It’s spring and with it comes to the old proverbial ’spring clean’. And so it’s out with the previous annoying template that was causing no amount of problems and in with something a lot more flashy, or as I like to thinkabout it a lot more ‘friendly and nice looking’.

For anyone who has owned or owns a Mac, the theme should be ‘familiar’ as it’s essentially a take on the Apple layout. It’s clean and simple, and what’s more it’s all customisable on the fly - you can click and drag any of the boxes in the sidebars and move/order them as you see fit, and you can also minimise them using the little green button.

The gallery has changed as well, it’s still in the process of being finalised, but it works a lot better than the previous one. There’s still a few things to be changed, improved on but all in good time. I barely have enough time to do what I need to do as it is.

So far everything seems to be working, but let me know if you find anything that doesn’t. So please go ahead and have enjoying, I’ll be doing some much overdue writing in the coming weeks too.

Popularity: 2%

written by Laurent \\ tags: geeking, Random, template, update, wordpress

It was trade show time again 2 weeks ago as the Tokyo Amusement Expo 2008 (aka Tokyo Arcade Game Show) rolled into town at the Makuhari Messe. Compared to the Tokyo Game Show, which is the year’s video game event by excellence, TAE is a much smaller affair spread over two days and taking in just one of Makuhari’s exhibition halls. When TGS rolls into town, pretty much the whole of Makuhari is taken over, and the majority of Tokyo’s geek community descends on the Chiba town. TAE was quieter and smaller, which didn’t necessarily make it less fun.

For one you get more space to stroll around, taking in all the glory of trade shows: the scantily-clothed ladies, the suits eyeballing people from the sides, the stall staff looking bored or scared, the geeks willing to queue 2h for a five minute blast on a yet to be released game and the hordes of pervy old men with big cameras chasing the aforementioned scantily-clad ladies. The arcade show had the added bonus of also being swarmed by hundreds of kids, dragging their parents to various stands displaying the latest wares aimed at the younger market, from card games to UFO catchers to… well, really weird shit.

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Popularity: 6%

written by Laurent \\ tags: akihabara, computers, Japan, society, video games

Spannered is a year old this month, and for the occasion the guys at the helm of one of the nicest music sites around have decided to re-design the whole ting. As anyone who’s ever attempted such a thing on a site with a substantial amount of content will know, it ain’t easy. The guys have pulled it off nicely though, and the whole thing is a lot easier to navigate and still looks funky fresh.

If you don’t know about Spannered yet I can only recommend you head over and find out more. Not only do they have a nice archive of interviews, features and reviews covering a wide range of music, subjects and artists, they also do it in your earhole with a podcast series and a hefty archive of live, recorded and exclusive mixes from featured artists and others - all streamable and downloadable.

For me it’s definitely one of the nicest music sites around thanks to its content and variety, and no I’m not saying that because they’ve featured my interview with Goth Trad on there a few months back  :lol: .

A new addition to the site is an mp3 blog, which will be taking shape over the coming month as the contributors get digging and uploading. The list of contributors is pretty sweet too, including the likes of DJ C, Kid Chameleon, Kone R and various other people dotted around London and the world. So I was pretty chuffed when they kindly asked me to take part as well. I’ll be contributing various bits once a month or so, with a look at exposing some of the weird vinyl I’ve come across in Japan as well as some rarer and more exclusive material from the Turntable Radio archive and artists I know. My first contribution should be up in a week or so, featuring a few bits from the TTR archive and some random Japanese records I picked up over the summer.

In the meantime, the guys have started it off with some wicked Brasilian gems and it’s only gonna get better so you know what you gotta do  :smile: .

Big up Ali and the Spannered crew for this!

Popularity: 6%

written by Laurent \\ tags: Music, Random, writing

One more thing on the whole piracy subject, and this one is gonna be short and sweet. I came across this video on the dot-alt blog, and it’s another great addition to the whole debate about piracy, not just in music but in every aspect of society.

This is a video of Matt Mason, the founding editor of Rewind magazine, doing a presentation about his new book ‘The Pirate’s Dilemma’. The video is quite long but really worth it especially if you’re interested in this whole subject. It’s hard not to be drawn in by Matt’s cleverly put together presentation and pretty spot on argument. He doesn’t actually focus on just music piracy, though he touches on it, but draws an interesting parrallel between pirate radios, and pirate movements, and pioneering. It’s definitely on point I think and gives more ammunition to the whole debate.

His book is definitely going to be worth a read.

Popularity: 6%

written by Laurent \\ tags: Music, Random

UPDATE - hours after I posted this Ed sent me another link, and one that couldn’t have been more relevant to the subject. The head of Warner Music admits that the industry was wrong to go to war with consumers, and what’s more he delivered that speech at a conference for mobile phone companies warning them of not repeating the same mistakes on the digital platforms that were made on normal computer platforms. Additional food for thought…

Continuing the recent series of posts about piracy and torrents, a friend of mine (Ed again!) sent me a very interesting link from someone who used Oink, worked in the music industry at various majors and who puts forward some very interesting points regarding the whole debate surrounding piracy, outdated business models and new technology.

You can check the article here. While not everyone may agree with his total disregard for the record industry (the majors that is, not the indies) it’s hard not to see some sense in a lot of the points put across - especially with regards to the record industry essentially missing the boat 8 years ago when p2p networks first surfaced. Something I’ve also mentioned before and which I really believe is what this whole debates does boil down to. They missed the boat and then went for the worst of the two remaining options: pretending that they were the victims and continually refusing to move on and adapt to the new world of music as a digital medium, with no tangible, physical aspect. There are other good points, regarding the bully tactics employed by the remaining majors and organisations like the RIAA, as well as some of the suggested possibilities for a new business model (which I don’t totally agree with).

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Popularity: 6%

written by Laurent \\ tags: computers, Music, Random

I’ve just found out that Oink, a website offering torrents of music releases in high quality formats, has just been shut down. As is the norm in today’s media free for all there is a grossly uninformed piece about it on the BBC website, and there is a well written and brilliant piece on the death of this music lovers’ haven on DJ Rupture’s website. The piece highlights the inconsistencies and dilemnas surrounding the whole music piracy debate that has been raging since people who make a lot of money from music realised they’d missed the boat to make more money 8 years ago.

Which made me think about the stuff I wrote earlier on this month regarding internet TV and free TV/movie content available online. Turns out in the guy who ran tv-links was also nabbed recently and the site shut down (though why still puzzles me considering that site was merely a recipient for links to copyrighted material held on other sites - the coporate machine obviously has intricate workings). UPDATE - found this amusing but also on point comment piece on the guardian site about tv-links being shut down.

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Popularity: 4%

written by Laurent \\ tags: Music, Random

I love a good story. But in this day and age of multimedia consumption, of here today, gone tomorrow, a good story can be hard to come by. And I’m not talking about books, I’m talking about audio-visual: movies, tv shows, anime, cartoons etc… It’s nothing new, you only have to look around yourself, at the latest movies or shows, to realise that the emphasis shifted a long time ago - from telling a story to selling you an idea, neatly packaged in special effects, famous people and whatever else is popular at the time. Which also isn’t to say there aren’t any good stories around anymore, they’re just harder to find.

My gripe though isn’t just with the celebrity cult western societies have been afflicted with for a while or the rise and predominance of the blockbuster movies and tv series. Rather it’s with the fact that a good story, especially in serial format, is just not something you can find easily anymore. Back in the days, things were simpler and while we had our fair share of crap we also had our fair share of good. Taking TV series as the main focus here, things have only got worse as the years have gone on.

While for the last ten years or so TV series have definitely moved towards a template that resembles more the Hollywood blockbuster prototype than anything else, one thing that has always been a constant is that if the series isn’t pulling in the viewing numbers it won’t last long, regardless of its artistic merit, especially the story. Examples of this are ripe, and it’s a given of the game, which is I guess fair enough. But today things have got more extreme - ratings are still a factor, but it seems that the story, the magic of telling a story over a long period of time is definitely getting lost. Series not only resemble movies, or try to, they also a lot of the time seem like they’re not really going anywhere. There isn’t a definite beginning, middle and end to a story anymore. Only the factors of ratings and popularity. And so the few series that do at times appear with a strong story, often end up never being told in full, due to low ratings or popularity.

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Popularity: 4%

written by Laurent \\ tags: anime, movies, storytelling, Television, TV series

The advent of web 2.0 has supposedly been a boon on both the internet and its users. Personally I’m still standing on the fence. Yes it has some very definite and enjoyable benefits, hell I’m using one of them right now by blogging this, but it’s also brought about a whole host of painful things, most notably in my opinion a giant free for all of user created content with no benchmark or quality control whatsoever, meaning we’re not only flooded with information, but we’re also flooded with a shit lot more crap information and data than before. Oh and it’s now never been easier for everyone and their dog to voice opinions on anything and everything. Maybe I’m getting old or maybe it’s democracy, I’m not sure.

A web 2.0 moan isn’t my purpose this time round though. Rather I’ve got thinking about one of the many promises the advent of the internet has made since its prominent rise in the late 90s. And that’s the promise of online, on-demand TV. Having been in Japan for over 9 months I must say I’m starting to suffer from slight withdrawal symptoms, not because I don’t watch TV anymore (that ticks a good box in my book) but because I don’t watch anything in English anymore. Japanese TV has its uses, but so far they’re pretty limited. As my mate put it, Japanese TV is the equivalent of having Channel 5 on every channel :lol: . Which ain’t that great is it? Ask the Italians if you don’t believe me, Berlusconi has ruined Italian TV forever with the same, cheap tactics.

So the other day I decided I wanted to start watching some TV programs again - partly because I’d been given some bits to watch by my friend (the first series of Heroes amongst other things) and partly because Ella had been hinting that TV links is a good way to watch some TV online. The downside of being given things to watch, is that once you’re hooked you want more, and yes TV Links is quite good, but it suffers from some problems like many other streaming sites out there. Links are often broken, copyrighted content is hunted down and withdrawn and streaming quality varies greatly, all of which don’t make for great pleasure. Unless you’re a technology freak.

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Popularity: 3%

written by Laurent \\ tags: internet, Television, web 2.0

Multi tasking is a funny thing. It’s something I’ve always done and been kinda good at, or so I think anyway. But recently I’ve realised that maybe, just maybe, it’s actually more of a hindrance than anything else. And the more I think about it, the more I think that’s the case.

I was reading a report thing I got after doing this personality test the other day and it was on point, saying that I’m the kind of person who likes to multi-task and actually enjoys it. It’s something I do without even really thinking - my brain’s just buzzing and if something can be done at the same time as something else I will. No matter what it is. My mind’s always racing around, thinking of what to do next, what can be done etc…

Lately I’ve come to realise that I should try and control it a bit more because while it’s a useful skill to have, it’s also one that leaves me doing 55 things at once and never really finishing one in the time it could have taken had I concentrated on that one thing only. For example the recent update to this blog could have been done much quicker, but instead I was always working on it alongside something else.

Thing is not only do I like multi-tasking, I’ve also got a short ass attention span, so my mind also has a nasty habit of wandering off while I’m doing something. Working on the internet doesn’t make this any better - if something is taking too long to load, I’ll be opening a new tab and checking something else rather than wait for the page/command/whatever to finish :oops: . I’ll blame that one on drugs and video games…

Anyways, I was listening to an interview with The Bug the other day where he mentioned that he spent most of the last year trying to do 3 albums at once, multi-tasking to save time and only ended up not finishing anything at all. So he’s now decided to focus on one thing at a time. And I think he’s right and I’ll follow his decision too. Let’s see how long it lasts and how well it works eh?

And cos it’s funny here’s a video of men multi-tasking (toilet humour)

Popularity: 3%

written by Laurent \\ tags: bad, good, multi tasking, time, tired, wasting, work

No you’re not dreaming, the site has suffered a drastic makeover and update. Which is part of the reason why I haven’t been posting much for most of the month. The other reasons being: I’ve had an surge of work (paid work even, the best and most urgent kind there is! :lol: ), I’ve got totally sucked into Heroes season 1 (catching up on 23 episodes before the new season started this week - tv marathons ftw) and I’ve been working on updating this blog as well, which was a slow process due to the aforementioned bits and other things.

Finally done did it though. New design, layout and a fresh new Wordpress version too. Which I must admit is actually nice - probably the first time I’ve felt genuinely pleased with it since I’ve started updating WP. I really wasn’t happy with what had been changed in the previous 2.0x versions, but this one seems to have fixed a lot of things and added a lot of good stuff. So far anyways. Having spent the best part of 6h doing everything today my brain’s probably just too frazzled and I’ll start seeing stuff I don’t like tomorrow after some sleep (and more episodes of Heroes, yes I’m hooked).

So anyways sit back, relax and enjoy. Have a play around, there’s lots of new little nifty things added: the snap shot preview for all links, the gallery’s had a face lift, there’s a new archive page (link at the top) which is lovely and easy to use, you can now share any post on this blog easily by clickling the share this! link which will open a pop up menu giving a choice of options like digg, delicious, emailing etc…, you can also navigate posts by using the calendar or the tags cloud (which will be updated this week to include all posts) or the search function, I’ve added the Turntable Radio podcast feed, and there’s a wicked little thing at the top which you can use to scroll through all the posts on the front page. Whoo hoo for geekery.

If you see anything broken or have any comments/feedback on the changes please drop us a comment. More posts coming up tomorrow too, got a backlog of writing!

Popularity: 4%

written by Laurent \\ tags: bloggin, computers, geeking, tired, update, wordpress

And I haven’t got a lot of either right now…

Apologies to those who check this blog ‘fairly’ regularly (I know there’s a few of yous unless Google Stats is lying to me) but I’ve had a lot on recently which has meant I haven’t had time to update the blog and probably won’t be doing so for another week or two.

I’ve been finishing the follow up to my ‘Packing Sh*t Up!’ mix which is coming along very nicely. That should be online next month. I’ve also been very busy finishing off and preparing the release of the second ‘Cuts of Culture’ compilation, which is something I’ve been working on for over a year now. It’s good to know that this will finally be released onto the world, although instead of the originally planned CD/DVD package it’ll now be a series of exclusive multi-media podcasts. It all starts next weekend and lasts for 9 weeks on the Turntable Radio podcast feed - you can find more info on it all on the Turntable Radio site.

I’ve also got some friends in town and will be away all of next week, but I’ll be back on saturday, the 21st, for ‘Back To Chill vol 11′ - this time round the man like Kode 9 is in town alongside Goth Trad, Rumi, the BTC crew, Quarta 330 and myself for an all night party at Nakano’s Heavy Sick Zero. So if you like to have your bits wobbled then head on down cos it’s gonna be weighty - full info on the BTC blog.

Also my article on Goth Trad is out now in the July issue of Japanzine, which you can find in most places in Tokyo and Nagoya, peep Japanzine’s website for more info and an online version. The full interview is archived on this site.

Oh and there’s a massive typhoon about to hit Tokyo apparently, tomorrow afternoon. I’m supposed to be working which should make for an interesting time. I hope I can record some of it.

Definitely back on the writing tip at the end of the month.

Popularity: 3%

written by Laurent \\ tags: Random

Your internet connection goes down and you find yourself unable to stop clicking the refresh button for the best part of an hour after you’ve confirmed that it is indeed down and you’re unable to find out when it’ll be back.

Your only thoughts are things like: ‘I really want to check my emails right now’, ‘I wonder what the weather is like in Burkina Faso right now’, ‘I know I’ll check the news on the BBC site, oh shit I can’t', ‘It’s only the internet I can just sit down and read a book for the night’ (only to find yourself looking at the computer on the table and eyeing the icon in the tray to see if it’s not miraculously fixed itself).

I mean it is only the internet and not having it for a night isn’t the end of the world, but it sure as hell feels like it when the realisation dawns on you :lol: . Christ I really do have an addiction :sad:. I know I can be weak minded when it comes to the net but it is funny…

Popularity: 3%

written by Laurent

Finally updated the portfolio part of the site with a selection of my writing from the last four or so years. After all this isn’t just a nombrilistic blog, it’s also an online portfolio of my writing, so it’s even more about me then a blog would be :lol: .

God knows why, but probably because I love music and writing, I decided to become a freelance music journalist and writer after leaving university, and with a little perseverance and lots of hard work I guess I managed to become one of sorts, having written for a variety of magazines and websites worldwide over the last 4 years - primarily about DJs and turntablists but also about other music scenes and music in general. Writing about music, and writing in general, is incredibly fun and I love it - shame it don’t pay the bills though.

I continue to write regularly (for ATM and Serie B) though these days I’m trying to diversify my writing a little bit more (one of the primary reasons for this blog). Travel pieces are my new thing - they’re fun and I’ve done two in the last month. I also still run/edit/do everything over at Spin Science, the only site of its kind in the world baby, and present Turntable Radio as well as maintain the blog over there. I used to be a frequent contributor to ukhh.com too, but I’ve given that up since moving here as it’s too much of a demand on my time - you can find a stack of reviews and features in their archive too.

Anyways I’ve added a whole bunch of the printed features, interviews and event reviews I’ve done since 2003, which were published by such fine magazines as ATM (UK, Australia, New Zealand), Undercover (UK), Serie B (Spain), Scratch Magazine (US) and Japanzine (Japan). This is a selection of what I think are some of my nicest or at least most interesting pieces. Maybe you’ll agree or you’ll think it’s a lot of toss. Whichever way at least you’ve had a look.

These include interviews with and features on the likes of DJ Supreme from Hijack, Third Sight, Kode 9, Skream, dubstep, Mr Lif, Spinbad, Baku, Tatsuki, Kentaro, 2tall, DMC, Mix Master Mike, Roni Size & Bryan Gee, Jonny L, A Trak and more.

I’ll be finishing the portfolio section at some point soon by adding a selection of the hundreds of music reviews I’ve written over the last few years for various magazines and websites. There’s a lot more selecting to be done there cos god knows I’ve written some fraff reviews at times (what can I say we all have our bad moments).

Seriously though anyone reading this who wants to give me a job writing then please get in touch - if it’s a job based in Tokyo, even better. If not the internet is a wonderful tool for allowing people to work anywhere in the world :wink: . Right I better go to bed before I totally put anyone off reading any of this or giving me a job.

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written by Laurent \\ tags: Music, portfolio, writing

As luck would have it the day I break my camera is the day the photo gallery on the site is finally fixed. I installed it about a month ago, when my mate Dave tipped me off that the plug in had been updated for Wordpress 2.1, but then it was only working for me and unviewable by anyone else. Which was frustrating to say the least.

So after much mucking about and asking various friends for help and advice, seeing as I’m still learning much about php and things like that, it was Andy who fixed it by figuring out that it was the Google Analytics plug in that was making the page bug. So massive thanks to And for sorting that one out and to Dave for cleaning up the template too. Looks like I’ve still got quite a bit to learn when it comes to things like php :grin:

So anyways you can now access the photo gallery directly by clicking the link in the top menu. The gallery holds all the Flickr albums I’ve published and once you choose an album you can browse its pictures using a nifty flash plugin that will overlay the pics onto the page. Check it out and let me know what you think! I’ll be uploading the last of the pictures I took over the last few weeks today. Now I just need to fix the camera!

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written by Laurent

I upgraded the site to the latest version of Wordpress about 3 days ago and since then it seems I’ve had nothing but woes… Oh WOE IS ME indeed. Actually I’m only writing this post because I’ve realised I really like the word woe. I don’t know what it is about it - or maybe it’s because since becoming an English teacher I’ve rediscovered my affinity and love for languages and words.

Anyways, the upgrading itself wasn’t too tricky, but everything that came after it has been a bit of a headache - from weird changes like the handling of links (hence the change to the formatting of the sidedar) to a very weird way of treating div tags and other geeky things like this. All meaning that while Wordpress 2.1 is an improvement on the previous versions it’s also a pain in the neck, especially if you’re not too technically versed and start wondering what the fu*k happened to all the sensible things you were used to.

On the plus side the upgrade meant I got round to tidying things up and adding some nifty plugins like the Sidebar Widgets and brankspanking new gallery (see the link in the main navigation bar for that). I’ve also started tweaking the CSS and changing the look of the site - albeit very slowly and carefully. I’m still learning. Being a geek does have its good sides. And then it’s also got its downfalls like maybe you reading this and thinking ‘what the hell is he on about’.

Edit - I wrote this post and things messed up even more. I don’t know if I’m laughing more out of tiredness or desperation… :-S

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written by Laurent