A very old friend of mine has a vid on Funny or Die, check it out below. I've known Brian so long, I can remember playing Axis and Allies with him in my parents garage. Vote "funny" if you are so moved, afterall, I always beat him at Axis and Allies.
Now that Agent Tatara has leaked our monstrous J-Pop Guest of Honor for New York ComicCon - T.M. Revolution! I thought I would provide you with an interim press release until we make an official announcement next week. Here it is, direct from Japanese newspapers! And yes, New York ComicCon did make the Japanese newspapers yesterday.
And did you know that he played Seymour Krelborn in a Japanese production of Little Shop of Horros?
-L
Peter Tatara back again from the Communications Dome on Level 44-C of BEA Tower, next door to the Aquasphere, where Lance is currently trying to get stingrays to recite Milton. Lance is pretty confident in this project and expects to have a symphony of stingrays greet BEA attendees with a slightly bubbly rendition of Paradise Lost. I'm not too sure fire and brimstone is what we want to hit attendees with as soon as they pass through the door. Also, I'm not too sure stingrays can talk.
You know who can talk, though? No, even better than talk, you know who can sing? New York Comic Con's newest Guest of Honor, a revolutionary man I hinted at a few weeks ago, a revolutionary man whose voice and image are known the world over, a revolutionary man who was born with the name Takanori Nishikawa -- but is better known as T.M.Revolution.
I've been working quietly with T.M.Revolution's management for the past handful of months to bring the star to NYCC, and all of five minutes ago, the news broke in the Japanese press -- meaning it's now okay for me to gab about it. We're of course blasting out a Press Release shortly, but I know if there's one thing Medium At Large readers crave, it's to be on the bleeding edge of the Japanese pop music scene.
For the .3% of you who haven't heard the name T.M.Revolution -- which is short for short for Takanori Makes Revolution -- he's one of Japan's biggest stars with an absolutely massive following in his home country and a fairly rabid international fanbase as well. He broke into the world spotlight in 2002 with the release of "INVOKE," the theme song to the anime series Gundam SEED and followed up quickly with "Ignited," the theme to its sequel, Gundam SEED Destiny.
(Here's a fun fact: T.M.Revolution, in addition to performing the openings to both series, is also a huge Gundam fan and worked his way into a few episodes, voicing the characters Miguel Aiman and Heine Westenfluss. I'm hoping to use the exact same strategy to work my way into The Venture Bros.)
For the past few years, T.M.Revolution's been performing with the group abingdon boys school, a band most known for "INNOCENT SORROW," the opening theme to the anime series D.Gray-man, but now that abingdon boys school is a success, he wants to return to his roots and make New York Comic Con a new personal start.
(Note that T.M.Revolution's band is -- at the insistence of their Japanese management -- always spelled in all lower-case letters. I'm all about the grammar, punctuation, and proper wordly stuff, and I just wanted you to know it's "abingdon boys school" and not "Abingdon Boys School" because that's the way Mr. Nishikawa wants it.)
We've got some big plans for T.M.Revolution, some pretty amazing and unprecedented things that I hope to talk more about soon. What I can say is that with everything that's coming together, this will be the biggest performance ever given by a Japanese pop star in North America. Big words? Absolutely. Are they going to come back to haunt me? I sure as hell hope not.
Tatara Makes Revolution!
Just a heads up that New York Comic Con has started to accept volunteer applications. Click on over to newyorkcomiccon.com and look for the Volunteer link at the top. Come work for me. It'll be fun. Seriously. Maybe. Probably. Not really. You'll end up hating me.
You get a free T-Shirt.
Peter Tatara here from the Communications Dome on Level 44-C of BEA Tower. I haven't really described the Communications Dome before, so I figured I'd talk a bit about its layout today. I'm sitting here in the Master Control Room. The chair's comfy, and the monitor is utterly obnoxious in size. We've got a bunch of hard drives in here, adding up to something like 500 terabytes. Sadly, they're all for Lance's MP3s, and I've got to store all my work on an old iPod Shuffle he gave me.
Around the corner is our helipad, its edges bristling with clusters of satellite uplinks, radio antennas, microwave dishes, and semaphore flags. Further down the hall, you'll reach the Archives Room, stacked to the ceiling with yellowing copies of The New York Times, The Washington Post, and Boys' Life. Next to the Archives Room is the Dome's cafeteria, affectionately known as the "Fiesta Suite." It's here that you'll find the margarita maker and back-up margarita maker for use should the first one break down or get stolen (again).
Continuing on, you'll start to notice busted Guitar Hero controllers strewn about the floor, which can only mean we're close to the television bank -- a wall of several hundred TVs tuned to different news networks from around the world. As you may have guessed from the broken plastic faux-guitars, Lance uses the room for a few other pursues, but -- hell -- I do, too. Whenever I'm working late, I drag the leather couch in from the Fiesta Suite and park myself in front of Television 273 (a nice 52-inch Sony Bravia) and put on Late Night with Conan O'Brien.
Earlier in the week, I thought I was dreaming when I saw Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert appear on Conan and then break into fisticuffs -- all three hosts brawling over the success of Republican Candidate Mike Huckabee. So uncertain as to whether or not what I recalled the morning after was real, I called up Pierre Bernard, one of Conan's staff members. Pierre let me know that, indeed, I wasn't dreaming.
Speaking more about Pierre, I've known him since the New York Anime Festival last December. Pierre came to NYAF and shot a few bits at the show. He's been editing his segment ever since the Anime Festival wrapped, and when I talked with him about the O'Brien-Stewart-Colbert battle royale, he revealed he just finished putting the NYAF video together. He'll let me know when it airs, but -- right now -- he's provided me with the entire segment. Behold!
If you're completely lost by the video's start -- and I know you are -- it's a nod to a viral video the Anime Festival put out last fall. You can see the Director's Cut of this video here...
Yes, Pierre Bernard watched this. Yes, Pierre Bernard liked it. Yes, it confounds me, too.
And, now, with Pierre's video cast across the internet, I can return to work, which may or may not involve watching more Conan O'Brien.
Here's a link to an interview with lil old me on ICV2. I talked with Green Bay Packers lover Milton Griepp yesterday and efficient fella he is, he's already got it posted. ICV2 Interview with Lance Fensterman
Maybe tomorrow I'll post some of my baby pictures.
-L
On Friday I got to see proofs of the tickets for NY ComicCon, and they are pretty cool.....Check em out below. Better yet, just buy a ticket now that way soon you too will have them in your sweaty little hands.....
Lest I forget to remind you that in just a few scant weeks you'll also be able to buy them direct from your local comic store....
I am from
All this got me a little nostalgic for my home state and I thought, "Well what does a middle class state like
Whilst looking through the Big Stuff Project I came across this,
The Hold Steady are my favorite band right now, so I just had to find a way to fit them in. In their song Stevie Nix they reference the Thunderbird with the line "The carpet at the Thunderbird has a burn for every cowboy that got fenced in." That's good enough for me!
First of all the Hold Steady rock, second of all they are referring to the old Thunderbird Motel in Bloomington, MN where I attended my first ever comic book convention. Ahhh nostalgia, you wash away the pain of dashed baseball dreams. The only better salve for baseball pain? Pitchers and catchers report in less than 3 weeks. Hope will spring anew for a Twins fan like me and knowing that Rocky Taconite could be our opening day starter will only help......
-L
