Jan 6, 2017

Song writing and working on my bike

Happy 2017 everyone!
Finally got around to getting some song writing done over the New Year Holidays and have spend some productive time reviving my once dead bike as well.

It takes time for some things to heal, I think especially mentally and spiritually. I always feel that the body follows the state of the mind.

Now the bike needs a little bit of fairing work and is ready for the road-worthiness inspection by the Japanese department of transportation (*sigh*)

Looking forward to a great year.
Thanks everyone for all the support.

-----

年末はバイク整備と作曲。
2017年も宜しくお願いします!



 

Aug 11, 2016

まったりと過ごす朝

今日は珍しくゆっくりと1日スタート
いまから自転車の整備を久しぶりにして、少しサイクリングかな。

最近は自分の時間をうまくとれていない日々が続いていたんだけど、しばらくはライブもせず制作に集中しないとな。

ちょっと大変になるけど、先輩のプロジェクトも積極的にサポートする事
考えていて、何か説明できないポジティブないいエネルギーを発している人だから、
力になりたいと考えている。

人を助ける事は以外と簡単そうで、大変。ボランティアするのはいいんだけど、実行段階で成し遂げる時間とスキルの投資は結構キツい時もある。だから中途半端な気持ちでは挑みたくないと考えている。

今日も1日頑張ろう


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Aug 10, 2016

Summer is here


Tokyo is super hot these days because of summer.

Busy these days with business related things and I was just reflecting on how grateful I am for where I am today.

Also a colleague of mine gave me a book about a Japanese startup that was very successful creating a unique e-commerce service.

It reminded me of the days when I tried to get my own business to thrive and wow was that a challenge in so many ways.

Now that my focus is on music in my life, I don't think I'd go back to that entrepreneur life style immediately but I do miss the excitement and pressure sometimes.

One of the things I miss most is teaching.    Business-wise, it wasn't very profitable when I was teaching myself. But it was the most rewarding work outside of music that I have ever done.

There was something in common with music, where you put your life and soul into creating and communicating to enrich someone's life. It was about empowering others to be successful or happy.

I love that aspect about anything I do.
 

Apr 20, 2016

Some changes in the blog setup

I have nothing against bloggers that have ads in their blogs and posts. But I've definitely decided against using them in my blog now.

Going back to basics in many areas. A few days ago I had a visit from an old friend that toured together with Lo-Fi and we went out to just spend some time looking for instruments. It was fun and also refreshing actually since I haven't been out in instruments stores just to hang out for a while.

It became an opportunity for me to try out some new bass strings. To be honest I bought these strings just because the packaging was cool and I wanted to try out something different.

Yes this combination is definitely not a good idea, but I was lucky this time cause the D'Addario strings I tried were excellent.

Looking forward to more time playing.

Now we are back

I wish I could come home every night to start writing songs, lyrics, and even recording in my home studio. I haven't lived like that for a while now.

Unfortunately, I haven't had the opportunity to do this for a while. Most of my writing was for a clear end goal, a business objective. This could be writing for a filming project or a particular event or ad... this was not so difficult. What was difficult for me was to tap back into just writing for the sake of writing and enjoying it, whether there was no client that would help me make a living.

I remember when I first started writing or performing music, it was clear that I wanted to write something that I thought was good, and that was all that mattered. It was and still is amazing to connect with new people that I meet through music and learning who they REALLY are. What we abstractly communicate through the art of music, I think is a true glimpse of who we are. Even old friends and band members, I am thrilled to learn about what they are feeling now and how they engage with the music we create together, even after many years of co-creation.

Just pursuing what you yourself think is "good" is a bit selfish, although necessary in the early years of learning to create. Of course only being able to create for yourself is not a good way to make a living as an artist. I eventually, out of necessity, I learned to use my craft to meet the needs of my target market and generate sales. Now after a long time of being away from art projects, I've decided that I needed to get back to pure writing, recording, and performing for the sake of doing it. Kind of like for own understanding of figuring out where I want to go next. Of course, naturally as a performer I want to please crowds and see them enjoy the music I create, whether that would be in the studio or on a live stage.

I also look forward to getting feedback about what I create since I've been keeping silence for so damn long.

Sure I always have the excuse of being super busy... I was actually working on writing (like a book) and that kept me busy enough to keep my mind off of writing music.

I also think that I was waiting to long for my band to be in writing mode again. But to be honest, I'm not sure when we will be in that mode again.

Yosh and I have been talking about starting a new phase of our music project, just the two of us mainly to see where we can go. I like the idea since it frees my writing and expression from some restrictions we had before with the trio format of Lo-Fi.

I don't think it will change us completely of course, since anything that we do is essentially us any way you spin it.

This summer I think will be a good time to release a few songs, and maybe do a few performances with the new songs we'll release.

Now that I feel like my mind is back on track, I hope to keep everyone updated here too.

The new homepage will also be ready soon.

I apologize to everyone that was in the dark about what happened to Lo-Fi. But I guess in simple words, we were just taking a break, and we will be back soon.

Feb 17, 2016

No point in reinventing the wheel

Yes, I am still alive. I am good and healthy, also  in a good state of mind and can write this entry.

To be honest I may not have been so "well" in the past, but at some point I found peace of mind.

Since I want so much out of life it's hard sometimes to be content enough just to kick back and ride along. But in these few months I've discovered that I need more time in my life to just think. Sure I can keep writing songs and dish out lyrics, but after a while it I felt I was just relying on an old formula instead of exploring.

After staying away from the circuit of gig after gig of performing and recording for more than a year, I feel I have a much better idea of what my music should be like.

The thought of starting from scratch is a bit scary since I've built upon a style that was based on what my band has been doing for the past 10 years or so. But I believe that if anyone is afraid to reinvent themselves or afraid to discover their true selves, anything they do is too artificial and superficial to really be inspiring.

Makes you think about what music or art is to people. If I pretend that music is a commodity like coffee, something we don't need but want, do we need to reinvent coffee every time we open a coffee shop? Or is delivering a country rock tune like it's been done for the last 30 years in the same formula, is exactly what is expected of us? I guess we need to decide ourselves.

I've changed a lot as a person over the past 2 years and believe that slowly there has been a change to the music I write as well.

Not out to reinvent what already works, but do want to recognize the fact that I wasn't happy with myself for a long time and struggled to figure out how to move forward and now I think I have started to figure it all out.

Nov 20, 2015

Thank you EL RODEO! Thank you AYUMI!

We are now on our way back from a show we did in Osaka with Ayumi. It was an event for a brand with a long history in Osaka. They’re called “El Rodeo” and have a 30+ year history in Osaka. It was amazing to hear about the long history of the event itself as well. We are participants in the 31st year of the event.

The night started out with a live painting jam to create a dress for one of the EL Rodeo Models. The canvas had the clothing textile pinned on to it, and as the painting finishes on the canvas it’s peeled off and turned into a dress sewn together on the stage.

Our set list for the night was:

Cubic Glass
Realize
Carpe Diem
Your Beautiful
Like The Sunshine
You Gotta Be
Higher
The World Is Yours

“Like The Sunshine” is a new song I recently wrote inspired by some of the themes of Ayumi’s paintings.

The show was really exciting and we want to thank all those who came out to see us at this show.

Hope to get the new song recorded soon!