Artist Takashi Murakami has directed the music video for virtual idol Hatsune Miku’s song, “Last Night, Good Night (Re:Dialed)”. It has also been re-mixed by Pharrell Williams, whose “Happy” has inspired some neat Tokyo videos recently.

Not surprisingly, then, Murakami has put Williams into the video. He’s the black guy with the hat.

The song is actually not new, dating from last year. But this new collaboration is a promo for Murakami’s feature-length film debut “Jellyfish Eyes”, currently screening in America until early June, on a tour organized by Blum & Poe, Murakami’s American gallery.

Billed as “a big screen tale of poignant memories and wondrous dreams,” it was, however, not a success in Murakami’s native Japan. The film had a troubled production, with Murakami frequently rejecting his animators’ efforts to make the characters he had created move in the way he wanted. The financial losses — Murakami and his company apparently poured in some $7 million — and the unhappy scenes behind-the-scenes have likely scuppered Murakami’s vision of two sequels.

Move over AKB48. There’s a new idol group in town and they’ve got pigtails. In fact, that’s their main asset.

The “Japan Twin Tail Association” has been around for a little while, promoting their love of all things pig tail (called “twin tail” in Japanese). Back in 2012 the association declared February 2nd “Twin Tail Day” (put it in your diary) and has launched numerous photo books and other merchandise to push its tastes on the rest of the world. One of the most esoteric of these must be the series it produced earlier this year of pigtail girls posing with guns.

Now they have made a plunge into the big time with the launch of the first pigtails specialist idol group, drop.

Misato Misaki, Hikari Takiguchi and Shizuka Sugino were all born in 1994 and are veterans of various TV ads and other “twin tail” projects. Together they form drop, who will perform their first live performance on July 6th at the Idol Yokocho Summer Festival 2014.

We’re a little confused that the girls don’t have pigtails in the traditional sense but I guess there is some room for interpretation in the twin tails universe.

Idol groups are a dime a dozen these days and you have to stand out somehow to make a difference. Will drop have what it takes? Only time will tell.

Idol unit BiS’s latest music video is directed by none other than fashion legend Nigo. “Nerve” has been released as a collaboration with 2.5D and Vice Japan, and features the female idols partly all dressed in school swimsuits.

The end of the video even includes a little easter egg with a part of the song “mirror mirror” (bombs BiS), made in collaboration with the band Vampilla.

Nigo is a music producer and of course the man behind A Bathing Ape (Bape). He also handled the music directing duties for the Japan version of Pharrell Williams’ “Happy” (the official music video, not the spin-offs). That video also features the likes of model Kiko Mizuhara and even unofficial mascot Funassyi.

The six-girl group BiS are no stranger to unusual publicity stunts, having in the past done a 24-hour 100km marathon race and even auctioned off their housewifery labor for three hours via Yahoo! Auction. Fashion designer Junko Koshinko officially joined the group in October 2013. They have already planned their departure from the competitive idol scene, though, with a Yokohama Arena concert in July being announced as their final one.

“Nerve” is actually a release from 2011, here given a new treatment by Nigo. Is this a good use of Nigo’s talents? You decide.

Here’s a making-of video (sorry, no English subtitles).

The website for UK fashion magazine i-D currently features Japanese idol group Babymetal. Online you can find an interview with the three young Japanese ladies, “bringing kawaii-metal to the world”.

Part gothic Lolita, part heavy metal, Babymetal have just appeared at Sonicsphere along with the likes of Iron Maiden. The three-piece is SU-METAL (16), YUIMETAL (15) and MOAMETAL (15), who certainly know how to scream.

i-D claims that Babymetal’s “eponymous debut album headed straight to the top of the charts worldwide, with a unique sound that merges Slayer with the very best dance mat anthems.” Well, we’re not sure they have their facts right (top of the charts worldwide?) but we like their enthusiasm. “It is awesome. With an incredible energy and a performance unlike anything you’ve seen before, a new legend is born.”

Here are some extracts from the “giggle-filled interview ahead of the band’s very first, very sold-out, London show.”

How was Sonisphere?

SU-METAL: It was the first time that we performed on such a huge stage so before we went on we were very nervous. The audience cheered lots so it made us very happy.

I heard that you performed on the same stage as Iron Maiden, who you’ve said before is your favorite metal band, how was that?

SU-METAL: We actually stayed on to watch their performance and we were like “did we really just play the same stage as them?!” It was really unbelievable.

You met some legendary metal bands too!

SU-METAL: Yes! Backstage at Sonisphere we were wearing BABYMETAL tshirts that reference classic metal bands like Anthrax, Slayer and Megadeath, so people recognise those and come to talk to us. So we took photos with some of the artists which was really cool.

Tell us about the fox god…

SU-METAL: We don’t really know what the fox god like because we’ve never met it, but we always have this message from this little master and we act accordingly. So we’re doing this European tour because of the calling. We’ve managed to achieve so many things that we would never even have dreamed of, so we really feel that there is a fox god leading us.

How does metal music make you feel? Angry? Powerful?

SU-METAL: It is more to do with my relation to the music, but whenever I perform it’s different to how I feel normally. I’m quite shy myself – I don’t actually go out dancing and headbanging but when I become SU-METAL and perform, it’s not embarrassing anymore. So when I perform, there are new discoveries in myself.

You’re supporting Lady Gaga. Are you excited?

SU-METAL: We’re all so excited! It still feels like a dream.

Her sound is very different to kawaii-metal, how do you think her fans will react?

SU-METAL: You’re right — in terms of music we’re completely different, but we ourselves didn’t know about metal music before Babymetal. When we first heard it we thought ‘what the hell is this?!’ but found it very interesting and enjoyed it, so I think the fans of Lady Gaga who don’t normally listen to metal music might feel the same way as us.

If you weren’t in Babymetal, what do you think you’d be doing right now?

SU-METAL: Just going to school and studying like ordinary kids. I don’t think we’d have the opportunity to go abroad or anything like that.
…

Which characters do you think you’re most like?

MOAMETAL: My favorite animation is “Love Live” and there is a character called Honoka Kosaka and I think I’m most like her, but who I aspire to be like is Nausicaa from “Valley of the Wind”.

YUIMETAL: I would like to be the Little Mermaid so I can live in the sea

SU-METAL: I would like to be the lead girl in Mama-Mia because she’s such a positive thinker.

This is the trailer to the band’s world tour, which kicked off in March in Tokyo.

Two years ago, in a country far, far away… It is a period of pop music. Rebel idols, striking from a hidden base in Japan, have won their first victory against the boring music empire. During the battle, the kitsune-sama fox god revealed his ultimate weapon, BABYMETAL, a kawaii-metal band with enough power to drive the metal resistance and restore musical freedom to the galaxy…

i-D magazine has been a stable for over 30 years now, famed for its wink-and-smile front covers and its coverage of the world’s fashion elite.

The sad truth is that sometimes Japanese consumers are a simple bunch. Forget complex marketing strategies or clever stunts. The way to their hearts is just to put a famous person on the front of whatever it is you’re selling.

Hence why there are so many TV commercials and other ads featuring the same gallery of celebrities. Hence why Hollywood films will have some random Japanese model appear at a press conference to promote the movie. And hence why this free 126-page guide for Hiroshima Prefecture tourism has sold out immediately after it hit the shelves.

It was published and released on July 14th but reprints have already been ordered. How come? Well, in order to give the booklet a push, the folk at Hiroshima made the decision to pay a no doubt not inconsiderable pile of cash to have Perfume to appear on the cover, looking cute and pop like the trio of young girls always do.

Within two hours of launching the campaign website, they had already reached the limit for 2,000 reservations, and now the publishers are getting orders from book stores all over the country, desperate to get their hands on the rare booklet. The initial run of 50,000 copies is almost all gone and the next run won’t arrive until mid-August.

The idea to include Perfume in the “Nakeru! Hiroshima-ken” (literally, “Hiroshima Prefecture that will make you cry!”) booklet and campaign is not as cynical as it sounds, since the girls originally hail from the region (it does, though, time in nicely with the release of their latest single). They also appear in a short PR video and are interviewed in the book.

The best place to get a copy in Tokyo is from the TAU Hiroshima Prefecture Store in Ginza, though at time of writing it no longer has any guidebooks left.

We’ve long struggled to understand the popularity of Perfume. On a superficial level, they are hardly what you might think of as glamorous. Rather, like many idol groups, they are presented as “amateurs” and this is reflected in that basically only one could be called beautiful. But it also shows in their ultimately fairly limited abilities to sing and dance, let alone write their own songs. Their managers are savvy folk and know to employ talented people to make cool music videos and album covers, which raises their sophistication. But what is the appeal of the Perfume girls themselves? Clearly they must have something, as this latest development shows!

Now we just have to see if the Perfume effect can actually increase tourism in Hiroshima.

Fancy having Namie Amuro on your cup?

If you recall, Koppu no Fuchiko (literally “Fuchiko on the edge of the cup”) was originally a Gachapon capsule toy created by Kitan Club. The mini mini Office Lady figure perches or hangs from your cup. A simple but cute idea — and it took off. There have been several series, a pop-up cafe in Harajuku, and the capsule toy has even now become a piece of merchandising for Japan’s biggest pop diva, Namie Amuro.

This isn’t as random as it sounds, since Amuro is a famous example of hattoushin bijin, a beautiful girl with her head one-eighth the size of her body. In other words, she kind of looks like a doll!

To coincide with Amuro’s latest arena tour, there is going to be a new Fuchiko model called “Diva who came down to earth to sit on your cup” — or just “Koppu no Fuchi no Amuro” for short. Look out for it around Japan from August 22nd, when her tour kicks off in Shizuoka. It will be sold through Namie Amuro’s website, Tower Records online store, and at Amuro’s concerts as part of a ¥3,000 ($30) concert pack.

As miniature J-Pop divas go, this is quite well done. Amuro’s trademark knee-high boots and hairstyle have been faithfully replicated on this mini toy, which measures a very petite 50mm. But does she sing?

In a possibly unprecedented move, the management of a Japanese idol group is suing two former members, their parental guardians, and the fans they had relationships with for damages.

MovingFactory, the management and label behind the seven-girl idol group Aoyama Saint Hachamecha High School has named both the two members, the fans and the parents in the lawsuit, which was made public yesterday.

Formed in 2012, Aoyama Saint Hachamecha High School is not as famous as other idol groups like Perfume, AKB48 and Momoiro Clover Z, but still has a reasonable fan base. Its single “STARTING OVER”, released in March, got to No.7 on the Oricon weekly singles chart.

In April this year it was suddenly announced that one of the members was leaving due to “health issues” and then in July another member was said to be taking a “break” from event appearances. New members were announced (the group now has eight members).

However, it was not until August that the reasons for the departure of Miho Yuuki (19) and Sena Miura (22) were made clear when a producer explained at an event that the two had been dating fans, which breached their contracts with MovingFactory. They were fired and the management even went so far as to reveal the names of the fans, which led to people tracking down their social media accounts and photos.

And now it has emerged a lawsuit has been filed for over ¥8.2 million (in excess of $75,000) for damages as a result of the girls’ actions. The two members are named in the suit, as are the men who had relationships with the girls.

“The parental guardians signed contracts that said the members would not have relationships with fans and would not neglect their work,” the management was quoted. “They have betrayed the members of the group and all their fans. We cannot forgive this.”

It was not until yesterday that the lawsuit was confirmed, though rumors about it had been circulating since mid-August when MovingFactory explained why the two members had left. One of the men in question wrote a blog post claiming that as an ordinary citizen he was free to have a relationship with someone and that he had received notice of a lawsuit. The other man went so far as to make a public apology via a YouTube video (since taken down).

There is a recent similar case. Last month the management company for idol group N Zero announced a lawsuit against a member and a fan for having “private contact”.

While there have been some scandals of this nature before, what usually happens is the “shamed” member is fired or punished. AKB48 member Minami Minegishi was demoted and even shaved her head in a bizarre act of public self-humiliation, while fellow member Rino Sashihara was exiled to a Kyushu “sister group” for a similar romantic episode, though her fan base has since exonerated her and turned her into one of the most popular members in the AKB sphere.

Some have criticized the management of idol groups for moral hypocrisy, demanding that female members be all pure and innocent while actually selling them as sex objects and profiting from the sexualization of young girls. In fact, as is alleged with former AKB48 member Tomomi Kasai, there are cases where relationships with the idols are condoned but only when it is with the (older) male management themselves.

Korg, although respected as a premier electronic musical instrument and accessories maker, still likes to have fun every now and then.

That’s why in the past it has released such items as Hello Kitty Guitar Tuner in collaboration with Sanrio.

And now it has created the Korg Miku Stomp Effect for Hatsune Miku, the virtual character originally created for the Yamaha Vocaoloid system that has since become a mini industry in its own right.

Hatsune Miku has inspired an opera, Blythe fashion dolls, racing bikes and more. She also recently became the Otona no Kagaku Pocket Miku Singing Keyboard for gadget kit makers Gakken.

Korg’s contribution is the rather snazzy-looking Korg Miku Stomp Effect. Korg is obviously at home with Hatsune Miku, who was born out of electronic music. This new Korg Miku Stomp Effect, to be released in October in Japan, allows you to have a guitar duet with Miku, singing in her unique Yamaha eVocaloid style.

Here’s a trailer hinting at the kinds of sounds you can create.

Korg says the aluminum diecast body on the effects unit is decorated with a specially commissioned original illustration.

There are 11 different lyric patterns and you can also input and customize your own lyrics. Korg are being a bit coy about how this will work. Apparently there is going to be a dedicated iPhone app but complete details are not yet available, plus they do not promise it can work with “English” but do say it can work with up to 6,000 characters in either Hiragana, Katakana or Romaji — but the latter is essentially writing Japanese in the Roman alphabet so it should in theory be possible to program Hatsune Miku to sing what you want to the tune of “Senbonzakura”.

This will have to confirmed in late October when the Miku Stomp Effect goes on release here. We can’t wait to see what Hatsune Miku fans create with their new musical toy.

Check out further details and specs on JapanTrendShop.

Red Bull Music Academy has produced a great series of documentaries about the little-known world of Japanese video game music.

The series is called “Diggin’ in the Carts” and so far parts 1 and 2 have been released. Each episode is around 15 minutes long and have English subtitles.

Composers featured in the series include Hirokazu Tanaka, Hitoshi Sakimoto, Shinji Hosoe, Hiroshi Kawaguchi and Takenobu Mitsuyoshi (both above), Masahi Kageyama (below), and many more.

The series highlights how important video games and their soundtracks were for the generation growing up in recent years, and “yet for most of us the composers behind these timeless melodies remain faceless”. The central thrust of the series is to put a face to these undervalued composers and argue that video game music has been probably Japan’s largest musical export to the rest of the world.

Here is Episode 1: “The Rise of VGM”.

In this episode we look at the birth and rise of music in video games. From the earliest sounds and melodies to the first fully formed continuous music to be pioneered in the arcade games from Namco. We meet Junko Ozawa, one of Namco’s earliest sound team composers, and also the legendary Hirokazu ‘Hip’ Tanaka, who joined Nintendo in 1980 and was responsible for composing some of the giant’s most loved classics like Metroid and Tetris.

The series is directed by Nick Dwyer and Tu Neill.

For some reason they have elected not to put the other full episodes on YouTube (yet?) but they exist as heavy videos on their own site that don’t really embed well.

The first episode was released in early September. Episode 2 is called “The Outer Reaches of 8 Bit” and is out now. The final three episodes are scheduled to go online over the next few weeks.

Watch the rest of the series when they are released and see other bonus content over on the Red Bull Music Academy website.

On a side note, one of the most famous composers of Japanese video game music, Mamoru Samuragochi, was exposed as a fraud earlier this year.

Maywa Denki are one of Japan’s best-kept secrets. Part music unit, part toy designers, part performance artists, the group is now 20 years old but continues to come up with great ideas.

Their biggest hit was likely the Otamatone Sound Toy, a remake of the theremin that came out a few years ago, though they are involved with new projects the whole time. Led by the irrepressible Novumichi Tosa, the boss puts himself front and center of the marketing. He’s the guy in the video below demonstrating Maywa Denki’s latest product, Mr Knocky. As Tosa shows, Mr Knocky is a surprisingly inventive drum instrument toy.

It doesn’t use batteries, instead relying on what Tosa calls “wire action”. As you shake the “mallet controller”, it makes Mr Knock drum. He has two drums and so there are two controllers. Switch the way you shake them to vary the drumming. This requires real skill to do well. You can hang Mr Knocky around your neck too if you want to walk around town playing his drums.

The second way you can play Mr Knocky is by putting the controllers flat on a surface (they helpfully have sticky pads to make this easier) and fitting them together. This makes them into de facto piano keys and now you can use your fingers to play the drums. Even better, get two Mr Knocky toys and combine the controllers so you have four drumming piano keys, all fitted together to make one mega percussion unit.

Here’s the full demo. Towards the end Tosa gives a showcase of some of the more difficult things you can do with Mr Knocky, such as “crescendo knock”, “paradiddle knock” and “unison knock”.

Here Tosa plays a Otamatone-Mr Knocky duet with himself!

Mr Knocky comes in two colors (white or black) and can even be given some extra character with the mustache accessory that is included.

But if you’re really keen on customizing things, take off Mr Knocky’s drums and replace them with other items like empty drink cans. The angle of Mr Knocky’s drumming arm can also be adjusted depending on the size of the ersatz drum.

Mr Knocky will be released in early October and can be purchased via JapanTrendShop.

To end, here’s Maywa Denki performing with the SoftBank robot Pepper earlier this year, along with a whole gaggle of their wacky inventions.

American band OK Go have released a music video for their song “I Won’t Let You Down”, from the album “Hungry Ghosts”.

Filmed using a “multi-copter camera” and directed by Morihiro Harano, the choreography for the video has been clearly sped up in the editing process but it still has the usual OK Go fun vibe and charm.

OK Go are famous for their inventive music videos that feature challenging set-ups and long takes. “I Won’t Let You Down” is no exception, including some bravado moments such as an aerial shot and the band “dancing” the whole time while riding self-balancing unicycles. And holding umbrellas.

The “Japanese” elements are pretty inconsequential. Some anonymous Japanese girls appear, twirl their umbrellas and legs in synchronized group movements, and occasionally chant “Ichi, ni, san…” (Look out for the three members of Perfume, who pop up for a few seconds at the start.)

The setting would also appear to be Japan, though certainly not Tokyo, given the expansive surroudings.

The machines the band members ride are Honda UNI-CUBs, a robotic scooter kind of like a very small Segway that can balance itself. The customized drone camera that filmed the whole enterprise was also apparently contributed by Honda.

There is a worrying precedent when overseas music artists come and make a “Japan-inspired” song or music video. The biggest criminal of recent times has been Avril Lavigne and her wacky “Hello Kitty” music video. We might be tempted to say the OK Go have almost opted for that cliche of Japanese or Asian people prancing around in mass games-style crowd choreography, but on the whole they pull it off with the emphasis leaning much more on fun tribute than cultural appropriation.

We’ve all seen them. We’ve all pitied them. We’ve all admired them.

Japanese trains are full of odd sights — but perhaps none so odd as the spectacle of people managing to get some shuteye no matter how crowded or what position they are in, whether standing, sitting, kneeing or (unfortunately for those around them) leaning. No matter how fast the train is going, no matter who is watching — the Japanese are able to sleep anywhere.

Even more impressively, they are more often than not able to wake up in time for their stop. It must be some sort of innate ability taught when salarymen join major corporations.

A new music video called “Dreamer Nippon Inemuri” is proving popular because it pays tribute to these sleepy commuters, featuring a series of shots of people sleeping while riding a train. (“Nippon Inemuri” literally means “Japan dozing”.)

The roughly 50 sleepers were filmed by digital marketing planner Kairi Manabe over two days on public transport. We’re not sure if this counts as infringing on their rights but the results are interesting to watch — not least to admire the tenacity of these train passengers determined to get some sleep no matter what.

The music for the video is by Yusuke Emoto.

The video is actually a Web commercial for Home’s, a real estate portal site which offers a function where you can filter searches based on the commuting time. In other words, it’s encouraging you to move somewhere that’s closer to work! “A long, long way to bed” as the video poignantly says at the end…

Our love for all things Maywa Denki is no secret. We recently went wild about Mr Knocky, their unique drum toy, and also think their retro Otona no Kagaku Maywa Denki Automa-te Auto Writer Hand is cool as hell.

If you’re a fan of original gadgets, especially musical ones, then Maywa Denki are the folk for you.

The original Otamatone came out a few years and was quite a global hit. It’s seen some updates over the time since but here’s the first major re-release: the Otamatone Digital.

This is a reinterpretation of the theremin (as we know, a popular instrument in Japan) but it reinvents the musical instrument in terms of look, sound and action.

For a start, it looks like a large musical note (or tadpole) with a face. You use the stem to “play” the notes and then control the “mouth” to adjust the sound that is produced.

The Otamatone Digital can play chords and has a back switch to change octaves. As before, you play the notes along the stem (they even provide you with “stickers” so you can see what you are playing) and vary the sound through the mouth, though now there are improved “modes” so you can create great sounds like a kick drum, snare, bell or cymbal.

Here’s Maywa Denki honcho Novumichi Tosa giving a demonstration.

You can play chords (even “power chords”) and “drums” on this tadpole. A mini theremin rock concert? You bet!

Here are several Otamatone Digital instruments playing “The Frog Song”.

The Otamatone Digital is available in black or white versions.

You can get the Otamatone Digital from Japan Trend Shop.

Music media Spincoaster has launched a new crowd-funding campaign on Makuake to create a music bar they claim is the world’s first to focus on LP and high-resolution audio.

Seating 17, the High-res & Analog Spincoaster Music Bar will play LP records at the request of customers and offer a “record keep” service where customer’s records can be stored for safekeeping at the bar.

This later service may seem strange to an outsider but in space-strapped Tokyo, it makes a very cool alternative to a storage unit rental. (In this way, it reminds of the “library bar” in Shibuya that also had a successful crowd-funding campaign last year.)

The makers are also selling the Music Bar as a daytime co-working space — a growing trend in Tokyo — with free Wi-Fi and fixed seats. The evening will see it transform more into the “bar” of its name.

At time of writing, they have already exceeded their initial funding goal of ¥1 million (about $10,000) with nearly 90 supporters, and with more than 36 days still to go they are continuing to collect funds. It seems Tokyo has enough analog music fans to keep this bar in business for a while.

It will open at the end of March, four minutes’ walk from JR Yoyogi or JR Shinjku stations.

The Bridge has shared a story about Fukuoka-based startup Shikumi Design and their futuristic musical instrument, Kagura.

While the name might imply traditional Japanese music, the “motion perform instrument” system is anything but historical, allowing you to “play” it intuitively through gesture recognition.

The makers describe as an instrument that “makes it possible to perform music by moving your body, without touching anything.”

It uses a patented technology that recognizes human movements and gestures so that the user can perform music freely.

It generates new music performance with visual effects.You can also append your voice to Kagura, arrange the tempo of music and where to put the sounds on the screen. And you can enjoy all of them by your gesture with the Intel RealSense 3D camera.

As The Bridge writes:

The Kagura app won the grand prize at the Intel Perceptual Computing Challenge competition in 2013. The new version introduced at this time has been upgraded to support Intel RealSense 3D, a new technology available on PCs from Lenovo, Acer, and others, enabling an app to understand and respond to natural movement in 3D with a built-in camera.

However, vision analysis for playing instruments is conducted in 2D, so if you are satisfied with playing instruments only, the app can work with any Windows PC with a built-in camera regardless of whether it supports the RealSense technology.

Currently it is designed for 64-bit Windows 8.1 only, but sure a Mac version is coming soon? iOS and Android mobile versions are also in development. Otherwise, all you need is the app and a webcam.

There is no limit to how many people can “play” it at the same time, though the makers recommend one or two maximum, since it can only recognize two hands simultaneously.

Where can expect to see the Kagura? Well, at special live events, perhaps, since it will be ideal for taking the role of the DJ or VJ to the next level.

Here’s an earlier prototype they made showing how your dance creates music and graphics.

Let’s have this in the 2020 Olympic opening ceremony please!

Learn more and download the app on the Kagura website.

Red Bull Studios Tokyo opens at the end of this month in Aoyama, in the heart of Tokyo.

It is the beverage brand’s eleventh such studio in the world and is designed by Kenya Hara. Red Bull will lend out the recording studio for free to certain music artists.

Red Bull is celebrating the opening with a three-day series of music events from February 27th, featuring Chip Tanaka/Hirokazu Tanaka. There will be special studio visits, workshops, concerts and more.

Red Bull’s association with the local music scene already has roots. It held its traveling music event, the Red Bull Music Academy, in Tokyo last year.

It’s a dangerous game to throw the racism card around but this development has succeeded in getting that reaction from most corners.

A photo showing a behind-the-scenes shot from an upcoming Fuji TV show has idol group Momoiro Clover Z and veterans Rats & Star posing in blackface.

New York Times reporter Hiroko Tabuchi and others shared the photo on Twitter and it has since gone viral.

Momoiro Clover Z are immensely popular right now, often appearing in mainstream TV commercials for major brands. They have previously teamed up with older music stars, such as their bizarre collaboration single with the rock band KISS.

As Kotaku points out, Rats & Star have a long history of blackface since they debuted in the 1980′s. But while Momoiro Clover Z are no strangers to costumes and dressing-up (the idol group’s concept is arguably a pastiche of anime like Sailor Moon), this is a whole new territory of role-play. Could their management really be so naive in this day and age?

Blackface in Japan is sometimes seen on television, though it is also sometimes adopted more foolishly by students and youngsters.

Unless the (online) controversy succeeds in forcing the broadcasters to change their programming, tune into Fuji TV on March 7th to see Momoiro Clover Z and Rats & Star appear together in blackface on the show “Music Fair”.

Flamboyant rock band KISS continue to conquer Japan. The makeup-loving rockers have for years been a staple of both summer music festivals and mainstream advertising campaigns.

And now they have joined the likes of Kabuki actors and animals from Ueno Zoo.

The KISS Face Pack comes from the same makers of the brilliant Kabuki mask (now there are TWO of those).

Isshin Do Honpo Inc has created the KISS Face Pack, a genuine mask meant to be worn by men or women to improve skin. It comes in two different two-packs based on the makeup of the glam metal band’s performers: Starchild (Paul Stanley) and Spaceman (Tommy Thayer), or Demon (Gene Simmons) and Cat (Eric Singer).

Despite their penchant for tongue-licking guitar solos and rumors of Satan worship, KISS is seen as harmless fun in the land of the rising sun.

KISS also collaborated with Momoiro Clover Z (who also love costumes and contentious makeup) earlier this year for perhaps the strangest musical release of 2015 so far: “Yume no Ukiyo ni Saite Mina”.

The face pack series so far includes JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure, the musical Cats, classic Hollywood horror movie characters, Kansai Yamamoto fashion, and even a spin-off Hello Kitty version from different makers.

On April 4th, Mori no Tosho Shitsu (Mori’s Library) in Shibuya will be transformed into a club for a silent disco event.

Remember Mori no Tosho Shitsu? It was the crowdfunded “book and beer” library opened by a book worm in Shibuya last year. Not only can you go there for a drink and a bite to eat, if you become a member you can borrow the books, just like a library.

While there are plenty of public libraries in Tokyo (there’s even one right in the same building as the Cosmo Planetarium), places like Mori no Tosho Shitsu attract interest because their book curation is special. You don’t go there just to see any books; you go there to see THE books the owner has selected. This is similar to the appeal of places like B&B in Shimokitazawa, Village Vanguard, and Shibuya Publishing Booksellers.

Silent discos are nothing new, not even in Japan.

But this is a silent disco inside a “library” in the heart of noisy Shibuya. How cool is that?

Audiences to the silent disco event will get to enjoy the music through wireless headphones, in the unique bibliographical surroundings of Mori no Tosho Shitsu.

If you like your drink too, you’ll be pleased to know the event is being supplied by Tokyo Craft Beer Mania. Craft beer will be available from ¥500 a glass.

Music is by DE DE MOUSE and others.

It’s also being billed as a club event, since it starts at 11pm and carries on until 5am.

Tickets cost ¥3,500.

The Self-Assembly Shamisen is, as the name suggests, a shamisen instrument that you can build yourself — and customize!

The shamisen is surely the most famous Japanese traditional instrument. You can see it at Kabuki performances, as well as other traditional events. Geisha play them and they are also part of Okinawan culture as the sanshin banjo.

However, they are expensive. Insanely expensive. Not only are they made solely by specialist artisans, the materials (snake leather?!) and twice-annual repairs all preclude any but those with the deepest pockets.

Itouhei have noticed this and come up with this solution.

The Self-Assembly Shamisen is a genuine shamisen but is designed for the player to build themselves. Certain materials and elements of the design have been adjusted to bring down the overall cost, though these choices have the benefit of also increasing durability and reducing the need for regular repairs to the instrument.

Best of all, perhaps, is how this is a shamisen that you can customize with your own paints and patterns.

Here are some snazzy examples.

Self-assembly toys and kits are very popular in Japan, as proved by the enduring success of the Otona no Kagaku (Science for Grown-Ups) series by Gakken. Entries in the series include a handmade home planetarium, mini electric guitar, and even theremin.