12.29.2013

2014 SXSW

If you heard me talk about SXSW in on one of post talking about Puffy a.k.a Puffy Ami & Yumi. Well  this coming year, 2014 SXSW, which is the largest  annual music festival of its kind in the world, with more than 2,200 "official" performers and bands playing in more than 100 venues which includes a Film festival and Interactive Festival. The music event has grown from 700 registrants in 1987 to nearly 12,000 registrants. SXSW Film and SXSW Interactive events have grown every year, most recently bringing around 15,000 to 20,000 registrants to Austin every March.

This years J-pop artists are. . .




Jungles from Red Bacteria Vacuum  

An all-girl Japanese punk band from Osaka formed in 1998 consisting of Ikumi (guitar/vocals), Kassan (bass/vocals, also formerly known as RanRan), and Jasmine (drums/vocals). The band relocated to Tokyo in 2000. Their first EP Roller Coaster was released in January 2006.
They have gone through numerous member changes but they have kept performing.
The band performed in US numerous times throughout the years, usually as part of Benten Label's Japan Nite, an annual tour promoting Japanese indie bands in America. As part of their 2009 American tour, they played at the opening of New People, a building dedicated to Japanese culture in San Francisco. The group released their album, "Dolly Dolly, Make an Epoch" in October 2009. The band toured in the US once again in March 2010, appearing at SXSW as well as participating in the Japan Nite tour once again. Red Bacteria Vacuum appear in the 2009 documentary Live House, including live performances and interview with the band and its past members. In April 2011 it was announced that Red Bacteria Vacuum would open for A Perfect Circle on all their non festival 2011 tour appearances.



Sentimental City Romance

Sentimental City Romance are a Japanese rock band formed in Nagoya, Aichi in 1973.  When the band was formed in 1973, they were mainly influenced by the American country/southern rock music and some British music. But they soon found their original play style as well as their unique Japanese lyrics. In the plass three years released “Sentimental City”, which was written for a TV series “Hanayome Noren”, was released from Warner Music Japan in 2010. The following year, Sentimental City Romance released their new album “Yattokame” from Warner Music Japan. “Yattokame” means, “long time no see” in Nagoya region. It was 25 years since they released their last original album.In 2012, Sentimental City Romance performed music in a play called “Actress, Keiko Toda live show ~Route 55~”, directed by Yukihiko Tsutsumi. Keiko Toda is also has been a fan of Sentimental City Romance. In February 2013, their 8 albums were re-released from Universal Music Japan. It was digitally remasterd SHM-CD (Super High Material CD).
From March, Sentimental City


The Starbems

THE STARBEMS formed in December 2012 by Toru Hidaka, the founder of BEAT CRUSADERS.
Right after BEAT CRUSADERS broke up in September 2010, Hidaka started his musical career meanwhile working in some other musical projects.
Since the 2010′s year end festival to “TOHOKU LIVEHOUSE DAI-SAKUSEN(The benefit for North-East Japan 3 clubs construction plans)” which is still going on, he supported the plan with no hesitation, and tried to develop his new musical ideas with a lot of musicians again and again.
Then September 2012, the current lineup is completed, and playing some POWER POP melodies + feeling of speed as MELODIC PUNK with sort of HARDCORE arrangements and Attitudes.


Starmarie

Starmarie (スターマリー) is a Japanese idol group formed in July 2008. It currently consists of 3 members. They are gothic lolitas.
The unit is based in Tokyo.
Starmarie took part in Allover project. Aoki Shiori, Kishita Nozomi, and Takamori Shino were members of Team α (alpha).
They participated in Anime Expo AX on July 4-7, 2013 at Los Angeles as industry guests. It was their first live performance overseas.

Mayu Wakisaka

Mayu Wakisaka,is an International Acoustic Music Award winning singe-rsongwriter with an expanding fan-base from all over the world. She is also a finalist in “UK songwriting contest” and “Great American Song Contest”While studying at LA Music Academy with 4 time Grammy Nominee, Tierney Sutton, she recorded her first EP “Stars Won’t Fall” and “24 hours” from the album was selected as Sony Walkman’s preload song. A fan from Singapore made the lyric video and gained more than 60.000hits on Youtube.Also,the title track from her self produced album “Stars Won’t Fall” was picked for a compilation album “ Deep4”.
“What I see in Love” made it to the final of “UK Songwriting Contest, and “Great American Song Contest”
She is currently base in Tokyo performing in cities like Tokyo, Osaka and Los Angeles.


ChihiroYamazaki+ROUTE14band 
 (I got to see them perform at Japan Nite YAY!)

 Chihiro Yamazaki (tp) started a band with Satoshi Yamashita (dr), Koji Yamamoto (Ba), Hana Takami (Key) in summer 2010.
Their unique sound witch is called "Singing Instruments" based on "Instrumental Pop" came from many different back grounds such as jazz, fusion, classical and rock.
They performed around Los Angeles only after half year from their establishment and sold all the tickets. They performed at SXSW 2013 as well as touring 8 cities over the States such as Chicago, Columbus, New York, Toronto CA, Las Vegas, Los Angeles and San Francisco.
During the tour, they have got a lot of interviews by the press who were impressed by their powerful performance and also they quickly sold more than 400 CDs.


[Champagne]

Created in 2001. This group has chosen such a sparkling name in reference to their goals in life they become rich and famous! In 2010, the group has participated in major festivals. Prestigious situation is the ROCK IN JAPAN FESTIVAL or the SUMMER SONIC 2010, and the group offers a promising vision of the Japanese rock scene. Under the label RX-RECORDS, offers its rock ‘n roll melody that meets their influences such as Oasis Rock or pop Michael Jackson. Their Rock is enhanced by the sophisticated mix English and Japanese words! After the first album, named ‘Where’s My Potato?’ and several tours with the other groups in RX-RECORDS, they released their second album in March 2011, ‘I want to go to Hawaii’. It ranks first in the Oricon Indie Top.


~Seeya

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