Spend, spend, spend!

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As promised, no longer just a boring shot of the sky to get us going. This time I give you a "trying-to-be-arty" shot of a new building in Ginza. I like the twisty-ness of it, plus the reflection of the sign on the left. And since I started in Ginza, I might as well keep it going on the commerce tip.

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This is my new Porter pass-case. I had been wanting to get a leather case for my commuter pass for a long. And partly in celebration of getting a new job, I treated myself to this little piece.

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It was not cheap, but I am kind of obsessed with perforated leather and I dropped a chunk of change on it. But each day I get to use it and it makes me smile. Actually a couple weeks back I dropped a boat-load of money in a matter of hours.

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It was fun, but now with the empty wallet ain't so fun. At least I used cash so I don't have to live in dread of some massive bill coming. And some how that bill is always more than you think it should be, every time! I guess that is one advantage of using mostly cash in Japan – no bill shock.

Eagle-eyed readers (viewers?) will notice a large Undefeated purchase in the pic above. I will share that one in the next post. (I think)

One more example of out of control spending.

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Ever seen a baby-blue Lamborghini Murciélago? It was a first for me too! Maybe first and last? I mean how many Lambo owners can reject the factory options and go for the customizing route? One more look?

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I say the color works. Thoughts?

Lastly, tell me, is it wrong that I like this song, even though it is basically an add for _______. Can you figure out what its for?

Santogold, Julian Casablancas, and N.E.R.D. Produced by Pharrell


The song was produced by Pharrell for Converse. I want to dislike it for its so thinly veiled corporate message, but I like the song. (Shrugging my shoulders)

Later

I like RAP.

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This picture is cleverly entitled "Moon Over Shinjuku." I had been playing with the camera settings and I liked the results.

It has been a while again. But this time, I have a really good excuse. I finally found a new job. So after four years of doing the same thing, its off to greener pastures. (I mean, at least I HOPE they are greener!) But, during my job search and now as I am learning my new job duties, it might be a little thin up here.

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As I have said before, I am not a huge fan of Engrish/Japalish mistakes. Mostly because whenever I speak Japanese I murder the hell out of it. I see no need to throw stones from my glass atrium. But saying all that, I love this sign. Its just so great with the Chinese, Korean, and English all neatly written. Notice they got the "AN" correct, not the more common article "A", and more importantly, how is "an irrelevant person" defined exactly I wonder. "Do not enter" just seems a whole lot more accurate. Besides...with that huge lock on there...who could enter anyways!?!?

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So I have been shopping again. Any regular readers should recognize at least two out of the three names on that shoe box. Patta is the shoe store in Amsterdam I am always jocking. Alife is one of the originators and leaders in this streetwear scene. I don't always love there stuff, but at least they are well thought out. Rockwell is the clothing line by the artist Parra. Parra's stuff always has great color and a playful attitude.

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I had read about the shoes and seen pics online. I was pretty sure I wanted them. And there is a newish Alife shop in Tokyo, so I was pretty sure I could get them. Of course I was worried about a line, availability etc, but luckily the Saturday they were to be released was a holiday, so I had no work! From the pic above you can see what time I left my house.

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This is what the store looked like just after 9:30 a.m. I was the only person there. I was surprised. Another surprise was waiting for me there. According to the web, Alife opens at 11 a.m. on Saturdays. Not true! They open at 12 p.m. SHOCKING...you can NOT trust everything you read on the wide wide wide. Needless to say, I had to wait longer in the rain, by my self, without a line. But since I had the time, I decided to walk around.

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This was the line out front of Undefeated.

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Here is the line for the re-opening of Milkfed.

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And here was the long line in front of Real Mad Hectic. How come I can't ever get a line?!?

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Well, the explanation was actually pretty simple. When I walked in the store at noon, the shoe I wanted to buy was no where to be found. That explained the lack of line and why the shop staff was confused why some joker was waiting out front. According to the web, the shoe was to be released to all Alife shops on the same date. But the shop staff said the shoe wouldn't turn up for another 2 weeks. (That damn internet lying again!) I was pissed, wet, embarrassed and irritated.

To make myself feel better I went and bought the Grand Theft Auto IV. Of course the shop only had the deluxe version so I ended up paying way more than I wanted to. But I got all this other crap too.

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I went to ALife again two weeks later, on the day after the release and got the shoes with no drama. I asked the guy if the shop had been busy the day of release. He answered "no, not really." All that worrying for nothing. The shoe is called "Rockwell x Alife x Patta 'RAP' Everybody Mid."

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The shoes are really nice, and quite different from the usual running shoes I get. But all the materials are very nice well made.

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There is a 3M reflective strip below the perforated leather. And I have always loved rip-stop nylon. It is such a good material for shoes; light, strong, and breathable.

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The soles are pretty amazing. I hope they don't get dirty quickly. Do you think they gave enough lace options?

And there you have it. My newest shoes. And I can't leave you without at least one music link. This video is pretty amazing. One of the more clever communication techniques I have come across. The song by David Byrne & Dizzee Rascal is not too shabby either. Enjoy "Toe Jam". It looks NSFW, but it totally is safe for work.



later

Leftovers

I came across this great sign the other day. (Actually, it's a 2 for 1 deal, cause the pins in the background ain't to shabby either.) I was with my girl in a department store that we don't go to often. We were just checking out the upper floors looking for a quick place to eat. We turned the corner, and ran into this gem of a sign. I love the retro/futuristic feeling of the font. I also love that I found bowling lanes in a department store. It was a bit shocking. So shocking it started a little emotion in me to, I felt the pull of the pins and the big balls. My girl was less than enthused. Oh well, maybe next time.

So, this week I have a bunch of unrelated stuff that has been gathering in my mind and in various folders on my desktop. We will call it leftovers. It is past time to get rid of some of this crap. (The first pic being a prime example.) So, let's get to it.

Just in case some of you had some lingering thoughts about how underground Bathing Ape is, linger no longer. Bathing Ape provided the t-shirts for the huge nationwide NTV 24 hour TV extravaganza. It is all for charity, so I can't hate on them. The event sticks a bunch of celebs on TV for 24 hours to raise money for various good causes. This year was all about the environment and childhood diseases.

They made 300,000 of the t-shirts and sold them all for the low low price of ¥1400. ($12) The "30" on the t-shirt is because this year marks the 30th year they have done this. Oh, I almost forgot the most iconic part of the show. They pick one celeb each year who runs/walks the entire 24 hours. It is an absolute torture to watch. They have 24 hours to finish a 70km course. This year it was a 66 year old comedian. He didn't finish the course in the allotted time, so it turned in to 27 hour TV. Again, I say this is not fun to watch. I only read about it and flicked through it a couple times. I don't want to see things that hurt my eyes.

This thing here is not harmful for your eyes at all.

I have been very lucky to run into some amazing cars lately. I snagged this pic in Shibuya on my way to play some table tennis. The guy driving this Ferrari 430 Spider did nothing to reverse the stereotype of complete asses driving Ferraris. Oh well. If you are wondering what I would drive, if I had to drive a Ferrari. Click HERE to see the 2008 Ferrari 430 Scuderia. I doubt it would make the best starter sports car...but, it is still my favorite current Ferrari. I also ran into another car I have no business driving. Actually, no one has any business driving this thing in a city.

From far away, it looks like your regular everyday Porsche. It is far from ordinary, move closer.

No, this is as serious as you can get without racing tires. This is the 2007 Porsche GT3RS. This thing comes standard with roll bars people. That is how ridiculous it is. I can't imagine what it would be like driving around a busy city. Can you imagine how hard the springs are? How sharp the brake response is? How much power this thing has from just a quick right foot tap?

At first glance the front doesn't look so different from the regular 911's. It is though, with many more scoops and diffusers. The emblem on the hood is not the usual metal one either, it is a sticker to save weight. That is how serious the German's are about this car. I love it. I love the color too. The orange really suits this shape. My 2nd fav detail on the whole car is the color matching brake calipers visible through the massive black wheels.

My favorite detail is the "RS" on the huge rear spoiler. So not needed, but so necessary. The owner of this ride was busy shopping in Gucci while I and a few other people drooled over his car. When he came out, with 3 staff members holding his large bags, it took forever to find places to stash all his loot. No space in the front trunk, very difficult to stick stuff in the back with all the roll bars. What a conundrum. Luckily my man didn't bring his girl shopping with him so they stacked all the stuff on the passenger seat. Smooth. (Not that I was watching and judging...me??? Never!)

And the last hotness I came across was this monster.

This Lamborghini Murcielago surprised me. I came around the corner and BAM! The white monster was just sitting there waiting for me. As curvy and sensual the Porsche is, the Lambo is all straight lines and edgy. Look how far forward the driver's seat is, compared with the rest of the car. It just keeps going and going to fit all the engine in the rear.

The flatness of this car is pretty damn amazing. It is all wide spaces, angles, and clear lines, yet somehow it is full of emotion. This thing exudes passion in a way that the Porsche can't.

The exhaust is pretty sick. I think the center exhaust option works on only a few cars, and this is one of them. It is my 2nd fav detail on this crazy car. My top detail is the real wheels. They are so wide that they stretched the wheel design in 3 dimensions. This pic tries to show that, not all that successfully, sadly.

If you scroll back up you can see the difference between the front and rear wheels. I love it. And that is all for the cars I have seen lately. But don't you worry, I will have my eyes open and my camera at the ready.

Speaking of keeping my eyes open...this product caught my eyes.

So, yeah, these cookies were in the local drugstore. The perfect product for the girl on the go who is a bit hungry and wants bigger breasts. F-cups no less! Strange. I wonder if they sell this kinda crap in drugstores in the US. Anybody? Japan is a great place to live, no? (And I won't even get into the ringtones ladies can download to increase their chest size.)

As you remember the other day, I went to a graf exhibition. As I was there, I was thinking about the huge effect that the whole movement is having, and had for such a long time. It is being used in the mass media all the time, there is even a video game about it. Any person living in any city sees it everywhere. The good, the bad, and the ugly. Lot's of companies co-opt the look to make their ad more edgy. It took me a minute to figure out if this was real graffiti or Nike looking for for more street cred.

I finally figured out it was some writer throwing his shit up on the Nike billboard. But, who knows, maybe Nike paid him to. I kinda like the how it looks together. And Nike is smart to put up such simple ads. They are just begging for somebody to spray all over them. Here are more examples.

I also like the new logo they are using in Tokyo. It is simple but it has a nice balance. (The swoosh is between the kanji characters for Tokyo.) One more pic.

Call me crazy, but I read no clear message in this one. But I don't hate it all. It made me stop and think for a minute, which is about all we can ask of art. Speaking of messages, there is no doubt in this one.

[via Supertouch]

I'm not sure one French graf artist is going to make a whole hell of a lot of difference, but WK INTERACT wants this war to be over. This "Bring Me Back" is a pretty impressive piece if you ask me. But you are an idiot if you are asking me about graffiti. I don't know nothing. Click HERE to see more picks and read a bit more about it.

And finally for today, I went shopping again. I hit the outlets first. New Balance and Adidas were a waste of my time. Not even anything I slightly considered. Nike on the other hand had a bunch of maybes.
[source]

Like these Stabs. I like the color combination. I have a t-shirt that would match really well, maybe too well. And it is only the one shirt. No other options. That's a limited wardrobe y'all. Plus, the price was still a bit high.

[source]

I was liking these square-dots too. If it was a mesh toe-box instead of the dead looking leather, these would be in my closet already.

[source]

These are pretty old, so I was surprised to see them. I carried them around the store for a long time. These were best things they had in the store. The price was a bit dear again. So, in the end, I put them down too. I ate lunch and then took the train back to Tokyo. Before I went home, I stopped in Ueno. I had kinda made up my mind to get the Air Max Lights. Remember these?

[source]

Shockingly they didn't have my size. I took it as a sign that I should not get them. So I made my way to the station to go home. But not before stopping in a couple mini-stockists booths. I never find much there. They have a varied selection, some new releases, some collectibles, some used stuff. It is completely hit or miss. Low and behold, I found these!


I nice vintage shoe from 2005. I will share soon. See you guys next week.

Culture vs. Consumerism

Just in case you didn't know, it's summer here in Tokyo. It has been crazy hot. Last week we reached a new record high temp for Japan; 40.9 degrees Celsius. That is a ridiculous 105.62 degrees Fahrenheit. Not surprisingly, some people died and some went into the hospital. Read all about it HERE. But don't worry my faithful readers, I have been able to survive the heat. I have also managed to live through a couple more small earthquakes. Yeah for me!

Last post I started with a night shot of Shinjuku from my apt. I got a couple requests for some daytime shots. This shot just below is the matching shot to my last post, only this time it's a bright sunny day.

My place has a 270 degree view. It is pretty nice, if I do say so myself. If you look a little more to the left, I can see the limited towers of Ikebukuro.

And if we turn slightly more we get the view of the suburbs of Hoya/Nishi Tokyo. Nishi means in west. We live to the west of central Tokyo. But if you take the train for 30 mins, so start to get to the deeper suburbs. And now you know what it looks like from the 11th floor of my apt. Yippee.

Thanks to all of you how threw your 2 cents in about the "This or That" sneaker question. I could only find the orange Air Max Lights. Which I do like, but I wanted to see the brown 90's in person before deciding. So....I went with option "The Other Thing": Rainbow 6 Vegas. Which may or may not have been part of the reason for the lack of a post last week.

All this shopping and gaming made me feel like a bad person. So I have been trying to get some culture as well. Let's see if I can balance my consumerism with some cultural experience.

Cultural Experience #1.

A couple weeks back I had a chance to go to a Japanese Tea Ceremony. Otherwise known as Sado: "the way of tea". I had no idea what to expect. I thought we would watch some people perform it, learn a bit, and I figure it would be a lot of sitting "seiza style". This is when you sit with your on your knees with your feet tucked under yourself. I was right and wrong. We did have to sit seiza style, but we were also expected to try doing it as well.

The key is moving your hand as fast as you can. As you can see from the pic, she could do it really well. But when she put the cup in front of me, with the green tea powder, and a little water; I couldn't move my hand fast enough to make the tea good.

After my second try, she tasted my attempt and declared it "green juice" not green tea. She didn't really smile about it either. I almost told her her Rolex didn't really match her kimono, but I held my tongue. In addition to my failed and insulted tea, my legs were dying. Seiza style is so hard, like torture. My legs did not recover until a couple of hours. It was a good experience, for sure. I LOVE CULTURE!

Consumerism #1.

So, I have been having a lot of bag related problems on the weekend. During the week, I need to carry a book, magazine, ipod, etc. I got that bag situation covered. But on the weekend, I only want to carry my wallet, sunglasses, and maybe a bottle of water. I wanted something small, but not tiny. Last weekend I finally found what I had been looking for.

For bags I lean away from sports brands; Nike, New Balance, and so on. It would give me too much of a headache trying not to cross brands. Also, camouflage works pretty well so I don't have to be too concerned about color matching.

I used it today, and it worked well. Although one of my friends said it was pretty gay looking. I never got a chance to ask him if it was the dots or the shape. He is a backpack only kinda dude, so...um...yeah. I won't let one tiny comment scare me away from what looks like a promising relationship.

Cultural Experience #2.

I have an interest in graffiti and how it connects to underground culture and culture in general. I really don't know nearly enough to be able to comment on it intelligently. But I do try to go to exhibits when I can. This show of Barry Mcgee was pretty good. Sadly, I couldn't take any pics inside. Rules! He is also know as Twist, click HERE for some shots of his stuff out in the open. He has been around forever, so he uses a real mix of styles and materials. What I really love is his graphic textures. Here is one shot that I found floating around on the interwebs.

I couldn't figure out where I had see these kinds of patterns before. They had some really warm feelings attached to them. It took a while to come to me, but I realized where I had see them before. I found out they are based on back covers of old sheet music from the 30's and 40's. My Dad had some old music that had these types of patterns on them. It was nice to be able to connect something of today's subculture to my Dad's memory. I wonder where all that old music went to?

Consumerism #2.


If you know this logo, you just might be a brand whore. I am. My girl is. Come join us. The brand is Goyard. They are an extremely exclusive (<--- read f*cking expensive) luggage maker. They also make wallets, see below.

My girl has been looking forward to owning one of these for years now. We were finally able to make it a reality. That is fun. It is also a nice way to balance out my large purchase of the Xbox last month. Compromise and balance is very important in both relationships and consumerism.

I didn't love the wallet right away. I thought the pattern was classic, but on the boring side. Now I have changed my mind. I like the quietness of it. All signs point to my next wallet coming from Goyard as well. I gotta start saving my pennies! If you have a chance, check them out, they are beautifully made pieces. But good luck finding a shop in your neighborhood. Less than 15 shops worldwide. Now that's what I call brand management. Taking forced exclusivity to a whole new level. They also do bespoke pieces and personalized monograms at your request. Developing.

I hope I found some balance in the ongoing struggle between my arty side and my side that wants to buy everything. Let's get to some music.

Music

#1. M.I.A.'s album finally dropped. I have yet to pick it up. I have been content grabbing stuff of the web. Case in point: this her track "Jimmy"



I swear I heard the original before. I think my CitySis turned me onto some bhangra remixes of this track ages ago. Who knows? Also came across this adorable and heartbreaking snippet of Diplo and M.I.A. in happier times. (They used to be together and now they ain't.)



That shit almost makes me cry every time. I have no idea why. Maybe it's the amazing song. The happiness on their faces. The bittersweetness of it. Here is the track in it's entirety. (Not the proper video, just audio.)



#2. Since we are on a ethnic tip. I found some shit that brought me back to my high school days. I got this awesome mix tape got from some kid in my school. We aways swapped rap tapes and this one day he gave me this tape full of Spanish hip-hop. At the time I played the hell out of it, and then kinda forgot about it. I had now idea it was so good. It was way before I understood what was happening culturally in the music. Click HERE to read all about it. But if you want to hear it click HERE and HERE. A 2 for 1 special. Just call me K-mart. [via Negrophonic]

#3. Not too much to say about this one. It is just a great mix by the South Rakkas recorded live at Fabric. What more needs to be said, really? Lot's of different styles, all of them good. Riddims galore! This shit should make you smile all the way. Love the amazing re-working of a Lily Allen track at 7 minutes. They tear it to shreds and build something fierce. [via Mad Decent]

#4. Nothing to say about this one either. Or, actually, a challenge. See if you can listen to this song without your mood improving. It is one of the most joyful songs I have ever heard. Click HERE to get happy. [via The Fader]

Off to kill me some terrorists.

Later