Little BSD: Cosplay Izakaya in Akihabara

Name: Little BSD (Referencing the freeBSD operating system, inexplicably. )
Hours: 6:00PM-11:PM Sunday through Thursday,
6:00PM-First train Friday and Saturday.
Price: ¥300-600 for food (healthy portions.)
¥600 for beers and cocktails.
Events: Seasonal and anime related theme parties.
Address: 3-7-14 4F Soto Kanda, Chiyoda-Ku (Right by Suehiro-Machi station past Akihabara.)
Japanese Level: Picture menu, so you can order with grunts and gestures, but that would be missing the point.

Everyone loves rooting for the working girl. Be they a bubbly waitress, busking street musician, or single mother hostess milking the client to help buy baby food, the fact that they’re doing their best to get by in this cold, cruel world brings out a protective instinct in the male clientele that helps them open their wallet to her plight.

Take the initiative and request them to draw something special or you'll get cheated with something played out like Doraemon.

Which isn’t to say that you need to rationalize a night out to Little BSD, the cosplay Izakaya squared away in the Suehiro-Machi side of Akihabara. With portions like this, you're loosing money going to a standard Izakaya. By virtue of location you’d expect a maid café; by the staff profiles on their homepage you’d expect a cabaret. The reality is somewhere in between, with reasonably priced bar food served with mizu-shobai hospitality.

Riyu owns a $1600 dollar Lina Inverse costume that she won't wear in public for fear of it getting sullied. That's either dedication, insanity, or one of the perks of living with your parents after college.

Order a custom cocktail and your waitress will chat you up as she works the juicer or draws a personalized message on your croquette. They’re accommodating, charming, and most of all, busy. The only way to tie down a waitress is to order more food—A sneaky innovation on the pay-to-play system. 

Surprisingly, most customers came in by themselves, sat facing the wall, then cleared out after a beer and late-night snack without exchanging more than a few friendly greetings with the girls. It seems that the true appeal is not in interacting with the staff, yet rather placing yourself in the middle of this hive of honeybees as they buzz sprightly around you.



Oh, the energy of youth!

Oh, the tastefully understated costumes!

Oh, the moe!

If their sweet smiles don't give you diabetes, the hot pepper filled cream sundae will.

But what are they working towards?

The motives of each girl are as varied as their taste in manga. Some see it as an extension of their hobby. Some were digging out from under a mountain of cosplay-induced debt. Still others just like the vibe the place gives off. But for many, the job is fertile ground for building up grass-roots support for their idol debut.

Emboldened by the mega-success of groups like AKB48 who gathered nationwide attention by acting locally, these girls are ready to wide the moe-wave out of this island Akiba and into the mainstream.

From the official staff blog.

On the night we visited the staff had recently returned from Moemotion, a promotional mini-concert featuring other cosplay cliques. Little BSD’s booth drew in attendees with bar food, copies of their original CDs, and, to boost audience participation—Green leeks, naturally.

The girls who get noticed can bulk up their resume working as indy-game voice actresses, anime songstresses, or contribute to voice clip collection CDs where they berate their boyfriend (the listener) for playing too much Monster Hunter, pelt him with wet kisses, or breath heavy into the microphone while doing pushups.

Each CD you purchase brings them one step closer to their goal. And you want to see these working girls succeed, right? Onii-San, onegai!

The Mousou Voice collection is available at Little BSD or online through the publisher.

Macross: Do You Remember How Goofy It Was?

So much has been said, blogged, and produced about the original 80's Super Dimensional Fortress Macross that it's nigh impossible to add anything unique to the dialogue. That's why we're dropping all pretense of having anything relevant to present. Instead, we've chosen to represent our love for the series in the only way we know how--By poking fun at everything that makes it great.

Easter eggs


While the infamous Budwiser missile hidden amongst the Itano Circus in the explosive finale of Do You Remember Love is the first thing that comes to mind when talking about gags planted by the staff the original TV series features a number of overlooked gems. One that flew over the heads of the Robotech generation were the names of the three Zentradi stooges that snuck onto the SDF-1 as spies. While Warera, Loli, and Conda's names appear harmless at first, in Japanese they actually spell out the not-so-subtle message, warere rorikon da: "We are pedophiles." Don't worry guys, we promise not to rat you out to governor Ishihara!

Gross misuse of culture

The Zentradi were slowly sliding towards assured extinction long before they disobeyed the teachings of their ancestors and confronted the Microns. Their conflict-based society knew how to command and pilot their war machines, but lacked the mechanical ability to repair, much less build them. It was only a matter of time before the factory gears went awry and the dreadnoughts stalled into silence.


Good thing the Earthlings brought them the gift of culture! After learning how to fix their broken weapon facilities through the power of pop music, they mastered the mysteries of mutton and cutlery. Like monkeys that turn objects in their environment into simple tools, the Zentradi display a high level of innovation by fashioning forks into makeshift cages. You’d expect more secure means of confinement from a race with planet crushing technology, but to the Zentradi building a better mousetrap means perfecting a black hole generator, so perhaps it worked out in favor of Minmay and her alcoholic cousin.

The army of the future with the organization of yesterday

Macross was an industry forerunner in many ways. It set the gold standard for all proceeding sci-fi anime with its (at the time) unorthodox mixing of high drama, transforming robots, and young idols. Unfortunately, for all the technological wonders promised by the titular dimension-leaping, mighty morphing flying fortress, its vision of future infrastructure was so near-sighted as it to keep it grounded.


Pilots report for duty using payphones and rush to the sortie point in civilian taxis. Officers are summoned over a city-wide loudspeaker system like a child lost in the supermarket. Sure they have arcade games with scaling vector graphics and 3D displays, but lack everyday technology rudimentary by today’s standards. Forget about wireless communication. Or IC chip personnel tracking. Or a reliable way to deploy troops. Earth never stood a fighting chance against the Zentradi until they discovered the Minmay attack, but even abject despair is no excuse for lazy planning.

Innsmouth look


Sailors get scurvy; inhabitants of the SDF-1 get googly eyes. Is it from the constant exposure to fluorescent lights? The stress from living inside a war zone manifested? Mass hysteria? We’ll never know if the cause was lazy animators or purposefully lazy eyes.


Happy cosmic wedding


Max and Milia answer the age-old otaku conundrum: Can love bloom, even on a battlefield? Their courtship stands as a historic first for nerd marriages. Not only was their first face-to-face meeting across the romantic glow of a game monitor, they even sprung to have a giant robot-shaped cake at their wedding. People today are able to exchange their vows in Klingon (or even in Zentradi), free from shame and ridicule, thanks to the precedence set by their brave love.

Space age comfort

Serving as the mechanical brain of the Macross, its command center represents the pinnacle of technology that looms tall against the unknown blackness of space. The future of the human race hangs in the balance of the decisions made here by Captain Global and his crew.

Given the importance of the physical and mental well being of the deck hands, you’d expect the architects to have installed something as sleek and comfortable as a Vernet Panton S-chair, or, in the very least, a battle-ready La-Z-Boy. Instead they get those pads that lock your feet into weight machines at the gym.

Virtual idols


When series director Ishiguro Noburo and character designer Makimoto Haruhiko gave birth to Lynn Minmay, I doubt they had any indication of the damage their daughter would wreck on the psyche of young boys across the country. The teen idol was an accepted proxy girlfriend for the kids too busy cramming for entrance exams to chase skirts, and Miss Macross was the next eventual step down the slippery slope of virtual relationships.


Minmay set a precedence of beautiful girls further and further removed from reality. Her DNA provided the blueprints for anime's first virtual heroine, an amazingly mind bending feat, given that anime is virtual by its very nature. Eve, the computerized idol that served as the benevolent protector of the 1985 OVA Megazone 23, had the same parents as Minmay, Ishiguro and Makimoto. Megazone 23 inherited a number of hand-me-down themes from Macross, including transforming robots, a contemporary Tokyo setting, and pop music to appease the masses. The OVA moved over half a million units, making it the best selling VHS film of the year, anime or otherwise. Paired with the success of its contemporary and similarly bishojo-powered Fantastic Adventure of Yohko Leda, 1985 marked the start of the countdown to extinction for 3D girls.


If Minmay and Eve are sisters, then Macross Plus' Sharon Apple is their younger cousin, and Hatsune Miku their niece. Before you damn the vocaloid, remember that it all began with one girl, whose boyfriend was a pilot.

Proto moe

Speaking of cute girls, Macross pioneered the marketing ploy of featuring an abnormal number of women in its crew. All of the command room members are female—Captain Global could have been the star of the first harem show if the focus wasn’t on the Space War.

Captain Global

Bumbling at best, dangerous to his passengers at worst, Captain Global stumbles through the series, stopping only to bang his head on low hanging archways and be chided by Shammy for forgetting—again—that the deck is non-smoking. His grand character arc of pleading for peace with the UN concludes with him making a halfhearted pass at Misa, one that she gracefully laughs off because a woman her age is legally bound by Japanese law to serve as someone’s surrogate mother, not their stand-in daughter.


Lacking the inner turmoil of Yamato’s Okita and the personal vendetta shouldered by Nadia’s Nemo, Global is not only a boring commander, but a largely inept one whose grand stratagem boils down to soaking up acceptable losses until the SDF-1 lurches close enough to the enemy to unleash robot punch. He may suck at everything, but at least he does it with aplomb. Precariously-placed-over-one-eye hats off to you, Captain.
That's it from these guys. Do you have any Macross trivia or memories to add? Have you ever made pineapple salad for your significant other? Or dressed your dog up like a VF-1 dressed up like a Zentradi soldier to re-enact Rick/Hikaru's daring escape? Or played the Robotech pen and paper RPG? If so, TSB wants to know!

80s Sci-Fi Horror covers by Junichi Murayama

Iara, an Umezu comic set primarily in feudal era Japan, is the last place you might expect to find cover art like this, but this was Japan in 1980 so rationale need not apply. Junichi Murayama's paintings can best be described as the Trapper Keeper art every elementary misfit dreamed of (I myself had this one and this one). More of his less psychedelic stuff can also be found here.

Fancy Cat: Otaku Karaoke Izakaya in Kichijoji

Name: Fancy Cat
Hours: 10:oo PM-First train
Price: ¥2,100 for the first hour with two drinks;
¥520 for extension (30 minutes)
¥580 for beers and sours
¥20,000 if you puke on the carpet, so stay at home if you can’t hold your liquor
Events: Vocaloid Day, Cosplay Day, All Music Unlocked Day
Address: 1-22-9 2F, Honmachi, Kichijoji (Behind Yodobashi Camera)
Japanese Level: Good enough to prove that you're not a fanny pinching creep.


The Otaking have found their Camelot. Located a kingdom apart from the garish, pandering consumer culture of Akihabara, Fancy Cat is the ultimate secret base, the mom’s basement that earthquake-proof architecture never afforded to socially awkward youth. Here, the currency of conversation is karaoke, and the etiquette is simple: Only anime, game, and tokusatsu songs allowed!

Photography inside the bar is strictly forbidden. Stolen shamelessly from http://www.i-love-kichijoji.com/tavern/

Though ostensibly a cosplay Izakaya, the harsh bathroom lighting, bookshelves stuffed with manga, and waitresses rocking absolute territory would have you mistake Fancy Cat for an oversized maid cafe. Thankfully, any similarities are superficial. Gone are the prerecorded chirps of “welcome home master.” The espresso machine with its heart-shaped lattes has been scrapped for a beer tap serving frosty brews. Be thankful for the two drink minimum—The sooner you get liquid courage coursing through your veins, the sooner you can throw yourself into the throng of anisong camaraderie.

More intoxicating than the alcohol is the unquestioning acceptance and celebration of all aspects of fandom. SDF Macross has the same amount of street cred as Macross F. Heisei Kamen Rider and Showa Kamen Rider stand on even footing. G-Gundam is the butt of every mecha-related joke, but that doesn’t stop the entire bar from joining in during Flying In The Sky.

Audience participation is not just encouraged, it’s demanded. This wild bunch stands by an unwritten moral code. Song genres should combo until someone breaks it with a Vocaloid track, opening the floor to the next trend. Cat calls and glow sticks are the nomenclature of criticism—Pink for like it, blue for love it. Mad libbing the chorus is preferred, with even the most seemingly spontaneous comments being carefully orchestrated by the crowd. It’s like Rocky Horror for otaku, only with the cross dressing delegated to the third Wednesday of every month.

Photography inside the bar is strictly forbidden. Stolen shamelessly from http://www.i-love-kichijoji.com/tavern/

Nurtured in this carefully regulated environment, Iyashi-Kei has evolved from passive and noncommittal to proactive and hot-blooded. Despite the perky waitresses and alcohol, Fancy Cat makes it very clear on their signage that they are not a cabaret club. The maids serve to provide an audience, not entertainment, and there is more of a frothing demand to see your fellow nerds perform the latest fad single than the idol who pioneered it.

Livelier than a night at the Izakaya, cozier than any bar, and more accommodating than the neighborhood snack, Fancy Cat is for otaku supermen craving a fortress of solitude where they can revel in their hobby for the sake of pure love, passion, and nostalgia amongst their peers. With the current generation, whose idea of social interaction is commenting on live Niko Niko streams, it’s heartening to know that face-to-face bonding and reckless abandon still have their place in an increasingly fragmented and insulated sub-culture.

Daisenpai

It was good to be a white guy in Japan during the bubble era.

Yurei: Ghost Izakaya in Kichijoji

Name: Yurei
Hours: 5:oo PM-Last train
Price: ¥2,200 course meal
Events: Special effect makeup artists and occasional stage shows.
Address: 1-8-11 B1F, Minami-Machi, Kichijoji



The key to maintaining an illusion is allowing yourself to be taken in by it. Once you begin to question its logic or discover its truths, the spell fades as quickly as a half-remembered dream.


Also used to wave down waitresses.

As a ghost-themed Izakaya, Yurei isn’t fooling anyone with its haunted house props, voodoo surf rock soundtrack, or bellowing fog machine. But it doesn’t have to—It’s your responsibility as the customer to buy into the hocus-pocus.


We'd let you eat it, but the guy who's using it needs it back *wink wink*.

The moment you descend the winding stairs and step over the threshold into the dim underworld, your spectral hosts make it clear that yes, you are in Hell, and yes, nothing is what it seems.


3D bathroom wallpaper provided by the DOOM II guy.

You clink glasses not with a hearty “kampai”, but a solemn “Namu Amida Butsu.” Plates of flaming ribs are engulfed in ghost fire. The bill is paid to the ferryman as fare for carrying you back over to the land of the living. All these small flourishes add up to a engrossing and comedic dining experience. Assuming you allow a gracious amount of suspension of disbelief, that is.


Each waitress is infused with a unique fruit flavor that they spritz into mixed drinks. Ours had marimo for blood.

The staff are all in on the joke, with the punch line being that, aside from a spooky naming scheme, the food is exactly like any other Izakaya. There's plenty of subtle smirks, but the waitresses never break character as they wheel out a procession of blood and head cheese French fries, Korean hot pot with soup stock from the burning lake, and cursed meat skewers.


LORD ENMA IS NOT AMUSED BY YOUR SNIDE REMARKS.

For those of you with a thing for dead girls, the waitresses contain enough necromantic charm to bury all of Akihabara in a moe-infused protoplasm. They mix custom cocktails, play quiz games, and dress you for your funeral portrait with all the love of a little sister who passed away from an incurable disease. Pretty much the same service you get at a maid cafe, only more tongue in rotting cheek.


Funeral parlors are the new maid cafes.

Our recommendation hinges entirely on your appreciation for haunted house kitsch. Do you titter at the thought of seeing childrens' disgusted reactions after reaching into a bag of peeled grapes and mini sausages that you told them were eyeballs and severed fingers? If so, then Yurei is right up your harmlessly demented alley.


Having un-ironically enjoyed a theme bar, there's only one option left for me.

The World Kaikan in Nakano

Conventional reasoning dictates that a building cannot qualify as abandoned if it still has inhabitants. After gazing up at the towering mess that is the World Kaikan, however, I’m no longer sure that such logic applies.



For over half a century, the World Kaikan has loomed over the back streets of Nakano, a five story edifice of decayed mystery whose very secrets have been eaten by the worms of time. Abandoned neon signs litter the grounds like the toppled gravestones of businesses that failed long ago. The front entrance is flanked by mounds of ripe garbage to the left and the fossilized remains of abandoned bikes to the right. Mutant cats dart through the rusted underbrush as if spying for their necromantic masters who stir within the crypt.


Hino Hideshi's pet cat.

Even vagrants know better than to stay out of its unsettling underground. The stairs are left unguarded for those with enough gall to brave the musty basement. Down here, door frames grow organically from the wall like fungus, derelict bars remain suspiciously intact, and a phantasmal old woman purportedly stalks the bathroom. The lights illuminate the sickly checkerboard pattern on the floor, which terminates at the mouth of a hallway swallowed by the darkness.



FUN FACTS ABOUT THE WORLD KAIKAN

1) Urban legend has it that the building was a hotel in its past life, a theory given credence by the piles of rotting furniture that line the stairs. Rusted box springs poke their heads through the debris like the first flower after a nuclear winter.


This ancient unicycle is one of the building's more benign mysteries.

2) The remaining pubs and watering holes evolved to survive the harsh conditions surrounding the building. Darwin would be delighted by Vow, a bar run by an ordained monk (Jodo Shinshu, if you're keeping track,) where you can imbibe in a sutra-specific cocktail while ingesting the words of the Buddha.



There is also Dio, the Jojo's Bizarre Adventure themed bar. If you need an explanation as to what Dio is doing at The World Kaikan, then navigating the Stance-themed menu would be muda muda!

3) Kuroki Kaoru, 80's porn starlet famous for her au naturel underarms and no-nonsense public persona, attempted suicide in 1994 after ditching director and collaborator Toru Muranishi when the bum refused to pay out her fair share of the profits. She survived the plunge from a building that is only described as "a hotel in Nakano."


Considering that a person could survive a five-story fall, and coupled with eyewitness reports of a burnt-out Kuroki wandering the halls of Broadway like a reject from The Ring, it stands to reason that The World Kaikan could have been the very building that she threw herself from.

4) The previous building owner ran away overnight with his family back to Taiwan, their room on the top floor untouched since. Rumors would have you believe that the yakuza got to him first, and that his rotting skeleton now inhabits the broken elevator. The only legitimate residents these days are Korean exchange students living in a makeshift dorm converted from the hotel rooms on the top floor.



Shinjuku has Golden Street, its shanty town of old-timey bars thick with the ambiance of the good ‘ol days of post-war poverty and the national zeitgeist fueling Japan’s rise to the top. The Nakano equivalent could be called Bronze Street—Tarnished, third-rate, yet beautifully compelling in its decay. The World Kaikan stands as the frayed banner that other ramshackle buildings rally under. Around it you can find storefronts whose broken windows are mended by crumbling movie fliers and whose doorsteps echo with the footfalls of more vibrant times.



The old hands who remain have seen Nakano's rise as the country's busiest shopping center to it's fall at the hands of subsequent stylish, youth-oriented districts. Yet the World Kaikan still maintains watchful vigilance as a reminder of a time when consumerism meshed seamlessly with the community. Broadway itself is a living museum, and it's curators call these rusted streets home, with all roads running to the World Kaikan.

Kawasaki Halloween 2010

Visit Umezu Kazuo's official homepage for more event pics and footage!

Autumn in Japan has very little of the seasonal charm you grew up with. Trick or treating never caught on, nobody celebrates Thanksgiving, and good luck finding a pumpkin to carve. Thankfully we have the good folks in Kawasaki to throw us a bone with their annual Halloween Parade! The event is a cultural mash-up, part Macy’s Day Parade, part costume contest.

This year saw over three thousand costumed participants take over the streets in a frenzied procession of Cosplay, furries, gore, and good old-fashioned Halloween ingenuity. Words would only waste your time―Check out the raw footage of the revelers:



The parade concluded with a costume contest where participants competed in your bog standard categories, such as best special effects, best character, best overall, and so on. Of course, when special guest Umezu Kazuo is presiding as judge over this carnival of souls, you can be assured that the results would be anything but ordinary.

Image lifted from Denbushi - I couldn't even see let alone take pics! Thanks!-Voidmare

Say hello to the winner of this year’s special Umezu Kazuo Choice Award, our very own Voidmare, for his home-brewed take on the titular fiend from the 1968 Umezu-inspired horror flick, The Snake Girl and the Silver Haired Witch (Hebi Musume to Hakuhatsuma).

Again, thanks to Jason for the photo and Velocitron for letting me use his airbrush!

I have to hand it to Voidmare for having the most perverted outfit out of an undulating sea of weirdos, exhibitionists, and fur suits. His baleful, empty gaze and twitching claws brought authentic fear and revulsion to the unexpected as he stalked through the crowd. It takes a special type of person to get their rocks off by loosening the bowels of those around them, and I’m proud to call him my (blogging) partner.

Not to be outdone, fellow Umezu and overall horror aficionado Gokicchi showed up in his self-stitched mask of Mokume, the Frankenstein-like demon doll from the one-shot Negai. Amidst the turmoil of the crowd, his otherwise plain clothes costume hit people when they least expected it and sent kids and women screaming for cover. True to the manga, he used real nails for the teeth! Concerned parents should sure to keep their children away from the grasp of Gokicchi's gardening gloves.

It turned out that this was only a warm-up for the true showing of deviance that night.


The room gets uncomfortably hot around 1:10.

Of all the cultural flotsam that washed up onto the beaches of Japan, I never would have expected the natives to celebrate and form a cult around The Rocky Horror Picture Show. If you’re not familiar with the concept of “shadow casts”, they’re fairly straightforward—Veteran fans get up in front of the screen to act out scenes of the film, complete with the requisite costumes and props, while the audience supplements the dialogue with witty call backs, MST3K style. Except in this case they imported an authentic British transvestite, and the puns were in response to not only the audio dialogue, but also the subtitles, sometimes in Japanese, but more often in Engrish!

As someone who hasn’t seen Rocky Horror since I was old enough to understand how warped it is, I was overwhelmed by the visual whirlwind of following the screen, and shadows cast, and audience all at once, compounded by the blitzkrieg of bilingual jokes and bisexual stage antics. At least I was lucky enough to be skipped over for the Virgin Hazing. I’d hate to show up the regulars with my banana-eating technique.

The Kawasaki showing may be the beginning of another Rocky Horror revival in Japan, unseen since the height of the bubble. There’s even talk of bringing back the theater musical at some point next year. True believers, keep your eyes on Lips, the Rocky Horror fan club and masterminds behind the night’s debauchery.

Koganecho on Sunday

I would rather spend a day filled with nothing worthwhile than one with everything worthless. Life in Tokyo presents endless adventure with scripted consequences. After months of excitement, the most fulfilling is often the least glamorous. Sometimes you need a lazy Sunday to take you back down in order to once again enjoy the thrill of soaring back up.

Hence our visit to Koganecho, a small town in the suburbs of Yokohama where even the busiest shopping promenade is sleepy by comparison. The day’s wanderings took us to Isezaki Mall, the areas most charitably dull quarters.

Snake Powder Emporium: Hebiya



Walking by, your eye unconsciously skips over the drab external décor, until you peer into the showcase and realize holy shit, a stuffed cobra! Step inside and its like you wandered onto the backlot of Hammer horror. Its walls are lined with taxidermy set pieces of snakes fighting mongooses, the cubbyholes filled with rows of rare serpents in formaldehyde vats. The owner must be either a mad scientist or the world’s tackiest serial killer.



In reality, the establishment is managed by an elderly couple that, staying true to the store’s Scooby-Do façade, don’t take kindly to meddling kids or strangers. Sadly they wouldn’t let us snap any photos, but you can still visit their online shop to pick up cobra and Okinawa habu powder for all your super-induced boner needs.

Lumberjack Grandpappy's Coffee Shack: Mameya



This cozy coffee shop gave off the relaxing aroma of fresh cut wood, something between a log cabin and your dad’s workbench. Their beans treated by hand in their patent tumble roaster and brew up the cleanest cup of coffee that I’ve ever tasted.

Being inside made me miss the little niceties about Autumn that you just can't get here. I would trade all the crepes and choco-cro in Harajuku for a single cider mill doughnut and slice of pumpkin pie.

Mysterious Antique Toy Store



Trolling for retro games is one of the small joys of life in Japan. Sadly, most of the charm fades away upon the realization that a colossal find like Chrono Trigger mint in box can be had without much fanfare at the neighborhood Hard Off. It hardly seems worth exploring if the final frontier is standing in plain sight around the corner. When everything you want is at your fingertips, the thrill becomes discovering things you never knew existed.



Pure Wrestle Queens is one of those games I never knew I needed until our paths stumbled across one another. Its fetching package wraps it in mystery. Is it rare due to unpopularity, or rather because it’s a masterpiece that none dare part with? Pure Wrestle Queens, I can’t wait to get home and unwrap you.

Jack and Betty



Normally “indy movie theater” is code for “shoe box with a digital projector”, but Jack and Betty shatters this mold with their stadium seating and (comparatively) wicked huge screens. Their standard sound system was swapped out for amps and stacks as part of the Bakuon film festival sponsored by folks from the sub culture rag Trash-Up!

Bakuon literally means “explosive sound” and the gimmick lives up to its name. You haven’t seen They Live until you experience John Carpenter’s ponderous soundtrack at bone-rattling decibels.

And thus concludes a day well wasted. I wouldn’t want to go back to Koganecho anytime soon, but I’m content in the knowledge that these urban retreats still exist. These wonderfully useless neighborhoods serve to help color the metropolis, who would soon normalize to a neutral gray without them.