R_E_N’s Blog

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• Oe no Chisato- The Full Moon
• Alaalang Dilim
• A Dream Within A Dream(Edgar Allan Poe)
• Kafka on the Shore(Haruki Murakami)
• South of the Border,West of the Sun(Haruki Murakami)
• The Wind-up Bird Chronicle(Haruki Murakami)
• Norwegian Wood(Haruki Murakami)
• After Dark(Haruki Murakami)
• Audition Film Review
• Piercing(Ryu Murakami)

69(Ryu Murakami)

May 24th, 2009 by heimeai

The complete review’s Review:

69 is the story of the year, 1969, as seen and lived by Murakami-stand-in, Kensuke Yazaki, the seventeen-year-old narrator of the novel. Ken lives in Sasebo (where Murakami grew up), a small city dominated by an American military base:

The base occupies the very best land, as it does in every town that has one.
Ken’s main ambition is to impress the girls, and particularly one he calls ‘Lady Jane’. From a promising start, his grades have been slipping throughout high school: he’s concerned about that, but notes that: “in 1969 failures were having a lot of fun”. Certainly, there are enough outlets other than academics that attract attention, from a widespread anti-authoritarian streak to pop culture. Everyone seems to play music, and Ken plans to make both a film and write a play. (Traditional outlets, such as sports, on the other hand, Ken finds considerably less appealing.)
Ken and his friends are in over their heads in practically everything they do (a political action they take gets them in deep trouble, for example), but there’s an enthusiasm for the new and different:

It’s funny: not one of us — Iwase, Adama, or me — had ever seen a single underground movie, yet we all dreamed of making one. It was like the French living on the Atlantic coast under the Nazi occupation, dreaming of an Allied landing.
Ken has his own style and approach, and most of the time it stands him in good stead. He’s a faker, but he’s good at it:

It was around this time that I’d begun trying to perfect the art of fucking with people’s minds. I’d figured out that when someone else was hogging the limelight, you could cut him down to size by bringing up a subject he didn’t know anything about. If the other person knew a lot about literature, I’d talk about the Velvet Underground; if he knew a lot about rock, I’d talk about Messiaen; if he knew a lot about classical music, I’d talk about Roy Lichtenstein; if he knew a lot about pop art, I’d talk about Jean Genet; and so on. Do that in a small provincial city and you never lose an argument.
Ken is always trying to do something, bored and annoyed by school (which he sees as “a factory, a sorting house”). Among his grand ambitions: the Morning Erection Festival. His attempts — to make a statement, make a movie, make a festival, get the girl, and deal with teachers and thugs alike — all makes for fairly entertaining reading.
69 is a somewhat nostalgic look back at coming of age in the late 60s — the now thirty-two-year-old narrator specifically mentioning the perspective from which he recounts his tale (and also offering an appendix of sorts, where he describes what happened to many of the other characters in the meantime).
Lively, often funny, the novel offers a good look at Japanese small-city culture in the 1960s, touched by the changing world and yet still very set in its small town, army-base ways. 69 is the most Haruki-like of all of this Murakami’s fiction, but Ryu’s narrator is less turned in on himself than Haruki’s tend to be, more eager to be in a crowd (and a leader in the crowd — foisting his ideas on them, and (he hopes) impressing the girls).)
Somewhat rough in its presentation, 69 is — for those interested in that period — a worthwhile and fairly amusing look at 60s culture from a (provincial but ambitious) Japanese perspective.

from:http://www.complete-review.com/reviews/japannew/murakr2.htm

Posted in Random Book Reviews | | | 0 Comments

In the Miso Soup(Ryu Murakami)

May 24th, 2009 by heimeai

The complete review’s Review:

In the Miso Soup is narrated by twenty-year-old Kenji who hires himself out as a “nightlife guide” for foreign tourists in Tokyo, helping them navigate this world of odd and expensive customs and possibilities. In the last days of 1996 he hooks up with Frank, an American looking to have a good time (or so he claims), and the novel relates their expeditions together as the new year approaches.
Kenji meets all sorts in his line of work, but he finds Frank troubling almost from the beginning. Nothing Frank says about himself is convincing, and he even seems to lie about irrelevant things. But the money is good — and then, before he knows it, Kenji finds Frank has more of a hold over him than he’s comfortable with.
Kenji first hears from Frank when the American calls him, inquiring about his availability; Kenji happens to be reading about a schoolgirl who had been murdered and dismembered when the call comes. Their first night out they pass by the place where she was killed — and Kenji notices that Frank pays with what looks like a bloodstained ¥ 10,000 note at the first place they go to. These coincidences — and Frank’s general demeanour and behaviour — make Kenji ever more suspicious.
There is no plausible reason to suspect Frank of any connexion to this (and other) crimes, but it becomes an idée fixe. As Kenji tells his sixteen-year-old girlfriend:

“I mean, I don’t have any actual evidence that he did it. The real mystery to me is why I can’t shake the feeling that maybe he did.”
This is also one of the big mysteries for the reader, as this implausible plot-twist is completely unnecessary and serves more to annoy than create much of an atmosphere of foreboding (which is presumably what Murakami was trying to do).
The descriptions of Kenji and Frank’s nights out — which take up most of the novel — do have their moments. The different sorts of nightclubs, the men (and, especially, the women) who frequent them, the services on offer are all described, and the seemingly jolly, naïve gaijin (foreigner) Frank is shown to be a quite spectacular fish out of water. Repeatedly, however, Kenji focusses his attention (and disappointment) on Japanese society, many of its failures reflected in these semi-seedy doings. (Frank is something of a foil, but ultimately far too cartoonish to be of much use as a representative of American society — except, perhaps, in its ultimate, apocalyptic manifestation (which may very well be how the Japanese would like to read this).)
The outings aren’t very pleasant. Frank claims to be after sex, but there’s clearly something else going on here. The scenes in the club they go to where the true Frank finally reveals himself are largely convincingly (if painfully) awkward, people brought together out of desperation, lying to each other and themselves, a protracted scene of miscommunication and unwillingness to admit to personal weakness or failure, everyone there a lost soul.
Fairly early on Kenji recognises that Frank isn’t quite like everybody else:

I didn’t know if he was a murderer, but I knew he had a bottomless void inside him. And that void was what made him lie. I’ve been there. Compared to where Frank was at, it may have been like a Hello Kitty version, but I’ve been there.
Things get very ugly and gory and brutal. Unfortunately, they also strain credulity: too many things that happen (and a few that don’t happen) are simply too unbelievable, and that undermines the entire book (nearly fatally). Murakami plays with some good ideas here, but the actions that go with the thoughts are cartoonishly exaggerated, from the true Frank to Kenji’s reactions.
Unevenly paced, unconvincingly plotted, and extremely gory, In the Miso Soup is far from satisfying. It does offer an interesting, bleak glimpse of contemporary Japanese society, but it’s unfortunate that Murakami uses the simply unbelievable Frank-figure (and Kenji’s unlikely suspicions) to make many of his points.
In the Miso Soup is an ambitious novel, but unfortunately Murakami seems to believe that such grand ambitions require everything in the book (especially the violence) to be on a similarly grand scale; it is a terrible miscalculation.

from:http://www.complete-review.com/reviews/japannew/murakr1.htm

Posted in Random Book Reviews | | | 0 Comments

Vincent Starry Starry Night(Mclean, Don)

April 20th, 2009 by heimeai

Starry starry night, paint your palette blue and grey
Look out on a summer’s day with eyes that know the darkness in my soul
Shadows on the hills, sketch the trees and the daffodils
Catch the breeze and the winter chills, in colors on the snowy linen land

Now I understand what you tried to say to me
How you suffered for you sanity How you tried to set them free
They would not listen they did not know how, perhaps they’ll listen now
Starry starry night, flaming flowers that brightly blaze
Swirling clouds in violet haze reflect in Vincent’s eyes of china blue
Colors changing hue, morning fields of amber grain
Weathered faces lined in pain are soothed beneath the artist’s loving hand Chorus:
For they could not love you, but still your love was true
And when no hope was left in sight, on that starry starry night
You took your life as lovers often do,
But I could have told you, Vincent,
This world was never meant for one as beautiful as youStarry, starry night, portraits hung in empty halls
Frameless heads on nameless walls with eyes that watch the world and can’t forget.
Like the stranger that you’ve met, the ragged man in ragged clothes
The silver thorn of bloody rose, lie crushed and broken on the virgin snow Now I think I know what you tried to say to me
How you suffered for you sanity How you tried to set them free
They would not listen they’re not listening still
Perhaps they never will.

Posted in Random Lyrics | | | 0 Comments

I Like You So Much Better When You’re Naked (Ida Maria)

April 20th, 2009 by heimeai

Oh the clever
Things I should say to you
They got stuck somewhere
Stuck between me and you

Oh I’m nervous
I don’t know what to do
Light a cigarette
I only smoke when I’m with you

What the hell do I do this for?
You’re just another guy
OK, you’re kinda sexy
But you’re not really special

But I won’t mi-i-i-i-i-i-i-ind
If you take me home
Come on, take me home

But I wont mi-i-i-i-i-i-i-ind
If you take off all your clothes
Come on, take ‘em off

‘Cause I like you so much better when you’re naked
I like me so much better when you’re naked
I like you so much better when you’re naked
I like me so much better whne you’re naked

Wow!

Oh the clever
Things I should say to you
They got stuck somewhere(stuck somewhere)
Stuck between me and you

Oh I’m nervous(I’m so nervous! )
I don’t what to do
Light a cigarette
I only smoke when I’m with you

What the hell do I do that for?
You’re just another guy
OK, you’re kinda sexy
But you’re not really special

But I won’t mi-i-i-i-i-i-i-ind
If you take me home
Come on’ take me home

But I won’t mi-i-i-i-i-i-i-ind
If you take off all our clothes
Come on’ take ‘em off

‘Cause I like you so much better when you’re naked
I like me so much better when you’re naked
I like you so much better when you’re naked
I like me so much better when you’re naked

But I won’t mi-i-i-i-i-i-i-ind
If you take me home
Come on, take me home

But I won’t mi-i-i-i-i-i-i-ind
If you take off all you’re clothes
Come on’ take ‘em off

‘Cause I like you so much better when you’re naked
I like me so much better when you’re naked
I like you so much better when you’re naked
I like me so much better when you’re naked
I like you so much better when you’re naked
I like me so much better when you’re naked
I like you so much better when you’re naked
I like me so much better when you’re naked
I like you so much better when you’re naked

Posted in Random Lyrics | | | 0 Comments

Annabel Lee(Edgar Allan Poe)

April 20th, 2009 by heimeai

It was many and many a year ago,
In a kingdom by the sea,
That a maiden there lived whom you may know
By the name of ANNABEL LEE;
And this maiden she lived with no other thought
Than to love and be loved by me.

I was a child and she was a child,
In this kingdom by the sea;
But we loved with a love that was more than love-
I and my Annabel Lee;
With a love that the winged seraphs of heaven
Coveted her and me.

And this was the reason that, long ago,
In this kingdom by the sea,
A wind blew out of a cloud, chilling
My beautiful Annabel Lee;
So that her highborn kinsman came
And bore her away from me,
To shut her up in a sepulchre
In this kingdom by the sea.

The angels, not half so happy in heaven,
Went envying her and me-
Yes!- that was the reason (as all men know,
In this kingdom by the sea)
That the wind came out of the cloud by night,
Chilling and killing my Annabel Lee.

But our love it was stronger by far than the love
Of those who were older than we-
Of many far wiser than we-
And neither the angels in heaven above,
Nor the demons down under the sea,
Can ever dissever my soul from the soul
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee.

For the moon never beams without bringing me dreams
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
And the stars never rise but I feel the bright eyes
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
And so, all the night-tide, I lie down by the side
Of my darling- my darling- my life and my bride,
In the sepulchre there by the sea,
In her tomb by the sounding sea.

Posted in Random Poems | | | 0 Comments

Sputnik Sweetheart(Haruki Murakami)

April 20th, 2009 by heimeai

The complete review’s Review:

Sputnik Sweetheart is a tale of unrequited loves and of those who, despite deep and close friendships, remain alone — all of us, Murakami sometimes seems to suggest. There is the narrator, a young teacher whose name we never learn (beyond the cryptic, Kafkaesque initial K one of the characters uses when referring to him). There is Sumire, the young aspiring novelist he loves. There is Miu — or a person called Miu (the narrator warns very early on: “I don’t know her real name, a fact that caused problems later on”) — who Sumire falls in love with.
The title is Sumire’s “private name” for Miu: she mentions to Miu that she is reading Jack Kerouac, and Miu can’t quite think of what kind of novelist he was, mistakenly calling him a Sputnik (instead of a Beatnik). Sputnik also means “traveling companion” in Russian, as Miu discovers, and this is how she feels about Sumire:

(W)e were wonderful traveling companions but in the end no more than lonely lumps of metal in their own separate orbits.
The narrator and Sumire also share a similar Sputnik-relationship. They are very close friends. She calls him at odd hours of the night, she trusts him — but she doesn’t love him, to his great disappointment.
The gist of the story is that Sumire goes to work for Miu, travels with her to Europe — and then suddenly and inexplicably literally disappears. Miu summons the narrator to Europe to see if he can be of any help, but he can’t figure out what could have happened to her either.
This being a Murakami novel, there is much more than this gist, of course. There are also many small episodes, similarly significant, and ultimately feeding into and deriving out of the larger mystery.
Sumire is trying to be a writer, and even though she is apparently very talented she isn’t able to entirely control her material yet. The results are still too unfocussed. The narrator isn’t a writer, but he does have some authorial concerns (especially about his role as both “narrator” and “narratee“). There are a variety of attempts at story-telling by the various characters throughout the book. Communication isn’t always easy, and sometimes the stories are the most effective way of conveying thoughts, ideas, and feelings.
Among the few apparent clues left behind when Sumire disappears are two pieces of writing, both of which are presented in full. One, significantly, tells not her story but Miu’s. Miu had warned Sumire early on: “The person here isn’t the real me. Fourteen years ago I became half the person I used to be.” The story behind what happened back then is only revealed in Sumire’s tale. Not surprisingly, what happened to Miu — causing her hair to turn white overnight — fits with the general satellite theme: she was literally stopped in orbit when she lost her better (?) half.
Miu and Sumire, and Sumire and the narrator have good relationships, on a certain level. But Miu can’t return Sumire’s love, and Sumire can’t return the narrator’s love. Miu is also married, but she doesn’t sleep with her husband either. The narrator is involved with an unhappily married woman (the mother of one of his pupils). There are no happy sexual relationships in this book: the others that Murakami describes also aren’t close to any romantic ideal. Everybody is a sputnik.
The novel meanders along, building to Sumire’s disappearance and then the attempt to figure out what might have happened to her. Murakami does this quite well, but he goes about it in a somewhat roundabout way, and it isn’t always clear what he is aiming for. When the narrator returns from Europe, essentially giving up looking for Sumire, the novel seems to spin even farther out of control as he lingers over a completely different episode, involving his girlfriend and her son. But here Murakami is at his best, back from the dreamy and sometimes unreal contemplation of what might have happened to Sumire. The surprising and seemingly unrelated episode does, in fact, help tie it all together, Murakami striking the right tone and then bringing the story nicely together.
Sputnik Sweetheart could do with a bit more substance. It feels a bit rushed in getting to Sumire’s disappearance, not entirely developed as much as one might wish. Still, it is a nice, wistful read, a good short novel.

from:http://www.complete-review.com/reviews/murakamih/sputniks.htm

Posted in Random Book Reviews | | | 0 Comments

3 Libras(A Perfect Circle)

April 20th, 2009 by heimeai

Posted in A Perfect Circle Lyrics | | | 0 Comments

LATERALUS(Tool)

March 22nd, 2009 by heimeai

Black then white are all i see in my infancy.
red and yellow then came to be, reaching out to me.
lets me see.
as below, so above and beyond, I imagine
drawn beyond the lines of reason.
Push the envelope. Watch it bend.

Over thinking, over analyzing separates the body from the mind.
Withering my intuition, missing opportunities and I must
Feed my will to feel my moment drawing way outside the lines.

Black then white are all i see in my infancy.
red and yellow then came to be, reaching out to me.
lets me see there is so much more and
beckons me to look thru to these infinite possibilities.
as below, so above and beyond, I imagine
drawn outside the lines of reason.
Push the envelope. Watch it bend.

over thinking, over analyzing separates the body from the mind.
Withering my intuition leaving opportunities behind.
Feed my will to feel this moment urging me to cross the line.
Reaching out to embrace the random.
Reaching out to embrace whatever may come.

I embrace my desire to
I embrace my desire to
feel the rhythm, to feel connected enough to step aside and weep like a widow
to feel inspired to fathom the power, to witness the beauty,
to bathe in the fountain,
to swing on the spiral
to swing on the spiral
to swing on the spiral of our divinity and still be a human.

With my feet upon the ground I move myeslf between the sounds and open wide to suck it in.
I feel it move across my skin.
I’m reaching up and reaching out. I’m reaching for the random or what ever will bewilder me.
what ever will bewilder me.
And following our will and wind we may just go where no one’s been.
We’ll ride the spiral to the end and may just go where no one’s been.
Spiral out. Keep going.
Spiral out. Keep going.
Spiral out. Keep going.
Spiral out. Keep going.
Spiral out. Keep going.

Posted in Tool | | | 0 Comments

Meeting Place(The Last Shadow Puppets)

December 30th, 2008 by heimeai

The Colder the night gets
The further she strains
And he doesn’t like it
Being this way

And she tried so hard
To steer away
From the meeting place
But her heart had left her there

She clings to his consciousness
Wherever he layed
Struggles to sleep at night
And during the day

He’s worried she’s waiting in his dreams
To drag him back to the meeting place
His love had left in there
Where the voices still echoes

I’m sorry I met you darling
I’m sorry I met you
As she turned into the night
All he had was the words
“I’m sorry I met you darling
I’m sorry I left you”

Four weeks they had trolled around
Playing the fools
They knew the time would come
And time would be cruel

Because it is cruel to everyone
He is crying out from the meeting place
He stranded himself there
Where the voice still echo

I’m sorry I met you darling
I’m sorry I met you
As she turned into the night
All he had was the words
“I’m sorry I met you darling
I’m sorry I left you”

I’m sorry I met you darling
I’m sorry I’ve left you

Posted in The Last Shadow Puppets Lyrics | | | 0 Comments

Brianstorm(Artic Monkeys)

December 30th, 2008 by heimeai

Some old track… or brian strom

Brian,
Top marks for not tryin’
So kind of you to bless us with your effortlessness
We’re grateful and so strangely comforted

And I wonder are you puttin’ us under
Cause we can’t take our eyes off the t-shirt and ties combination
Well see you later, innovator

Some want to kiss some want to kick you
There’s not a net you couldn’t slip through
Or at least that’s the impression I get cause you’re smooth and you’re wet
And she’s not aware yet but she’s yours

She’ll be sayin’ use me
Show me the jacuzzi
I imagine that it’s there on a plate
Your rendezvous rate means that you’ll never be frightened to make them wait for a while
I doubt it’s your style not to get what you set out to acquire
The eyes are on fire
You are the unforecasted storm

(Brian)
Calm, collected, and commandin’
(Top marks for not tryin’)
You made the other stories standin’
With your renditions and jokes
Bet there’s hundreds of blokes that have wept cause you’ve stolen their …thunder
Are you puttin’ us under

Cause we can’t take our eyes off the t-shirt and ties combination
Well see you later, innovator

Posted in Arctic Monkeys lyrics | | | 0 Comments

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