lost and changes his mind. However, as the final lines imply, that's simply to late. He's filled the deep hole in himself with junk instead.

Contrasting the drink with the real sun is a great comparison for both the song, and a deeper level to the straightforward lyrics.

But what I like the most is how deceptively simple the lyrics are. They are essentially about a man drinking himself to forget, which is a popular topic in music, just as the similarly named "Tequila Sunrise" by the Eagles is. But what it is about is a bit more than that. Urge Overkill had always parodied the rock n roll lifestyle of sex, drugs, and alcohol, before, but this is the first song that doesn't feel like that at all. The song treats addition like the pit it is, but with a small inkling of hope that there is more than the artificial sun the singer lives his life by. It aims a bit higher than similar songs of its style.

It also helps that it has a kicking riff that goes great with the dark tinge of the lyrics. Sonically, the band has rarely ever sounded tighter than on this track, which goes well with the desperate state of the subject of the lyrics.

At some point instead of just being about carefree fun and optimism like Chuck Berry and the Beach Boys, rock music became entrenched in love of excess, lust, fatalism, and nihilism, until it became the grey mush of forgetful nothing it is nowadays. Bands like Urge Overkill wisely took the things rock bands made important and shone a light on how stupid, how dangerous, (and eventually) how evil, they actually are. Fun is fun, but the line is there for a reason, and patting yourself on the back for stumbling over it and off a cliff is not cool or rebellious, it's suicidal.

Or maybe it's just me. Either way, I'm glad songs, and bands, like this exist. Keeps me away from modern radio and away from all the pop songs celebrating self-destruction. I'm under no illusion that suicide is is preferable to life, and as someone who has stared the devil in the face and has no desire to ever see it again.

Lyric Time for a Busy Week

It's been pretty hectic this week, so here's a small post. Hopefully next week I can make a bigger one. For now, here are some inspirational lyrics that never fail to get to me. I've had these lyrics in my head buzzing away recently.

Sunny Days

Performed by: Jars of Clay

Written by: Stephen Daniel Mason, Charlie Lowell, Dan Haseltine, and Matt Odmark

Sunny days keepin' the clouds away

I think we're coming to a clearing and a brighter day

So far away, still I think they say, the wait will make their heart

Grow stronger or fonder, I can't quite remember anyway

So if you're waitin' for love, well it's a promise I'll keep

If you don't mind believing that it changes everything

Time will never matter

Winter, spring is what love can truly bring

Ice turns to water, water flows to everything

You can lose your mind, maybe then your heart will find

I hope you won't give up what's movin' you inside, no

So if you're waitin' for love, well it's a promise I'll keep

If you don't mind believing that it changes everything

Time will never matter

So if you're waitin' for love, well it's a promise I'll keep

Even if you don't mind believing that it changes everything

Time will never matter

If the car won't start, when you turn the key

When the music comes on, all your cold

Cold heart can do is skip a beat

It's a promise I'll keep, when you're waitin' for love

If you don't mind believing that it changes everything

Time will never matter

So if you're waitin' for love, well, it's a promise I'll keep

Even if you don't mind believing that it changes everything

Time will never matter

Your time will never matter

Resolution

This is one of my favorite songs in the genre of Ska music. It is called "Resolution" and it is by the band called the O.C. Supertones.

When I was still in the process of conversion and thinking my way through where my life was going, I heard this song for the first time. It really helped me parse things out. With my birthday recently I figured I'd take a look back and see where I am now. Thanks to this song and other events in my life I can safely say I've come a ways since then.

So I'd like to share it with you. Have a good week!

I've meant to do this for some time

Gotta get it right this time

This time my God I will be yours

All my heart, my soul and mind

Been so long since I truly smiled

But you touched my heart today

Reached through my mind of mud and mire

Consumed the idols in your way

So, I am brand new

Today, I make my resolution

Today, I make my resolution

Today, I make my

Today, I make my resolution

Today, I make my

Looking back the way I used to be . . .

Been down so long that is seems like up

I took it now I've had enough

Of the life that I've been living

It feels so cold this far away

So, today I will make a change

I will make a change today

Purge my mind of mud and mire

Cast all my gods away

So I am brand new

Today, I make my resolution

Today, I make my resolution

Today, I make my

Today, I make my resolution

Today, I make my

Looking back the way I used to be . . .

It was just me and God

Can I be there again?

Today I make my resolution

Today, I make my resolution

Today, I make my

Today, I make my resolution

Today, I make my

Today, I make my resolution.

Music to Write by: David Wise

Video game music tends to get a bad rap. The first is that since a lot of people see them as pointless time-wasters they figure the music is just as pointless. The second reason is that because game systems used primitive soundchips in the old systems that they weren't capable of writing good songs.

The first is just silly, but the second is flat-out wrong. Here's the thing, early video game music up until around the PlayStation 2 heavily relied on instrumental music in the vein of old pop music like The Ventures or The Glenn Miller Orchestra, and since these songs had to keep people engaged and coming back for more game they tended to need to be better than average.

Whether you like video games or not, some of it is exceptionally creative, and some of it is downright brilliant. In fact, some of it is pretty inspiring to some including me.

Today I'm going to talk about tracks from one of my favorite video game composers, David Wise.

David Wise was a member of the company Rare (formerly Rareware) and was one of their in-house composers. He has since moved on to freelancing as the company has floundered in creativity and a loss of key staff over the years. The story goes that he was found selling keyboards in a music store and wrote some catchy tunes that played from them, for that he was approached to work at Rare. And the rest is video game history.

The reason David Wise has become one of the most popular composers in the video game world is because of his writing style. What I said before about The Ventures or The Glenn Miller Orchestra? Throw in a bunch of other genres from dance, tribal, surf, post-punk, and classic video game music and you might begin to understand his appeal.

*Tracks after the break*

Thank you for waking me up

Yu Yu Hakusho: Ghost Files is a Japanese anime that ran long ago in the early 1990s. The original manga it was adapted from was written by Yoshihiro Togashi and next to Dragon Ball is probably the most influential manga from that era.

For me, it is one of my favorite shows out of Japan. Though those of us in North America only got it a decade later, most of us saw past the fact that it was a decade old show (as the way it should be) and saw the material for what it was. A clever action adventure show with a focus on good against evil. Something that even Japan is having problems putting out these days.

The story starts as our hero, Yusuke Uremeshi is killed in a car accident. He dives in front of a speeding car to save a boy from being struck and in doing so dies an uncharacteristically heroic death. You see, everyone had written Yusuke off as a trouble-making punk with no love or passion for life. But something inside him made him do the unexpected, and it confuses pretty much everybody, including the bureaucrats who run the border between life and death. You see, the Spirit World is run by those who wish to help guide along the souls in the living world from point A to B in their lives, but in doing so tended to miss the eccentricities that make humans such a complex being.

Because of this, Yusuke wasn't "supposed" to die. Thus, Koenma, the son of the man in charge of the Spirit World finds a way to give Yusuke back the life he sacrificed.

What happens next is quite the wild ride, and the reason why Yu Yu Hakusho is considered a classic in its genre.

It is only through dying that Yusuke is able to see the world for what it is, and what lies below the surface. Japanese folklore demons are real, and Yusuke must use his new spiritual powers to stop them from wreaking havoc in the real world. At the same time he befriends a couple of these demons who have turned over a new leaf and are far more interested in doing the right thing as opposed to greedily engaging in their own interests. And yet again we meet humans who are not on the right side of the fence, who wish to watch the world burn, demon or not. All this to show that good and evil is far more than skin deep.

But despite the usage of "demons" (again, this is not in the supernatural sense, these are folklore demons from Japanese legend who have abilities of their own) the lines of good and evil are not by race but by the character of those propitiating the acts.

The story is of a coming of age of a teenage boy who sees the full scope of the world for the first time and is determined to make a positive change to save it from those who might have been more like he once was. Those who would prefer to tear it all down. In this way, we have the adventures of Yusuke Uremeshi, the Spirit Detective, the guardian of the balance between the two separate worlds. Where it ends up going is quite the adventure. I'll try to speak about it more in future entries.

Of course, it is an action show. There is a lot of martial arts action, battles of will, and violence. Blood is spilled and some sequences can be a bit much for some viewers, making this more acceptable for older teens and up. By then the themes would be more apparent, as well. Those with a love of the genre should enjoy Yu Yu Hakusho. It is a classic for a well deserved reason.

Goodbye Sky Harbor

By the band Jimmy Eat World. Though I have grown out of a lot of the music I listened to when younger, some still stick with me. This is one. It is the final track from the band's breakthrough 1999 album, Clarity, and one of their most famous.

They were a pretty big deal in the late '90s and early '00s, but since the pop world is so fickle, there's a good chance no one in that scene listens to them anymore. I have been to concerts where bands with well crafted songs and engaging themes are not as warmly received by the audience as the newer flash in the pan bands (and I mean flash in the pan, I looked up some of the bands I mean and they haven't done much in years), but some manage to keep marching regardless of how fickle their audience might be.

The lyrics on this album are probably the best the band ever put out, and this sixteen minute song (!) is one of the best of the decade. Seek it out if you can.

Goodbye Sky Harbor

Written by: Jim Adkins, Rich Burch, Zach Lind, Tom Linton and Thomas Darrell

Is tomorrow just a day like all the rest?
How could you know just what you did?
Like all the rest, how could you know just what you did?
So full of faith yet full of doubt I ask . . .

Again, I shall ask you this once again:
He said, "I am but one small instrument"
Do you remember that?

Time and time again you say:
"Don't be afraid, don't be afraid!"
The only voice I want to hear is yours.

Again, I shall ask you this once again:
He said, "I am but one small instrument"
Do you remember that?

So here I am above palm trees so straight and tall,
You are smaller, getting smaller . . .

But I still see you.

Great Endings

Here is one of my favorite endings of any book I've ever read. I'm not going to tell you the author or title in order to avoid spoilers, but it is incredible.

Without further delay:

“She shut her eyes and saw the pin point of light but so far away that she could not hold it steady in her mind. She felt as if she were blocked at the entrance of something. She sat staring with her eyes shut, into his eyes, and felt as if she had finally got to the beginning of something she couldn’t begin, and she saw him moving farther and farther away, farther and farther into the darkness until he was the pin point of light.”

Jesus Hits Like the Atom Bomb

This is going to be a really odd choice. I used to be a big listener of alternative rock from the 90s (before I got sick of the depressing lyrics) and still do enjoy the strange sounds such bands can play around with. For some reason, this song from the band Tripping Daisy (whose lead singer went on to form The Polyphonic Spree, who are far more well known) from their excellent album "Jesus Hits Like the Atom Bomb" released in 1998 when the mainstream was done with rock bands that didn't sound like third rate Nirvana rip-offs.

The album is not religious, despite its title, but the title is very apt for what the album feels like. An alternative rock explosion of positivity and whimsy stuck somewhere between child-like wonder of the world, typical '90s teenage irreverence, and the ultimate acceptance of growing up. The best way to describe it is a bomb of life. The lyrics are pretty hard to decipher if they're not being outright silly, but there are a few gems in there that point to more than the obvious.

One song in particular still comes to me so many years since mainstream music has flat-lined, and that is the opening track. Unfortunately, the album is out of print, the band no longer exists (the guitarist died after their following album-- praying he's with the Lord now), and the world forgot about any alternative rock not made by Nirvana. But these guys were way better than Nirvana and were quite overlooked. Check these lyrics out and see if you can get from them what I do so many years later.

The second half of the song, especially, when the song hits its peak, I think the excitement of the unknown really shines through bright and strong.

Field Day Jitters

(Music: Tripping Daisy, Lyrics: Tim DeLaughter)

Wondering jets inside of me.

I've got the field day jitters-- wet matches and a bottle of Mr. Clean.

I'm a nervous wreck in the shape of a test

I figure it's all about giving.

 Causing all of the brain to slip into frame

and visit the space that it gives me for sleep.

Wondering jets inside of me.

I've got the field day jitters (jitters, jitters) . . .

I'm an open nest, a paper address

I can get lost in just living.

Blowing thoughts of regret, you'll never forget,

the feeling of falling and breaking.

This is me, your glue gun's dream.

A map of every road.

A friend that drops his nose.

But this can't be.

I'm a cracking machine!

My will is to hold, and my creed is to be the unbreakable me.

Now it's time to fill up the cracks in me

(no stopping, no stopping, no stopping)

It's what I want, it's what I see,

that I'm unbreakable, capable, breakable.

Now it's time to fill up the cracks in me

(no stopping, no stopping, no stopping)

It's what I want, it's what I see,

that I'm unbreakable, capable, breakable.

Bye-bye.
 

Never any doubt in me

(no stopping, no stopping, no stopping)

It's what I want, it's what I see,

that I'm the unbreakable, capable, breakable me.

Bye-bye . . .

The Commitments

This week I'm going to take a look at the film "The Commitments", directed by Alan Parker, and released in 1991. It is one of my favorite films and has still endured to this day despite how much has gone in in the years since I've first seen it, and I know many others still connect to it even so many years later. Though I'm not sure a lot of people really know why. It still works today just as well as when it first released.

Back in the early '90s, this film sort of came out of nowhere. Based on a fairly good book of the same title by Roddy Doyle, no one was really prepared for this film to become as popular as it did or touch people the way it did. It's a fairly straightforward plot that has been done before, but what is it about this particular film that has helped it endure over the years when so many others have been forgotten?

There are a few reasons, I think.

I think a good bit that helped it is how timeless much of it is. I first saw the film around 2000 or so and had absolutely no idea the film was over nine years old at the time. The references to music and pop culture are all over the place, and both the dress, style, and atmosphere could be almost any period, it's quite a remarkable feat and the production staff deserve much credit for it. But what really puts it all over the top for me, more than the excellent soul music throughout, is how universal everything about the film is.