Posts in Video
Japanese: Tejime and Shazai

Tejime (choreographed group celebrations for when something exciting happens):

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kTMJFeGUiZw]

Shazai (different types of apology):

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zg_vny5sFpo]

Finally, as a special bonus, dogeza (abject apology)

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1CJ90QCSmnc]

And that, my friends, is how etiquette videos should be done.

VideoJack Dysonapology, behaviour, bow, etiquette, japanComment
The hypocrisy of conscious consumerism

Slavoj Zizek, who I quoted a month or so ago here, on the hypocrisy of conscious consumerism.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/v/hpAMbpQ8J7g]

Do you buy organic apples because you think they taste better or because you’re trying to buy redemption for your own participation in a pernicious capitalist system? In this lecture, compellingly illustrated by the RSA Animate crew, the philosopher Slavoj Zizek criticizes charity and what he calls “cultural capitalism”—think TOMS shoes or Fair Trade coffee—as palliatives that only perpetuate an immoral economic system. (via YMFY, which I love)

VideoJack Dysonconsumerism, I give up I'll never buy anything again, intelligent, talk Comment
Born under punches - Talking Heads

Live in Rome, 1980. "That way of making music, with those rhythms and big ensemble of musicians that make up an Afro-funk band, was a way out of the psychological paranoia and personal torment of the stuff I'd been writing - and feeling - the paranoia of New York in the 70s, my age, my personal stuff, fitting in and not fitting in." David Byrne.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SVIKF03KkVM&w=700]

Wish I'd been there. Just brilliant.

FYI, Wikipedia says: "Born Under Punches (The Heat Goes On)" is the opening track to the acclaimed Talking Heads album Remain in Light. The track has a prominent bassline and sets the funk tone of the album. A live rendition of the song was included with a long bass intro on the 2004 re-issue of the live album The Name of This Band Is Talking Heads.

"The song was included as the first track to Röyksopp's mix album Back to Mine. It was named as one of the best songs released between 1980 and 1983 in the 2008 book The Pitchfork 500: Our Guide to the Greatest Songs from Punk to the Present."

ps - here's the opening song from that concert. Psycho Killer. Wicked font in the opening titles!

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QNAzXlDaHQU&w=700]

music, VideoJack Dysondavid byrne, moments in time, talking headsComment
Versions, by Oliver Laric

“Versions” is a visual essay by Oliver Laric, investigating the re-appropriation and manipulation of images in our culture. First half more interesting than the second half, where some of the commentary gets a bit obfuscatory. oliver laric versions 2010

As a post script to his essay though, I'd say it's important to remember that the "copy and paste" function, writ large like these examples, is not always a product of laziness. With some of it, it's an efficiency thing. Cutting corners in order to get things out to more people - a modern audience already understands the frame of the narrative, they just want to see it in a different framework, a different context, proving a different moral. The same is as true in Disney as it is in Grimm's fairy tales, Greek myth etc.

Watch the video here.

(link found on the indefatigable art blog BOOOOOOOOM!)

art, VideoJack Dysonart, copying, oliver laric, visual essay Comment
RZA made a movie. A kung fu movie.

Wu-Tang vs The Golden Phoenix Man I would LOVE to be the RZA. Not only does he make wicked hip-hope, but now he's gone and made his very own kung-fu movie. It is going to be DOPE. Serious cast too: Robert Tai of 5 Deadly Venoms fame (fight choreographer), some of the Jackie Chan Stunt Team, a posse from the USA Shaolin Team, Chi Kua Chun (who dropped nails in loads of Shaw Bros. films), Shaolin monk Shi Yan Ming (34th generation? I thought monks were celibate...), and finally the legend that is Doctor King Ogun Ali Muhammad, founder of the Universal African Fighting System. YES! I'm going to learn the move that makes the ground blow up and then blood explode out of your acupuncture points.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4d62oRG-ca0]
VideoJack DysonRZA, wu-tangComment
Tokyo spam sandwich (with pork beans)

People have funny little routines when they get home from work. Some people turn on the telly and tune out until bed time. One very good friend of mine likes nothing better than to just sit on the sofa with all the lights off. Another turns on his Xbox 360 and rains merry hell onto the heads of digital terrorists from his virtual gunship. I don't have a telly (I do, but it's only for films and stuff), so I quite like to cook. It's very relaxing - meditative if you like. And you know what? I'm not alone. The video below comes from jetdaisuke, in Tokyo. Turns out we share a great deal in our cooking techniques (and, I think, general attitude to life). I need to know where he got his panda-thing from. And I love the way he says "sliced cheese". Rocking. [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1H2bRd91sZw]

Odd, silly, VideoJack Dysonjetdaisuke, tokyo cookingComment