March 23

Lyrics that sent a chill

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“Even though the world is turning lonely eyes”
–from the Beat Crusaders‘ LOVE DISCHORD.

The line sent a chill down my spine for some reason when I first read it.

By Michael | Posted in Quote | Comments (0)

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March 14

the pillows - Ride on a Shooting Star

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This was the song Ride on a Shooting Star by the pillows at the El Rey. Thanks to efilnow for uploading it!

By Michael | Posted in Videos | Comments (0)

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the pillows - one life

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This was the song one life by the pillows at the El Rey. Thanks to efilnow for uploading it!

By Michael | Posted in Videos | Comments (0)

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the pillows at el rey entrance

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the pillows at el rey entrance

By Michael | Posted in Images | Comments (0)

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the pillows at el rey

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I got back from the pillows live at the el rey a few hours ago. The live show was amazing. The opening band was extremely bad, and no one remembered their name. This opening band had to get a substitute drummer, relied on synths too much, and all of their songs sounded the same.

Next was the noodles, an all-girl japanese rock band. Their songs were okay. Their last two songs were great! But they didn’t have intensity and presence.

Finally, the pillows came on, and immediately, the mood of the whole place changed. People just want crazy when they came on the stage. And the pillows rocked the rest of the night. It was amazing seeing them in person. The show ended too quickly.

I used my cell phone to capture about half of the pillows show. But it turns out that if you exit from video mode with the “end call” button, the video doesn’t actually save. (But audio recording saves automatically when you hit the “end call” button.) So pretty much, I lost all the video :(. I guess the phone software designers weren’t all that great, but ultimately, it was my fault for not knowing this.

Also, after the first two bands played, I went to the merchandise table, but unfortunately, about the time I got there, all medium sized t-shirts sold out, so I didn’t get anything.

But in any case, I finally got to see my favorite rock band, the pillows!

By Michael | Posted in Journal | Comments (0)

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March 7

Ikimono-gakari’s New Album Too!

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Whoa. This month has been double-plus-good for japanese rock. You have the pillows releasing their new single (Tokyo Bambi) and touring the US. Then you have Asian Kung-Fu Generation with their new album (World World World). Just now, I realized that Ikimono-Gakari released their new album last month (Life Album). This is epic stuff! I can’t wait to hear IG’s new album since their first major label one was most excellent.

By Michael | Posted in Journal | Comments (0)

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March 5

AKFG’s World World World is out!

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Today is a glorious day: Asian Kung-Fu Generation’s newest album, World World World, was released! Their last album was in 2006. I currently listening to it right now, and it rocks!

By Michael | Posted in Update | Comments (0)

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March 4

the pillows tour the US again!

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Folks, I am about to inform you of something indescribably amazing: the pillows, a japanese rock band, will be returning to the US this month for their second ever US tour!

Their delicious label website has more information on the shows, but the awesome news is that they will be visiting LA on March 13th! I discovered this two days ago and was extremely excited (I normally don’t get this excited). All I could do was think about this live show.

Why? Because the pillows are one of my favorite rock bands. Even though they sing mostly in Japanese (I don’t understand a thing), their songs are very fun to listen to and play. Whereas new rock is dying in the US (commercialized punk and emo), the “new” sounds of rock are flourishing in Japan, and the pillows are one of these Japanese rock bands who are experimenting with and creating new rock sounds.

When I became a fan of them in 2006, I narrowly missed their first US tour (I learned about it 1-2 months afterwards) and was sad that I couldn’t see them. I vowed that I would make my best effort to attend their show the next them they tour the US.

My barrier to the show was transportation (need a car to get to LA), and I was wracking my brains trying to figure out some solution. I found a few (like <5) people at Caltech who were also interested in the pillows on facebook so I was going to email them about the show.

As it turns out, a person who I was working with Ch 121 problem sets with is an anime fan and has a car. So I convinced him to go to the show :). So now, for all purposes, I’m going to the pillows’ LA show! Too awesome!

By Michael | Posted in Journal | Comments (0)

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