music (Page 40)

Get ready to rock! 38 awesome covers of video game music in 17 minutes

It goes without saying that here at RocketNews24, we love video games. While we might not always agree on which system is the best (PC MASTER RACE!), there’s no doubting that we’ll never complain about plunking our butts down in front of a screen and killing some baddies. In fact, some of us are even going to E3 this year for…uh, you, our dear readers! We promise that we are in no way totally, completely, and utterly thrilled to be attending. It’s all for you!

See how much we love you?

And what else do we love besides video games and our super awesome readers? Well, I can’t speak for everyone here, but I love some tasty metal riffs. Which is exactly what makes this medley combining music from 38 different games so awesome. Check out the 17 minutes of awesomeness below to see if your favorite game made the cut! Read More

Become MASTER OF NUGGETS with this heavy metal recipe book

Have you been looking for a way to combine your love of thrash metal with your enthusiasm for trying new food? As you may know, we at RocketNews24 are always looking for ways to mix up new musical experiences, so we were tickled to discover Metal-Meshi, a tour through headbanging history told through metal-inspired recipes!

The brainchild of Tokyo-based foodie and blogger Yasunario, Metal-Meshi takes its name from “meshi”, a slightly slangy, rough-sounding Japanese word for hearty food.The book offers up over 60 mammoth-sized dishes that put some of Japan’s other Americana offerings to shame! So what kind of gastronomical excitement has Yasunario come up with?

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Super Mario Bros. theme gets an amazing jazz cover

While thoughts of the Roaring 20s typically conjure images of flappers and raucous parties, now it can also remind you of Super Mario BrosLos Angeles jazz musicians, The Handy Dandy Boys, recently recorded a mean, jazzy version of the “Overworld BGM” theme from Super Mario Bros., complete with banjo plucking, a brass section, and a silent film-inspired, mustachioed music videothat will put a pep in your step.

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Harajuku-themed music video improves Pharrell Williams’ “Happy” with sumo, bears, and robots

Like it or loathe it, Pharrell Williams’ “Happy” is still killing it in the charts more than six months after its initial release and remains of the most played songs on the radio. Sure, the lyrics are kind of simple, and its gets kind of repetitive, but when an artist devotes so much energy to being upbeat and provides a track that you just can’t help tapping your feet to, it’s hard not to crack a smile.

Fan-made remakes of the music video are ten a penny right now, with people all over the world feeling the urge to make their own smiling, strutting, and dancing compilations, but one particular video, titled “Harajuku Happy“, is by far one of the coolest we’ve seen, giving us a tour of the titular town while showing that life in Japan’s capital isn’t all black suits and bowing.

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One of the very first Japanese words I learned was afuredasu, or “overflow.” This wasn’t because it showed up in a textbook or a teacher taught it to me, but because afuredasu seems to show up in roughly a third of every Japanese pop song ever produced.

It’s not the only phrase that’s a regular in J-pop lyrics though, as shown by this flow-chart that can turn anyone into a Japanese lyricist.

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Knocking on your door: Kiyoshi Sugo’s beautiful, melodic dubstep【J-Tunes】

May is almost over and summer is about to kick into high-gear. Business people are slipping into their “cool-biz” outfits, and the air conditioners on the trains are coming on full blast now. Pretty soon you’ll be able to find us all at the beach fanning ourselves while slurping down the finest kakigori money can buy. And what better way is there to go into summer than with some sick new tunes?

That’s right, we’re back with more J-Tunes for you! And today we have one of Japan’s best electronic music producers, Kiyoshi Sugo. If you like dancing, lush melodies, fat basslines, or sick drops, you need to check this out.

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American singer to perform theme song for newest Studio Ghibli film 【Video】

A recent scandal in the Japanese entertainment world may have delayed the release of the announced box set of the works of retired anime director Hayao Miyazaki, the latest offering from the production house he helped found, Studio Ghibli, is still on track for its planned July premiere. With the big day coming up fast, producers have released a short teaser of the anime film’s theme song, which is being performed by American folk singer Priscilla Ahn.

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Drop the… iPhone? Dupstep remix of smartphone ringtone leaves us shaking our booties

There are a few things we at RocketNews24 love more than anything else in the world: Food, video games, animeweirdness from Asia, and sending Mr. Sato out on adventures involving as many of the above as possible. We also love good music, so it goes without saying that we’re always ready for some new tunes to dance off all of our junk food calories, like maybe some sexy new dubstep remixes.

So, how about this live remix of the iPhone ring tone, complete with a drop dirty enough to make Skrillex blush? It’s guaranteed to get your body moving and confuse all your Apple-loving friends at the same time!

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Attack of the clone choir: Stunning cover of Kiki’s Delivery Service theme song 【Video】

Ever find yourself alone in a situation where a cloned version of yourself would really help? Unfortunately, not all of us have access to Kim Jong Un-level technology, but one talented Japanese singer has found a way around that by duplicating himself on video to make a series of pretty creative covers.

Last week, his cover of “Wrapped in Kindness,” the end theme from Studio Ghibli’s Kiki’s Delivery Service became a huge hit with Japanese netizens who couldn’t get enough of his great voice(s). Click below to see the video where one singer becomes a six-man band!

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Pleated skirts, Kewpie dolls, and death: The wild music and videos of Urbangarde【J-Tunes】

It’s been a good few months for weird music videos, hasn’t it? With BABYMETAL, Avril Lavigne, and Die Antwoord all confusing us in good and/or bad ways (seriously, Avril?), it might seem like there’s no room for crazy music left in your head. But you’d be wrong, because today we have for you the most recent offering of the electro-pop-rock band Urbangarde. And the video isn’t just visually striking–the music is guaranteed to get stuck in your head for the next couple of days! It’s a problem we haven’t figured out to solve yet.

Though, we have to admit that we’re not trying very hard.

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It’s becoming more and more common for idol singer units in Japan to pump up their sales numbers by offering some kind of special prize to fans who purchase multiple copies of the same CD. Each disc might come with a raffle ticket for a chance to shake hands with the group, and at least one band will let you straight up go on a date with the member of your choice if you buy enough copies.

By far the most coveted prizes are those handed out by Japan’s biggest musical act, AKB48. The loyalty of the supergroup’s fans is legendary, but even with their reputation proceeding them, we’re shocked at just how much cash the unit squeezed out of one ardent supporter.

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Having grown up in Los Angeles, where celebrity drunk driving arrests are only slightly less common than rainy days, I’m generally not shocked when I hear about an entertainer being in trouble with the law. Things are very different in Japan, though, and whether it’s because those in the public eye are better behaved, more skilful at covering their tracks, or have a cozier relationship with the mass media, stories about major transgressions by performing artists are few and far between.

So when pop musician Aska was recently arrested, it sent shock waves through the country. Of course, if you’re not a fan of Japanese pop music from two decades ago, you probably think the 56-year-old singers legal problems are none of your own.

That’s not the case, though, if you’re a fan of Studio Ghibli anime.

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This is probably the best acoustic Super Mario Bros. cover ever 【Video】

The Super Mario Bros. theme, also known as the “ground theme,” “overworld theme,” or perhaps just “da-da-da-dada-da-da!” is arguably the most well-known piece of video game music in the world. First recorded for the NES game in 1985 by Nintendo’s in-house musician Koji Kondo, the track was designed to fit the action and pacing of the platformer, and added a light, whimsical accompaniment to gameplay that might otherwise have felt entirely different without it.

Thousands of people have attempted to tweak and cover this iconic track over the years, tackling it with a variety of instruments. More often than not, the result is the same – a great track is a great track regardless of the person playing it, after all – but occasionally someone with real talent comes along and blow us all away with a rendition that we almost wish Nintendo would include in their next Mario adventure.

Russian guitarist Igor Presnyakov’s cover of the overworld theme is one such rendition.

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When you really stop and think about it, the concept of idol singers is a little strange. At its core, the idea is to leverage the performers’ good looks into higher sales than they could achieve through their musical talents alone.

We realize that in face-to-face dealings, there’s very little a guy won’t do for a pretty girl, if for no reason other than to raise his chances of getting a date with her by even the tiniest fraction of a percentage. But does it really make sense for hard-core fans to try to impress their idol of choice? Regardless of how many copies of your favorite singer’s albums you buy, it’s not like she’s going to go out with you or anything.

Unless, of course, you’re talking about the idol group AeLL.

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Cultural differences spoiling the sing-along version of Frozen for some fans

Disney’s Frozen is a big hit in Japan, where it’s known as Anna and the Snow Queen. It’s not such a big surprise, as Japan’s always had a soft spot for Disney and stories about the power of friendship and family, and the film’s lack of dramatic, showy romance also fits in nicely with Japanese narrative sensibilities.

So when Disney decided to bring the sing-along version of Frozen to theatres in Japan, a country where you’re never more than a few minutes from a place to sing karaoke, you’d think it’d be an amazingly enjoyable experience for moviegoers. Unfortunately, it doesn’t look like that’s always the case.

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When most people hear “Japanese female musician,” the image that springs to mind is an idol singer, covered in frills and girl-next-door sweetness. You’ll get no arguments from us against the theory that Japan produces more bubblegum pop princesses than anywhere else, and the county’s not likely to lose the top spot on that list anytime soon.

But not every female vocalist to achieve success in Japan did so by hitching her wagon to the idol system star. While its popularity has ebbed and flowed multiple times, the history of girls’ rock stretches back at least three decades in Japan, and today we take a look at, and a listen to, some of its stars.

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Does Avril Lavigne’s Tokyo music video really have anything to do with Japan?

The lack of both L and V sounds in Japan’s language hasn’t kept Canadian musician Avril Lavigne from achieving widespread popularity here. As a matter of fact, given the country’s affinity for female solo acts, and its decades-long ready acceptance of “girls’ rock” music, you could make the argument that Lavigne has an even broader fan base in Japan, or at least one that’s split more evenly across the gender line.

So when Lavigne recently revealed she’d filmed her latest music video in Japan, maybe it wasn’t so surprising, even if a few of her choices for representing Japan were.

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The pillows fans rejoice! You could win a contest to meet the band in Tokyo【Videos】

2014 marks 25 years as a band for the pillows. They are celebrating with a song entitled “Happy Birthday,” and also by announcing a cover and dance contest. For those with the misfortune of not knowing who the pillows are, they are a Japanese rock band whose style has changed over the last 25 years from pop to jazz experimentation to alternative rock.

Many of the band’s fans outside of Japan became acquainted with them through the six-episode animated series, FLCL, for which the pillows provided the music. The caffeinated, crunchy soundtrack is the perfect complement to the nonsensical but purely fun plot that includes a robot that emerges from a boy’s head wound, the spirit of a powerful pirate king and the sexy maniac who hunts him down riding a Vespa with an electric bass as a weapon.

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Japan Self-Defense Force’s elite Central Band performs Hatsune Miku song Senbonzakura

There are a number of active bands in Japan’s Ground Self-Defense Force (GSDF), but at the top of them is the Central Band. In existence longer the GSDF itself, they are the go-to band in situations where it’s unacceptable to screw up, such as welcoming foreign dignitaries and ceremonies of the highest order.

Then there’s “Senbonzakura”. This song was produced by WhiteFlame (aka Kurousa-P) and utilizes the artificial vocal talents of vocaloid Hatsune Miku. After its upload to video hosting site Niconico Douga in 2011, it became a modern classic of the vocaloid genre spawning several remixes and covers online and in karaoke rooms.

So what happens when the rigid discipline and tradition of the GSDF Central Band meets the wild pop of Senbonzakura? Let’s take a listen!

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When Final Fantasy VII was first released in 1997, gamers around the world emotionally connected with it in a way that had never been seen before. Years later, the game still occupies a special place in many people’s hearts, with many clamoring for developer Square Enix to release a version with graphics updated to today’s standards.

But even as so may ask for a new edition of the game that looks better, you won’t find anyone asking for one that sounds better, as the role-playing classic’s soundtrack is one of the most universally-loved musical collections to ever come out of the medium. As testament to its lasting appeal, a Final Fantasy VII symphony concert will be held in Tokyo this summer.

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