Last FM, Perth Jrock Community.

My new Last FM group “Perth Jrock”

• URL
  

If you’re a perth resident, make sure to sign up and show your support.

Don’t Jump, Don’t look down.

Elevator opens
To the balcony,
12th floor.
Your clutching
The guardrail
Frantic eyes
darting
Manical laughs
Fill my ears
You dance,
on the edge
of a knife,
playing a dangerous game…

Japanese film terms.

Here are some common terms from the glossary of Chris D’s 2005 book “Outlaw Masters of Japanese Cinema” Which I am currently devouring.

Bosozoku – Teenage car/motorcycle gangs, often serving as an apprenticeship for the Yakuza.
Chanbara – Swordplay cinema, usually Samurai.
Daimyo – Samurai lord.
Eiga – film/movie(s)
Gendai – modern.
Hara-kiri – Ritual suicide with sword.
Ippiki okami – lone wolf.
Jidai-geki – historical period piece, usually Samurai orientated.
Jingi – Honor and humanity; sometimes used to signify the code of gamblers and Yakuza.
Jitsuroku – true account.
Kaibyo – cat ghost.
Kaidan – ghost story/strange tale.
Kempeitai – military police.
Manga – comic book.
Matatabi – wandering, gambling swordsman.
Ninkyo – chivalrous.
Onnagata – male preformer cast in female role; common in 19th century Kabuki theatre as well as early 20th century silent era films.
Oyabun – boss.
Pink – intense softcore porn, often with ultra-violent content.
Roman porn – pink films with “romantic” as well as S&M styled interludes.
Ronin – masterless Samurai.
Shoringi kenpo – hand-to-hand fighting and boxing style combining philosophy martial arts.
Sukeban – delinquent girl gang leader.
Yakuza – gangster
zankoku – cruel.

On the topic of my website

I worked to create a respectable website as my base of operations on the url www.rikuakutenshi.com during december 2007, afterwards work on the website has dropped off considerablely, throughout this Janurary 2008 period. Starting in early feburary, work on the website will resume as I plunge into the use of dreamweaver CS3 and PHP/MySql coding. This website is the best place to get to know me, what interests me, what makes me tick ect and hopefully this blog and the website will be successfully intergrated some point in the not too distant future. Until then, check out what i’ve made thus far:

• URL

Last FM journal update.

Catch some new j-goth PV’s and the “Weekly PV update” if you head on over to my japanese-music orientated journal on the social music site Last FM.

• URL
• RSS feed

Remember to add the RSS feed to your RSS reader to get all the updates ASAP.

A Forest/Dusk and her embrace.

A Forest/Dusk and her embrace (2007)
by Jesse Young

Draped in an allure
T’was thick as to obscure
Entrap and betwixt its prey
She the lowly maiden fair
For whom many hearts despair
Neither her look nor her gaze
Whispered mischievous intent
Playfully naïve minx
Though illustriously aware
Many men claimed to have saw
For time immemorial
She frolicked the woods yore
Nubile forest nymph
Possessive of remarkable flair
But lo! To catch her eyes
She’d tear you to the brink
With her disconcerting incise
In a rare and fleeting moment of surprise
Barely a glimpse would suffice
Decreed to a life sentence
Inclined to chase this maiden fair
Far through all woods of yesteryear
Chasing a blank forgery of a heart
Long since faded, eroded imitation
All but lost to the winding passage of time.

Simple love rhyme.

Simple love rhyme (2007)
or
(The pretty indispensable curious alluring atypical novel puzzling illusory extraneous paroxysm­inducing preoccupation of a creature.)
By Jesse Young 

Apple of my eye
Dissolve the floodgates of my heart
Diamond of my sky
It’s through you, I channel my art
Soother of my soul
Coddle me with kisses
I am your devoted foal
Even if it’s hit and misses
Our passions spent
On a heart shaped box
Sweetly content
In mismatched socks
I offered a pair of mittens
In snappy winter snow
You gave me three kittens
So this of you I know
Throughout the beating squall
That tempest we heard and see
You’ve possession of me whole
Assuage all strife that burdened me
Carve our names into a tree
An august picnic under the willow
It’s love that rends us free
Your face buried in my pillow.

Shadow Lover

Shadow Lover (2007)
by Jesse Young 

(Verse 1)
There’s a tremor in my voice,
A quivering of lips,
Buckling of the knees.
Nonchalantly trading quips,
Belies a hidden tryst
I try to steal a glance,
furtively, to advance
dare I take the chance?
I wondered as we danced.

(Chorus)
And all the lights swirled around the place,
The heady afterglow and bitter aftertaste.
Cascading shadows obscuring my face,
I’m forever the shadow lover
I see through all your pretensions
and I’m not your man at all.

(Verse 2)
Sweet nothings from a lover
signed, sealed and delivered
But I am just another
Clandestine hush hush cover
“Could you ever understand me?”
I tersely replied
Stifling the tears,
Once reserved inside,
I peered at the mirror,
To find you looking back,
To a blank spot on the wall,
but for a phantom outline,
woefully faint and small.

(Chorus)
And all the lights swirled around the place,
The heady afterglow and bitter aftertaste.
Cascading shadows obscuring my face,
I’m forever the shadow lover
I see through all your pretensions
and I’m not your man at all.

(Bridge)
Oh no, no no no
You never ever see
But you happily venture,
To feign affection.
Yet you depend on,
Meee-eeee
I’ve got my place,
I’m forever your shadow lover
I see through it all,
Your pitiful,
I’m not your man at all.

(Verse 3)
Winking once,
As you poked my arm.
I smiled back,
Though, I confess,
You’ll never know,
The heartrending harm,
Your playful poke,
Was made to evoke.
I averted my gaze,
And sunk, into the void
The shadow world,
But you never noticed,
You never notice.

(Chorus x 2)
And all the lights swirled around the place,
The heady afterglow and bitter aftertaste.
Cascading shadows obscuring my face,
I’m forever the shadow lover
I see through all your pretensions
and I’m not your man at all.

Your pitiful,
I’m not your man at all.

I’m pitiful,
I was never your man at all.

The mindless never-after

The mindless never-after (2008)
by Jesse Young

Oh abiding pain,
In memoriam,
Mind abated, thoughts restrained.
My misshapen soul,
Itched, wallowed & lost control.
Sullied long to,
Labour a cloistered hole.
Though drawl,
Sexless nights held terrors,
Ambered in death’s thrall.
Onrushing visions spill out,
Traffic lights whirl,
Past & present cemented,
The future, I confess, not so sure.

Bi-weekly Cultural Digest #1 – 29th Jan 2008.

Word(s) of the Day:
Soiree - n. An evening party or reception.
Apéritif - n. An alcoholic drink taken as an appetizer before a meal.

Idiom/Slang of the Day:
Jack of all Trades:
A handyperson in several fields / someone with ability in many areas.

Poem of the Day:
The Tyger (from Songs Of Experience)
By William Blake (1794)

Tyger! Tyger! burning bright
In the forests of the night,
What immortal hand or eye
Could frame thy fearful symmetry?

In what distant deeps or skies
Burnt the fire of thine eyes?
On what wings dare he aspire?
What the hand dare sieze the fire?

And what shoulder, & what art.
Could twist the sinews of thy heart?
And when thy heart began to beat,
What dread hand? & what dread feet?

What the hammer? what the chain?
In what furnace was thy brain?
What the anvil? what dread grasp
Dare its deadly terrors clasp?

When the stars threw down their spears,
And watered heaven with their tears,
Did he smile his work to see?
Did he who made the Lamb make thee?

Tyger! Tyger! burning bright
In the forests of the night,
What immortal hand or eye
Dare frame thy fearful symmetry?

Film of the day:
The Notorious Bettie Page (2005)
Directed by: Mary Harron

Biopic chronicling the career of notorious American pinup and bondage model Bettie Page. Set in the conservative 1950’s under the backdrop of the obscenity trails surrounding pornography being held at that time. Gretchen Mol does a stellar job embodying the look of the naive Page, raised in a strict Christian household. Difficult childhood experiences are hinted at though not exploited by the camera explicitly and it is this restraint which keeps the film tasteful throughout. Page’s utterly naive behavior and ambivalence to matters of sex are hard to believe but not being an authority on her life I am not sure how close the portrayal holds up to the real Page. There isn’t really a drive to go for strong social commentary but rather this film stands a document of the times and indeed of Page’s life with the viewer left to form their own impressions of this influential American sex symbol.

My Rating: 3.5/5

Quote of the day:
“One of the great tragedies of mankind is that morality has been hijacked by religion.”
Arthur C. Clark, author. Source

Person of the Day:
Haruki Murakami

One of the most widely read Japanese author’s internationally and the 2007 winner of the prestigious literary “Kiriyama Prize” (which he declined to accept for “reasons of personal principle”). Haruki Murakami’s major breakthrough occurred with the publication of his 1987 novel “Norwegian Wood” which sold millions of copies after which he traveled throughout Europe, and settled in the United States. His other major novels include “The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle” and “Kafka on the Shore”. Murakami is famed for his richly imaginative style where social criticism and bizarre and surreal plotlines intersect.

“Murakami writes of contemporary Japan, urban alienation and journeys of self-discovery.” Independent.

“Critics have variously likened him to Raymond Caver, Raymond Chandler, Arthur C. Clarke, Don DeDlillo, Phillip. K. Dick, Bret Easton Eillis and Thomas Pynchon – a roster so ill assorted as to suggest Murakami is in fact an original.” New York Times.

Artwork of the Day:
A piece by David Hockey:

About the Artist

Book of the Day:
Lady Chatterly’s Lover

From wikipedia:

“A novel by D. H. Lawrence written in

1928. Printed privately in Florence in 1928, it was not printed in the United Kingdom until 1960 (other than in an underground edition issued by Inky Stephensen’s Mandrake Press in 1929). Lawrence considered calling this book Tenderness at one time and made significant alterations to the original manuscript in order to make it palatable to readers. It has been published in three different versions. The publication of the book caused a scandal due to its explicit sex scenes, including previously banned four-letter words, and perhaps particularly because the lovers were a male and an working-class male and an aristocratic female. The story is said to have originated from events in Lawrence’s own unhappy domestic life, and he took inspiration for the settings of the book from Ilkeston in Derbyshire where he lived for a while. According to some critics the fling of Lady Ottoline Morrell with “Tiger”, a young stonemason who came to carve plinths for her garden statues also influenced the story.”

Full Free Ebook

Band of the Day:
Dir en grey

Formed in Japan in 1997 and hailing from Japan. Dir en grey is one of Japan’s premier hard rock/metal acts. With five full-length studio albums under their belt and another on the way, Dir en grey has had a string of chart successes in Japan since their inception and gained a cult fan base in Japan and internationally. In recent years they have toured extensively overseas with many prominent acts including KoRn and Deftones and headlined their own US tour. Their music is hard to categorize and songs differ greatly in style and tone, from pop to death metal. Earlier offerings had more pop leanings spreading out into prog-rock and now into hard rock and melodic metal territory with their 2007 release “The Marrow of a Bone”. Known for their charismatic stage presence, (especially the wild antics of their lead vocalist, Kyo) and offbeat or extreme music video output, Dir en grey lead the pack in the new wave of J-rock fever sweeping the world.
HIGHLY RECOMMENDED

Offical Myspace
Offical Website

Website of the Day:
http://www.pinky-violence.com/

From the main page:

“What is PInky Violence? It’s a line of sexy, action-exploitation thrillers begun in the late sixties in Japan. These films featured female yakuzas and girl boss guerillas duking it out for their freedom, their pride and their own piece of the pie. This electrifying genre mixed titillation with social commentary, predating its closest American and European counterparts by several years. These groundbreaking films continue to influence some of cinema’s most celebrated directors, like Quentin Tarantino, Robert Rodriguez and Takashi Miike. Step inside for the be-all, end-all of grindhouse girls gone way past wild!”

This site with contributions from Chris D, author of “Outlaw masters of Japanese cinema” is a perfect introduction to underground Japanese cinema and highly recommend to anybody who is looking to venture into the world of extreme Asian cinema.

Trivia of the Day:
”Celtic warriors sometimes fought their battles naked, their bodies dyed blue from head to toe.”

Source