Juniper Berries, vol. II

[Kataja76]

ORIGINAL MESSAGE, Fri 20 Jun 2008, 9:29 pm EEST: AnimeB diary: Midsummer Birch Trees

Midsummer Birch Trees

The Midsummer holiday, juhannus, has reached Helsinki. Once again I am writing my diary and gazing out of my window. It is pouring with rain. Rather depressive pictures of families bitterly huddling in their summer cottages are filling my mind. No, I am not going to go outside and grab my bicycle, as I had planned.

"Liput lepattaa märkinä", "flags are fluttering all wet", sings Tiktak. So convenient. But why on Earth am I bringing up Tiktak right now?

Actually, when I realized that AnimeB had gone as quiet as any Finnish town for juhannus, I decided to post a short shoutout, complete with some nice related Youtube link. Sadly, I could not find a matching Finnish-made AMV. So then I did some pretty random browsing and ran into "Heilutaan" (2003) by Tiktak. I had never even realized that the song was by them; I have grown to like it over the years.

The next thing you know, I am trying my translating skills on the refrain. This is not one of my most serious works, but I think it came out pretty nice. At least I can sing along with my text myself!

As usual, my advice is to hit up the volume - this is another song that loses a lot of punch if played too quietly. "Heilutaan" by Tiktak. Enjoy! Especially younger male AnimeBees might enjoy more than the music.

Refrain (original Finnish):

Hei me heilutaan taas mutta ei me kaaduta
Ehkä väsyttää vähän mutta nyt ei nukuta
Hei me heilutaan taas mutta ei me kaaduta
Ei me menneisyyttä kaduta tai sitä kelata
Ei se meidän syy oo, jos on suunta hukassa
Kellot takaperin käy, maailma on vinossa

Refrain (English translation by Katajainen, 20th June 2008):

Hey we swayin' once again, but no, we ain't gonna fall
Tired? Maybe but this is no time to sleep, no, not at all
Hey we swayin' once again, but no, we ain't gonna fall
What is gone is gone, it's nothin' to regret or to recall
Are you blamin' us for bein' lost? You ain't got a clue
All the clocks are tickin' backwards and the world has gone askew

The nicest AMV adaptation I found is made out of Lucky Star.

Iloista juhannusta!! While I was working on this message, the rain sort of passed, it is just gray and very humid outside.

*****

REPOST/BUMP, Sun 22nd Jun 2008, 7:21 pm EEST: Today I watched again layer 01: "Weird" of "Serial Experiments Lain" (the Anime), after a long pause. I must say it was a very different experience now that I knew better what to expect - even though I had forgotten many details. Not better or worse, just very different.

I think it was not a bad idea to order that DVD series a couple of years ago.

[Kataja76]

AnimeB diary: Today I read "Sweet 16" by Takako Shimura, as scanlated by the Lililicious community. A modest one-shot possibly based on the author's own adolescence experiences, the story was nowhere near the masterpiece qualities of Shimura's other work available in English, "Aoi Hana". However, Ms. Shimura has a very special touch of sensibility capable of captivating my heart. She does not really need say much, it is enough for her to depict human emotions and draw her lovable illustrations... And I will be hooked.

Also, I finished reading "Dominion" [vol. I], 3rd edition (ISBN 1-56971-488-6), a dark-future tank police comedy by the much more famous author Masamune Shirow. No, I was not impressed and would not recommend the book to anybody. It does have a lot of fun moments and some interesting content, but is tiresome to read and often either gets boring or or goes totally overboard.

A nice Dominion moment: Leona Ozaki, wearing less clothes than usually, cleaning her precious mini-tank nicknamed "Bonaparte", is singing:

T is for Tank,
And T is for Terror...
And K is the K
For Killing in error...



(Part III: Never Say Never Again. No page numbering.)

[Kataja76]

ORIGINAL MESSAGE, Thu 24th Jul 2008, 12:00 am EEST: AnimeB diary/reviewing MT: Honestly, I did not expect chapter 7 of Megatokyo end in a way nearly as impressive as this. The following two interlude pages support it perfectly as well.

Nevertheless, Mr. Gallagher should watch out. He has wondered so far from the original MT spirit that he is very close to destroying Largo's character. And I mean destroying in a way even I could not forgive.

I forgive a lot in this very instance, you know.

The mystery about Miho as a girl inspiring ph34r even in Ed helps a lot to balance Largo's behavior. But it may not be enough. Erika should be supporting that effort as best as she can, and she is not.

***

REPOST/BUMP, Fri 25th Jul 2008, 10:38 pm EEST: AnimeB diary/reviewing MT: Today I reached page 910 of (online) Megatokyo. Quite promising for Largo: the moral dilemma is to choose between the responsibilities of Great Teacher (at Shiritsu Daitou High) and Gamemaster (at Megagamers).

Of course, a bunch of zombies armed with baseball bats and chainsaws as a random encounter would not hurt. When it comes to developing Largo's character, few things that do hurt would hurt.

***

REPOST/BUMP, Sun 27th Jul 2008, 3:17 am EEST: AnimeB diary/reviewing MT: I just cannot help it, I feel compelled to rant about Megatokyo. I just reached page 940, and the whole beginning of chapter 8 has been great! Almost every page has worked perfectly. There is a balance between love and l33t, there is a balance between mundane and monstrous. We readers even got one of the most prominent bits of fan service so far, and it totally supported both the plot and the overall atmosphere.

Okay, there are some little points left proving the obvious fact that the author is just very good at his work, not a genius. There are some clichés that cannot be left out but should be dealt with even more skill.

When your character shouts, "I DON'T WANT IT TO BE EASY!! I WANT IT TO BE RIGHT!!", about his own love affair... Yes, you are depicting an important issue. In this world of ours, idealisms are real sometimes, while the ideals themselves might not be. But I do not think I would end a page with that one. Saying it aloud gets very easily anticlimactic in real life, let alone in the genre of romantic comedy.

[Kataja76]

AnimeB diary: Yesterday I reread cursorily "Oh My Goddess! Vol. I: Wrong Number" (First edition, June 2002, ISBN 1-56971-669-2) by Kōsuke Fujishima. This marks my return to the classic series after a hiatus of over two years. No, I did not like the beginning any more than in 2006. I just finally ran into vol. II at a public library without any effort so I decided to give it a shot. Returning to vol. I meant preparing for that shot.

That's it for now. Like Public Enemy would have said, "more news at 11".

[Kataja76]

AnimeB diary: Today I finished reading "Oh My Goddess! Vol. II: Leader of the Pack" (First edition, August 2002, ISBN 1-56971-764-8) by Kōsuke Fujishima. Maybe slightly better than vol. I, but the difference is not big.

***

Been There, Done That - K's 80s Show, part I: Inspired by Aniki, I am launching a retrospective series of music from the 1980s. The idea is to post Youtube links to one, two, or (at the very most) three eighties songs as a bonus every time I publish a blog entry.

I am starting off with a free association that followed from "The Riddle". Ladies - as far as there are any around - and gentlemen, let me present Over the Hills and a Far Away as I remember it recorded by Gary Moore of the United Kingdom in 1986.

I believe it was in 1987, after the album "Wild Frontier" had come out, that a friend of mine flipped a cassette into my player and let me hear the song for the first time. I was more or less like, "That's quite okay, although I don't understand why modern guitar music needs all those distortion effects." (Not sure if I was familiar with the terminology, but that was my opinion, which has only softened, not really changed, over the past two decades.) At that moment, I was much more into playing with our Star Wars and Masters of the Universe action figures than into widening my musical horizons. Only later did I realize that Moore's song actually had a pretty strong Celtic vibe, which has made it one of my favorites among the eighties hard rock. Yep, I have liked Irish folk music since an early age.

As a side note, I had began to learn English at comprehensive school in 1985, and its presence in my everyday life was very fragmentary. Without the Internet, getting access to current song lyrics used to require a lot of effort, so I did not really have a chance to understand what the song was about. Probably I got a word here and a phrase there, but most of the text remained unintelligible or misheard ("faithful night" instead of "fateful night" did not make much sense, for example). It was not until today that I stopped to read and comprehend the whole thing.

Searching for information to write this rant, I have understood that my Northern American readers may not even know the name of Moore, who used to be very popular in Finland. Instead, some youngsters will know a Nightwish cover version of 2001 - which I had never heard of before! Compare the imagery with the old Gary Moore video.

Two final notes: You noticed the nick of the person who had put the Nightwish vid on Youtube, right? Love Hina Forever!! Well then, pay attention to the YLE logo in the Moore vid too! Perhaps it is not a coincidence that you find a Finnish rip of this Northern Irish song on the Web.

[Kataja76]

AnimeB diary: During the weekend I ventured to the adjacent town called Espoo to check out Ropecon XV. (Please pronounce the vowels as if they were in Japanese; the Finnish yearly national roleplaying convention has little to do with English rope.) Funny stuff spotted: two Agatha Clays (of "Girl Genius"), one of them with a cute Dingbot; live Leekspin (admittedly imitating a similar procession of this year's Finncon-Animecon); a perfect-looking home-made X-wing fighter pilot outfit (worn by a very pretty young woman); another young cosplayer who might be of more interest to the average Animebee than to me; and more.

Unfortunately I must confess that the delicious pizza of restaurant Cantina impressed me more than a lot of the roleplaying stuff I saw and heard. Such an enthusiast I used to be, and I have never turned my back to the RPG world; I have just slowly floated farther away from it. But still, I am happy I spent much of my weekend at the con.

See also the main Ropecop illustration of this year's con materials, by Juha Harju, and more Ropecon + 2008 photos on Flickr.

***

Been There, Done That - K's 80s Show, part II: Most of my readers are probably familiar with this one, but talking about the eighties, "Ghostbusters" by Ray Parker Jr. (1984) is always worth a mention. At a time when I was not yet interested in following current pop music, this song hit me through the Commodore 64 computer game loosely based on the movie. The game even provided the lyrics, so I was able to ask my parents to translate! See the music video on Youtube.

[Kataja76]

AnimeB diary: Some short moments ago I finished reading "Megatokyo" vol. II (the printed version) by Fred Gallagher and Rodney Caston.

Sadly enough, I do not have any time to venture back to the eighties or anything right now. I also missed the Helsinki Comics Festival today.

See you around, An1m3B33z.

[Kataja76]

AnimeB diary: Yesterday evening (27th Sep), I finally finished reading vol. II of "Sweet Blue Flowers" (Aoi Hana) by Takako Shimura. Actually I have read most chapters of the two first volumes at least twice by now. The story has no doubt become one of my all-time favorites among Japanese comics.

What I like best are Shimura-san's wonderful style of illustration, most of the themes, and some of the character designs. Her narrative techniques, however, felt a bit clumsy in the beginning. Interestingly enough, I do not really perceive such problems in the beginning of vol. III any more, but keep paying attention to innovative and refined ideas. Either Shimura-san has developed over the past two years, or then I have grown to understand a lot more tricks of Japanese storytelling by reading her work. Any way is fine with me.

Last Wednesday (24th Sep), I watched the second Narnia movie, "The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian" (United Kingdom/United States, 2008). It might be the best basic fantasy movie I have ever seen. It must be mentioned, though, that I have read C.S. Lewis's novel over twenty years ago and forgotten most of the story. (For some reason, "The Voyage of the Dawn Treader" has left much clearer memories - and even they are blurred). What I remember is the atmosphere of the Narnia books, and this second movie, especially its first half, truly excelled in interpreting that. The first movie was very good too, at least compared to the rather horrible experience caused by "The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King". What the Narnia movies do not offer are fresh new ideas or points of view. They are just enjoyably nostalgic, and that seems to be something the mainstream people with their mainstream monies can achieve if they try hard. So I really wish they could keep doing that and spare us from such sad misconfigurations as Steven Spielberg's 2005 film adaptation of "The War of the Worlds", originally a science fiction novel by H.G. Wells.

***

Been There, Done That - K's 80s Show, part III: All right, time to get down with some stuff from my dear home country. If I should name a single classic pop song representing eighties' Finland, there would not be much hesitation: "Levoton Tuhkimo" (1984) by Dingo. The band enjoyed huge popularity for roughly two and a half years (1984 - 86), producing two unquestionably successful LPs (including the fourth most sold Finnish album to date) and one that did "only" well. Their legacy became much stronger than the short period on top might suggest, and long years later even I became convinced that Dingo had been an important factor in the Finnish rock history rather than a forgettable and slightly annoying fad. "Levoton Tuhkimo" (the title translates as "Restless Cinderella") is a combination of a simple yet clever hook riff and a generic text that will probably touch the hearts of more urban generations to come: it describes the despair of loneliness in the middle of people who dance the night away.

The last time I heard the song it was at a cheap restaurant disco. It worked very well when played very loudly. But frankly speaking, as heard on Youtube with modest volume, Pertti Neumann's voice and style of singing sound pretty painful to me. Unintentional, or the very style of those days? The Estonian 2006 cover, "Rahutu Tuhkatriinu" by Mari-Leen, sure feels much better produced, if more impersonal. I recommend checking out that version, here as a "Yu-Gi-Oh!" AMV. The Estonian lyrics seem to be different from, although clearly inspired by, the original. Here the protagonist is successful hunting in the city night, but eventually left feeling empty, while the girl in Dingo's song has her "Cinderella story" behind her and has to face isolation and ridicule by other people.

[Kataja76]

AnimeB diary: Color My Soul

Color My Soul

Right now when I am beginning this entry [which was afternoon; I had to interrupt because of other stuff], there is a beautiful rainbow slowly fading away before my eyes if I gaze out of my window. Most of the trees I can see are at least half yellow, with the occasional shade of orange and blood-red. The ruska never gets as full and bright here by the southern coast as it does in the northern parts of the country - the shift to yellow or red is more gradual, and lots of the colorful leaves fall down soon while others stay green. Yet this time of the year is a recurring aesthetic experience, especially the sunnier days, when the temperature may be unexpectedly chilly or warm.

Yesterday evening I finally unzipped the first volume of "Hōrō Musuko" by Takako Shimura (as scanlated by the Kotonoha community, latinized Hourou Musuko). I immediately devoured the whole, over 180 pages. My mood made me do that, and yes, I loved it.

The beginning of this story felt even clumsier than that of "Sweet Blue Flowers". You know the feeling sometimes when you watch a movie for the first time, and during the first half an hour you have difficulty recognizing the different characters and getting the point of what is going on? Then, during the second thirty minutes, the pieces of the puzzle begin to fit together, the whole makes more and more sense by the moment, and the plot carries you away? Well, roughly the same happened to me with "Hōrō Musuko". Of course, this is not because the images would be too dark, blurry, or otherwise difficult to perceive. Shimura-san's style of illustration is extremely clear, but as she points out herself, her character designs tend to lack the necessary number of distinctive features. Worse yet, her storytelling may be confusing for the unexperienced reader, and she has difficulty introducing characters' queer traits in a completely credible manner...

But once I have truly entered another new world by Shimura and gotten familiar with the cast, there is no turning back. So many feelings to relate to, expressed in such refined manners. And I do not care if I am repeating myself: the illustrations alone are so beautiful that I would deeply enjoy them without any story whatsoever. The themes: Queer people and their close ones, presented as very human beings, facing themselves and life step by step (this time, we are dealing with transvestism). The emphasis is on feelings and social relations rather than on sex; even ecchi is more scarce by far, not to mention subtle, than in Love Hina.

And on top of all this, I get more insight into Japanese middle-class everyday life. The depictions seem pretty realistic, although of course I cannot really tell fake from genuine. A question arising is whether there are any manga series with contemporary (say, 1960 to present) Japanese working-class everyday life scenes. I think I have never seen one.

(Sorry, there are further interrupting factors, so I have to skip another dose of the 80s show. Do not worry, there is still more to come!)

[Kataja76]

Note: This edited and reposted message includes passages both in English and in Swedish. Do not miss the eighties show at the end of it all, even if you have to skip my entry on comics by Li Österberg!

***

ORIGINAL MESSAGE, Thu 2nd Oct 2008, 11:08 pm EEST: AnimeB diary: I just finished reading Hōrō Musuko II. Not necessarily better than the first volume, but definitely getting deeper and deeper, facing more and more problematic issues. Yeah, I am pretty hooked.

EDIT, Mon 6th Oct 2008: Damn, Hōrō Musuko III done as well. I had wished it would last, like, at least three days. No, two reading sessions and less than one day. I just could not hold back.

EDIT, Thu 9th Oct 2008: Today I finished reading Negima II with thought. I had left most of the extras pending and actually lost the book. Found it under some papers lying by my desk.

***

EDIT, Wed 15th Oct 2008: AnimeB diary: Fanzineserien "Agnosis" (nr. 1 - 6, 2004 - 08) av Li Österberg från Sverige färdigläst i går.

Försändelsen med fanzinena fick jag den 17 september, och redan samma dag läste jag kanske fyrtio eller sextio procent av det hela. Därefter kände jag att jag borde fortsätta långsammare och mer funderande. Vissa serier läste jag ivrigt två eller flera gånger medan andra krävde så mycket koncentration att jag skjöt på läsandet ganska länge.

De bästa av numren är väl 2 och 5. Tvåan eftersom den rör mig djupast, och femman eftersom där mångsidigt innehåll möter briljant teknik (och på något sätt funkar den fjärde delen av "Det är inte så här det ska vara" bäst också).

När jag började skriva denna text fattade jag att Li Österbergs serier rör sig helt utanför den logik som AnimeB:s angloamerikanska censurpraxis bygger på. Troligen borde jag ge inga länkar här, för tekniskt taget brukar det finnas explicit content där man kan finna hennes verk. Men tonen i "Agnosis" är sådan att enligt min mening är Österbergs serier lämpliga för både vuxna och tonåringar. Det skulle man väl inte säga om man t ex betraktade masturbation i sig själv som något slags problem - och den åsikten är ju mycket vanligare i Förenta staterna än i Norden i dag.

Jag planerar att snacka mera om "Agnosis" någon annanstans på nätet senare. Om det finns någon som är intresserad, gäller det att sända mig ett privatmeddelande.

***

Been There, Done That - K's 80s Show, part IV: For obvious reasons, my perception of the eighties is biased towards the end of the decade. It was not merely my age, though - at least I like to think that the aesthetics of mainstream pop culture were also moving towards what attracted me more, reaching the peak around 1991.

This time I am introducing a great icon song of the late eighties, one of the last things to hit me hard before I became a follower of the alternative hip-hop culture: "Like a Prayer" (1989) by Madonna. For me, it was little more than an outstanding song about painful love, something I was very eager to receive in those days. The echoes of how much indignation the video clip aroused did reach me back then, but I do not really get it even today. It must reflect how much more seriously both displaying the symbols of (Catholic) Christianity and addressing racial discrimination are taken in some other parts of the world than they are over here.

[Kataja76]

AnimeB diary: I just reached the 1.000th page of "Megatokyo" (online). I have been into so much other stuff lately, both within and outside the comics scene, that for a while I feared I had gotten alienated from the world of MT. Happily enough, a recent return to the webcomic proved my doubts wrong. Had I not already received a good dose of endorphin writing the AnimeB wiki article on the Kalmar Union, it would have been very, very hard to stop reading the comic at a cliffhanger - which is what I did, after all.

***

Been There, Done That - K's 80s Show, part V: This time I am bringing up an icon so simple I often forget it comes from the eighties. To me, "Live Is Life" (1985) by Opus (Austria) represents something timeless, saying almost nothing and yet so incredibly much in a few modest lines. And remember, I am the guy who abandoned mainstream pop music for alternative rap to hear more lyrics! Well, if you check the second Youtube link and see Opus on stage, you might crack a smile at their, well, timelessness...

Live Is Life
Live Is Life live

[Kataja76]

AnimeB diary: I did it!! I beat Pepe in the point count, reaching number nineteen in the richest users chart.

#18 - Ryo Misaki - 443,839.74
#19 - Kataja76 - 370,901.39
#20 - ☼Pepe☼ - 369,093.55

I have also beaten such old heads and huge posters as Dark Evangel, Ederius, Grey Fox, Kioswan and Mandi (Saiko Desu Yo). Congratulations to all of you, seemingly you either have gotten a life or moved forward.

***

Been There, Done That - K's 80s Show, part VI: What would the eighties have been without Italo Disco and Italo House? Yep, I listened to a lot disco for two or three years before discovering hip-hop. Among piles of crap there were some real gems, such as "Ride on Time" (1989) by Black Box (Italy; note that not all Italo Disco was made in that country, though). I did not have a copy of this great song in the nineties, so it still sounds quite fresh when I return to it. Pay attention to the still pre-Eurodance beat and sound effects! According to Wikipedia, this song already belonged to the era of controversy concerning heavy sampling - a confusing novelty back then.

Ride on Time

[Kataja76]

AnimeB diary: Yesterday I finished reading "Love Song. 4 Tales by Shôjo Artist keiko Nishi" (1st printing of English-language graphic novel version, 1997).

Last week I watched "Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind" by Hayao Miyazaki (1984) at a movie theater. Beautiful, but not even comparable with the magnificient comic version. All films by Miyazaki I have seen so far have had some strongly cartoonish, Disney-ish features. These are not present in his manga work, which I consider very mature.