I’ve been threatening to DJ — well, “music select” — somewhere for a while now, and I’ve decided to finally make it happen this week. On Friday (November 27) I’m introducing something I’m calling PLAY, in which I’ll be setting up my laptop in a corner somewhere at Cafe Pause, and make people listen to a selection of tracks by me, from 21:00 until 23:00 (when the cafe closes). This is not an event proper, it’s just a casual invitation to come hang out and listen to (what I think are) some good tracks. I don’t know if this will become a regular thing, it might, and I may invite others to join me in the “selection” duties in the future.
If you’re wondering how I’m doing this, today I found what looks like the perfect software for my needs, something called Djay. All I wanted was something that would let me transition tracks, and also allow for pre-cueing, which I’ll be able to do courtesy of my ZOOM H2, using it as a USB audio interface. If this all works as well as I’m hoping it will, I can also see us recording a live episode of Radio OK Fred this way.
A few months ago, Jeremy Leslie over on his MagCulture blog posted a detailed — and crowdsourced — map of London’s best magazine stores. At the time I thought it was a terrific idea, and wanted to create something similar for Tokyo. Sure, I already have a few I know, but the best way for this to work is if I can get as many contributions as possible.
So please, let me know what your favorites are — either by leaving a comment or by emailing me. I’ll compile the results, and create a proper map on Google Maps, just like Jeremy did for London.
The French Embassy in Tokyo has recently moved to new premises, and to commemorate this is holding a special exhibition at the old location. “No Man’s Land” (November 26 to January 31) features a vertigo-inducing number of participants, including my fellow Radio OK Fred co-host, Audrey Fondecave.
And speaking of Radio OK Fred — on hiatus since the start of my health problems — I can tell you that we’re planning on recording a new episode soon-ish, and before that you’ll get to hear two episodes that were recorded (but not yet edited) earlier this summer. Here’s a link to the last episode that was uploaded (#14).
Satoshi Kon’s next film is called The Dream Machine, and unlike his previous complex and adult work (Millennium Actress, Tokyo Godfathers, Paprika, Paranoia Agent), is being described as a family-friendly film. Here’s what Kon has to say about the film (taken from this interview):
On the surface, it’s going to be a fantasy-adventure targeted at younger audiences. However, it will also be a film that people who have seen our films up to this point will be able to enjoy. So it will be an adventure that even older audiences can appreciate. There will be no human characters in the film; only robots. It’ll be like a “robot movie” for robots.
The film’s official site now reveals a few images from the film, including the one pictured above. Via /Film.
Very nice to see Matt Alt and his wife Hiroko appear on the cover of this week’s issue of Metropolis, as part of a feature on small business owners — you can read the piece online here.
Information Architects (iA) has begun selling the template for its site as a proper WordPress theme, and is using a “dynamic pricing” strategy to determine the selling price — they talk more about the strategy here. It’s currently selling for $33, but that will be for the first 100 purchases only, which will be followed by a price adjustment.
This could have been a very interesting cafe project, if completed.
In 2008 Japanese architect Hiroki Tanabe developed a small café house of 62 sqm — a two-story complex which has an elongated U shape. On the first floor there is a kitchen and the café doubling as living room. The second floor houses a bedroom and bathroom.
For its new “Night Color” series of black appliances, Panasonic enlisted Cornelius to create music for a special installation at Tokyo Designer’s Week. I didn’t get to see it because I didn’t want to wait in line, but now we get to see a video of it. Via Patrick Benny.
It was indeed a terrific return to PauseTalk (Vol. 35) last night after a skip month, and I’d like to thank everyone — all 30 of you — who attended (and the manager of the cafe thanks everyone for all the drinking). If you haven’t already, do take a look at the great gallery of portraits taken by Max Hodges — he didn’t get everyone, but it’s certainly a nice representation.
Below is a partial list of those who attended — if you are not there, please let me know and I’ll add you right away. The next edition (Vol. 36) happens in three weeks, on December 7.
Last night’s PauseTalk (Vol. 35) was a great one — I’ll have a separate post for the list of participants — but I first wanted to share a terrific gallery of portraits that Max Hodges took after the official session was over. I’m not exactly sure what gear he was using, but it included a circular flash and a big box with lots of wires.
Pictured above, Perrine Valli, a French dancer/performance artist in town for a couple of months as she researches a piece on sexual identity, that she will perform at SuperDeluxe on December 1.
Even more than today’s HG House — yes, I know it’s confusing — I really dig Sou Fujimoto’s House H, especially the interior — it has an M.C. Escher meets Muji feel to it. Photographer Iwan Baan has a gallery of 40+ photos from the house. Via Designboom.
PauseTalk is a regular series of events that take place at Cafe Pause on the first Monday of every month, with a start time of 20:00. The idea is to create a forum where Tokyo-based creatives can get together and discuss their own projects, as well as cultural currents of the city. The next edition is December 7.
He writes a monthly column covering Japanese product design for The Japan Times, called "On Design." It appears on the fourth Thursday of every month, in both the print edition and online. He also contributes a weekly round-up covering the latest product and interior design happenings from Tokyo and Japan for MoCo Loco. It gets posted on Wednesdays.
I'm also a proud member of the Pecha Kucha Night family, working on various projects, including updating Pecha Kucha Daily, a blog that highlights the creativity coming out of PKN events worldwide.
I serve as editor-at-large at Néojaponisme, a web journal covering social and cultural aspects of Japan. Read the manifesto, by founder and chief editor W. David Marx.
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The "Jean Snow" logo is made up of the Blackout open source typeface. The "M31" logo is by Ian Lynam, and is part of a series of 31 unique designs. The site's design is based on the Grid Focus WordPress theme by Derek Punsalan.
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