| #602 |
|
2002 |
Perilous 602 Perilous In Japan Part 2 Osaka is a very different city to Tokyo. Smaller but just as packed, it is a little bit like Tokyo on crack. People are always in a hurry, noisier, and a dull haze of pollution hangs in the air. For travellers, Osaka station proves to be a labyrinthine maze of endless malls, each with multiple levels and sublevels running for close to 2kms in each direction. Without popping above ground every now and again its very easy to get disoriented and end up in on the other side of town. The city is also split into two separate halves, the northern end, Kita, is the CBD full of office towers and a sleazy red light district promising all manner of exploits with schoolgirls and others for a hefty fee. The southern side, Minami, is full of amazing restaurants, upmarket shopping and Amerika-mura . . but we’ll get to that in a moment. I’m in Osaka primarily to use it as a base point for day trips to the surrounding areas – the tourist mecca of Kyoto which is full of endless temples and shrines, and offers a glimpse of less futuristic Japan; Himeji where the famous Himeji Castle towers above the surrounding area (which appeared in the classic James Bond film You Only Live Twice); Hiroshima where there was an amazing secondhand record sale happening right in the main hall of the station full of mint-condition Japanese vinyl jazz and other gems; and the Buddhist mountain retreat of Koyasan. Also Osaka offers the opportunity to catch up with an old MC that used to rhyme with us back in the mid-90s, MC Teacha, who now teaches at a Japanese Junior High. Osaka’s music scene seems pretty vibrant although the time we have there is very limited. Japanese punk experimentalists The Boredoms still carve out a substantial slice of the undeground scene with their side projects including the space rock of AOA; whilst ex-Melbournite Drillchop9 and his wife Yuka collaborate with a noted Japanese contemporary dancer Yoko to make odd Kid606-meets-The Slits type stuff at their monthly club night. The weirdest and most disturbing thing about Osaka however is Amerika-mura or America-Town. This is a set of streets in the Minami area full of shops selling American pop culture. Second-hand Mickey Mouse teeshirts vie for eager punters against bad rap songs blasting from an equally bad set of rap record stores. As a side note, I should point out that the density of record stores here in Osaka is just as much as Tokyo and apart from the over-dominance of mainstream hip hop imports there are some excellent second hand stores. Japanese youngsters mope around on the corners scoffing their takiyaki (octopus balls) looking tough in their Playerz tops and Wu-Wear. Unlike the pop culture areas of Tokyo there is an all pervading sense that these teens have been totally suckered by American marketing – eradicating every bit of Japanese-ness other than their food. Well, that’s not really the case but at first glance it looks like it. Saddest of all is the presence of a large number of mainland Africans pretending to be African-Americans. This is ultra-weird – this guy who pretending to be from the Bronx and is talking at you like he is ‘down’ with you ends up really being from Ghana and has never even set foot in America. I guess that it’s a way of getting respect in a culture that is reasonably intolerant of foreigners. Next fortnight, I’ll finish up with Tokyo and some of the cities electro producers. Yellow Peril  Goto
Snarl Texts Index Pages
|