#number girl

[roseillith]

omoide in my head number girl flcl x kare kano (short version)

[sayonara-midori]

anyone wanna be friendos? (I’m listing all of my interests in the tags

[glittermutt]

the mutt music bingo dropped. do it. NOW!!!

[chill-band-folder]

Number Girl - OMOIDE in My Head (2002)

[aurrymaycry]

Hi-Fi Rush: a rebellious, punk, major piss at the current Game Industry.

It's a simple promise, really. One we've all wanted at some point during our childhood or teenagehood: We'd imagine a scene in our head. A fight, a conversation, going from point A to point B, anything, to the beat of the music we'd be listening to. Don't lie, I know you've done this, and all of us wished for that to happen in real-life in some way, shape or form. Hi-Fi Rush tell you from the get go it will deliver on that front and realize your dream, as almost every single aspect of the game is tied to the rhythm of the OST.

We'd imagine a scene in our head [...] to the beat of the music we'd be listening to.

You have an rhythm indicator at all points, but it's not just the music that guides you: The ennemies talk and move to the beat, the environment moves to the beat, your character's idle stance is dancing to the beat, all of that to condition you to what the game wants from you. And that suffices to immediately bring satisfaction to the player. Press button to the beat, game rewards you for it. You have a weak and fast attack, a slow and powerful attack, a parry, a dodge and that is all that you need to play the game. No need for gear with stats that you don't understand that will give a false sense of progression like in more recent productions. You will feel yourself getting better by just playing along.

No need for gear with stats that you don't understand

And even so, you don't have to play along. Even if you choose to disregard the main gimmick, the game will still be beatable like a regular beat 'em all as the game comes with a wide array of accessibility features and easier difficulties that let everyone enjoy the show. Now, this is formula unapologetically taken from the Devil May Cry series (understandably so when the game's lead designer is the same as the original DMC & Bayonetta, games that defined this specific genre of beat 'em all gameplay): It will encourage you to play along however, and the further you'll advance, the more the game with ask of you, without ever being out of your reach as a player and the more it will reward you for succeeding, not through materials or loot, but with the feeling of having done something really fucking cool. Inspiration from it's big brothers doesn't stop there, however. Tango Gameworks' secret baby pays hommage ludically, but also aesthetically to the games that came way, way before.

Tango Gameworks' secret baby pays hommage ludically, but also aesthetically to the games that came way, way before.

From the moment you turn it on, you can see the bright colors, the bubbly character design and vibrant personality the game exhudes, the one you'd get from entering the room of a 16 year old teenager during the 2000's. The pop-punk aesthetic, mixed with a refined cel-shaded artstyle won't fait to remind you of Dreamcast games of old, like Jet Set Radio or Space Channel 5, games where the music also were focal points of interest. We've gone through the Devil May Cry influence already, but we can feel it in the gameplay loop of linear levels that are still large enough for exploration, (with all the little secrets and challenges and enemy rooms along the way) and the control scheme itself as well, hell the even has game has a Style Gauge, the signature mechanic of the DMC series. The cast of characters feel like they've come out of an Edgar Wright movie, and that Chai, the main protagonist would fit right along the likes of Shaun from Shaun of the Dead and Scott Pilgrim. And lastly, the whole rhythm schtick can definitely string that Guitar Hero chord somewhere. All the game's I've cited were games of the 2000's and 2010's generation of games. All of these games were experimental products of their time that carry all the youth, innocence and simplicity of bygone times, for both the player and the industry. Hi-Fi Rush does its best to recapture that feeling and pay its respects to it.

The main protagonist would fit right along the likes of Shaun and Scott Pilgrim

A trend that carries over to the music as well. Though mostly original works by Reo Uratani (Monster Hunter Series, Ultra Street Fighter II) and Shuichi Kobori (Metal Gear Solid Series, The Evil Within), Hi-Fi Rush continues to borrow from millenials' teenagehood by featuring groups like Nine-Inch-Nails, the Black Keys, Number Girl, or even The Prodigy. Number Girl in particular must be the most niche, underground group to be selected here. It's one of the pillars of Japanese Indie Rock, and the main inspiration of groups like Asian Kung-Fu Generation (you know, the ones that pulled that off.), whereas The Prodigy was featured in a late segment of the game that is a nice strong the the best video game level ever made with how on point and cathartic it feels to go through, and how well it delivers on the whole game's promise. Aside from the licensed tracks, the rest of the OST nails the spot it aims to with its constant 120 BPM that goes from Alt Rock to Jazz Fusion to even Classical Music. With the music being the centerpiece of basically every aspect of the game, it was paramount for it to deliver an enjoyable, non-repetitive experience, and it does so by the use of dynamic music, where it'll adapt depending on the current state of the game (exploration, combat, cutscene, etc.). And despite the referencial tone of its presentation, and the impressive audio design necessary for a beat 'em all/rhythm hybrid game, Hi-Fi Rush's actual production team was rather small. It has all the components of a big triple-A release yet managed to deliever all of that with a rather small team in comparison. Crazier yet, the game had basically no marketing campaign at all, with the developers showing the game for the first time ever in a relatively random livestream, and releasing it right after, betting a cheaper price-tag, gamepass inclusion and word-of-mouth to boost its sales.

Hi-Fi Rush continues to borrow from millenials' teenagehood

A crazy plan that only made me think that I was being sold a CD by an indie group on the streets, but it turned out to be pretty well-produced in the end. All of this sounds crazy, all of this is crazy, unexpected from both Bethesda & Microsoft, and would be deemed a guaranteed failure should you pitch that to any kind of executive in a suit and tie. But that crazy plan actually worked, with the game reaching 2 million players by it's first month of release, with some citing it as "Perfect until proven otherwise". And you can't help but feel that part of all of this was intentional. As if the game itself was screaming to the current status quo of the game industry to invest millions in marketing, trying to equate hollywood in prestige and production value, and its disregard for the conditions of ethics and focused vision, to go fuck itself.

The main antagonistic force in Hi-Fi Rush is, quite literally, a corporation. The levels include a factory, a laboratory, an expo, and the bosses are the heads of the departments you'd expect from any tech corportaion. It's a business, through and though, just like what the game industry is. So then you start to look at it through that lens. And you can see how on the nose it happens to be: The head of production is a ruthless ball of anger obsessed with pumping product at maximum capacity, at all times, without any consideration for it's employees (which are, well, literally robots, but you get the gist). The head of R&D is an evil scientist with ambitions ambitions that go way beyond of the scope of what is actually asked of him, spending money loosely to quell his ego-fueled "vision". Marketing, in illusions of grandeur, puts on a literal show where they put themselves in the center spotlight in-lieu of what they are supposed to sell, the head accountant will do anything for profit, even if it means using underhanded tactics and cutting essential costs, and of course, the CEO's main motivation, is find the most convoluted and impractical way to sell more product. All aspects are common issues found in way too many recent studios. Some of you may have thought of names of industry veterans tied to similar problems in the past (or present).

The main antagonistic force in Hi-Fi Rush is, quite literally, a corporation. The game doesn't hide its criticism of the industry, or its self-awareness as a game. It's humour go from subtle metatext to breaking the fourth wall with the finesse of a wrecking ball.

Given all of these elements, and the game's development history of a timid production squeezed in parallel to an expected release, that has gone against all expectations established by the studio and the publisher, one can only wonder if John Johanas, the director behind all of it, didn't have a bit of resentment with how the current video game industry turned out to be. He's already stated in the game's first demonstration that it was a "dream game of his, that he thought about way, way back." and his admiration for past works, and a past time, can be observed both in surface, and more subtle ways.

Intentional or not, Hi-Fi Rush defies the status quo with a bold, confident, stylish neon explosion of stellar gameplay & nostalgic yet fresh presentation that brought me back to easier, simpler, more fun times with video games as a whole. It's one that I'll remember fondly for years to come and that I hope will, just like it's predecessors, gain fame in the minds of people slowly but surely.

[erifaults]

Hisako Tabuchi 🔢 

[airheadrecords]

『 ZAZEN BOYS 雜談——洪申豪x唐世杰 』

橫跨二十年的回憶特別企劃——邀請到透明雜誌兩位成員，曾在日本與向井秀德共演的洪申豪、多次舉辦 Zazen Boys 來台演出的長腦筋唱片唐世杰，互相聊聊各自對 Zazen Boys 、向井秀德的印象與回憶。

﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍

1.兩位一開始是怎麼接觸到Zazen Boys音樂的呢？

洪：我記得很清楚好像是第一次去日本的時候，可���是2004年，就在日本的唱片行看到Zazen Boys第一張同名專輯《ZAZEN BOYS》上架，白底黑字、小畫家噴霧筆刷的那張。日本的唱片行有寫好多字卡，記得當時寫著「來自九州的刺客」類似這種文字介紹，也有提到Number Girl。我當下沒有買，因為那時候日幣還很貴，我也沒那麼多錢，現在買得起了。 當下就記住這個名字，回來我記得就直接在Soulseek上抓，很震撼，因為聽Number Girl那時最後一張，就很明顯的感覺到向井想要搞點不一樣的，歌的結構跟前幾張那種單純直線都不太一樣，第一首《Fender Telecaster》，超帥，這大概是2000年初的時候。

唐：應該差不多也是這個時期，但我第一個深刻的印象應該是看到《CRAZY DAYS CRAZY FEELING》的 MV，YouTube還沒有那麼方便的時候，那時候幾乎都用Soulseek抓專輯和MV。

洪：我們在Studio Ａ上班是200幾？（註：解答請見 ME VS MUKAI VS ZAZEN 第一章）

唐：Studio Ａ那時候可能已經發兩三張了。

洪：他們那個發行速度很快，幾乎一年一張。

唐：那時候已有YouTube。

洪：有，YouTube也有Facebook。

唐：當時那個時期，你要找這些音樂還不太可能在YouTube看到，所以就要自己找，尤其以前很多的影像主要都是製作給電視節目，需要有心人把節目錄下來再轉到電腦才有機會看得到。現在這些內容在YouTube都很好找了。以前為了要找這些內容都只能用抓的。 一開始的印象就是聽了《CRAZY DAYS CRAZY FEELING》才回去聽更多作品，之前雖然也聽過Number Girl，但是接觸到Zazen已經是發了第二張的時候，我記得應該是這樣。那時候對他們很著迷，聲音和內容很有趣，小鼓壓一個超破、貝斯顆粒很大，riff很有存在感，超緊，感覺有點理解後期Number Girl的內容，就是下一個階段的向井的感覺。

空：近幾年他們作品都有陸續上網路串流了，有些Live版本的《透明少女》在一場演出內唱了三次？

洪：這很帥，他們故意的，這是他的任性，我就喜歡他這一點。這就是向井世界，哈哈哈。TAKE THIS！還有同一個Set唱兩次，因為太短了。 

唐：我們是從頭唱？有倒過來嗎？

洪：沒那麼帥，是從頭唱，是そのまま從頭再唱一次（笑）。 

2.記得2014年洪申豪有和向井秀德在日本一起演出過，你還記得當時的心情嗎？

洪：他很自由，也不管你歌詞記不記得，和弦熟不熟，就突然問你要不要。他突然問，突然出招，你就是接招，但我覺得那個感覺都很輕鬆，我也無法完全把歌詞記得，但他也不在意。然後唱完就是喝酒，他是真的一直以來都是這個感覺的人。

3.你們各自對向井秀德的個人印象是怎樣子呢？

唐：很獨特，感覺一直是個人意識很鮮明的人，從Number Girl到Zazen都一樣，你看不出什麼生澀的階段，無論是作品或者表演上都很老練，一直到現在還是維持著這個狀態。甚至互動相處上也是如此，很特別的人。

洪：所以我覺得這就是他的替身能力，向井世界就是那個領域範圍。

唐：前年那次台北演出結束後送機，我們聊到了一些彼此喜歡的東西，我記得他聊到自己很喜歡馬丁史柯西斯早期的King of Comedy、松本清張、還有一些早期日本的搞笑藝人什麼的，算是我們第一次聊到比較再更之前的成長啟蒙，這次我對他的印象就更深刻。在這之前，你對一個創作者的想像多半建立從他的作品、歌詞、音樂風格等等，無論如何都已經是他轉化成自己作品的結晶，再怎麼熟悉一位創作者都很難理出更深的脈絡，而為什麼讓他作出這些聲音，或為什麼表演中要抽一排煙，作出舉起手槍的手勢什麼的，我覺得都是他整個藝術形式的一環，向井會時不時把這些脈絡偷渡在裡頭。那次聊天之後又得到更多的喔～原來啊～怪不得的感覺。

洪：從他青少年的時候啟蒙他的。

唐：然後我現在看待他的表演形式，會覺得他越來越沒有包袱的感覺，越來越自然，好像很嚴肅又好像不太正經，可以有這種平衡我覺得蠻棒的。

4.向井秀德世界中的《我們的靈魂樂》？

唐：他之前寫《我們的靈魂樂》的側標時，也是很有他的風格。唱片公司邀請他寫我們的側標，好像二話不說就答應了。他寫來到台北的時候，他在街上遇到人就問說「Are You Touming Magazine？」就這樣，他沒有要評論你的音樂，也沒有什麼廢話，這就是他會說的話，超好笑。

洪：這件事最棒的就是，有一家唱片公司那時要重發Superchunk的《Foolish》還有《Indoor Living》，我記得好像是戴子找了透明雜誌寫推薦，但是我們推給好友羅宜凡寫，我記得好像是這樣，超亂來。羅宜凡的寫評論就是，因為他在東岸住過一陣子，他說他去Chapel Hill的時候，在街上遇到人，他就會問說「Are You Superchunk？」。 (註：羅宜凡就是精裝少年壞報的主編。) 過了沒多久我們去日本，又碰到向井的時候，我們就跟向井講，然後他回應「誒～這可這不太好。」哈哈哈超好笑。

唐：就是這個笑話的脈絡。

洪：超inside joke但超好笑。

空：看到側標的人一定在想說莫名其妙（笑）。

洪：對欸，如果有人同時有那兩張專輯的側標，超好笑，而且這個笑話超棒。

5.當初是什麼契機，長腦筋唱片去邀請到Zazen Boys的呢？當時情況大概是如何呢？

唐：他們幾年前來過台灣參加一個音樂祭叫《音樂航空站》，那時候一位朋友當他們的隨行翻譯，他應該是知道剛好我們這一群人有在愛，就讓我們和他們打招呼，才有後來這些演出的後續。但我有一點不確定我們是不是之前就有碰過面還是什麼？

洪：已經認識了。

唐：那可能就是先前有一次是我們一群人飛去日本大阪。看銀杏BOYZ和Zazen Boys一場共演，大概一千多人的場地，當時我們都很喜歡就飛去看了。

洪：那時候銀杏BOYZ還沒來台灣？

唐：來了，就是那一年的野台開唱還是隔一年，就看到他們合演的消息，當時銀杏他們來台灣有見到面，經紀人就說你們要來跟我說，我們一群大概七八個朋友就飛過去看。那次就是第一次看Zazen Boys，他們開場，銀杏BOYZ壓軸，超級好看。

洪：最後還一起合唱，超好看。這個不是第一次共演，那時候他們好像已經有辦過幾次共演。

唐：那次演出結束應該就是第一次正式見到面，後來吃飯後還去一個BAR聊到天亮。

洪：那個晚上CASIO MAN也在，我記得跟他聊很久，覺得那一次去就算是真的有認識到。

《君と僕のMATSURI SESSION》 2007

《音樂航空站》2009

6.之前幾次長腦筋唱片舉辦Zazen Boys演出時，有發生哪些特別的事情嗎？

唐：他喝開了會很有趣。我記得他第一次來只想吃牛肉麵，後來幾次來我就只給他幾間店名，他都會一個人去。

空：就是自己行動那種。

唐：對，上一次來他還從飯店走到旁邊的師大育成中心前面彈吉他唱歌。

7.那2014年師大公園那次突襲演出也是這樣決定的嗎？

唐：突然在師大公園演出那次是第二次來台灣演《世界》的隔天，他們預計是傍晚左右的飛機回國，在此之前沒有別的計畫，有機會的話想路上唱唱歌，但不確定台灣可不可以這麼做，怕有法律問題。我有印象好像之前有在網路上看到他在下北澤車站附近唱歌的影片，他就問說台灣可以這樣做嗎？我們就想說不如那就師大公園，當晚就在網路上發個消息說他們明天會在，然後人就來了。 

《世界》2014

8.你們看過的Zazen Boys的演出哪一場最印象深刻呢？

洪：我印象最深刻就是前面說的Zazen Boys跟銀杏BOYZ共演的那一場。

唐：真的，超深刻。

洪：真的是好看欸，對我來講那整個人體驗都是太奇幻到不行。跟朋友一群這樣坐飛機去看演出，演出之後還去跟他們一起吃飯去喝酒，還真是超爽的，爽歪。那時他們就是兩個最大的BOY團，銀杏BOYZ、Zazen Boys，銀杏BOYZ那時應該是當時日本受歡迎的樂團之一，傳奇的演出，很屌。

( END )﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍﹍

[studentofetherium]

song of the day

[junojuxtaposition]

Some guys I've been listening a lot lately.

Consider tipping/commissioning me up at Ko-fi & Artistree!

[shantihtown]

(Xユーザーの高野 寛 🍥さん: 「一瞬、 「マイナンバーガール」っていう曲を書こうかと 思った https://t.co/uyJkKbUphW」 / Xから)

[roseillith]

number girl flcl & kare kano gamestop preorder beta ver

[rallizedenudes]

[readmarxz]

number girl

[makiko-g]

君は家猫娘だった。