mar.

In magazines and the like, you’ll see that I was meant to already have been in LA, but actually I left Japan on 3/3 and presently, as of 3/3, I’ve only just arrived. I was really supposed to travel to America sometime in February, but I was an idiot, resulting in about a week of hospitalization and then home recuperation for the better part of February. (No thanks to all that, I updated here a lot,,,) I’m completely back in action, have arrived in LA, so that’s that. I’m sure you want the details but the topic is still a little hot to the touch so I thought maybe I could let it cool down a bit and then tell you, but before I came here I ended up giving a bunch of interviews to reporters, so please go watch those, ok? I can laugh about it now, but there were some pretty serious consequences and I was pretty scared at the time, but like, sometimes it’s just like that, ya know? Still, when I was at Narita airport, Mr. Matsumoto was shocked to see such a huge number of people come out to send him off. How did all of you know? What kind of information network are you running? Hey, all of you! Shouldn’t you be using something like that to promote world peace instead? But in any case, thank you so very much for the send-off. But you know I can’t do anything in return, right? ,,You’re all busy people too, aren’t you? There’s no way you aren’t. Even if I leave you guys alone, you’ll all organize anyway and cause a big fuss over me, I guess.     I had just gotten back to LA, and before I had the chance to meet with anyone I got on my Mac just to check the BBS,,, Huh—wh, whoa yYo–Yo,,,,YOSHIKIiii? Nooo Frigginnn Wayyy? I still haven’t confirmed if it was him or not, but as soon as I know I’ll let you all know as well. And if it wasn’t actually him, then let’s all agree not to make jokes that threaten to cause someone to have a heart-attack, okay? If it really was him,,,,, let’s move the conversation offline, shall we? (LOL) ,,After all, that’s a little embarrassing, don’cha think?

First on the agenda for lemoned this year, Messr. MIYAGI HIROSHI, who handles my makeup, will open a HAIR SALON at lemoned. The name of the business will be cut zone LEMONed… “SQUASH” (like the drink). It’s planned to open around May. It’s planned to operate out of the first floor of the Omotesando LEMONed building. And with the various PSYENCE series and file2 in hand, that’ll complete my recent endeavors, but in May we’ll be releasing a video called 7 CLIPS which will just feature seven music videos. Also,,,, maybe this is something only I find exciting, on a personal level, but there’s plans to release a remix of PSYENCE. Things like who will remix what, and what songs will be selected, none of those things are decided yet, but there’s plans for lots of people,, chefs other than myself to serve up a lovely meal. As for me, I’m hoping we can keep things analog and put out a record. Additionally, for those of you who win the write-in lotto for UGLY PINK MACHINE file1 and 2, I’m planning to send some yet-unknown number of unedited tapes of the regional performances from PSYENCE A GO GO bit by bit. All you lotto-winners out there, please get one another’s information and copy your tapes for one another to try to collect them all. Please go ahead and copy the tapes and distribute them to those who didn’t win as well. (It goes without saying, but keep things free of charge), the only thing that’s prohibited is buying or selling them. Follow that one rule, or these sorts of events won’t be possible in the future.

That purely-Japanese-lady-ish passion + alternative… Miyuki Nakajima meets NIRVANA……… Without sacrificing either side of the equation, balanced and equal, it wouldn’t be Cocco. I can put together the context, but I can’t quite see the full end result,,,, This makes 43 listens. ,,I’m waiting for the album,,, I can’t wait.

There should still be time, if you hurry,,, You can make it right, so hurry up,, But that woman can’t, won’t win against these memories. Come on, hurry, do you want me to shoot you down? In a moment of madness you hurt me by mistake, you should cry and wail on your knees. Go on and try soothing this full-to-bursting heart of mine. You’re running out of time. Get on your knees, cling to me and beg forgiveness. Murmur words of love to me as you droop powerlessly before me. The bullets aren’t flying yet. The love hasn’t disappeared from my heart just yet. I’m still looking only at you for now. Lick from the tips of my toes. Alright, stand up already. You want me to shoot you down? I’ll break your nose, knock you down, and stomp the life out of you. All your idle excuses make for some nice sightseeing, but no matter what you say now, it doesn’t matter anymore,,,,, When I count down from three, you'll be seeing angels,,, So close your eyes,,, I’ll shoot you down………3…2…1 “Countdown / Cocco”

Hea-chan and Pa-chan went back to Japan.

I was left in a terrible state of shock today. How many years has it been now since I last felt like this? There’s a female singer I’ve been into since about a month ago. Her songs just keep echoing in my head all day long. “Do you want me to shoot you down?,,,,,” “Hold me, even though I’ve burned to ashes……” All of a sudden, with no warning, fragments of poetry lodge themselves in my ears until I can’t dig them out, and even when it’s a song I’ve only heard once, I’ll have two or three different songs of hers all jumbled up in my head until I was half driven mad. I kept asking people if they knew “Kokko,” if they were a band or a member of a band, since I could only vaguely remember the name without knowing the details. For certain reasons, I’d become cut off from the outside world (more on that later), and it wasn’t until a month later that I was able to connect all these fragmented memories together. From the package of a CD labeled “Cocco,” the figure of a lone girl stared straight at me. When I finally got around to listening to that maxi single, “Countdown,” I was just exclaiming “This! This! I found it! I was trying to find this!” for a good little while,,, but then after listening to it two or three times through, I was struck by a kind of horror that all these fragmented memories that I had thought were fully formed thoughts—things that happened just a month ago, things that should be new memories to me, connecting to memories of the past, further and further back (my childhood, things going back even farther than that, all the musical knowledge I’ve gained up until now) all mixed up together—to the point that I started trembling in fear that the it all might start breaking down somehow. To give an example, within me, punk, KISS, zeppelin, and all of what I’d come up listening to in the past, which was part of an era—the era I’d listened to them—those memories and that musical knowledge was itself a part of those days, everything that happened to me and my memories, all of it was mixed together and stored in the same locker so that whenever I need to call on those memories to play whatever kind of music I need to play at any given time, I’m also calling on the mental landscape and my impressions of that era, but cocco completely ignores all of those mental associations of mine, grinds and mixes old and new together, so much that it’s almost creating memories that I shouldn’t have and landscapes I have no way of having ever seen before. It’s not like the moment of having first found music that I think is good or that I consider my favorite music is something I can rationalize, since at that moment something like fate or destiny brings into being an impossible to fully understand, almost handbook-like set of knowledge, unique to everyone (although it might take into account each person’s sense of taste and prior experiences) and which, compiling and working through is, in itself, a great joy—to the point that the satisfaction of clicking the last piece of that puzzle into place is why I buy albums and create music—and I thought that, encountering this music was just another part of that compilation process, but I as I listen and listen again, the more I listen, the more afraid I become. I cry at memories that I shouldn’t have in the first place, and I even feel like I can experience something like what a girl going through a menstrual period goes through. Like the world of Total Recall. I feel like you may be saying “Don’t listen to it, if that’s how you feel,” but you’re wrong. I want this violation. It’s only been a day since I got this CD, and I don’t know if there will be any changes to me, chemically, but I’m in a panic. Anyway, Cocco’s maxi single “Countdown” will go on sale on 3/21. To those whose interest has been piqued, please give it a listen. ………………“Nowadays, girl power is where it’s at!” The Matsumoto who used to scoff at such generalizations about the present days……… can’t say anything to refute them at all in this case.