Good Die Young

Rather than backdating a few belated posts, I thought I'd do a quick summary of the last week..

First of all. Michael Jackson, RIP. I heard about it on friday 26th that he'd died. It's hard to believe he's gone. I guess he's one of the last superstars there will ever be. Once Prince and Madonna are gone, that's it.

I talked to some Japanese people about it, and I was surprised by the lack of emotion. It looks like the negative media was more noticeable than the amazing talent and classic songs that will live forever. They have their J Pop and they can have it. Thank You MJ. Out of respect, today I played his hits on my iPod going to work.

I noticed there was a Floral Jem for sale in Shimo Kitazawa, not too far from Shibuya so I decided to catch a short train ride to check it out. It looked really beat up, but it didn't sound half bad. They wanted too much for it though.

The train was really packed on the way out there so I thought it'd be an "adventure" to walk back to Shibuya. It wasn't so bad. I mostly zigzagged the Keio line and got back in more or less 40 minutes. The walk gave me a lot of time to think.

I did the usual rounds of UFO catchers and music shops.

At Ishibashi I tried a used vintage-style Edwards E-LP98-LTC that was 47,800 yen. It's almost the same as the one I tried in Ochanomizu, looking a bit more relic'd, with yellowed binding, a matte nitro finish and a few "non-factory" blemishes.

I was playing through a nice Marshall stack, and I have to say this sounded more like my Les Paul back home. In fact some young J musos were admiring my playing and probably this guitar as well.

Tempt.

Last night we went to an izakaya here in Yotsuya that advertised 100 yen bottles of beer. We thought that was great, until we walked out with a 3,600 yen bill. We only had two beers! Looks like the food had a inflated markup to make up for the cheap booze. Note to self: Come here ONLY for alcohol next time.

I was still hungry so we watched "He's Just Not That Into You", while eating piping hot popcorn that I made for that "cinema" experience.

Just for the record, the movie was ok with lots of famous stars throughout. This should probably go without saying, but I must warn that this is seriously a CHICK FLICK. The guys get made out like they are the bad guys big time. No Fair!

I was considering going to the Tokyo Guitar Show on Sunday, but I realized that I see guitars plenty as it is, and to pay to get a headache from "Stairway To Heaven" or something along those lines, made me give it a miss.

So that's my week so far. Until next time JIJ signing off!