Dreamlando

As far as I can think back, I was always fascinated with Japan, amusement parks and tacky, mass-produced kitsch.

All of these obsessions seem to have met at "Nara Dreamland", or "Nara Dorīmurando" as the Japanese would say it.


clicking on pics increases the magic!

"Nara Dreamland" opened in 1961, near the city of Nara. It is always said that the Japanese like to copy things, while making them better in the process. "Dreamland" on the other hand just copied "Disneyland", there was nothing better about it.


Some parts of "Dreamland", like the entrance and train-station look like a carbon copy of its Californian inspiration. The whole layout of the park, the castle and most of the rides are also copied.


The fact that the park opened just six years after Disneyland shows what an impact Disney´s ideas must have had worldwide. Upon closer inspection "Dreamland" might have taken the ideas but certainly not the imagination and devotion that made Disney parks such a lasting success.


Where Disney´s imagineers went all the way to create convincing and immersive worlds, "Dreamland" used cardboard, concrete and plastic. This makes it so much more interesting for me.


Through the years, the park must have lost it´s artificial magic as the owners jusr added random rides and coasters without integrating them into the faux-Disney-look. With the opening of the immensely popular Tokyo Disneyland in 1983 the naive 20 year old forerunner in Nara must have appeared like an embryonic version from a parallel universe.


Neglect and dwindling visitor numbers took its toll on "Dreamland". Throughout the late nineties and early 00s the park was almost looking abandoned. By the end of august 2006 the "Dreamland" closed its doors forever.


Here you can witness "Nara Dreamland" on opening day in 1961. The resemblance the park had to Disneyland in this early phase is uncanny and amazing. The second video is even longer and shows more of original rides like the "Jungle Cruise".


The last video shows bits of Dreamland in its later days, when the crowds have gone and only a handful of school-children are stumbling across the cracked concrete.


A bizarre photo-trip to Dreamland, shortly before it was closed can be enjoyed here.

Project Level-D

I think I have read most of the JG Ballard obituaries, tributes, essays and reviews since yesterday. Thanks to Simon Sellars´ brilliant Ballardian-Twitter service and the Guardian collection, it was easy to almost overdose on the theme. Reading all this made me hyper-aware of the ballardian reality that surrounds us and the following is as ballardian as it gets.


For some time I am intrigued by the dubious, ever increasing interest in female dolls and figurines that cater to grown-up, mostly Japanese men. But the new, ultra-realistic silicon sex dolls that enjoy growing popularity are beyond creepy.


Generations away from your typical, cheap, blow-up-doll from yesterday, the creations from the Superior Structure Artistic Silicon Doll Team, or shorter: Project Level-D are looking amazingly real. Horribly real.

Look at the facial expressions and the suggestive, pseudo innocent poses in which the various models are presented. They either appear sad, melancholic or as if they just died, still inviting you to do whatever you like to their multi-joined latex bodies.


Meet the proud owner of a harem of Level-D models. This young man, who decided that he just could not get along with real women, paid ca. $6.000,- for every one of his "girls".

Will it be long before the next generation of "animated" models will invade the living- and bedrooms of these men?

Sushi Assembly Line

Make sure to watch in high-resolution


This is exactly the kind of late night programming that some German TV-programs would use to air: webcam movies from all over the world, vintage NASA space programs or station to station train rides through Siberia. Usually this would be better than the day time programming.

These guys here have put a video camera on a sushi conveyor and added some fragile music. This could go on for hours and I would only wish that the "creators" would have stayed out of it. Their presence is a bit annoying as is their "creative reasoning" why they did this. For once Youtube comments are bringing some focus to the table: "It´s just a camera on a conveyor belt in a sushi bar!"

International Heaven

What an international mix: American Michael Arias (aka Maikeru Ariasu), a SFX specialist who would become the first foreign director of a major anime-movie in Japan ("Tekkon Kinkreet") has now finished his first live-action movie: A remake of a German tragic-comedy.

Arias´"Heaven´s Door" is a take on "Knocking on Heaven´s Door" by German taxi-driver-turned-director-turned-hack Thomas Jahn. The soundtrack is once more delivered by British electronica duo Plaid. The original movie is set in Germany, the remake is relocated to Tokyo.


Plaid also did the very impressive music for Arias´ "Tekkon Kinkreet" which was released as a regular soundtrack and as a remix album.

Plaid, who were once part of The Black Dog, have specialised their music as a mix of pseudo-oriental, fractal melodies with lots of exotic, polyrhythmic percussion.
On "Tekkon..." Plaid were the perfect match to the fantastic, overwhelming vision of a clattered, futuristic metropolis. Especially the fist and last tracks ("This City" and "White´s Dream") are some of their best compositions.


It could be said that that the music for "Heaven´s Door" is a bit Plaid-by-numbers, but that would be unfair without having seen the movie. Have a listen to Hydrosphere (click the arrow for embedded stream) which has those trademark fragile, fluttering melodies that sound like ice-crystals melting away in the sun. It´s clearly one of the highlights of the album.


"Knocking on Heaven´s Door" is the story of two people who meet at a hospital, discovering that they are both terminally ill. When one of them claims that he has never seen the ocean, they decide to run away, fulfilling this last wish. The German original is a classic buddy-movie with two guys as the protagonists. The Japanese remake changes the setting to a boy/girl scenario, which surely adds some romantic possibilities to the drama.

Spot Checker

click pics to enlarge (very large)

When I was a kid my parents used to have one of those triptych bathroom mirrors with which you could create your private endless hall of mirrors. I think it was my first encounter with optical illusions and I must have spent hours losing my three-year old mind inside this green shimmering imaginary corridor.

Japanese superheroine artist Yayoi Kusama is obsessed with dots, spots, and reflections to infinity since she was ten years old. In 1939 she began to paint and cover everything around her with dots.


During the 1960s she stayed in New York were she created her most famous paintings, objects and happenings. Yayoi was pop-art personified but somehow she was even too far ahead for her own good. In the early 1970s she started her own fashion company and a semi-pornographic magazine. Without financial backing she soon had to close shop.

Broke and depressed she returned to Japan where she decided to go on living in a mental hospital. She kept on working and exhibiting and only a few weeks ago, one of her paintings was sold for over $ 5 million, which makes her the highest rated living female artist.


Some of her fascinating installations - like the above pictured - "The gleaming lights of souls" are completely mirrored rooms that are filled with constantly changing lights. Totally amazing!

Caught Japandering again...

Attack of the 50 ft. Gaijin


Go Girl


YeYe 1967

Kindertrauma

I came across this strange video of a Japanese artist/entertainer Maywa Denki who builds all these primitive, mechanical, noise making gadgets.
Well, the first part of this video is quite bizarre - even for a kiddie program. I immediately thought about what effect some of this would have had on me if I had watched it as a child. I would have been traumatized! There is something really eerie about those twitching "Geisha"-girls and let´s not even talk about the singing.



Thinking about this, I remembered some things that frightened me as a child. Things that nobody else would find memorable scared the shit out of me.
I remember listening to the radio while being home alone one evening. I was a single child and even up to the age of 10 I didn´t like being alone in the dark. It must have been around 1977 and the DJ enthusiastically announced a track from Kraftwerk´s new album. I heard "Autobahn" before, so I was looking forward to it. The track was "Schaufensterpuppen" (Showroom Dummies) and I remember to this day that I found it horribly disturbing.

The clanging beat, the spooky "choir" and the lifeless but threatening words worked up fear in my mind. The idea of creepy Showroom Dummies coming to life, breaking the glass and crawling the streets was really frightening me. Back then the irony of "going to the club and starting to dance" was totally lost on me. Instead I looked down the street through my window because I knew that only three houses down, there were real showroom dummies waiting...

I actually wanted to post the German version because its lyrics and sounds are much more intimidating than the English and French translations, but when I found this video-clip of "Showroom Dummies" I just had to post it. If you watch it to the end you will see Kraftwerk dancing! This will scare you too, no matter how old you are!



Thinking about this I remembered a website called Kindertrauma ("Your happy childhood ends here) which recollects and re-visits scenes and moments of cheesy horror flicks which scared you as a toddler.

Kindertrauma is of course dealing with the horrors American TV was inflicting on kids. It is full of retro-stuff you might not know if you haven´t watched US channels in the seventies or eighties.
Interestingly there are also contributions by younger readers who share their traumatizing Tv-moments. A Pepsi-Ad from 1995 was seen by some as nightmare inducing as a Busta Rhymes Video.

Ahh, that Busta Rhymes clip for "Gimme some mo`"! While I was 30 when this was on the air, I can totally understand the effect this could have on kids. The Bernhard Herrman -sample from Psycho alone makes the song creepy and there is something about the whole look of this thing that is very unsettling. This was directed by Hype Williams who did some of the most memorable videos during the last half of the nineties (and one of the best ever with "She´s a Bitch"). I wonder why he never moved into feature films.

Honk if you´re Bionic!

Watch and listen: "Love Me" by Capsule





"Truly Trionic" and "Jolene Machine" by Philip Castle. Click on the autobods for enlargement.

More on the amazing Capsule in the near future.

Japandering

Why watch old, Japanese movie trailers and commercials? Because -thanks to Youtube- we can!

One of these faces doesn´t belong here:

It´s Marilyn, of course.


This is Ex-Bond girl Mie Hama, who was a major star in Japanese cinema of the 60s and 70s. Internationally known for her role as Kissy Suzuki in "You only live twice", she was also seen in many Toho-monster movies and in the Crazy Cats-comedies. In this commercial she flips a pancake and twists many, many levers.

Legend has it, that Mie threatened to commit ritual suicide when the Bond-producers threatened to replace her, because of her bad english! Who knows what she did to get this job.

Speaking of Mie Hama and the Crazy Cats. For obvious reasons, this musical comedy act is totally unknown outside of Japan. Our loss!
These cats were at least as much fun as the Rat-Pack!
The trailer for their "Las Vegas, free for all" is totally amazing. It looks like a mix of "Oceans Eleven", "It´s a mad...world", "Viva Las Vegas" and 1000 beach-blanket flicks. Oh, The Peanuts (and a stylish Pan-Am bag) are also making an appearance:



Bathing culture is as Japanese as it gets, and this spot is probably only a little bit alien to us gaijin. In Japan, sumo-sized men in tiny bathtubs are as common as an Godzilla attack:


Yellow Magic Orchestra. Always selling out:



James Coburn, who went from manliest man alive to a man who looks like an old lesbian, is selling out too in one of the countless "japander"-commercials for Lark Cigarettes.

For more (much more) American celebrities "japandering" their faces for Japanese products and lots of yen, visit the amazing Japander.com. It´s a great A-Z library of first-class prostitution.

Which brings us to Andy Warhol! We all know the spot Andy did for TDK, but did you know that he also did one for Quicksilver? No? Well...see for yourself:
(genius and kirei!)

Rick it !

I am a sucker for Japanese product-design. And sucking is definately on my mind after checking those delicious "Ice Candy"-packages over at the lovely PingMag.


Since it is so hot out here in the Prairie today I am in desperate need of some iced treats, even if they were made out of beans, which - surprise - some of those Japanese Ice-Candies actually are!


Despite some exotic ingredients which mostly are incredibly healthy and incredibly yucky for western tastebuds, those small frozen treats look wonderful with - or without packaging.
I also can´t stop admiring the constant use of pastels in Japanese design.


So, "green tea"-icecream, eh?! I am sure it won´t take long until the "wellness-mafia" will market this for for the western market as a cure for everything.


Meanwhile I am still contemplating the licking and sucking part of it all.

Before & After & After

3 Matterhorns: Switzerland, Disneyland, Nara Dreamland

Hello Kitty Horror Punk

The Hello Kitty AK-47 is the must have urban self protective item for every fashionable pre-manga-girl. Shower them with love. Over and over again.

Below: This is artwork for japanese "horror punk band" Balzac. This little dammned Hello Kitty blob of a marketing icon is really everywhere.

From Kitty Hell

Receptionists

When I was in Tokyo for the first time in the winter of 1992 I came across many late teenagers who appeared to be totally stressed and fatigued.
It was explained to me that they were in the final stages of the long process to enter university.

I heard bizarre stories that it was not unusual for parents to enlist their fresh-born babies for acceptance tests to be taken 18 years into the future. Those tests were said to be so tough that japanese kids are actually just going to school to learn for these tests.
My host, a Japanese guy who grew up and went to school in Germany, was currently studying at Tokyo University.

Of course I was curious how he managed those tests, without ever going to school in Japan. He told me that his main study was German language and history. He apparantly received his test-papers, read them, corrected them and walked out. This must have been so embarrasing for his tutors that they gave him his immatriculation right away.I was also told that many families would/could only enlist their son(s) for the university. Either for financial reasons or some sexist bullshit.

So when the girls would finish school they would find work as "Receptionists" in the countless department stores and shops of Tokyos sprawling, five city-centres. I came across this brigade of incredibly beautiful, immaculately groomed and uniformed girls everywhere. It was not unusual to be greeted by 8 or 10 of them while entering a shop. They would stand there, neatly lined up, they opened the doors for you and would tell you how pleased they were to open the doors for you.Nobody could tell me about the career possibilities for these girls, each of them looking like a supermodel or at least a Stewardess from the most luxurious first-class Airline.

Apparantly they are expected to find a man and marry. After all, each new year brings an abundance of highly educated young women who were not enlisted for the university test upon their birth..
These wonderful pictures are taken by japanese photographer Junko Takahashi. The book The Receptionist is her first to be published in the USA.

Kylie said to Towa: German Bold Italic

Now if this isn´t high-concept...Japanese producer meets Australian "in limbo" popstar and they make a record about a typeface! Yes, a typeface! A non existing typeface!

Towa Tei, went back to Tokyo after leaving Deee-Lite and became a hipster phenomenon with his first solo album "Future listening" in 1995. Along with fellow japanese pop-stars Pizzicato Five he brought back Bossa Nova with a distinct hi-tech-twist to western metropolitans.

In 1997 Kylie Minogue was drying off after her success with Nick Cave and was about to re-establish herself as a sort of indie-brit-camp-pop-superstar, or something to that effect.
We all know it would take another three years and some wardrobe which was about to malfunction at any moment before that plan would work out.

I have no idea about the impact this collaboration made on the worldwide charts, but I think it was not exactly a smash. (O.K. it was a moderate hit in Japan).

Quite unfair, it should have been big! And here is why:

- Great, bouncy electro-house with big production
- Lyrics that mostly consist of the words "German", "bold" and "gut, ja?"
- Kylie as a demented Geisha (only Björk, Madonna and Aneka would have this idea!)
- Quirky Japanese who looks like Andy Warhol as a japanese mannequin and moves like a robot from Düsseldorf.
- Having Haruomi Hosono of Yellow Magic Orchestra saying the words "German bold italic" and leading Kylie on a leash (sound cable), which is in itself a nod to YMO´s first album-cover.
- Video intro spoofs TV-sex ads and is done by The Gentle People.
- It uses bits of "Groove is in the Heart".
- It´s a song about a typeface!

So why wasn´t this a hit again???
Watch it and decide:



I could watch this over and over again and it sounds massive as a proper recording.
Anyway, they must have had so much fun that they came back for another colaboration "Sometimes Samurai" in 2005, which again samples YMO.

More on Towa Tei and colleagues coming soon.