Last December, Yeasayer called it a day. Brooklyn’s favourite psych-freaks were one of those bands I discovered in my first flush of uni freshers excitement, along with Wild Beasts, The Maccabees, Everything Everything, and a smattering of standard issue Leeds dub and reggae. It was a minor musical awakening of the kind felt in university halls across the nation. Continue reading “Leaving the Moshpit”
Yesterday, over drinks, somebody cornered me to ask which I prized most- movies, music or reading. A terrifying question, to be sure. I wrestled with the answer, and what it said about me. Continue reading “Slowburn Playlist”
I was chatting to a German guy on Tuesday morning as we shambled into town in the sunshine. We were holding forth on music, videogames, the merits of our various hometowns, the strange chaos of Japanese cities, and particularly on history. We spoke about the Berlin Wall, and how it created and still shapes the modern city. It arguably stopped Berlin from dominating Germany the way London does the United Kingdom, or Paris does France.
It came to me that all cities have a Berlin Wall, a dividing line that separates the city into two types of governance, two personalities, two essences. All cities have work attire and evening gear. All cities are transformed, lycanthropic and howling, at night, and wake up naked in the woods at dawn under the fading moon, with blood on their teeth. All cities are mixed metaphors. All cities are two cities*.
And why should here be any different?
Continue reading “Cities Divided (Killer Whales Killer Whales Killer Whales)”
Hey there, all.
I haven’t felt much like blogging for the last few days because the auld foe is back- I’ve been having big trouble sleeping again, and teaching on a tight budget of sleep really drains you to the core.
There’s a café/bakery at Itsukaichi called the Little Mermaid, which I dearly love- it’s part of some behemoth baking conglomerate, but hey. I love it because serves tasty pastries and bread products, alongside donuts filled with cauliflower curry (which are bloody good) and sesame-coated pounded rice cakes containing sweet red bean paste*. I love it because it’s light and airy, and feels like part of a community. The coffee there, and generally in Japan, isn’t quite to my taste, but it’s still half-decent.
The Worlds Outside 