Japan Live

I almost got lost for a second time in a row going to a cafe called Rain On The Roof in Sangenjyaya because, well, the place IS a challenge ...

I hadn't realized this until last night, but the pop band Round Table is a somewhat different entity from the group known as Round Tabl...

It's hard to beat the Lady Spade . They dance. They're babes. Their act is like something out of TV re-runs of 60's and 70's...

Three members of the splendid Tokyo band Vasallo Crab 75 have gotten together for a side-project called Kanariya , and they did their first...

Nostalgia for school days, a quest for more musical performance space, novelty, and Japan's shrinking population seem to be behind an in...

I'm wondering why I wasn't that impressed with Hoover's Ooover when I saw them live a few years ago. Writing about them in one ...

Lady Spade dance to 'sexy and cute spy music' . Lady Spade sing 'retro Japanese cabaret style' . Lady Spade put on 'dra...

At the Que on Sunday night, after a show by a mellifluous male singer Takamori Yuuki and the joke-loving power pop quartet Stainless , adva...

#10. Murmur The Afternoon of the Marble Design Japanese guitar pop is alive and well! That's the conclusion I reach when listening to th...

For the past few years Japan has been going through a comedy boom that has given birth to a slew of comedians as TV personalities, some of t...

FYI, here's a nice, brief New York Times profile piece on the Koenji music scene. All those tiny yakitori joints and pubs do indeed loo...

Sometimes a song is so good you don't even need to know what the words mean. I love Elis Regina, though I only know a handful of Portuge...

Amagasaki isn't the first destination you'd think of when planning a trip to Japan. Right next to Osaka to the west, it's an ind...

Every year, on November 26, advantage Lucy, Vasallo Crab 75 and other bands gather together for a musical event called Munekyun Arpeggio , w...

After seeing Japanese-German indie pop band Miniskirt for the first time in years last night, I was exploring the Web and unearthed this br...

I was supposed to see Mix Market and a promising young band from Aichi prefecture called SpecialThanks tonight in Yokohama, but I got comp...

Very sadly, I missed advantage Lucy's 'one man' album-release show at the Que on the 24th, but the next night's gig at the ...

Spangle call Lilli line told me in an interview a few years ago that their next album will be something that challenges the listener and ex...

Commenter san told me about this Halcali video for their song "Girigiri Surf-Rider" and I thought it was the greatest thing and ...