Red Ruin - Exploring the world through sight and sRed Ruin - Exploring the world through sight and sMp3 blog focusing on Japanese and other foreign indie and underground music, art, cinema, and culture. 
Articles
Mirror - Pass the Town and to the C
2008-09-01 08:16:00 Artist: Mirror Song: Pass the Town and to the C From album: On, Then, In [Buy CD][Website][MySpace] It’s like following a wild flowing river of guitar strings downstream. One encounters rocky banks and beautiful sandy shores in turn. The stream bubbles clear and gentle and breaks white ... More About: Japanese Music , The Town
Architecture Daily
2008-08-24 08:17:00 “Arch Daily ” is one of my new favorite sites. It’s just bursting with bounties of inspiring new architecture. The presentation is great, with lots of big pictures and they even give you the plans and elevations. Not everything will suit your fancy, but for my taste, there’s quite a high ratio of ... More About: Architecture , Places
Manu Delago - Mono Desire
2008-08-14 07:49:00 Artist: Manu Delago Song: Mono Desire (Hang Drum Solo) Genre: Instrumental [Buy CDs][Website][MySpace] Here is an instrument you don’t normally see too much of. The Hang Drum. Very smooth sounding. Check out Manu Delago’s site for some other good clips, including one more solo and some classy group ...
Denis Kamioka - Handmade
2008-08-07 08:56:00 “Handmade” stars Dan Nakagawa and Lovefoxxx (singer of CSS) who are both Brazilian musicians. The short film chronicles the emotional hills and hollows in the course of a relationship between their characters. It makes interesting use of visual effects to construct the strongly stylized symbolism that pervades nearly every shot. This is apparently the ... More About: Denis
Journal Spy Effort - Simply
2008-07-29 09:18:00 Artist: Journal Spy Effort (Now Mirror) Song: Simply From album: Journal Spy Effort EP [Buy CD/Mp3s][Website] Journal Spy Effort was one of the first bands to catch my attention when I started searching for unique Japanese Indie music. This song in particular didn’t really seem to be a ... More About: Japanese Music
The Pagan Spolkestra - SOIL
2008-06-11 07:40:00 Artist: The Pagan Spolkestra Song: SOIL From album: Open Arms EP Genre: New Weird UK [Buy Mp3s][Myspace] Some bands have a sound that grabs you because of their pure musical mastery, some have an indefinable aesthetic charm that wins you over emotionally; and some, you guessed it: have a winning ...
Stealstealground - Swimming Bird
2008-06-10 20:45:00 Artist: Stealstealground (???) Song: Swimming Bird From album: Stealstealground [Myspace][Website][Song Lyrics] Stealstealground is a brother and sister breathing a music of listless understanding; singing songs of wise and delicate youth. Simple songs of simple beauty and a faint calm sadness. I wasn’t able to find their album for sale, ... More About: Chinese Music
Brian Dettmer - Book Sculptor
2008-06-03 11:26:00 Brian Dettmer uses knives and old books as his rather unique art supplies, and makes surgical three-dimensional collages of brilliant complexity. The thumbnail image is his carving of “Gray’s Anatomy”. Seems like it would require extreme attention to detail and a high tolerance for tedium, slicing carefully through hundreds of pages to reveal a ... More About: Book , Sculptor
Aya Kato - Gallery
2008-06-02 05:06:00 This is some very interesting art from Aya Kato. Click on the “Gallery ” link at the top to check out 8 years of illustrations. The mood ranges from dark and gothy to bright and elegant; always with very fine details and a distinct, personal style. Each of the images has a name and story ... More About: Music
They Shoot Music Don?t They
2008-04-25 17:01:00 Inspired by the innovative work of La Blogotheque’s Take-Away Shows, “five persons somewhere in their mid twenties” decided to start their own impromptu indie-video venture in Vienna, Austria; and they’ve already got some big names. I must say that I hope this format continues to spread. You often get to see a lot more of ... More About: Music , Shoot
Pochakaite Malko - Laya (Japan)
2008-04-24 08:26:00 Artist: Pochakaite Malko (?????? ???) Song: Laya From album: ?????? ??? (Pochakaite Malko) [Buy CD][Website] Here’s a band that I guess you would define as either progressive rock, avant garde, or Zeuhl depending on your level of music nerdiness. I find them interesting and quite theatrical. This ... More About: Japan , Japanese Music
Galneryus - Beyond of the Ground
2008-03-31 09:24:00 Artist: Galneryus Song: Beyond of the Ground From album: The Flag Of Punishment Genre: Flag Metal [Buy CD][Website][Song Lyrics] Any band whose first 3 album titles include the word “Flag” clearly mean business, and Galneryus is no exception. They embody the spirit of heavy metal hyperbole, both in blazing ... More About: Japanese Music
Gramophontastic Video Contest
2008-03-12 08:45:00 Â Said the Gramophone has recently concluded their “Wonderful Video Contest In which people make films for their favourite songs”, and there are some great ones in there. Yet another fine example of what creative people can do with a little encouragement, some basic equipment, and possibly an all-consuming lust for prizes.[Link]
PiKAPiKA the Movie
2008-03-12 02:41:00 “Pika Pika” is a Japanese onomatopoeia with a meaning akin to that of our twinkle, sparkle, or glitter. It has come to be used as a term for a memetic movement of “light doodles” which are spreading around the internet. These are created by using a flashlight or led lightsource to draw images in the air, the trails of which become a single image in long-exposure photographs, and then turning a sequence of these images into an animation. The Pikapika project started by Tochka, a Japanese creative group, has now collaborated with the Japanese internet company So-Net to create the light-doodle-animation extravaganza that is “PiKA PiKA the Movie ”. The project’s blog on So-Net has quite a few different pikapika videos, including some behind the scenes footage. It’s interesting to see how the seemingly random flashlight wavings of a bunch of people wandering around turns into complex and charming collaborative animations. More About: The Movie
Madame Tutli-Putli
2008-03-04 11:16:00 This groundbreaking Canadian animated short can now be seen in its entirety at the CBC website. Its been raking up awards and leaving people stunned since the film began its festival run last year. Dark. Thrilling. Eerie. Beautiful. I came out of the theatre in awe. I said ... More About: Madame
Far France - Addict
2008-02-28 04:14:00 9mm Parabellum Bullet, Ogre You Asshole, Nhhmbase, Toddle ? Japan?s indie rock resurgence continues with the likes of Far France , a quartet of twenty year olds from Tokyo who possess a level of talent far beyond their age. I was one of those people that broke ... More About: Japanese Music , Addict
Takagi Masakatsu
2008-02-28 02:59:00 We’re big fans of multimedia artist Takagi Masakatsu here at Red Ruin. He recently performed at the Kennedy Center in Washington D.C. as part of the Japan! Culture + Hyperculture festival. For those of us who couldn’t make it, the entire performance can be seen online here. And for those of you ... More About: Japanese Music
Grammatics - Shadow Committee
2008-02-17 18:07:00 Artist: Grammatics Song: Shadow Committee From album: Shadow Committee 7″ Genre: Indie Dramapop [Buy Mp3s][Myspace] I heard about the band Grammatics from a music recommendation thread on some Japanese site; and this song sort of makes me wonder why I hadn’t heard of them elsewhere first, and how long they ...
Balloon Ride
2008-02-06 19:44:00 This aptly titled song is a wondrous power ballad by Toronto based rock band, Ivory Tree Observatory. Such is the song?s power to capture the mind, I find myself overwhelmed with the sense of flight within the first few notes. As these delightful ... More About: Ride , Balloon
Bacon - Bye-Bye Little School Girl
2008-01-08 07:46:00 Artist: Bacon Song: Bye-Bye Little School Girl From album: Bacon (Self-titled) [Buy CD][Bacon’s Website] Why not make a resolution to help expand the musical horizons of those around you this year? For those of us with friends who are drawn to some of the extremely successful pop punk ... More About: Japanese Music
?Humanizing China?
2008-01-05 10:03:00 I see I haven’t been doing much of the “Exploring the world through sight…” part of our title. So here is some very interesting slice-of-life photography of daily situations in various parts of China complete with captions. I don’t know about you, but I often get the feeling that we humans experience the ... More About: Exploration
On the off chance?
2008-01-05 08:21:00 Well, happy holidays and new year to everyone. I’ve been using some of my spare time to work on making a new video player that will have a lot of good functionality built in. For example it has a playlist to support multiple videos, and you will be able to copy link code ... More About: Whatever , Chance
World?s End Boyfriend - Planetarium Ghost Train
2008-01-04 07:10:00 Artist: World ’s End Boyfriend Song: Planetarium Ghost Train From album: Christmas Song (Xmas Song)[?????????] [Buy CD][Discography] Here’s a slightly tardy and amorphously seasonal sounding song for the holidays from a record of decidedly seasonal title. It is the work of Katsuhiko Maeda, whose World’s End Girlfriend project we ... More About: Japanese Music
Interview: Caroline Lufkin
2007-12-13 06:50:00 I remember coming home one night from a tough day at work, exhausted, hungry and wet from the rain. Murphy?s law seemed adamant in proving itself to me. ?Anything that can go wrong, will go wrong,? the law states. And so when ... More About: Interview , Japanese Music , American Music , Caroline
Modified Toy Orchestra - Freeno and Olaf
2007-12-07 00:28:00 Circuit bending is the art of short-circuiting children?s toys or other electronic low-voltage devices for the purpose of generating new sounds, which can then in turn be used in composing music. There is a strong element of randomness and experimentation with this process in ... More About: Olaf
Les Cowboys Fringants - L?Hiver Approche
2007-12-06 01:28:00 Artist: Cowboys Fringants Song: L’Hive r Approche (Winter Approaches) From album: Break Syndical Genre: Québécois néo-trad [Buy CD][Website][Lyrics] I write this while watching the first snow of the year and remembering by it the long lost friend who recommended to me these very Cowboys Fringants toward the beginning of my music ...
The Antlers - East River Berlin Wall
2007-11-24 17:40:00 Artist: The Antler s Song: East River Berlin Wall From album: Cold War (EP) [Buy other Album|mp3s][Website][Myspace] This wisp of a song is to waking up on a cold dark morning what Hermit was to waking up on an all too sunny one. It’s a long and longing corner ...
School Food Punishment - Close,Down,Back to
2007-11-20 23:44:00 Artist: School Food Punishment Song: Close ,Down,Back to From album: School Food is Good Food [Buy CD][Website] School Food Punishment, besides being a name that conjures amusing memories, is a Japanese group that makes some pretty catchy pop. Most of the songs from their first full album School Food ...
Toddle - Colonnade
2007-11-19 14:06:00 Artist: Toddle Song: Colonnade From album: Dawn Praise the World [Buy CD| mp3s][Website] With Dawn Praise the World Toddle has taken a significant step forward as a band. While their first record I Dedicate D Chord was strongly regarded, to me there seemed to be a slightly distracting ... More About: Japanese Music , Nade
DJ Wordy
More articles from this author:2007-11-02 10:59:00 China isn?t exactly well known around the world when it comes to turntablism. In fact they?re not even on the radar, which makes it all the more surprising for a world-class talent like DJ Wordy to emerge out of Beijing. A former guitarist, ... More About: Video , Music , Chinese Music 1, 2, 3 |
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