Jamie Bower, No Reservations.

...doesn't have as nice a ring to it as Anthony Bourdain but we'll work something out later.

Anthony Bourdain, for those unfortunate souls who don't know, is my hero. I want to be him when I grow up (minus the changing into a man part). He is a chef, but those that have eaten my food know that becoming a chef is not in my box of repertoires. Most importantly (for me anyhow) is that he is the host of the Travel Channel Show "Anthony Bourdain; No Reservations". In a nut shell, he pretty much gets to go all over the world and eat, drink and talk to awesome people and just be overall awesome. Those who have not seen his show should immediately watch this clip on Tokyo~



See what I mean? This is my dream job. The only difference would be that I would have to incorporate my knowledge of linguistics or something into the show since I lack in any culinary skills (which is what he focuses on, and I don't wanna be a copy-cat anyways).

So I've had a spark of genius (or silliness for those nay-sayers) and I am going to grab my dream job by the nuts and take control. I will use my upcoming travels in to South East Asia as my first "episodes" and I will film them using my handy-dandy video camera (literally video, no digital film for me). I'm not going to go into details about it (no copy-cats!!!!) but I will say that I need some help. I know nothing about video editing and it would be nice to get some recommendations for some software. I use a PC (screw you Apple and your better-ness) so whatever is compatible with PCs, please let me know what and also where/how to get them ((i.e. for free!!)). Any other video related/filming advice is also well appreciated. It will take me a long time to get this all edited and cleaned up, so don't expect anything right away. These things take time, it is known (haha, geek alert for anyone who knows what i'm quoting).

Also my show is this Saturday at Shibuya La Mama  

come and watch if you dare!!

PEACE OUSTIDE
~JME

Pictures from my ill fated show~

Ill fated meaning how horribly it went on my part (Maria was great of course)

I look like I wanna kill someone.... 

concentrating WAY too hard...

wow, awkward moment. 

Well, in about a weeks time I'll be saying hello to try dos~ wish me luck! 

PEACE OUTSIDE
JAMIE 

So, um...what country am I living in again?

DONE WITH INITIAL CERTIFICATION TRAINING FOR GABA!! WHOOO HOOO!!!!

...Sorry, but it's really been a grueling 3 days. From Tuesday to Thursday, 10am-7pm, non-stop learning how to be a good Gaba instructor/customer service bitch. That's right, customer service...my favorite. Even though I am an instructor, we are supposed to carter to the whim of the "clients" (not students), and make sure that they leave a "satisfied customer". Makes since, but I hate to look at it that way (I bow down to NO ONE, you hear? No one!) yet, I understand the importance of making sure all our "students" (clients just sounds so stiff and impersonal) feel like they're getting their moneys worth (one "package deal" of lessons at Gaba costs about a small fortune) and actually learning something, which is what every teacher in any field should be concerned about. I think just putting the "customer service" label on it is what bothers me the most so, from now on I'll just ignore that bit (but not in the sense of not making sure i'm giving my all to every student, of course).

I officially start on Monday, and I'll be working at the learning studio in Tokyo, which sounds like it will be a busy one (more money for me, whoo!). I met some pretty chill people during training, including the guy that was training us. Yet, from hanging out with all these other gaijin (foreigners) and speaking nothing but English for the past couple of days, I've sort of forgotten what country I'm living in. Every time I stepped out of the Gaba building onto the crowded streets of Tokyo was like a little culture shock experience. I've been getting home late as well so I haven't really seen my host family much (hence haven't spoken Japanese much) which has also thrown me for a loop. To top off the unbalanced-ness, last night I performed at this place called the Pink Cow (i'll get into the performance details in a bit)

Even their bathroom was made up with art work~

This place was amazingly chill. It's part restaurant, part bar; part art gallery, part stage, and all parts awesome. The lady that owns it is from San Fran and has been running her place for 11 years now. It's located in Shibuya, in the basement of some other building and it's very spacious (a rare commodity in Japan). In the front it has a little stage equipped with a DJ hole. There are tables and benches with colorful pillows strewn everywhere surrounding the stage area. Off to the left of the stage there's more seating and artwork displays (actually, this whole place in itself was an artwork display). Towards the back was even more seating and sound equipment. TV's were placed everywhere so that you can watch the performance from where ever.

Micheal discovered this fact out fast. 

Even further back takes you into this little cozy hole of a bar area where the friendliest bartender will gladly use you as his guinea pig for the various drink concoctions he thinks up (for free, if you sit there long enough). Somewhere in there is a kitchen (I saw the chef make an appearance every once in a while, but I never saw where he came from), and all the employees are foreigners with the same goal; just trying to make a life for themselves in the busiest little city around.  I have no problem picturing this place in Portland, and it made me a little home sick to tell the truth. Now, why was I there??

As mentioned before, I was performing~! Well, I ~accompanied~ my friend Maria Sekiya on guitar. I did do a solo bit as well though. How did it go?

I butchered everything.

This picture about captures how the
performance went; Maria, beautiful
and perfect; me, a mess and slightly retarded. 

Maria was born to sing and nailed every song; me on the other hand, well...perhaps if I had had more time to practice I would have done a better job (only had about 4 days to prepare due to finals at school and the damn job training). But actually getting up on stage and doing it was the hardest part and what counts the most right?? I mean, I actually played and ~sang~ one song by myself. I've never had the guts to do that before and even though I royally screwed up Muse's "unintended" I still got a round of applause and shouts of encouragement from friends and acquaintances a like, which made it worth it. I didn't have anyone video tape it (for obvious reasons) but I did convince my friend, Micheal to take pictures and as soon as he gets them to me I'll post them for your viewing pleasure.

Aside from the embarrassing-ness of it all, I met a bunch of awesome people. This particular night was dubbed "Ladies Night" and the focus was on getting intelligent women together to talk about how awesome we are (okay well, perhaps it was more like getting together to network and share what we're doing with our lives in Tokyo, etc). There were fashion designers, musicians, actors and theater owners, painters and dancers and just plain cool people. The Pink Cow holds loads of events to host local artists to get their work out and the owner even invited ~me~ back to the next open mic event. I also volunteered to be a model for a body-painting exhibit they're going to have in a couple weeks, so that will be exciting. AND ( so much happened last night, it's hard to type it all out) I got talked into performing at Japan Music Week at Shibuya La Mama (see previous posts for details on that place) on the 19th of this month. Yikes!!!! Need to practice. Oh and to top that all off, the guy that conducted training at Gaba just happens to be very involved in the foreigner music scene in Japan and said to keep in touch for some future gigs/networking opportunities. Thank you Japan, for giving me back my passion for music; I had lost it over these past two years and really appreciate being reunited. I feel like Japan gives a lot more opportunities for musicians than America does...or perhaps it's just that I don't know the right people in America...anyway.

One of my adoring fans, Namiko!

And possibly my #1 fan, Micah! 

The lady on the right (Joana) is the one that
will have be perform at Japan Music week. Micheal
was dragged into it as well. 

The performance by the belly dancer just reinforced the
feeling that I was in Portland rather than Tokyo. 

Overall, I give the Pink Cow 10 thumbs up and I will most definitely go back just to chill there, and recommend anyone who is coming to Japan to look it up (just follow this link to their home page). 

Now it's time to enjoy my day off.

PEACE OUTSIDE
Jamie

Nature walk

Today was another BEAUTIFUL day in Tokyo. It was about middle 60's with a slight breeze and blue skies. Yet despite that, I was feeling really depressed all day....and for the past couple days for that matter. Can't seem to shake this funk. So today i decided that instead of sitting inside all day like I was wanting to, I was going to get out and enjoy the nice weather. Not that I've been couping myself up indoors all this time, it's just that every time I go out it's for some reason/matter or other. I haven't been able to just have me time outside of the house (plenty of me time in doors but it's not the same).

So I got dressed, looked up how to get to that fabulous park my host mom took me to a couple weeks ago and set off! I bought Onigiri (rice balls) and this green apple that was grown locally and tasted AMAZING and ate in the park. I actually pass the stop for this park on my way to and from school everyday but haven't had the time/energy to actually go there by myself. It's called 石神井公園　(Shyakujikoen) for those of you who live in Tokyo and want a nice park to meander in. It really is huge and they have a little lake in the middle where you can rent these paddle boats and go paddle around for a while (a popular thing to do among couples it seems; people holding hands everywhere I went!). I spent about 2 1/2 hours there just walking around and taking the occasional picture, It was really relaxing and brightened my mood considerably!

Look! They have swan paddle boats too! 

Truly one of the best apples I have eaten. 

lots of old people where fishing as well
Don't know if they can keep the fish or not though

HUGE ASS SPIDER AND IT'S EQUALLY HUGE WEB!
as well as the pretty shrine in the background

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Now to prepare for tomorrow's live performance in front of all my peers! Yikes!

Jamie

Visual Kei concert vs. Hard core punk concert (with clickable links for words/ bands you might not know)

I realized after I had bought my ticket to go see Chemical Pictures at Takadanobaba Area the other weekend that I have not actually been to a visual kei concert in Japan. Ever. Sure I've been to VK bands live such as; Dir En Grey, Miyavi, Girugamesh, and PLC; but all those concerts took place in America. But how different could it be? I mean, a rock concert is a rock concert no matter where you are, right? Wrong.

Well let me be more specific. The crowd at a rock concert shouldn't be all that different, or at least that's what I thought going into this.

Now, for those of you who know what VK is all about, you probably also know what VK fans are all about. And to narrow that down even further I should say you know what the fan girls are all about. It's true that the VK fan base is made up of mostly girls, but when these bands come to America, that doesn't matter for the most part. The audience rocks out no matter what (or at least they rock out within the parameters of the venue's rules, i.e. more and more places are banning crowd surfing, etc). Now growing up I have watched countless concert DVDs of my favorite VK bands and took into account how hard the fans rocked the house (moshing, crowd surfing, etc) so when I bought my ticket to see Chemical pictures, I was ready for a night of thrashing and bashing; a full out rock-a-thon.

Oh was I disappointed.

The line us was decent. CP were great. The crowd I wanted to destroy.

All girls (not really surprising but still a little weird). And they were all wearing slippers!! If anyone knows about this phenomena please enlighten me because I could not figure it out. Of course there were also the crazy cosplay outfits but that was to be expected. What wasn't to be expected was how all these girls, with their mean looking make-up and gothed-out clothing just stood there when the bands played and listlessly waved their arms in rhythm to the music and playfully yelled out their favorite band members name. It was a little sickening. To watch these bands who were completely ripping up the stage (or at least some of them did) and to have the crowd pretty much give you nil of a reaction must be frustrating...or maybe they just like the attention from all the girls as they look down on their worshiping faces and crack a stunning smile that makes them giggle with happiness. Giggling... at a rock concert. *shutters*.

But don't get me wrong, I still like VK music and respect the bands, it's just their fans that I have lost respect for. At least the ones here in Japan anyway (I mean, come on. Slippers!?!)


Needless to say I ditched after CP played (which they played second to last, dangnabit).

And regardless of this incident I went to another VK concert the following weekend because Unsraw was playing and I hoped that at least their fans wouldn't let me down. But I was sadly mistaken. Slippers galore. But I did discover a new band from that concert called Nil Delete Heads who I will definitely look more into later.

However, the day after the Unsraw concert my friend lead me to this venue in Shinjuku called Anti-knock where they were having a line up of these hard core punk/grind core bands playing. A little skeptical I went along and had the time of my life! (well, maybe not my life but it did make up for the crappy two previous concerts). Not only were the bands tearing it up but the crowd was very into it as well. Circle pits, crowd surfing, I even got punched in the face with a can at one point (but don't worry, no marks ;-). Now THAT'S what a rock concert is supposed to be like! I haven't been to a show like that in a long time. I'm not really into grind core music per-say but the concert was totally worth it. One of the bands was from America. They called themselves Trash Talk and were really awesome. I got to talk to the vocalist and one of their roadies throughout the concert (something you cannot expect to do at a VK concert, unless the band you're seeing is virtually unknown and hence has no crazy followers that will push you down the stairs for talking to their sweetheart). Also talked to a lot of the other bands as well; all really nice and talkative despite the image they portray on stage and in public (Punks are friendly people).

One band's vocalist in particular though had me a little confused....

This guy was a total gangster. I mean, completely thuggin'. I don't usually associate "intimidating" with Japanese men but this dude had me worried. And then it hit me....

Was he Mexican?!?

He was speaking Japanese without any difficulty....

I had to figure this out.

So I went up to him after they played and close up he is 100% Japanese....but from a distance.... lol

(not that I think all Mexican guys are scary but they do pull the thug look off very well).

And as I was leaving, all sweaty and broken, I heard someone yell out "hey Averil! Avril Lavigne!" which I was like "oh hell no", and turned around to confront the offender who turned out to be one of the vocalists from one of the bands. I knew this insult was directed at me because in the past I was called Averil all the stinkin' time and it really pissed me off. And this time was no different.

I walked up to him and said "F* no"
Vocalist: "F* me?"
Me, aghast "Heeeeell no. And don't call me Averil"
Vocalist, not getting it "You're cute like Averil Lavigne"
Which lead to a hasty slap to the face by me, much to the great amusement of his friends.
Vocalist, completely shocked but laughing says something in Japanese to his friends which I proceed to tell him off in Japanese which then he begins to apologize and I accept and give him a knuckle pound and no hard feelings. See? Punks are nice people.

To wrap it all up, VK concert = never going to again.

LOVES AND HUGS
Jamie