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November 22, 2024
 

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Daniel Robson
Daniel Robson, a British journalist based in Tokyo since 2006, is a features editor and writer at The Japan Times. He also writes freelance about music, videogames and Japanese pop culture for other publications around the world.
Japan Times
LIFE / Digital
Apr 7, 2010
Game director Mikami ups speed, action in 'Vanquish'
Fifty-two floors above the ground in Tokyo's Roppongi district, one man is reaping all the applause. As he soaks it up, the look on his face is difficult to read. It has been over four years since he last received such attention, and he has yet to impart the information he came to relay; has yet to experience...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Apr 2, 2010
Lights, camera, Sakanaction!
"I hope foreign listeners can persevere with Japanese music," laughs bespectacled musician Ichiro Yamaguchi. "Sure, there's a lot of crap music here, but there's a lot of good stuff, too. Intelligent music is in the minority now, but I believe it will become mainstream in the future."
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Feb 19, 2010
Tokyo Jihen "Sports"
Given that she writes the majority of the songs in both projects and works with many of the same musicians, it's bizarre that Shiina Ringo's finest moments come not in her solo work but with her band Tokyo Jihen. Last year's long-anticipated solo release "Sanmon Goshippu" ("Superficial Gossip") was a...
LIFE / Language / BILINGUAL
Feb 17, 2010
Keep your fūtō out of your mouth at the post office
A fun part of living thousands of miles from family and friends is sending packages home — that is, so long as you know the requisite jargon to communicate at the yūbin kyoku (郵便局, post office).
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Feb 5, 2010
Supercell's synthetic pop wins real fans
"Most people become a musician intentionally and set out to find success," says Ryo, the multi-instrumental talent behind art-pop outfit Supercell. "But me, I just uploaded a song to (video-sharing Web site) Nico Nico Douga without any big intentions. People on that site go by their user name, not their...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Jan 8, 2010
Uhnellys "Be Bo Da"
Anyone who says the Japanese can't do hip-hop is at best wrong, and at worst blinkered. Usually taking their cues from old-school rap, before the quest for "bling" railroaded the genre's more commercial strata into a moneyed-up misogyny fest and drove the good stuff underground, plenty of Japanese acts...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Dec 25, 2009
The decade's most influential
Last week, The Japan Times picked Hikaru Utada as the most influential artist of the past decade. This week, our writers ask various figures in Japan's music scene who they thought were the most influential artists of the noughties. We asked them to choose one Japanese artist and one non-Japanese artist,...
LIFE / Language / BILINGUAL
Nov 25, 2009
Moving house needn't leave you speechless
Along with divorce and bereavement, hikkoshi (引っ越し, moving house) is widely considered one of the most stressful experiences a person can go through, and adding an unfamiliar language to the mix can be enough to drive the best of us bonkers. It doesn't help that in Japan fudōsanya (不動産屋,...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY
Nov 21, 2009
American bar, ski lodge owner puts the emphasis on fun
"The first question people ask when you say you're in the bar business in Japan is whether you have to pay money to the yakuza," says Matt Naiman, owner of several bars around Japan and a ski resort.
CULTURE / Music
Nov 13, 2009
Coldrain "Final Destination"
Formed in 2007 in Nagoya, emo- rockers Coldrain have a commodity that is rare among Japanese bands: English-language lyrics that don't suck. That's mainly down to vocalist Masato being part American. Yet while their lyrics are written in English, the band's presence online is entirely in Japanese. Coldrain...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Nov 6, 2009
Vola & The Oriental's record-making Machine
"Once you're on a major label, you have to crank albums out fast!" says Ahito Inazawa, the frontman for Vola & The Oriental Machine.
CULTURE / Music
Oct 30, 2009
Masadayomasa "Kimagure Kapuri"
OK, so they're not the first band to do away with bass guitar and present a big fat sound as a duo. But by god, they're one of the best. Formed by Ruu and Miwako in Fukuoka in 2004, Masadayomasa play live shows so hot as to practically melt your ears: Miwako standing as she crashes massive rhythms from...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Oct 23, 2009
Versailles get dolled up for visual-kei fest
With dozens of Japanese bands trying to crack the West over the last 20 years, whoever would have guessed visual-kei would be the first genre to truly succeed?
LIFE / Food & Drink / WEEK 3
Oct 18, 2009
Roll up! Roll up!
London, where there are tens of thousands of Japanese people living at any one time, is awash with world cuisine. But most Japanese food available in eateries there would hardly pass muster in its homeland.
CULTURE / Music
Oct 16, 2009
Loud Park
Loud Park is Japan's biggest gathering of heavy-metal maniacs, and a relatively new but much-loved event. Since 2006, the two-day festival has presented the world's heaviest and hairiest, from Slipknot to Marilyn Manson, and this year sees the return of the festival's first headliners, Slayer and Megadeth,...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Oct 2, 2009
Little Boots serves pop a remedy
"I don't know what it is about my music that appeals to the Japanese," says Victoria Hesketh, the British pop sensation better known as Little Boots. "A lot of people in England miss the point, and they're like, 'Oh, it's just pop music.' And the whole point is that I was trying to do something simple...
CULTURE / Music
Sep 25, 2009
Burning bright, a light that will never go out
While Sonic Youth just keep getting older and Dinosaur Jr are now all seniors, The Cribs have taken a shortcut to making their own baby-based name sound ironic. The Wakefield, England, band — initially based around twins Ryan and Gary Jarman and their younger brother, Ross — were all in their mid-20s...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Sep 25, 2009
She "Orion"
In the anime "Macross," the top chart sensation was Sharon Apple, a cybernetic singer who bewitched a fictional future with her laboratory-engineered music and hologramatic cleavage. Here in real-life Japan, 2009, the defining act is Perfume: three carefully choreographed girls who sing autotune-crippled...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY
Sep 19, 2009
Tokyo rabbi gives unconditionally
"Whatever we have, we give 100 percent," says Binyomin Edery, the 33-year-old chief rabbi at Chabad House in Tokyo. "Our bank account is at zero! If we have one, we give two; if we have two, we give four. That's what we do."
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Sep 11, 2009
Electric Eel Shock stays metal, man
'I am 'Metal Man,' " states Akihito Morimoto matter-of-factly. "I love heavy metal, and I also studied metal materials and die-cast manufacture at university. So all my life is about metal."
Two of America’s biggest debt holders are dumping Treasurys
The U.S. Treasury building in Washington. Investors in Japan and China sold a pile of U.S. debt in the last quarter, just before the U.S. presidential election.
Ishiba aggravates his own political failures with diplomatic faux pas
Prime Minster Shigeru Ishiba is greeted at the APEC summit in Lima by Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau on Friday. The Japanese leader was criticized for remaining seated while meeting several world leaders at the event.
Japan's 3.31 million visitors in October set monthly record
Kiyomizu Temple in Kyoto in December 2023. Famous autumn leaf colors contributed to increased tourism demand last month from many markets across Asia, Europe and North America, the Japan National Tourism Organization has said.
Japan ranks last in romance satisfaction for second straight year
In a survey of 31 countries, Japan ranked last in terms of those who felt loved, with just 51% of respondents saying so.
Ruling coalition and DPP strike last-minute deal over economic policy
DPP policy chief Makoto Mahaguchi speaks at the party's policy gathering in Tokyo on Wednesday.
Japan, U.K. and Italy discuss inviting more countries to joint fighter project
A new concept model of a next-generation fighter jet to be jointly developed by Japan, Britain and Italy is on display in Farnborough, Hampshire, in July.
Haruki Murakami's 'The City and Its Uncertain Walls' gives deep deja vu
For “The City and Its Uncertain Walls,” translated into English by Philip Gabriel, Haruki Murakami confronts the ghosts who won't leave him alone.
Japanese expats in Asia find community through rugby
The Taiwan Fivewoods celebrate their victory at the 2023 Asian Japanese Rugby Cup in December of last year.
In Fukushima, a weekend of prose, poetry and translation
Aomori-based writer JJ Carter presented on tabletop gaming as creative inspiration for building characters and narratives.
For Dr. Nakamats, aging is just experience in action
Though he didn't win the recent gubernatorial election in Tokyo, the 96-year-old Dr. Nakamats' run was seen as inspirational in Japan's aging society.

Podcast

One of the many entrances to the Kabukicho neighborhood in Tokyo’s Shinjuku Ward.
Kabukicho: Tokyo’s ‘stadium of desire’

Longform

Construction takes place on the Takanawa Gateway Convention Center in Tokyo, slated to open in 2025.
A boom for business tourism in Japan?
By Kathryn Wortley

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