So a #music + #comic on the overnight trip this week to the exhibition of the artist's THE GHOST IN THE SHELL, APPLESEED and other works.
I got the over 65 price of 900yen for the exhibit ticket.
Seeing the manga pages B4 size, as they were drawn is extra impressive.
He used a copier a lot in his process, so has scribbled layouts as well as the inked and toned or colored pages were here too.
Some of the type set text had fallen off the final camera ready pages. I expect a few of those pages were not first generation, even if that is what was printed.
Unusually for such an exhibit, you could photograph everything, as long as you didn't use a flash. But as Japan doesn't have "fair use" of copyrighted material, you can't just post that all over social media. I took quite a few hires photos, but not of everything. All artwork is behind glass though means there are reflections on your pictures.
The exhibition is about a 1/4 the size of the YASUHIKO YOSHIKAZU Exhibit I visited in Hyogo last year, but this is vary much more B4 manga art pages.
It seemed kind of an out of the way quiet museum with lots of trees around everywhere. Maybe Masamune Shirow lives close by? Seemed a "good area". Quiet. I actually walked past the Museum at first as it is set back from the street and I walked down the right side of the road, and the museum is on the left.
I expected a big building with a big sign on it. Maybe it is, but that is all hidden by the trees that are all along the street from the station.
There was a large merchandise shop that I didn't even notice till I was about to leave as it was separate from the Museum Shop where I bought the exhibit book. The merch shop is to the left before you go up the stairs to the exhibition, whereas the Museum Shop is in front of the stairs, to the left of the main museum entrance.
They date the ticket, and they also give you a small THE CREATIVE WORLD OF MASAMUNE SHIROW card. The Tickets are dated as you can only enter the Merch Shop on the day of the ticket.
I did have a look at the Merch, but a t-shirt in my size with a design I would actually wear that wasn't way over priced was not to be found. Others were buying handfuls of them though, probably to sell on eBay/Mericari later.
Overnight stay in Shinjuku, and apart from getting dinner, was just exhausted and just rested to get back home the next day. Has been 25 years since I last stayed in Shinjuku.
Used to stay overnight there once or twice a year from around 1994 till 2000, and visit a few places like, a big resin garage kit store, the huge CD store that was there and go to Ikebukuro to visit Tokyo Hands and a foreign books store. All these things have gone. Seemed more clothing fashion. Also gone is my energy to visit a few places during a stay. Can only manage one now. But with online shopping, travelling all over the place also isn't required any more.
And today, May 30 2025, they announced the exhibit will be at Shinsaibashi PARCO Osaka Sep 5th - Oct 5th.
This is only about an hour away by train from me. I could visit again.
A small 2 day trip, and it looks like the weather will be fine "enough". This time last year did a similar trip to Nagoya for Anno and Nagano Exhibitions, but this one actually has work in progress stuff as well, which is a major draw card for me, as is original actual size inked pages.
Will take about 4 hours to get to The exhibit museum, door door. Will be a long tiring day. 😀
I think I can probably manage 3 hours in the exhibition, and have enough energy to get back to my Hotel in Shinjuku. But maybe not.
Last year I had to sit for quite a while part way through the Anno Exhibition last year, after spending the morning getting to Nagoya and seeing the Nagano Exhibition. There were a few comfy chairs in front of these figures:
All were "life sized", or what the suit would be for Godzilla, anyway.
This getting old thing. Year by year, getting around gets harder, and those afternoon naps get more vital.
I will find out tomorrow, won't I?
At the Sound Messe a couple of weeks ago I spent maybe 2 hours walking around and the rest sitting in a guitar clinic. Did have a guitar on my back though. Took me about a week to recover.
I wonder how many years it will be before I just decide it is just too hard? When I am over 70 maybe?
Remembering how tired I was in Nagoya afternoon of the first day last year, and after the Messe, has made me rest most of the last week, except for the normal walking I do..
So the practical side of getting older has been on our mind more than I would like.
Still hope to find tomorrows exhibition amazing. It is the only thing I am going to Tokyo for.
Fake Internet and Instagram guitarists is a recent noise in the Social Media Swamp. People mime playing to a perfect backing track. Some get caught doing it, one recent Italian guitarist, GIACOMO TURRA, got found out other ways.
This video isn't like that! Mistakes and all! This came up in Mattias's FREAK GUITAR WEEKEND too, where live with your mistakes , they will lead to something interesting, and was better than being fake.
I have been Finger Drumming for some 5 weeks now, so still a beginner. Made huge progress in the first 2 weeks practicing for 10 minutes a few times each day, but still can't do much with my left hand. Finger Drumming is really hard, and expect many of the videos I have seen on it are faked, or edited together and refined in same way.
In my video here I made mistakes in my production method, which then made syncing the different parts together, and then finding it all so tedious I didn't bother to get "the perfect take" before doing the next part, which compounded the timing issues.
This was my first attempt at doing 3 video files all synced to the same final sound file as an experiment, so "perfect" and releasing it wasn't my original goal. This is the kind of thing music Vbloggers seem to do all the time, but I think they have more sophisticated video gear to help in the process. Not just a bottom of the range Android phone. Many fake parts of it too though.
I just used my phones front video camera and recorded the instrument outputs into Reaper, so I could mix the parts together, and sync that with the appropriate takes.
But having to press camera start and Reaper start and stop multiple times is tedious and seems to increase the chance of making a playing mistake somewhere MUCH higher. Just more things to think about and overload the old wet cpu...
What the camera recorded for the Finger Drumming take is:
What I realize now, of course, is that I should have had my studio monitors on, so there was a sound I could see to sync the final mix too. Using just the images at 30fps is rather hit and miss in my Vegas Movie Studio Editor.
So all 3 videos have stereo sound that I mute, except for my talking at the start of the drum clip. In each of the videos, it was only the last take I needed, and syncing that up to the final sound visually is just not the way to do it! All tracks were played live, mistakes and all, but the sync is off, so it kind of all looks fake anyway.
I recorded the drums first, just the sound out of the Yamaha FGDP-30 METAL kit. I then used that as the reference and recorded the 2 guitar parts. The rhythm guitar is out of time for bits, but it is what it is and just adlibbed at the time, and the last take I could be bothered doing.
The mixed Audio from Reaper was then brought back into Movie Studio and I synced them up, until I couldn't be bother futzing around any more.
Interruptions from the cat, and others, didn't help the calm state of mind I needed.
It would have looked better if I had mimed the guitar playing to a perfect music track, but that isn't what this was all about.
I started Finger Drumming with an Akai MPD218, but have found the Yamaha FGDP-30 to be so much more sensitive and playable. It is also the best thing to pick up for 5 minutes and practice throughout the day. Your practicing before your PC based DAW has even loaded.
YouTuber Style
So YouTubers/Instragramers all edit their videos to be perfect right? So to be one of those, I have made some small changes here to make the guitar parts fit better with the sloppy finger drumming. I didn't change the finger drumming, just moved the guitar parts to fit better. So the video is now not just as was played. Not sure if you would call it faked though.
So first the rhythm guitar part was moved a little earlier to fit the drums in Reaper. Then the Lead later bit was delayed for the same reason. As can see in the video editor here:
It meant a few frames at the end of the Lead Guitar Part split had to be repeated to fill the gap. That is completely invisible to me. It just made a pause a smidgen longer.
The Rhythm Guitar was advanced a little and that is invisible too.
And we have put a trimmed version on Bandcamp, with the Bullwinkle reference:
And this more refined as a Music Video THIS TIME FOR SURE:
That should be the end of that! On to something else...
I wouldn't have expected that, as I kind of thought of him as more of a Country Music Guitarist, which probably isn't fair at all. But Adam also takes that to mean it is completely fine to dive into your obsessions .
I consider myself "a maker", to use that rather recent term. That people also now mean it to including making anything you are passionate about is fine by me too.
So I attended Sound Messe Osaka 2025 and 3 of the 4 sessions of Mattias's Freak Guitar Weekend that day. The clinic was the reason I went. The forecast was for heavy rain. but luckily that cleared up early Saturday morning and went and dropped on Tokyo instead.
It is a 90 minute train trip for me to get there, but that means changing trains 4 times and climbing multiple stair cases to get to the different company train lines. Made harder carrying a guitar and as the chance I would drop it was higher than normal, I took my oldest and least fussed if it got damaged 1984 MADE IN JAPAN Squire in a well padded carry on your back gigbag I bought some 4 months ago. And as instructed, a battery operated guitar amp, headphones and tuner. I have since become a fan of the VOX amPlug2 Metal, even if the 3 effects are way too heavy handed and there is no way to make them a bit more subtle.
I hadn't noticed the fine print that the show opened at 10:00AM for booth staff, but 11:00AM for the rest of us, so we practiced the Ancient Japanese Art of Waiting Patiently in Line for 40 minutes.
Met a few people and gave out name cards and stickers to almost anyone that I talked with. 😀 I am strange that way!
Don't think of myself as a "guitarist", and don't care to look at all the guitars on show except the now in production FREAK GUITAR LAB Ulvs, took me straight to the ELECTRONIC ZONE Zanshin Booth.
The Japanese Yen exchange rate is terrible at the moment, but it was still a shock to be told the 7 string made in Sweden Ulv is currently 900,000yen. That was the one I was most interested in, but not for that kind of money. Part of the reason is also the Japanese taxes Zanshin have to pay.
It was thus interesting to see they are going to make FREAK GUITAR LAB guitars in Japan. This should reduce the cost, speed up production and maybe have better quality. Japanese guitars are still awesome. The two examples above are the first prototypes and Mattias told me the body shape will be more Super Strat like. I hope so, as the above doesn't look great to me. I think they should have the same body outline as the Swedish versions even if without the costly beveled edges. Note both of the prototypes didn't have locking nut and trem. But even so, the left TT fret version is some 500,000yen! TT frets aren't cheap being made in Sweden. Time will tell if the TT frets will be allowed to be made in Japan too.
Had to get to the Zanshin booth first thing to buy my 5,000yen clinic all day pass and get to the UMERUCUBE. I then spent most of the day away from the exhibition space, up on 3F at the clinic, in what was a large meeting room.
And the extra cool thing about that was the toilets were not packed full, and there were a lot of Restaurants to choose to have lunch at. Not like the Exhibition space at all!
There was a long break between the 2nd and 3rd sessions and that is when I had lunch and visited the Exhibition space of B2F. RED the Electric Guitars and BLUE, the Tokyo Pedal Show. I ignored Acoustic guitars and the rest except for the ORANGE section of some distributers booth. They had ORANGE CRUSH MINIs on sale for 8,800yen, but I bought one 6 or so years ago for about that price in Sydney.
There were many performances on 2 main stages, but I didn't attend any of those, and probably the way many attending enjoyed their version of the event. Is that what all the middle aged women were there for?
Most of the makers had a small stage/demo space in their booth and at around 4:30PM when I got there, there were all playing to be louder than everyone else. IT WAS SO LOUD AND NOISY! Just the kind of space I hate to be in. Most of the companies in the Electric Guitar zone were custom, small makers, with only Ibanez being a big brand.
I didn't like the noise level at all, so didn't put up with it for too long and left before 5:00PM, for the 90 minute trip back home.
Mattias's Freak Guitar Weekend was well worth it to me, even if he spent so long talking and demoing KONNAKOL I really didn't need to have taken a guitar.
Mattias and Tokyo Metal City did give exercises to practice in the hand outs. The FREAK GUITAR WEEKEND 30 page TAB book is great, and he will give us a download link for the backing tracks. He spent some time using his FLUMMOXED as an example, and that is in the GROW YOUR OWN MUSTACHE Volume 10 I already own.
Mattias prefers single string scale exercises, and the TAB book has an exercise in Lydian, MAY THE FOURTHS BE WITH YOU, that goes through all of them. And this is a practice thing I was playing with that kind of shows my recent, mostly single string with diversions approach.
This is me in my tiny studio, I am recording what I am playing into REAPER listening to the repeating 8 bar backing over my monitors. My SHARP AQUOS mobile phone was in a Ulanzi phone tripod on my desk recording me. In Vegas Movie Studio I replace the phone sound with what REAPER output. The scale fret board graphic is something in made in CorelDraw after getting the 8 string trying to work out what I was doing...
Mattias also stressed how important a volume pedal is for him. He uses an indestructible DUNLOP passive volume pedal, around 30,000yen in Japan, which is more than I paid for my Ibanez 7 String guitar!
I took his advice and bought one mid 2024, the BOSS FV-50H. The H is important as it is the 250k ohm for use with guitar. Some 6,600yen at the time, and completely fine for my home studio use.
I was pretty much knocked out for much of the next 2 days with sore legs and shoulder. Will do it all again next year, I am sure.
And just before 5PM Wednesday afternoon Japan time, Mattias emailed me the link for the backing tracks, that I have now down loaded. Lots of work here.
Looking forward to seeing him and Freak Kitchen on stage in September.
But often practice goes like this:
To get around this constant issue, I bought a music stand to hold the TAB at a height fine for me to stand, so don't need a chair. I have guitar straps and strap locks, and have for many years, but have rarely used them. Time to change that.
Next big trip for me will be to the Setagaya Literary Museum in Tokyo for The World of Masamune Shirow Exhibition. Expected to do that when visit grandson later in the year, but plans change and I should do this before summer really sets in here. Like the last week of May.
Music + Comic on the coming Sound Messe Osaka 2025
It is the GOLDEN WEEK Holidays here, not that really has much impact on me, other than places can be more crowded.
The schedule for Mattias's mini FREAK GUITAR CAMP and the "optional" requirements of bringing your own guitar and a battery operated Headphone Aamp, as there will be no power available to attendees.
But the real crux Music + Comic on: OFF THE GRID, BEING OUT OF YOUR COMFORT ZONE or maybe NOT BELONGING?
The thoughts as I prepared for a Freak Guitar Weekend Clinic during the Sound Messe Osaka 2025 this coming weekend. It is 90 minutes by train each way, so a carry your guitar on your back in a gigbag (the way everyone does it here, but I haven't done that before) thing, and take a guitar headphone amp (which I didn't have and bought one second hand on line), wired earbuds and tuner. Not taking my better Ibanez RG, but this 1984 MADE IN JAPAN Squire with a DiMarzio HS3 pickup in the bridge.
This is my oldest, and now, least used guitar and so the one I am most comfortable to take on this trip to ATC Hall Osaka. Very close to Osaka Expo 2025.
I expect carrying this much of the day will be very tiring for me, a guy in his later 60s. I could drop it or fall over with it. I will probably be wiped out before I even get there if I couldn't get seat on the train.
I attended Mattias's clinic during last years Sound Messe 2024 and it was great. I aren't a good student of Konnakol though. I was the only retired person there. This year is longer and hands on with guest musicians. He does that with his yearly FREAK GUITAR CAMP in the Swedish woods too. It seems a significant part of that camp experience is "the eating vegetarian and shitting like a horse" and that hasn't been brought along😃
The other thing is Saturday is forecast to be fairly heavy rain. Sunday maybe not, but it is too far out to tell yet. Getting myself and a guitar wet isn't really something I want to do. Maybe I go Sunday.
Seems an opportunity I shouldn't pass up.
"One ticket to FREAK GUITAR WEEKEND please, and I'll take a helping of HUMBLE PIE with the FEELINGS OF INADEQUACY topping"...
Vocaloid was used extensively by Composer Susumu Hirasawa in the soundtrack to the 2006 Anime Paprika. A film to later have a few concepts & scenes "borrowed" in 2010s INCEPTION. More than a few.
In the early 1990s I developed a Smalltalk/DSP system in Roland Japan R&D I demonstrated and wanted to use in developing a "singing" synthesizer. Management said don't need that, and a couple of years later Yamaha came out with Vocaloid, a singing synthesizer. Is it what I would have developed? I don't know as I didn't get that far. In Japan, it also generated the virtual Idol, such as Hatsune Miku and that is a whole other thing.
So I have an interest in things "singing" synthesizer, and only found out about the anime Paprika through a post about the storyboard art book this week. A bit of following the threads, and the soundtrack becomes something I need to hear, the use of vocaloid, and other works of Susumu Hirasawa. Then I need to see the movie:
So I got the Bluray on Amazon. Wow.
Dreams vs Reality, and Paprika's weird/ surrealism leaves it up to the viewer to interpret. Or does it?
The Anime is based on a novel by Yasutaka Tsutsui, but Kon was much more interested in producing interesting visuals than explaining character motives, so unless you know the book, which is like nobody, the result is amazing to look at but much is not "obviously" unexplained. May be vaguely hinted at with Interpretive Dance, is closer to the approach taken 😀 .
The composer also influenced Kon, with his philosophy. Composer Susumu Hirasawa was also an Amiga user at the time, so was original enough not to be an Artists only use APPLE guy and took advantage of the unique real time midi effects BARS & PIPES provided.
So I have now seen the movie, listened to the Soundtrack a fair few times, and read about the novel and how that was interpreted in the film. One of the essays I saw mentions all the references to film in the anime, so it is could be more a Reality vs Film thing. I think Kon just liked Film images, so put them in. You could interpret it as as Reality vs DrugUser too, were leaving reality for "the other place" destroys your life.
Satoshi Kon died of pancreatic cancer at 46 years ago now, so he doesn't have any further insight into it.
