My 2013 Top Ten

Below are the Top 10 list I made for 2013.

[10] Placebo's Loud Like Love http://t.co/iMzKaJMzu8 Lumayan buat kangen-kangenan sama mas Molko dgn rambut jaman Without You I'm Nothing

— Your father (@deadeyedoll_) December 23, 2013

[9] Rob Zombie's Behold! The Pretty, Filthy Creatures http://t.co/uZgGHILewV Flannel & rambut salonnya dibuang, sekarang dekil bau lagi ^^

— Your father (@deadeyedoll_) December 23, 2013

[8] Top's Doom Dada http://t.co/ndmpoK7IwD because if you label this sound as k-pop, then gimme more of that shit

— Your father (@deadeyedoll_) December 23, 2013

[7] Pearl Jam Sleeping by Myself http://t.co/aADuovvDEG 1 dari 3 lagu yang paling ga pengen kedengeran 'galak' di Lightning Bolt

— Your father (@deadeyedoll_) December 23, 2013

[6] Crayon Pop's Dancing Queen 2.0 http://t.co/ZhjyJf8aZ8 semua yang salah, digabung. Their choreographer is working a dream job.

— Your father (@deadeyedoll_) December 23, 2013

[5] Perfume's Spring of Life http://t.co/n3fpBBUenH karena Daito Manabe, dan Kashiyuka tersayang rambutnya bagus deh :3

— Your father (@deadeyedoll_) December 23, 2013

[4] Dear Cloud's Polaris http://t.co/YiR9Lr4OYG i really like the the contents of their Let It Shine EP, but this one's just splendid

— Your father (@deadeyedoll_) December 23, 2013

[3] NIN's Came Back Haunted http://t.co/uwFKJ32oHC albeum favorit ai karena hangat intim & because it's not howtodestroyangels

— Your father (@deadeyedoll_) December 23, 2013

[2] Tricot's おやすみ http://t.co/R2F91tfxaW dikasitau @dare_darou waktu mereka masih bergaya pulang kerjakelompok. Sekarang wis verified kabeh

— Your father (@deadeyedoll_) December 23, 2013

[1] Sebadoh's I Will http://t.co/BC0SmyCXIb nomer wahid, karena mengingatkan lagi betapa kerennya REM di jaman pra-losingmyreligion

— Your father (@deadeyedoll_) December 23, 2013

FISH STORY

 Fisshu Sutori | Yoshihiro Nakamura | 2009

PLOT:
2012, group of men having chit-chat in a record store, discussing an LP of a visionary punk band that was released before the Sex Pistol’s made “punk boom”. A giant comet was seen in broad daylight heading towards earth for apocalypse.

2009, a sleepyhead high school girl was left out in a ship by her schoolmates and experienced terrorist attack, until a brave man arrived and posed the hero.

1982, a cowardly college student trapped in a car with a song that carries mystical rumors in pitch-black midnight, on the road, alone. A scream of a woman was heard.

1975, a loud ruckus of a band is recording their final song because the record label decided to take the lead singer as a solo artist. A novel held responsible for the lyrics it contained.

1950, after the war, a Japanese publishing company is in dire need of translators to keep business afloat. A man came to provide service; he translated an English language novel into wretched nonsense.

NOTES:

Yes, this is one of those movies with different timezones but somehow interconnected to one another. But don't give up all hope; this isn’t Crash or Love Actually. This one’s decent.

Adapted from KotaraIsaka’s novel with the same title, the film asked, “Can music save the world?”.
In this movie, it can. It did.

Instead of focusing on the apocalypse, this movie took a luminous perspective in looking at the whole ‘end of days’ fuss. It’s a brilliant comedy-drama that took 38 years of consequence bearing. I supposed the plot description is clear enough to give you the gist (if not a spoiler), but the main thing in this movie is the character development. There are plenty of rooms for the character to emphasize their personalities, and the cast (also the writers) embraced it splendidly.

Dialogs are sharp, sentences are efficient.

I have no data about the production budget, but the time difference were portrayed appropriately without having any fancy preps and props. It was all done in the delivery; how each story linked to one another by popping up accordingly in different state of time, and how each character complimented its current zone.  I put my applause and highlights to the casts.

Apart from the popular “random fucking” and “pray for all your sins” end-of-the-world choices, are you brave enough to dedicate your remaining time with music, for music’s sake?

Movie Trailer

Gekirin Music Video

MOTHER

마더 (Ma-deo) | Bong Joon Ho | 2009

PLOT:

An anonymous lady lives in a small southern side town of South Korea. She lives off selling herbal medicinal ingredients and practicing illegal acupuncture works for her secret regular customer to feed herself and her son Do-Joon.

As an intellectually challenged man, Do Joon didn't have many friends, apart from Jin Tae; the town’s good-for-nothing unemployed slacker. Problems arose when a high school girl found dead on the roof of the junkyard, and the evidence leads the local police to believe that Do Joon was the murderer. This is the story about a mother’s fight to defend her son’s innocence, as she unraveled the other side of the story from the people she met along the way.

NOTES:

This movie is quite unsettling. 

It felt so close;not too close to triggers memories, but close enough to smack your head and get your attention. This is proper storytelling. 

Kim HyeJa delivered an intense performance; a close up of her face will give you goosebumps in this particular movie. That look, her close ups, will keep you on your seats. Her performance is filled with heartwarming (and wrenching) details of motherly actions, which makes it highly relatable to the audience. 

This movie blends heavyweight content with comical execution skillfully, without turning it into a comedy or a tearjerker drama. It is the in-betweens. Main story aside, there are issues on teenager’s life, social pressures, normative interaction and the stress of being outcasted from the society. Not as an accent or fillers, the issues are wisely dropped to shape relevance to the settings. It serves you layers after layers of uncertainty like a street magician, until the complexity of the story conveyed beautifully; it is blossoming towards the end. 

In the beginning, it’s like the ending. But in the end, it questions everything and answers nothing.

And this is one of the prettiest dramas I’ve ever seen.

 

 

Barefood - Perfect Colour (single)

This song will go a long way.
Years later, this song will trigger many kids to learn the guitar, sing, and start a band.
That is my highest praise for any musician. If I can go higher, I would.

But I'm gonna wait a wee bit more for that. After the official release date, that is.

LINDA LINDA LINDA

LINDA LINDA LINDA - リンダリンダリンダ - 2005 - Nobuhiro Yamashita

PLOT:

This is a story about 4 girls’ effort to perform their rendition of The Blue Hearts’ songs at their school festival. The end.

Oh wait, their lead singer is anervous exchange student from South Korea that doesn't speak Japanese well.

The end.

NOTES:

The scene I remember the most about this film is the part when Kei pointed to the stairway and said something like, “the next person coming out is our lead singer,” and outcome BaeDoona looking ill and pale. That, and an almost 20 seconds of cut-to-cut camera switch of close ups with no dialog. 

ShioriSekine (bass player of the Base Ball Bear) act as the ParanMaum’s bass player and her band provided two songs on the soundtrack album, along with James Iha for the instrumental score and ParanMaum with their Blue Hearts cover. YuuKashii and Aki Maeda provided the visual goodie-goodie of the movie, and of course BaeDoonashowed us all how to look adorably pale and ill.

With no means to stereotype, but almost every Japanese movie that became my favorites have one similarity; they picture awkwardness well. Not one of those Hollywood “oh shit” moments, but the crickety, dot dotdot, big water animation behind the head kind of awkward. I love that.

To sum it up, LINDA LINDA LINDA delivers a light story about friendship and high school romance that will leave you with cuddly heartwarming feelings. Cute Japanese schoolgirls playing punk songs; there will be no other feelgood movie that’ll beat this one in a long time.

 

 

 Movie trailer

Them song music video

Owaranai Uta

MUKIMUKIMANMANSU - S/T ( 무키무키만만수 ) - 2012

These girls are the shit. 

To be blatantly honest, I’m tired of those good girls singing prettily in front of their webcam in a neatly done bedroom with acoustic guitars, doing covers of the top40s or oldies and foolish love songs into “their own version” of coffeeshop background music. 

I’ve had enough of “that”. Those are poison. I didn't get my ears checked three times a year for “that”. 
These girls I’m about to rant about is the antidote of all that is “that”.

First off, let me break it down to you real quick why you should really, REALLY, get their album:

1. They’re sporting the most awesome group name ever.  I mean, who would’ve thought of MUKIMUKIMANMANSU as a name? What is MUKIMUKIMANMANSU? But admit it, it kinda grows on you by now, innit? Try saying it. MUKIMUKIMANMANSU. Really, SAY IT!
2. They’re crazy. They’re crazy and intentionally honest about it. See the live performances below. It’s fugly and refreshing.

Their self-titled in 2012 was a big blowout. They tore the cliché about girls and acoustic guitars. The album is fueled with angst and freedom. It’s like talking to a person with full expression and no image to be taken care of.  It’s fun and liberating.

MUKIMUKIMANMANSU is a well-produced insanity accentuated with temper tantrums thrown here and there. It is folk-ish in the most punk-ish context; it spat on the JUNO soundtrack with the filthiest gooey slime and redefines minimalistic sovereignty. Try going for a ride with your toddler controlling the wheel. Intense, unpredictable, and will surely involving a few curse word due to frustration, but at the same time you want to know how it will end. It is wrong on so many levels (and culture, I’m sure).

I never knew there was a fine line between idiocy and psychoticism, but MUKIMUKIMANMANSU sure dances comfortably there. They are the queens of the in-betweens.

 

Check their sounds in the video below with ONLY your best headphones. Your lousy notebook and desktop speakers wont do them any justice.

Note: I can only describe MUKIMUKIMANMANSU’s brilliance with antonyms of the mainstream’s definition of acknowledgement. Fuck adjectives.

Kegawa No Maries' ビューティフル

It's rough, punk-heavy, melodic, and -almost- filled theatrics.

It's a shame they disbanded in 2011.