Burnt Jam

"思い出は億千万"

2010-02-01T23:23:00.007-05:00

思い出は億千万 (Omoide wa Okkusenman/Memories are 110 Billion)

When I was a child, I did these things
Faded memories, wearing red and white hat on my head
Ultraman! Ultraman Seven!

When I was a child, dear memories
When I ate curry and such, silver spoons on my eyes
Ultraman! Ultraman Seven!

But, now, I’ve forgotten such things
I feel like I’m being chased by something everyday

Even if I look back (In forgotten albums)
To those times (I’m doing stupid things)
I can’t go back (Laughing with friends)
Ultraman! Ultraman Seven!

Those guys now, where are they? What are they doing?
The answer is blurred
Ultraman! Ultraman Seven!

But, now, I’ve forgotten such things
I feel like I’m being chased by something everyday

The courage you gave me was 110 BILLION! 110 BILLION!
The seasons that passed were dramatic

When I was a child, I did these things
Wearing 3D glasses that came with the magazines
Ultraman! Ultraman Seven!

When I became an adult, forgotten memories
Revived vividly, making the letter L with our arms
Ultraman! Ultraman Seven!

But, now, I’ve forgotten such things
I feel like I’m being chased by something everyday

Even if I look back (Old diaries open)
To those times (On the faded pages)
I can’t go back (My first love’s name)
Ultraman! Ultraman Seven!

Merely looking back at those times, I can laugh with innocence
I didn’t know dirty things
Ultraman! Ultraman Seven!

But, now, I’ve forgotten such things
I feel like I’m being chased by something everyday

The scenery that I overlooked was 110 BILLION! 110 BILLION!
The seasons that passed were graffiti

The courage you gave me was 110 BILLION! 110 BILLION!
The seasons that passed were dramatic

JAPANESE

So, until I start intensively start covering traditional folk songs, this will be one of the few times where the original songwriter is unknown... sort of. I'll try to explain.

The music for this song comes to us from the NES (or ファミコン/Famicom in Japan) game, Mega Man 2 (or, again, ロックマン２/Rockman 2 in Japan) released in 1988. Composed by then-Capcom video game music composer, Manami Matsumae, the song was titled simply "Wily's Castle (Dr. Wily Stage 1)" as it was the final stage in the game. The original song can be heard here.

In 2007, using a rock arrangement of the song (commonly credited to a group or a person known as Family CoMcert) a user uploaded a video of Mega Man 2 footage along with karaoke style lyrics on the bottom. A few weeks later, an individual named "ゴム (Gomu)" uploaded a version of him singing the lyrics over the Family CoMcert version. While, it'd be hard to classify his singing as "good" there's something about his off-key screaming that really fits.

It all took off from there. On both YouTube, and NicoNico Douga (Japanese equivalent of YouTube), hundreds of users uploaded their versions and remixes and covers of the song. While some were straight forward, karaoke-style attempts, others um... took the song in a whole other direction. Others took the arrangement to their guitar or piano or violin.

The song became such a big hit that Gomu's version of the song was featured on a Nico Nico Douga sponsored album and a version done by music group JAM Project, a super-group made up of famous anime theme song singers, on a different Nico Nico Douga album.

What's funny about the lyrics, is that they actually have nothing to do with Mega Man and instead focus primarily on Ultraman. Regardless, the subject matter is something anyone can relate to, whether you grew up with Ultraman or not. In Japanese, my favorite word is "natsukashii" (懐かしい）. In the entire time that I've known this word, I have never been able to find a decent English translation for that word. Sometimes, it's translated as "nostalgic." In this song, it's used in the second verse, in this context I translated it as "dear." My Casio electronic dictionary defines it as "good old," which is closer I suppose.

However, there is no one word in English that accurately defines "natsukashii." It's best described as the feeling you get when you hear or see something or whatever that makes you think or say "Man, this really brings back memories" whatever it may be.

I honestly, LOVE this feeling. I've spent several hours watching old commercials on YouTube and reading articles about various things from my childhood. I've really come to embrace this attitude. I don't own any of the recent video game systems, but a few years back, I spent $50 on an NES and games. If I find them, I'll always buy DVDs of shows I remember. The fact that there's a single word in Japanese that precisely explains this feeling is awesome to me.

This song embodies the meaning of "natsukashii." From the fact that it uses music from a 20-year-old video game right down to the lyrics. When you reach a certain age, everyone looks back on their childhood and wonders what happened to such simpler times. Times when we didn't know such cruelties of the world. Times when we simply laughed innocently and acted out as our favorite heroes from television.

For me, around the time that I was in 1st grade, possibly one of the biggest shows was Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers. I still have vivid memories of running around at recess with my friends, pretending to be Power Rangers. While, several of my friends remain to be my friends to this day, I can't help but wonder what happened to the ones who I've lost touch with. Much like the song asks: "Where are they? What are they doing?"

To this day, the original writer of the lyrics is unknown. According to the Wikipedia page on the song:

The original writer of the song's lyrics is unknown.^[10] When Nico Nico Douga attempted to discover the song's proper writer to include the song in one of their CDs^[11], their campaign was unsuccessful and determined that it was written as a collaboration of users in the Nico Nico Douga and Japanese internet communities.^[12]

I mentioned traditional folk songs at the beginning of this post, and, in my opinion anyway, this really qualifies as a "modern-day traditional folk song." Although not being of the folk genre, the song has the same qualities as many traditional folk songs. The tune derived from an original source (in this case, Matsumae's Mega Man song), only for lyrics to develop from the tune. Although the writer is unknown, varieties of the song were written and subsequently launched the song into popular culture. It's nice to think that even in this day in age with record producers and record labels and such. Songs can still be written and made in a traditional manner.

While, the version at the top of the page remains my favorite (it's a remix of this version and Gomu's version), here's others that I like:

This almost live version supposedly features Gomu himself. Along with some other dudes wearing animal masks on piano and guitar.
This version is seemingly done in the style of metal band, X Japan. Seeing as X Japan is one of my favorite bands ever... it's easy to see why I like it. That version from before features the music put to the awesome animation someone made explaining the story in the song, but there's also a video that puts it with seamlessly edited footage of X Japan's Last Live concert. Both are awesome.
This version done on a KORG.*
This live version performed at some sort of huge anime theme singer concert festival... thing. Features several people from the aforementioned JAM Project. While the arrangement isn't anything that special, it's really cool to see it performed at such a big setting. Plus, the singing is top notch.*

*Link to Nico Nico Douga. Requires account.

P.S This site talks about the Okkusenman "revolution" in more detail and includes links to tons of versions. Many of which I used on here.

"on the まゆ毛～切りすぎて～" GO!GO!7188

2010-01-11T12:13:00.008-05:00

on the まゆ毛～切りすぎて～　(on the eyebrow ~cut too much~)

GO!GO!7188

I cut my bangs too much!
I cut my bangs too much!

My bangs look like a Kokeshi Doll!
My bangs look like a Kokeshi Doll!

I was irritated…
So, I cut it by myself with scissors!

On the eyebrow on the eyebrow
On the eyebrow on the eyebrow (I cut too much!)
On the eyebrow on the eyebrow
On the eyebrow on the eyebrow (I cut too much!)

My bangs are “dakadaka”!
My bangs are “dakadaka”!

I have a feeling…
That kid is staring at my forehead!

On the eyebrow on the eyebrow
On the eyebrow on the eyebrow (I cut too much!)
On the eyebrow on the eyebrow
On the eyebrow on the eyebrow (I cut too much!)

On the eyebrow on the eyebrow
On the eyebrow on the eyebrow (I cut too much!)
On the eyebrow on the eyebrow
On the eyebrow on the eyebrow (Looks like a Kokeshi doll!!!!)
On the eyebrow on the eyebrow
On the eyebrow on the eyebrow (I cut too much!)
On the eyebrow on the eyebrow
On the eyebrow on the eyebrow (I cut too much!)

JAPANESE

*I'm not sure of the meaning of "dakadaka." Possibly Kagoshima dialect.

**Translated by me. If you want to post somewhere else, please let me know**

GO!GO!7188 are a Japanese punk rock trio out of Kagoshima. The story goes that lead guitarist Yumi "Yuu" Nakashima" and bassist Akiko "Akko" Hamada (now Noma after marrying in 2006) played in a JUDY AND MARY cover band in high school. After graduating, Yumi and Akiko moved to Tokyo to continue playing music. It was there that they met drummer "Turkey" while they were in junior college. In 1998, they three of them formed GO!GO!7188 (to this day, the meaning of the band name is only known by the members).

In 2000, they released their first single Taiyou (太陽　meaning: "sun"). From then, GO!GO! has always had a very varied sound. I guess the proper title would be "punk-surf-rock-pop-enka."

On their 2009 release Antenna （アンテナ）, GO!GO! decided to add "metal" to their growing list of genres. In an article with The Japan Times Akiko said:

"The first thing was that we wanted to make a song with twin-pedal kick drum in it...And we wanted Turkey to shout. Those were the two critical points in making that song."

The result was "on the mayuge ~kirisugite~" (trans: on the eyebrow ~cut too much~). A metal song about cutting your bangs too short.

GO!GO! aren't strangers to making comedic songs, as one of their most famous songs JETTO NINJIN (literally, Jet Carrot) definitely shows their humorous side (along with the music video for it). "on the mayuge" definitely falls into that category.

From Akiko's previous quote, it was obvious that lyrics were not a factor when writing this song. But then again, I honestly can't see GO!GO! writing a metal song with serious lyrics. Yumi's high pitched voice coupled with Turkey's back-up screaming goes surprisingly well with the music. It all comes together to make one pretty catchy metal song and a nice first attempt for GO!GO! at writing a metal song. Though, I wouldn't want to see too much of this type of song from GO!GO! in the future.

"Discovery" Daft Punk

2009-12-14T23:19:00.001-05:00

I thought for a while what I should make my first post about. Should it be my favorite album ever? The aforementioned Frank Zappa album? A recent album? An album I just bought? But in the end, I realized that I should write about the first album I ever bought with my own money.

And by this point it should be obvious that it was Daft Punk's "Discovery" album released in 2001.

I first discovered Daft Punk when I was around 12 or 13 years old. Thanks to my friend who introduced me to anime, a the video for One More Time (what I learned later was part of the Interstella 5555 movie made from the Discovery album) would play fairly often on the Cartoon Network television channel. Of course, it also helped that the song was featured in a Victoria's Secret commercial at the time too.

Underwear models aside, the music itself was pretty awesome as well. It was catchy, it was upbeat, it was fun, it was just cool, man. Seeing as I was a teenager growing up in the suburbs of Vermont, I didn't even know what a rave was at this point, and disco was just an old kind of music that was supposed to be bad. Although, the Daft Punk duo have stated that Discovery is an homage to the music of their childhood in the 70s and 80s, to my 13-year-old self living in a time before everyone and their mother was using auto-tune, this was the music of the 21st Century.

Receiving a gift card to FYE for my Bar Mitzvah, I knew exactly what I was going to spend it on. Of course, buying an album with only hearing one track is not usually a good idea, but hey, I had Cartoon Network and Victoria's Secret on my side! Needless to say, I did not regret the purchase one bit. Discovery was played on an old portable CD player my dad handed down to me on almost every car trip my family had. When we went to Virginia, a 12 hour drive, it would be played multiple times. To this day, it remains one of my favorite albums ever.

Starting off with the previously mentioned One More Time, those electronic horns in the intro signaled the start of something big. By the time the bass beat comes in, if your head isn't bopping to the beat, I'm sorry, but you just have no groove. One More Time ends and starts the second track, Aerodynamic, seamlessly with a gong. The completely-instrumental track continues to build on itself throughout the song, it starts off with a funky enough beat, before going into some raw guitar shredding (which has remained as my alarm on my cell phone for quite a while now). From there, it combines the first beat with the shredding until it completely changes to a much quieter 80s synth riff which picks up it's own bass beat as well. Aerodynamic ends with a gong and wind sound effect into Digital Love, a 21st century disco song that borrows a riff from a George Duke song, and a crazy guitar solo enhanced with music sequencers.

The fourth track of the album, Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger, is probably Daft Punk's most famous song. Gaining fame in recent years due to YouTube Videos and this guy:

Kanye's version would ultimately become more well known than the original Daft Punk version. It still surprises me to this day that most people have no idea that Daft Punk originally wrote the song, seven years prior. Also, when I was in 8th grade, in our rollerskating unit in gym class, the teachers would let us bring in CDs to play while we skated, provided that they were appropriate enough for school. When I tried to bring in my Daft Punk CDs, the teacher nearly refused. She compromised and said I could pick four tracks. I told her to just play from Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger down. She said no, and started from the 5th track instead.

While I don't know this for a fact, I'm sure she played an edited version of Kanye's Stronger when it came out. I mean, if she didn't have CDs, she'd just play Top 40 radio, and that song was all over it at the time. I was way before my time, man.

And to set the record straight, I'd take Daft Punk's version of Kanye's any day of the week.

Anyway, after H,B,F,S came Crescendolls. I always liked this track, despite being a tad repetitive. Though, I always wondered what the people were saying. The liner notes list it as an instrumental, but they're clearly saying something between the "HEEEEEEEYs" and the "HOOOOOOs" and the "LOOK OUT!" But I guess the world will never know. Seeing as the first five tracks make up a pretty energetic (nearly) 20 minutes. You get a minute-forty-four to relax with the slower, calmer, Night Vision. I always thought that Night Vision served as a good break in the album. And you'll need it, because unfortunately, the worst two songs on the albums follow it. While Superheroes is repetitive but still okay, I absolutely cannot stand High Life. I would always skip past it. Still do in fact. It's just loud and repetitive and always made my head hurt. At least in Interstella 5555, you can watch something to take your mind off the annoyance of the music, but when listening to it on headphones... ouch.

Thankfully, we're saved by the slow groove Something About Us. While the subject matter of the song was lost on my 13-year-old ears, I still appreciated the pure funk in the song. The funk continues on in the instrumental Voyager and Veridis Quo. We jump from the 70s to the 80s into Short Circuit and finally return to the retro-modern-electro-pop featured at the beginning with Face To Face.

Finally, we end with the 10 minute, Too Long. Lots of people seem to not like Too Long for, well, being too long. I completely disagree. While the lyrics are a tad repetitive, the music isn't at all. The song does a great job of slowly building up on itself. The song starts off with simply snapping and the vocals. As the song continues, it brings in other things to add to this. First a keyboard and a drum beat. Then a bass riff and another drum before stripping it completely and adding a whole new beat and riff, full of energy. While it uses the same beat until the end, it builds on the energy, so by the end you're ending with the same amount of energy you started with from One More Time. Sure, it's possible that Daft Punk could have done the same exact thing in half the time. But this is the finale of Discovery. The entire album is a Modern-Disco-Opera that has a definite flow. Too Long is the perfect epic finish that it deserves.

In the end, Discovery is a 61-minute musical journey that Daft Punk does an amazing job of taking you on. Even though I still hate High Life, the rest of the album is amazing enough to make me forget about it. In my opinion, Discovery is one of the best albums of this decade, for sure.

If you've never listened to this awesome album, buy it, download it, stream it, do whatever. Just listen to it. If you have listened to it, I definitely recommend watching Interstella 5555. It definitely adds some awesome visuals to the songs, and tells a pretty good story along with it. Think Daft Punk Presents: Fantasia. Also, Daft Punk fans should check out the Alive 2007 album. This live album mixes all three of the Daft Punk studio albums with new stuff to make even more amazing music.

ブログ開設

2009-12-14T17:43:00.001-05:00

So, even though, literally, millions and millions of music blogs exist on the internet, I've decided to add one more. I think the internet can handle it.

Anyway, my name is Nate, and I like music...obviously, or I wouldn't be writing this. I started liking music ever since I heard my dad's cassette of Frank Zappa's "Strictly Commercial: The Best of Frank Zappa." Although, I was quite an anomaly being the only 6th grader in my school who even knew who Frank Zappa was, and didn't listen to KoRn or Limp Bizkit or whatever was popular at the time. From there, my music tastes evolved (and devolved) over time. I started getting into classic rock like Floyd and Zeppelin at first, then I had a terrible period in late middle school where I listened to bad 80s songs, and I had a period of time in high school where the majority of my music collection was metal. And in early college, I turned my back on the Western music scene and listened to stuff mostly from Japan.

But really, this all just factored into what my music tastes are today... practically everything. There's a few genres I don't really care for, like country and hardcore rap and this whiny version of rock that seems to be so popular with the kids these days, but, I'll give everything a try at least once. My music collection has everything from Woody Guthrie to Killswitch Engage, so, it's pretty well varied, I guess.

I started this blog because I like writing, especially about music. So, I decided to give this a try and unleash my opinions about music for the world to see.

Anything else about me? Well, I'm a college student majoring in Japanese (odd, I know) at SUNY Albany, but I grew up in Vermont. I'm not going to list my favorite bands, because that would take DECADES, but, people who are in the know can probably figure out that I'm a fan of Weezer. I still like Zappa. Basically, anything with a loud guitar.

So, sit back and follow along. I can't say that you'll agree with me, but it will be fun anyway.