Gil Asakawa's Nikkei View | rock
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June 26, 2009

Here's a video that was coincidentally uploaded to YouTube by singer-songwriter David Choi, whose stuff I like very much, on June 23, just two days before Michael Jackson, the "King of Pop" suddenly and shockingly died. (It's the third-listed link on You Tube when you search for "Michael Jackson.") "Ben" is an unusual choice for a Michael Jackson cover -- a moody, plodding story-song that makes sense as a story only if you know it as the title song from a 1972 horror B-movie about a boy (not the young MJ) who befriends a pet rat named "Ben" who leads a pack of vicious killer rats. It was the sequel to the equally cheesy (no pun intended, honest) 1971 movie, "Willard." Choi posted his thoughts on Jackson's death on his blog, and like many others, he admits he sees Jackson's influence more clearly now that the man is gone.
May 28, 2009

Dengue Fever, an Asian American band featuring a Cambodian American singer and European American musicians. I loved watching Dengue Fever's new documentary, "Sleepwalking through the Mekong," and listening to the great music by the band as well as some of its antecedents collected on the soundtrack. I've written about Dengue Fever before, but didn't get a chance to see the show when they played Denver on a tour. So I'm glad this documentary has been released. The film follows the band on a 2006 visit to Cambodia, where singer Chhom Nimol was born. She moved to the U.S. where she was discovered singing in a karaoke bar in Long Beach, south of LA, by the Holtzman brother, Zac and Ethan. The Holtzmans had fallen in love with old recordings of Cambodian pop and rock music during a trip to Southeast Asia and had decided to perform that music in America. Since they -- and the rest of the band -- are white, they went in search of someone who could sing in the Cambodian language, Khmer, and came across Nimol, who's an enchanting singer with a strong voice and an undeniable beauty that practically glows whenever the camera focuses on her. Together, over four albums, two EPs and now this documentary film, the group has recorded a body of work that's consistently interesting, compelling and challenging, with its dreamy mix of psychedelia, folk-rock, surf music and Cambodian melodies. The end result, for me, is a perfect expression of that tired cliche, "East meets West," or better yet, a reflection of one aspect of Asian America.
October 9, 2008

One of the great advantages of working for MediaNews Group Interactive is that our office, on the 9th floor of the same building that houses both the Denver Post, which we own, and the Rocky Mountain News, is that we have a terrific view. Located at the corner of Broadway St. And Colfax Ave., our building overlooks Civic Center Park, which is surrounded by us, the City and County Building, the Denver Art Museum and Denver Public Library complex, and the gold-topped Colorado State Capitol. Off in the distance to the west beyond the City and County Building rise the mellow foothillas and then the already-snow-dusted Rocky Mountains. With the sun shining and the air crisp with early fall -- a rarity here, since fall is often skipped in the rush from summer to winter -- it's easy to remember why we love living in Colorado so much. Today, the view off our 9th floor balcony of Civic Center Park showed some event going on. The summertime Farmers Markets had already stopped, and beside, they were held on Wednesdays and this was Thursday. You could hear the amplified sounds of music wafting up off street level, though, and a weird-looking tower was spitting out soap bubbles. There was a large, colorful peace sign drawn on the grass of the park, so I figured it must be an anti-war demonstration of some sort. During lunch, I wandered downstairs and crossed the street to check it out. It turned out to be a peace-and-art event, and a celebration of the late musician-activist-Beatle John Lennon's birthday. Lennon was born in Liverpool, England on Oct. 9, 1940.
June 21, 2007

Interesting exercise in nostalgia with irony: KCUV-FM in Denver is celebrating the official kickoff of summer by recreating the sound of Denver's FM radio from 1967, complete with news items, radio commercials from back then, and typical playlsists, all presented by the airstaff of progressive radio from the time, including guys like Bill Clarke (who's on Channel 7 now but...

February 4, 2007

I dunno about you, but I find it fascinating that Prince played the Super Bowl halftime show tonight. It’s good to see him again, and damn, he looks good and he’s hot, ripping up the guitar like a diminutive, modern-day Hendrix. It’s sort of weird to see him playing music so centered around his “Purple Rain” period, but cool to see the marching band playing along, though I can’t really hear them at all. Just in the past few years during the Super Bowl halftime show we've seen Janet Jackson (with her "costume malfunction") along with Justin Timberlake, P. Diddy, Kid Rock and Nelly; the Rolling Stones ad last year, Paul McCartney. But Prince?
January 29, 2007

Although a small label had unsuccessfully released some singles in 1963, most American rock and roll fans were introduced to a new band from England via Capitol Records’ 1964 album, “Meet the Beatles.” That album, and the subsequent visits by the mop-topped Liverpudlians to the U.S., sparked by appearances on TV including historic performances on the “Ed Sullivan Show,” re-set an entire generation’s emotional gyroscope. Beatlemania brought with it a different kind of music, pop that popped with surging harmonies and was driven by hard, clangy rhythms, shot through with the soul and R&B of rock’s roots but also energized with a new kind of electricity. The Beatles were the prototype for power pop, a genre that generations of bands, fans and rock critics have been seduced by ever since “Meet the Beatles.” The list of power-pop artists that have been critically heralded is long even though few have hit the charts and become rich and famous: the Byrds (as much power pop as folk-rock and later, country); Alex Chilton and Big Star, Marshall Crenshaw, Windbreakers, Bram Tchaikovsky, the Records, Flamin’ Groovies, Let’s Active, Bangles, Nick Lowe, Matthew Sweet, Rubinoos, the Shoes… the list goes on and on. One power pop band that actually has hit songs to its credit, the Smithereens, has gone full circle with its latest recording, “Meet the Smithereens.” It’s a song-by-song replica of “Meet the Beatles,” only done as the Smithereens.
January 3, 2007

... Well, maybe not completely different, but music that you most likely haven't heard. It's been a long time since pop music has been a unifying force for an entire generation (or two, or three). Now there are too many genres, too many listeners with too many tastes, too many subcultures, too many niches (it's like the Web, no?). For myself, I listen to a wide variety of stuff but not nearly as much new music, either pop or alternative, or hip-hop or whatever, than I used to when I was a rockcrit. I do my share of iTunes downloads, and back in the halcyon early Napster days, I did my share of file-sharing (or stealing, I know, I know). Most of the music I seek out these days, however, is music within proscribed genres like jazz, world music, blues, "Americana," singer-songwriters or -- gulp -- crass baby-boomer oldies. I seek out very few new bands unless someone recommends an act to me. I manage to keep somewhat current by listening to some music that's offered online for free (and copyright free). Here are three sources downloadable via RSS feeds.
December 26, 2006

James Brown died on Christmas day, a typically dramatic move for the 73-year-old, self-described “Godfather of Soul,” who was known for dramatic endings in concert. The news of his death caught me off guard, because I hadn’t heard much about the performer in years. Although Brown’s music career was in its sunset years, he was still touring and singing regularly. He was hospitalized with pneumonia just a couple days before, and died of heart failure not long after telling a friend he would perform in Times Square for New Year’s Eve. The man earned another of his many nicknames, “The hardest working man in show business,” to the very end.