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Your Guide to Design and Pop Culture in Tokyo

Aug 24, 2005

RATN: J

RATN: J

I was late discovering Tujiko Noriko, but I’ve become a fan, and this new collaboration album, RATN: J, sounds like something I’m set to enjoy (as well as news of the new Disques Corde label).

In the first of a series of collaborations this summer, Tujiko Noriko teams up with Japanese breakbeat master Riow Arai (forthcoming are albums with Aoki Takamasa and Australian Lawrence English). As Arai is known for massive rhythm constructions, and also from the funky visuals used to promote the album one would expect a punkish array of driving beats backing up Tujiko’s fragile voice. But as a matter of fact, the Paris-based chanteuse is responsible for all the music, and consulted primarily Arai’s producing skills. The result is a very personal yet refined, and surprisingly wide-ranged collection of songs. After a set of similarly titled, rather unexciting opening numbers, the album gradually reveals its true beauty, and even though comparison is always tricky and better avoided, sooner or later Bjork will surely pop up in most listener’s mind. “J” marks the first release of Disques Corde, the new platform for high-quality music set up by Hara Masaaki (Soup-Disk) and Shonai Masayuki (Onsa). Watch out for more good stuff to come from here. (REALTOKYO)

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PauseTalk

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 happens June 4.

We hereby define a new term, that of the magaziner, described as a person who exerts an unhealthy amount of love for all things magazine. The Magaziner is a site that mostly focuses on the intersection between magazines and the digital frontier, and what it means for the medium. This does not preclude the inclusion of a healthy amount of print love.

Codex is a weekly music podcast hosted by Jean Snow, recorded in Tokyo. Playlists for all episodes are posted on the site, and you can subscribe to RSS feeds of posts and episodes.

Jean Snow is a contributor to Arcade Mania, your guide to the arcade gaming scene in Japan (Amazon US/Amazon Japan). He also provided assistance on Tokyolife: Art and Design, a guide to Tokyo's cultural output of the past few years, covering the works of over 80 influential creatives.
He will be contributing to the upcoming fifth editions of The Rough Guide to Tokyo and The Rough Guide to Japan, due for release in 2011.
PechaKucha

Jean Snow is Executive Director of the PechaKucha organization. He also helps run the PechaKucha Night in Tokyo -- please get in touch if you are interested in presenting at a future event. For a more intimate salon-like discussion group, join him at his monthly PauseTalk event.

A longtime resident of Tokyo, he lives and breathes design, pop culture, and gaming, sustained by an unhealthy addiction to magazines and frequent visits to his favorites cafes. He has reported on these obsessions for various online/offline publications, including the following: Time, Inside (Australian Design Review), Gizmodo, Gridskipper, Kotaku, 1UP, Tokyo Q, Superfuture, OK Fred, Arthur Frommer's Budget Travel, I.D. (International Design), Metropolis, Azure, MoCo Loco, Kateigaho International Edition, Wired's Game|Life, PingMag, CNNGo, Phaidon, and The Japan Times.

You can subscribe to an RSS feed of this site, and also follow him on Twitter and Facebook, or get in touch by email.

 

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The "Jean Snow" logo is written using the free Kirimomi Swash 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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