How it all began
Trying to chronicle where the Ayu stuff began
It started innocently enough. It was the yearly “Two weeks off work for Wimbledon” which involves an unhealthy amount of tennis watching and not a lot more. But then, being at home for all that time, I tend to play around with stuff. I’d recently purchased a new iPod, and was checking out the iTunes store. I noticed that at the bottom of the page, you could change your region. I quickly set it to America, to see if there was any Kanye West tracks I was missing (there wasn’t). I then thought, hmm, what are the Japanese listening to?
This thought wasn’t spurred on by any fondness of anime or other Japanese culture interests. I was into gaming, and did own a few Japanese games, mainly for novelty value - what with their funny writing and all. The number one song at the time was “BLUEBIRD” by Ayumi Hamasaki. Okay, quite a cheery song, not something I was really into, but pleasant enough. No idea what she was singing about though. On a whim, I tried to purchase it. Of course, iTunes doesn’t let you buy songs from other countries, which is a real shame, and a pain as well. They’d get more money, so why not? Legal reasons I guess.
I was still in the impulsive mood of wanting to listen to the full song, so Googled the song, and found that Play-Asia sold it. Success! It was quite cheap as well (about £7 all in) so I clicked buy and that was that. A week or so passed, and the cd turned up in the post. What was this strange paper wrap around the spine of the case, and why did a single have so many tracks?
I gave it a listen, and enjoyed it. The dance remix of the song was a particular highlight. I became more curious about Ayumi, and soon purchased a couple of her albums - (miss)understood and I am… That was that for a while, I’d got a few foreign albums to listen to, nice curios, but nothing serious. At this point I was still heavily into hip-hop, and that stayed the same for a while.
In 2007 I became aware of A BEST 2. Ah, why not? I got the White version (with upbeat songs) and gave it a good listen. I also checked out the concert DVD which was bundled in. It was impressive stuff. Not really being a concert goer, the whole spectacle was really cool to watch, and it introduced me to more of her songs. A copy of Black was soon on its way.
I was becoming increasingly less enthused about hip-hop. It was changing (in my mind) into something I didn’t like any more. I’ll still attest to 2004-2005 being the highlight of the genre. Sooo much good stuff around at that time. My self-burnt cdr’s were increasingly filled with Ayumi Hamasaki songs instead of Kanye ones. I was starting to try and learn a bit of the language - I was listening to it a lot, so wanted an idea of what she was singing about. I’d printed off some translation sheets in the past, but actually figuring it out myself would be a fun task.
I purchased a Japanese dictionary, and started listening to “teach yourself Japanese” podcasts. In songs, certain words will appear again and again - at least to a non-native speaker. I wanted to find out what these meant, just to get a basic grasp on the sentence structure and if words were vowels, verbs etc… I also taught myself to read katakana and hiragana, which would become very useful. Kanji were a whole other complicated mess - I’d give those a miss.
Up until this point, it was only Ayu I was listening too. I can’t remember how or why, but I downloaded a torrent of Namie Amuro’s “Queen of Hip-Pop” at some point. This was interesting, as it was more r’n’b-ish than Ayu - more like a Japanese version of an English song I would normally listen to. From there, I became aware of VERBAL from m-flo. They are a hip-hop group who are known for their many collaborations with other Japanese artists. I got one of their albums, and soon widened my horizons to other Japanese acts.
I purchased an a-nation collaboration album to try and find other songs I liked the sound of. Kumi Koda’s “With Your Smile” was on there. This was by far the highlight - and from then I was quickly buying up her albums too.
TBC
It started innocently enough. It was the yearly “Two weeks off work for Wimbledon” which involves an unhealthy amount of tennis watching and not a lot more. But then, being at home for all that time, I tend to play around with stuff. I’d recently purchased a new iPod, and was checking out the iTunes store. I noticed that at the bottom of the page, you could change your region. I quickly set it to America, to see if there was any Kanye West tracks I was missing (there wasn’t). I then thought, hmm, what are the Japanese listening to?
This thought wasn’t spurred on by any fondness of anime or other Japanese culture interests. I was into gaming, and did own a few Japanese games, mainly for novelty value - what with their funny writing and all. The number one song at the time was “BLUEBIRD” by Ayumi Hamasaki. Okay, quite a cheery song, not something I was really into, but pleasant enough. No idea what she was singing about though. On a whim, I tried to purchase it. Of course, iTunes doesn’t let you buy songs from other countries, which is a real shame, and a pain as well. They’d get more money, so why not? Legal reasons I guess.
I was still in the impulsive mood of wanting to listen to the full song, so Googled the song, and found that Play-Asia sold it. Success! It was quite cheap as well (about £7 all in) so I clicked buy and that was that. A week or so passed, and the cd turned up in the post. What was this strange paper wrap around the spine of the case, and why did a single have so many tracks?
I gave it a listen, and enjoyed it. The dance remix of the song was a particular highlight. I became more curious about Ayumi, and soon purchased a couple of her albums - (miss)understood and I am… That was that for a while, I’d got a few foreign albums to listen to, nice curios, but nothing serious. At this point I was still heavily into hip-hop, and that stayed the same for a while.
In 2007 I became aware of A BEST 2. Ah, why not? I got the White version (with upbeat songs) and gave it a good listen. I also checked out the concert DVD which was bundled in. It was impressive stuff. Not really being a concert goer, the whole spectacle was really cool to watch, and it introduced me to more of her songs. A copy of Black was soon on its way.
I was becoming increasingly less enthused about hip-hop. It was changing (in my mind) into something I didn’t like any more. I’ll still attest to 2004-2005 being the highlight of the genre. Sooo much good stuff around at that time. My self-burnt cdr’s were increasingly filled with Ayumi Hamasaki songs instead of Kanye ones. I was starting to try and learn a bit of the language - I was listening to it a lot, so wanted an idea of what she was singing about. I’d printed off some translation sheets in the past, but actually figuring it out myself would be a fun task.
I purchased a Japanese dictionary, and started listening to “teach yourself Japanese” podcasts. In songs, certain words will appear again and again - at least to a non-native speaker. I wanted to find out what these meant, just to get a basic grasp on the sentence structure and if words were vowels, verbs etc… I also taught myself to read katakana and hiragana, which would become very useful. Kanji were a whole other complicated mess - I’d give those a miss.
Up until this point, it was only Ayu I was listening too. I can’t remember how or why, but I downloaded a torrent of Namie Amuro’s “Queen of Hip-Pop” at some point. This was interesting, as it was more r’n’b-ish than Ayu - more like a Japanese version of an English song I would normally listen to. From there, I became aware of VERBAL from m-flo. They are a hip-hop group who are known for their many collaborations with other Japanese artists. I got one of their albums, and soon widened my horizons to other Japanese acts.
I purchased an a-nation collaboration album to try and find other songs I liked the sound of. Kumi Koda’s “With Your Smile” was on there. This was by far the highlight - and from then I was quickly buying up her albums too.
TBC
この犬は私のです
Everyone likes dogs right? Well, here is mine:
She was losing her hair a bit, so I got her a nice doggie coat from some pet shop in Odaiba. She seemed to like it, and it was the perfect fit
But as it is now summer, she's got a short haircut to keep cool with
She was losing her hair a bit, so I got her a nice doggie coat from some pet shop in Odaiba. She seemed to like it, and it was the perfect fit
But as it is now summer, she's got a short haircut to keep cool with
London ロンドン
Well, it was a sunny day on Saturday, so me and my mate thought
we'd pretend to be tourists in our own city, haha.
All the tourists seem to hang around Trafalgar Square up to Westminster,
so we hit up there.
We then went to the Langham Hotel, the first time I'd been that
way since I met Ayu there in January. It was certainly a lot warmer now,
although Ayu was nowhere to be seen
We'd been walking for a while (the Tube is for wimps!) so we
had to have a sit-down for a bit. Cavendish Square Park
is, in my opinion, the nicest little park in the city.
Then I went and had rest.
Goodbye!
we'd pretend to be tourists in our own city, haha.
All the tourists seem to hang around Trafalgar Square up to Westminster,
so we hit up there.
We then went to the Langham Hotel, the first time I'd been that
way since I met Ayu there in January. It was certainly a lot warmer now,
although Ayu was nowhere to be seen
We'd been walking for a while (the Tube is for wimps!) so we
had to have a sit-down for a bit. Cavendish Square Park
is, in my opinion, the nicest little park in the city.
Then I went and had rest.
Goodbye!