Taylor Swift

From the 1980s, pieces by Rand Hardy.

This is Kaoru, a 20-year-old girl with rocker style we often see in Harajuku. She is a Kera Magazine reader model and the designer of her own brand S. Kaoru.

Kaoru is wearing a Rolling Stones graphic t-shirt and a dragon jacket, both of which were bought resale from Kinji. Her high waist jeans are from Jimsinn, worn with a belt. Her bag is a resale and her patent platforms with pink laces are Yosuke. She is also wearing Shibuya 109 accessories, including a Seiko watch, bracelets, rings and a flames print headscarf.

Kaoru likes to shop at Jimsinn, and she’s a fan of West Side Coasters. Find out more about her on Twitter or Instagram.

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Aran and Hiromi are a stylish Japanese couple who we have been photographing around the streets of Harajuku for several years. Aran is a chef, and Hiromi is an assistant hair stylist.

Aran is wearing a cutout zipper top from Thomas with Avan Trance skinny pants, and boots by the Japanese brand Julius. Aran’s accessories – some of which he picked up resale – include a tall hat, sunglasses, a coin bracelet, and a neon clutch from Juun.J. Aran’s favorite designers include Damir Doma, Songzio, and Juun.J. For more info, find Aran on Twitter or Instagram.

Hiromi is wearing a Toga x Opening Ceremony top with rolled up pants and open toe leather heels. Accessories include a Henrik Vibskov hat, sunglasses, a Brooks Brothers tote bag, and a Casio wrist watch. Hiromi’s favorite shop is Sister Shibuya and she likes the music of The Beatles. Find her on Twitter or Instagram for more info.

Click on any photo to enlarge it.

We call that “a normal day”

The Blackwell Series of adventure games lets you play as Rosa Blackwell, a medium, and her ghost buddy Joey Mallone. I haven’t played any of the Blackwell games, but I’ve been assured that at no point will you be forced to dance with Joey Mallone’s ex-wife while possessed by Mr. Mallone. Not only would that be incredibly weird, it would also be an embarrassing cliche.

No, instead, what you get are some very highly regarded mystery adventure games that, graphically, remind me of classics like Secret of Monkey Island or Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis. From a story standpoint, you need to solve the reasons behind a rash of recent suicides, determine if a series of accidents at a construction site were really “accidents”, and unravel real estate shenanigans. Good to see they’re not just following the standard whodunit scenarios.

There are 5 games in the series and the first three will be released for iOS on July 10, with the other 2 expected later this year. Check after the break for some pretty pictures.

From Blackwell: Legacy

From Blackwell: Unbound

From Blackwell: Convergence

Feast your eyes on this trippy ketamine-vision of ocular candy. Portland resident and Fade to Mind affiliate MASSACOORAMAAN hits it outta the park with “WIJD”. While the visuals (produced by Kingdom and Subtrança) may be jumbled and disorientating, the song itself is strong and simple, riding a crooked but danceable rhythm and a strong Voix Bulgares sample into the hazy ether. It’s the perfect way to whet your whistle for tonight, (Tuesday, June 24th) when MASSACOORAMAAN will DJ at the Middlesex Lounge for RE:SCAN with COLBY DRASHER and DJ WON’T.

The post MASSACOORAMAAN — “WIJD” appeared first on The Boston Hassle.

A few months back, Japan’s masters of far-out progressive psychedelia ACID MOTHERS TEMPLE returned for another go-round as THE MELTING PARAISO UFO, and Astrorgasm From The Inner Space has grown on me steadily ever since. It’s a fine, thick slice of fried-brain improvisational psychedelia from a group of musicians at the height of their power. The entire full-length is composed of just four songs at about 19 minutes each, so I think we may as well just go through each of the tracks individually, no?

Astrorgasm From The Inner Space starts with a new recording of Acid Mothers’ classic GRATEFUL DEAD homage “Dark Star Blues”. This epic version enters a frenzied jazzy peak around 12 minutes in. It builds and builds until finally, when the tension is unbearable, it returns to its primary riff. Return seems to be a theme for the 19 year strong ensemble at this point, and the return of original vocalist Cotton Casino after a decade’s absense serves to strengthen that point significantly.

The shortest song at a positively spritely 16 minutes is “Pleasure Mantra of Sorrows”, an amorphous jam that is as ethereal and laid-back as something showcasing such unpleasant feedback squalls is capable of being.

The fantastically titled “Kiss in the Tangerine Dream House” starts off as the closest thing this album has to a pop song, riding a pair of eastern-tinged folk rock riffs back and forth in a fashion that wouldn’t be out of place on a Brian Jonestown album (except, you know, for three times as long and with various long synth noise interludes). Like “Dark Star Blues”, it starts to deviate heavily from where it starts off around the 12th minute, allowing some noisier guitar soloing to really take the reins for the back half of the song. Unlike the leadoff track however, this one does not resolve back to its earlier incarnation but simply abandons it like a husk or an old skin to strike off into exciting new terrain. It is most excellent.

The closing title track slowly builds from the merest whisper, unfolding into a haunting passage on what sounds like accordion and tablas. Driving rock drums pick up about 7 minutes in and the song enters full freakout mode before building to wilder, noisier sounds in the fashion that so many of these jams tend to.

Astrorgasm From The Inner Space doesn’t reinvent the wheel for what an ACID MOTHERS TEMPLE & THE MELTING PARAISO U.F.O. album should sound like, but why would you want it to? They have a million other slightly-different band names for stuff like that. This is just a great addition to their wide and sprawling canon from a group about to enter their 20th year. Theirs is an inner space that is kaleidoscopic and inviting. Check it out.

The post ACID MOTHERS TEMPLE & THE MELTING PARAISO U.F.O. – ASTRORGASM FROM THE INNER SPACE appeared first on The Boston Hassle.

Not actually a really fun version of a Nirvana song…

Thomas Inskeep: Dierks Bentley is so smart he can write a song sure to be loved by the bros titled “Drunk on a Plane” and simultaneously make it a heartbreak song — albeit one with lines like “got this 737 rockin’ like a G6.” He also rhymes “sexy” with “whiskey.” Of course, the catch is that he’s getting drunk on a plane because it was supposed to be his honeymoon. Bentley sells the hell out of this, and he’s a great enough salesman that you buy it. 
[7]

Patrick St. Michel: This easily could have been just another Nashville-edition Mad Libs, “the gang is getting wasted in (location)!,” condescending to the junior off to study abroad who gets a little too excited about never-ending Bloody Marys. Dierks Bentley, though, makes the indulgence part of a narrative, a well-worn one but still better than hedonism on Virgin Atlantic. So “Drunk on a Plane” has a sad edge to it, but the trick is in finding a way to turn it into something ultimately celebratory and well-earned. As eye-rolling as the mile-high joke is, he also whips out “got this 737 rockin’ like a G6,” and makes it sound stadium-ready.
[8]

Katherine St Asaph: Hey, an actual story! Even if it is “From Cayman Islands With Love.” This nonsense only works if you see the chorus as wish-fulfillment: buying drinks for everybody, getting some poor flight attendant fired for in-flight fucking, quoting “Like a G6,” lodging a beefy country chorus where it shouldn’t belong — market wish-fulfillment, then. The rest is instrumentation so cartoonish I’m surprised little drunk bubbles didn’t float-stumble out of the guitar neck — but it’s one of those cartoons that’s actually a little smart and sad if you think about it.
[6]

Brad Shoup: It’s a Penthouse letter in the sky, because someone commissioned that stunning fiddle yaw and didn’t stop to consider that it could depict a sad faded fucker at high altitude. Bentley goes for some of that “You Get What You Give” iambic tetrameter, turning heartache into entitlement like an Arizona State alchemy major. It’s a story instead of a portrait, and Lord knows country needs better versions of each.
[5]

Anthony Easton: The happy song about sad things, especially sexy sad things, is one of the things that Dierks does well. If the happiness/sadness works in conjunction with drinking, he is exactly in his wheelhouse, and in the current country landscape, the expression of more than one emotion suggests a greater level of both engagement and sophistication. He is really good at the drama and the pleasure. The Aerosmith guitar riffs, the grind of the vocals, the hints of Mexican horns, the music tilts and verges on collapse. That’s before the lyrics — and the lyrics are some of the best of the year. It is a perfect short story, with strong writerly details, good enough that it might as well be written by Tom T. Hall c. 1976. My favourite line is the one about cheap champagne in a real glass, which I will keep assuming is a metonymy of the problems of authenticity and authorship in nu-Nashville. My second favourite line is the one about the plastic groom, which is a self-aware continuation of the theme.
[9]

Megan Harrington: Tasteless, mostly harmless, terminally boring bro-country. I appreciate that none of its characters are being lured to a remote location after a thick application (or with the promise) of alcohol but I do sadly wonder why getting wasted and skirt-chasing women that are paid to be nice to you is a fantasy worth memorializing in song. 
[4]

Alfred Soto: Huge congrats to whoever thought bending those strings for the requisite funny-sad mockery would make a shrewd effect. I want to think that Bentley and his writers, unable to match the precision of Brad Paisley’s plane song, watched Pedro Almodovar’s much derided but awesome plane movie (i.e. the real “Bottoms Up”). But swapping pickups for stewardesses is as easy as swapping spit.
[7]

David Sheffieck: The reason people travel with earplugs and eyemasks.
[2]

Culture jammers Negativland are releasing their single "U2", for which the group was sued in the 1990s. The single was taken from an album of the same name, that remixed and repurposed versions of U2's "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For", some of which sampled the radio presenter Casey Kasem, who died this month. The original record was on sale for ten days before a legal battle began with Island Records and it was taken off shelves. Negativland have now made the original unmixed studio multitracks available for free downloading and remixing.

Remixers are encouraged to post their versions of the "U2" single at Negativland's site, and on the group's Facebook page.

Praising the recessive trickster on his centenary, Anthony Lane notes the Alec Guinness who “grew into a hero—or, rather, into one of life’s supporting players who had heroism thrust upon him, whether he liked it or not.” The Man in the White Suit and The Ladykillers get their props, but the absence of The Horse’s Mouth surprised me. As the curmudgeonly painter Gully Jimson, Guinness plays him as if he were a vibrant, violent supporting character in a Dickens novel instead of a protagonist; the part hovers between realism and sketch comedy and is all the more brilliant for it (Joyce Cary’s novel is worth a read too).

In the droll journal A Positively Final Appearance, Guinness has a few darts to throw at fans who presume to impress Obi-Wan Kenobi with their knowledge of all things Star Wars. For one, he’s not having it (“I shrivel inside each time it is mentioned”). Note this hilarious exchange between him, a boy of twelve so besotted with Star Wars that he’s seen it a hundred times, and his indulgent mother:

“I would love you to do something for me,” I said.

“Anything! Anything!” the boy said rapturously.

“You won’t like what I’mm going to ask you to do,” I said.

“Anything, sir, anything!”

“Well,” I said, “do you think you could promise never to see Star Wars again?”

He burst into tears. His mother drew himself up to an immense height. “What a dreadful thing to say to a child!” she barked, and dragged the poor kid away. Maybe she was right but I just hope the lad, now in his thirties, is not living in a fantasy world of secondhand, childish banalities.

Watch the throne.

I’ve just returned to PT HQ high atop Mount Hexmap (the captain of the flight back from Helsinki kindly let me D. B. Cooper it out the back door when we passed overhead) and I’ve got my feet up on the desk here at the Pocket Tactics Reminiscing Station and Toll-free 20 Questions Helpline. It’s good to get all the reminiscing out right after your trip while everything’s fresh, especially a trip like this one.

I saw a lot of games at PG Connects Helsinki this week — over fifty, in fact, as I was one of the Big Indie Pitch judges. For around four hours we heard three-minute pitches from indie developers from all around Europe, and one team from Brazil, who brought a PC game. F for following instructions but A for moxie — but I like moxie. And more besides.

I saw beautifully designed digital board game Ortus Arena, which you might remember from their Kickstarter last year. I saw charming fantasy turn-based hex map soccer game Buglantic Football. I saw Fighting Fantasy makers Tin Man Games’ first post-Inkle gamebook, Appointment with Fear. I even saw Brian from our old friends Witching Hour Studios, who was presenting Romans In My Carpet. But out of all of those fine games (and a handful of duds) there was one standout — a game that I think you’re going to love: Kingdoms.

Outflanked.

Kingdoms didn’t actually win the Big Indie Pitch. Those laurels were placed on the flashy chrome and anti-matter hood of AG Drive, an F-Zero-esque racer with genuinely awe-inspiring 3D graphics. But Kingdoms was the game I (unsuccessfully) lobbied for, and at least in these pages, it’s the real winner.

French developer Paul Vauvrey has worked on-and-off over the last four years designing Kingdoms, a very modern-looking title that instantly gives off the aura of one of the oldest games in the world: Go. Like the world’s most enduring board game, Kingdoms is a game about controlling the board by placing pieces to convert your opponent’s pawns into your own. The rules are simple and few in number, but create space for great strategic potential. Kingdoms’ starkly beautiful visual aesthetic owes as much to Letterpress as the game design does to Go or chess.

Playing with a development build of Kingdoms at the event’s fully-enrolled indie showcase room, I asked Vauvrey what else he’s worked on before. “I’m working on a tactical game for Windows and OSX called Surround,” he tells me. The man has an obvious affection for un-Google-able game titles.

Each turn in Kingdoms gives you two moves with which to perform one of two actions: place a pawn on the board adjacent to an existing pawn (you can capture enemy pawns this way as well) or fortify a pawn from being taken on your opponents turn. You may only fortify a pawn against an attack from one cardinal direction, and if you take the pawn at the “root” of your opponent’s line, you capture all of the pawns that have grown out from it. Capture a pawn and you get a bonus move on your next turn, which is Vauvrey’s variation on Go’s ko rule.

A gif showing the effects of a big reversal — click to see it in motion.

Kingdoms is going to be out on iOS sometime this summer. It will feature asynchronous multiplayer over Game Center, local multiplayer, and AI for single-player. I mentioned to Vauvrey that he’s made a game that would be well-suited to chess problem-style puzzles.

“I definitely want to have that,” he said. “In researching the design, I spoke to a lot of French chess players who told me that they learned to play from magazine that would include a cardboard chess board printed with the piece positions. When you flipped the board over the solution was printed on the other side. I want to capture that sort of feeling with daily or weekly problems for you to solve in single-player.”

I remark that a game like Kingdoms would translate well to the tabletop. “The game started as a board game, of course,” Vauvrey says. “I still want to make into a board game at some point — maybe we’ll do a Kickstarter.”

I’ve already cleared off a space on the coffee table for it.

You can follow Vauvrey’s studio Space Bears on Facebook or Twitter.

It’s a goer.

Way back in 2012 the developers of Barkley 2* told me that their epic cyberpunk basketball comedy JRPG (the sequel to 2008′s absurd masterpiece Barkley: Shut Up and Jam Gaiden) would be coming to mobile as well as PC. If this is the first time you’re hearing about Barkley, the shortest primer on the game is it takes place on post-apocalyptic Earth where NBA legend Charles Barkley accidentally destroyed the City of New York by performing the forbidden Chaos Dunk at Madison Square Garden, leading to basketball’s prohibition. It actually gets stranger than that, for what it’s worth.

Apparently inoculated against ideas like “scope creep” and “budgets”, the Tales of Game’s crew announced this morning on the Barkley 2 Kickstarter page that there’s another Barkley game — a mobile game — in parallel development. BBall Tactics will be to Barkley 2 what Blitzball was to Final Fantasy X, which is to say that it will hopefully be a ridiculous time-sink from which there is no escape. Turn-based basketball with cybernetically enhanced NBA all-stars for iOS & Android.

Obviously there’s a lot of placeholder art in that screenshot up there, but have a look at the video Tales of Game’s posted after the jump. What about the core Barkley 2 game? The once-predicted December 2013 release date has come and gone but the game is in alpha and ToG have been posting updates to Facebook with comforting regularity.

*Full title: “The Magical Realms of Tír na nÓg: Escape from Necron 7 – Revenge of Cuchulainn: The Official Game of the Movie – Chapter 2 of the Hoopz Barkley SaGa”

Given the extent of radar coverage, they *really* should have rethought the World Cup assignment.

There are hundreds of classic games that we at RDBK consider important, even crucial experiences for the development of a proper gamer’s palate. But there are really only a handful of constant muses, of raisons d’être, of sine qua nons. These are the games so powerful, so enchanting that they keep Owen off the streets and out of prison, year in, year out.

X-COM is one of them, and with the release of OpenXcom 1.0, it’s never been more accessible. OpenXcom is no mere mod or patch, but a full-blown open-source remake, and it renders the “but I’m too young/old to learn/relearn X-COM’s creaky interface” objections moot. Owen’s been stuck in Overwatch mode for months now, vigilantly awaiting its release. Here are just a few of hundreds of usability improvements:

• Visible radar coverage lines in the globe view
• Improved pathing for planes and soldiers alike
• Customizable starting base layouts
• No more 80-item inventory limit
• Inventory saving, pre-equipping, item stacking, etc.
• Tooltips!
• Support for higher resolutions
• 3D explosions
• Memorials to fallen soldiers
• A skirmish mode with randomly generated missions
• Mod support

You will however need to own a copy of X-COM, since for religious reasons OpenXcom uses the original art assets. There’s only one thing for it: head over to Steam and part with a fiver. Try not to be seen by Chryssalids.

After the jump, a terrific launch trailer shows off all the above features and then some.

That kickin’ beat is available for download. OpenXcom supports custom soundtracks. You know what to do.

We met these two blue-haired guys in Harajuku and stopped them for a few snaps. We found out that their names are Yana and Shoshipoyo.

Yana – pictured to the right in the monochrome outfit and darker blue hair – is 21 years old. He’s wearing a tank top from Long Clothing over a mesh top, with black shorts. He accessorized with a KTZ horns beret, Ray Ban sunglasses, silver earrings, a choker and a bones necklace from OS Accessories, a Dominic Jones ring and a Nike wristband. He told us his Converse with rocking horse platforms were custom made. Yana’s favorite places to shop are W.I.A., Dog and Pin Nap, and he’s a Miliyah Kato fan. Find out more about him from his Twitter and Instagram.

Shoshipoyo – one the left with aqua blue hair – is an 18-year-old student. He’s wearing a colorful keyboard print sweatshirt from Jeremy Scott and a matching bag with Disney princesses pants from Dog Harajuku. His accessories include star stud earrings, facial piercings, a Mercedes Benz necklace from Pin Nap, a Vivienne Westwood armor ring and the same Dominic Jones ring Yana is wearing. His platforms are Buffalo. Shoshipoyo told us that KTZ and W.I.A. are his favorite brands, while Dog Harajuku is his favorite shop. His favorite singer is Brooke Candy, and he’s active on Twitter.

Click on any photo to enlarge it.

Meet Mikki, a well-known Harajuku personality who works at the vintage boutique Punk Cake. She has curly hair in a high ponytail, with a big bow on top.

Mikki is wearing a Punk Cake top and graphic shorts she bought in Los Angeles with a sheer dress on top. Her sandals are Dr. Martens, worn with black socks. We also noticed her heart pendant and heart clutch, as well as some plastic beads bracelets.

Mikki’s favorite place to shop is Punk Cake and she likes new wave music such as The B-52s. Follow her on Instagram for regular updates.

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Giving aggression we can feel…

Iain Mew: My love for this song owes a lot to its video. It’s not just because it looks like the most fun school assembly ever, but because it highlights how the song works so well: Itzuka always stern and commanding, setting off madness behind her with the merest gesture. Just like she conducts the students in the video, in the song it’s her words setting off electro bombshells all round while she rolls with the impact, coolness personified.
[9]

Patrick St. Michel: Charisma.com are often angry, whether the pair’s songs come out of headphones, a nearby store or even shitty laptop speakers. The general booming-ness of Charisma.com’s songs also cuts across language barriers – “Iinazuke Blue” is just the latest single in which they operate primarily in an aggressive mode. Honestly, keep it that way. Whats kept me at arm’s length are the targets of their rage. On their first EP, they took aim at…people who look at their cell phones on the train and women who like cute clothes. They are J-pop’s version of The Oatmeal. “Iinazuke Blue,” thankfully, is a bit more general in being peeved, and their thundering sound remains intact, an aggressive electro stomp of a thing. It’s their best song because curiosity won’t ruin it at any point. 
[7]

Scott Mildenhall: Brimful of words that Google Translate only serves to further obfuscate (unless “shopping in the delicate maiden gastric ulcer junk circuit” is what they’re actually saying), plus energy in the form of gentle aggression. A fine mix of imaginative and easy on the ear, and weirdly not dissimilar to Kasabian’s recent high-level deconstruction of the concept of self-awareness “Eez-Eh”.
[7]

Thomas Inskeep: This might as well be the theme to “Mario Kart XX: Need for Speed.” 
[1]

Edward Okulicz: Reminds me of something from t.A.T.u.’s unsung third album, maybe “220” with the voltage turned up even higher: steel-sharp and deadly but lacking in hooks.
[4]

Will Adams: Now this is aggression you can feel, right down to the clipped electro. “Iinazuke Blue” doesn’t let up, and while it could stand to have more twists and turns, it’s one of the most bracing singles I’ve heard this year.
[7]

The collection of apps that formed the central part of Bjork's sprawling Biophilia release have been added to MoMA's permanent collection. The first software to be added was John Maeda's Reactive Books in 1994, but Biophilia is the first software to be added to the collection which exists separately as downloadable app.

Paola Antonelli, Senior Curator, Department of Architecture and Design has written on the acquisition here, and view Bjork's Biophilia in the collection here.

Meet Rin, a 29-year-old company employee who caught our eye in Harajuku.

Rin’s full outfit is by his favorite designer, Vivienne Westwood. He layered a long animal print shirt over pants, and accessorized with sunglasses, a “sex” earring and a skeleton one, several charm necklaces and rings, a suitcase-style bag and Vivienne Westwood’s classic fringe rocking horse shoes.

Rin told us that his favorite band is Sex Pistols.

Click on any photo to enlarge it.

Long-running breakcore institution VENETIAN SNARES, aka Aaron Funk, has really taken things to another level on his 22nd album My Love is a Bulldozer. Best known for his maximalist, complex drum programming and strange time signatures, some time about a decade ago Funk also started layering modern classical string arrangements and almost gothic/medieval atmospheres into his high bpm skittering breakbeat cacophony.

Those elements are plentiful on My Love is a Bulldozer, but they are joined by very effective SQUAREPUSHER-style jazz flourishes and (unexpectedly) a number of impressive vocal performances by Funk himself. His singing is rich and epic, almost operatic in delivery. The album maintains a very specific mood from beginning to end, a relatively unique sort of desperate, yearning romanticism that sucks the listener in completely but can leave you feeling breathless and exhausted by the end.

While breakcore as a genre may not be enjoying the level of popularity it had in the late 90s/early 2000s, I’ve been starting to notice a resurgence of interest in high BPMs and classic Amen-style hardcore breakbeats coming from some unexpected clusters within the wider EDM universe. If more new artists can take that to a place as weird and woolly as Venetian Snares, I say bring it on!

My Love is a Bulldozer will be released via Planet Mu on Monday, June 16th. You can pre-order it now here. His current tour will include two stops in NYC but alas, none in New England.

The post VENETIAN SNARES – MY LOVE IS A BULLDOZER appeared first on The Boston Hassle.