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ystk-archive · 3 years

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First of all, big apologies to the six people above who asked me about this song over a month ago when it came out. I understand what Nakata meant when he said he only knows a song is finished when he hits his deadline – I could’ve easily let this sit another week and came back and messed with it more lmao.

If you want the short and simple of it: it’s nice, with all that piano it’s sort of reminiscent of jelly (aside from the WOF thing which I’ll, uh, get into below), it’s great to see Toshiko in one of their MVs again (and Nakata directing which hasn’t happened since ’07) though I’m not wild about the video per se. I guess in a broad sense I would say I like it, it’s a return to form for him and infinitely more enjoyable than anything he’s done with his “officially solo” material, but I could also fully understand if someone thought it was boring.

For my actual thoughts on it...

Hikari no Disco (ひかりのディスコ; Light Disco) as a whole package is sort of unusually mired in nostalgia. It’s got all that densely layered, classic style Nakata’s best known for which has been largely absent from his other projects over the past six years of CAPSULE (god I still don’t like the all-uppercase stylization) being in live-shows-only mode. As a piece of music it has an endearing sense of comfort and awe; it amuses the listener with odd little vocal modulations (my favorite is at 2:02), pointed percussive moments, and a strong piano backbone that work in tandem to give it character and charm. It even eschews the club-ready rinse-and-repeat of Nakata’s past compositions for capsule in favor of something very traditionally pop: an actual, proper break right before the song’s climax. Maybe it’s not a stretch to say all the tiny flourishes and embellishments in Hikari are a pure reflection of Nakata finally finding some kind of reason to go back to capsule – the overly bombastic (and loud) way the track opens feels like a curtain unveiling, like somebody pointing to capsule and going “hey, look at this!”

Though there is a bit of an elephant in the room here and that would be the recurrence of the motif from WORLD OF FANTASY (the repeating pattern of twelve-ish notes) which defined that track ten years ago. For the person who mentioned him recycling material, he did say in his Real Sound interview that he deliberately sampled it, but despite my agreeing with him in that it’s a good motif I have a few issues with its reappearance in Hikari. It’s such a specific and memorable facet of a previous track in their discography that its inclusion here feels like a sister song has been created rather than an entirely new work. Not only that, but Nakata went one step further with this callback and basically reimagined the entire music video for WOF as well. He’s definitely not a stranger to self-reference within his music but it normally seems to occur under incidental circumstances, and since historically capsule isn’t a music unit that does a lot of looking back, it comes across strangely for longtime listeners. Nostalgia and sampling oneself aren’t inherently bad, the problem here is that it doesn’t do enough to transform its inspiration point into a solidly new work. I spend both the song and music video just thinking about WORLD OF FANTASY and comparing the two in my mind.

Which, speaking of new works, you probably don’t need me to tell you this brings absolutely nothing new to the table for Nakata’s standard. I’m mixed on whether or not I could call this a detraction, because on one hand I’ve believed for years that he could stand to break out of his comfort zone musically and really try wholly different things (CAPS LOCK is an example), but on the other hand I recognize that capsule’s first new track in six years may not be the place to expect that. I think my concerns right now are for an album that’ll be too self-referential and maybe too focused on being something people remember liking from over a decade ago. (I mean, even their new artist photo is a goofy MORE! MORE! MORE! reference. Love the gloves, though.)

Lyrically Hikari is even more nostalgic, verging on the same type of sweetness present in past capsule songs like FRUITS CLiPPER’s dreamin dreamin and FLASH BACK’s Eternity. I often find myself fixating on the line “この身体にまだ / 慣れてないけど” (“Though I’m still not used to this body”); it strikes me as a strange thing to say in a song that’s otherwise teeming with sentimentality and familiar words (disco, stars, sparkling, landing, lights). Is the speaker meant to be an alien that got turned into a human? Are they now a 41-year-old grappling with age? Am I reading into things here? To answer the person who asked what the song “means,” it’s really up to your interpretation and how you relate to it. For me it’s a song about the lights of the city at dusk, the lights of the club and, just maybe, the lights inside all of our hearts. (That was awful. I’m kidding.)

The music video is an anomaly in that it is apparently Nakata’s return to the director’s seat after a fourteen-year absence from helming this aspect of capsule. While video direction isn’t exactly his forté, nor has it ever seemed like a passion of his, I’ve always enjoyed the outside-the-box approach that yielded visual works like Retro Memory’s stylish, static angle lounge singer concept and Glider’s quirky portrayal of the afterlife, or something. Despite what I said earlier, Hikari is equally helped by the immediate parallel the viewer will draw between it and the music video for WORLD OF FANTASY – it’s almost as if (note: he did not say this! I’m speculating!) Nakata revisited WOF and felt dissatisfied by director Tani Atsushi’s “night drive through Tokyo but make it Blade Runner on a budget.” As someone who never particularly cared for that MV, I have to praise what Hikari does differently with the same basic premise. Here, Toshiko is shown through a neutral lens that chooses not to highlight her body as she gets into a Honda Prelude, an older car almost utterly devoid of the cool points earned by WOF’s Lamborghini. The core of Hikari’s intrigue is in anachronism: the car is from the 1980s, but the road Toshiko is driving on didn’t exist at that time, so when does the music video take place? They carefully include a shot of Tokyo Tower, a symbol of pre-2010s Tokyo, and exclude the much newer Skytree. There’s also the appearance of the cassette tape from which the single’s cover art and central nostalgic ethos are derived. Where WOF followed expectations of an ultra-sleek futuristic cityscape, Hikari is subversive in only the way something with Nakata’s direct involvement could be. It does it all with an unsteadily amateurish camera, a fixation on the unfocused glittering lights of the city, and an intense 3D-effect filter that brings to mind Sugarless GiRL, his last directorial work.

Though as charmingly set up as Hikari is, the video – and Toshiko – ultimately go nowhere. Not that capsule’s music videos were ever particularly story-driven (the animated sci-fi trilogy notwithstanding), nor do they need to be, but there’s a one-note sameness that permeates Hikari and leaves me wanting more. This is especially glaring in the way the video ends with in-car audio and prolonged silence, suggesting something is about to happen, but nothing does. As the music itself ended I found myself desperately hoping for a visual conclusion to go with it: maybe she’d answer a phone call, or arrive at her destination and get out, but the MV just sort of...stops. Legend has it she’s still driving to this day.

Overall the music video does its job better than any other capsule MV between 2010 and now, and the musical nostalgia here is a fun diversion even if it isn’t exactly introducing new ideas. I’m presently just confused about the status of the album (and whether something as jarringly old-school as Utsusemi will get tacked on there) but capsule’s not really followed consistent scheduling since they moved to Warner/ASOBISYSTEM. Maybe next time they drop something I’ll be more conscientious of the timing of answering questions about it though, lol.

#messages #capsule #Hikari no Disco #i really wrote ~1000 words about this...#and i didn't even say everything i could've said #oh well

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avantegardedog · 5 years

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UGH my asks are being dumb so this is a text post version

ANON: dove, hot cocoa, pearls, seaside, lol added a few for you 😉

Dove - How do you express love?

um I really don’t know. Like you would think I do but like I never rlly think about it. When I have money I like to buy people small gifts (not really trinkets, but buy ppl lunch/dinner/coffee or for the movie theater, etc.) but I also get v anxious about gift-giving and also probably have a desire to try and buy ppl’s love. I’m v physically affectionate w partners (or at least I feel like I am) so maybe that’s another way? idk I’ve never really gotten the whole “love language” thing very well probably bc my mother is a demon and doesn’t know how to express love like a normal human

Hot Cocoa - Three things you love about yourself? ok when I first tried to post this I had much longer responses but idk if I feel up to that again but short answer is this was a terrible time for this question bc I’ve been moody af all day lol 1) I try to stay flexible about my opinions/beliefs, at least when it comes to my field (art/music). I have some opinions that are cornerstones of my artistic ethos so to speak, but I’m pretty willing to be wrong about a lot of things lmao. Idk I feel like it helps me keep growing

2) I’m pretty lowkey about hanging out. Like, growing up w an abusive mom and 4 older siblings trying to go “do” anything always turned into an ordeal, so I’m pretty comfortable with just hanging around, independently doing our own thing or working or watching a movie or whatever tbh. I never want to make plans with people tho bc i feel like that’s boring haha. Don’t get me wrong, I like doing stuff, but I’m very much a homebody and I get depressed frequently, so when it comes to fun going out plans, I’m not really the guy :P

3) I don’t like tooting my own horn but like... I do have some genuinely good (or at least interesting) ideas and if I can work with people that I get along with, I love workshopping/trying ideas with people and watching a project evolve

Pearls - Do you want to get married?

um this was another long one that was kind of a non-answer. In the long term, I think I wouldn’t mind being married one day, because I’d really like to have a love/relationship/romance that’s strong and healthy like that but on the other hand I’m not even close to ready for it and I won’t be for many years, so I try not to think about it too much. I’m 21 now so I’m at the weird stage where some of my friends are getting married and some of us have still had few serious relationships, so I get a little jealous/anxious sometimes. I also have concerns about my mental health, even when I’m older being married to (or in any relationship with) somebody who has the issues I do can be rough and while I’d hope somebody who was willing to marry me would be ready for that, it’s a lot to ask of somebody you love, even if they offer. Also my parents getting divorced didn’t like traumatize me or anything (I was 17 and about to start college) but watching their relationship fall apart and realizing there wasn’t much there to begin with has scared me a little Seaside - Ideal date?

idk really? like I said earlier, I’m pretty content just hanging out and being lowkey, but that’s also not always really a date. I’m a big fan of dinner/coffee, because I like being able to talk with people. Movies are cool, but once again, only if there’s time/space to talk about it later. If we’re talking about being a bit more creative than the bare bones, classical/contemporary/avante-garde music concerts are something that I dig, and once again it gives a lot to talk about. Same thing with art galleries, or dance recitals, poetry readings, etc. Idk man I think art is just kind of the medium I choose to live my life through so for a date, I’m a big fan of get coffee/dinner, go see the thing, have some time/space to talk about the thing afterward

idk I’m not really all that exciting, hate to break it to ya. I’ll readily admit one of my biggest problems with wanting/trying to date is that I’m not great at coming up with plans lol. Sometimes I feel like I’ve been lonely for so long that spending time with people and shooting the shit is enough, at least to start with

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vdbstore-blog · 7 years

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New Post has been published on Vintage Designer Handbags Online | Vintage Preowned Chanel Luxury Designer Brands Bags & Accessories

New Post has been published on http://vintagedesignerhandbagsonline.com/changing-faces-three-women-making-their-mark-on-the-beauty-market-fashion/

Changing faces: three women making their mark on the beauty market | Fashion

Marcia Kilgore: ‘Instead of luxury labels, what people want to portray is their own brand’

Marcia Kilgore was watching telly when she had the idea. “I thought, what about Netflix but for beauty – so everyone could get a bigger piece of the beauty pie?” The woman behind Bliss Spas, FitFlops and Soap & Glory, Kilgore has long been renowned for “disrupting” the industry, but this project threatened to go even further, toppling it on its side, skidding into a hedge.

I’d heard a rumour that Kilgore’s new venture was such a threat to established beauty brands that she’d received death threats. She chuckles. “There’s room for us and for them. After all, Netflix exists, but people still go to the cinema, right?”

This is how Beauty Pie works: you pay £10 a month for membership, and then you can purchase its carefully curated collection of make-up and skincare at factory prices. So, that’s £20 lipsticks for £2.24, excellent foundation (in Armani-esque bottles) for £4.75, and the new “Super-Eye Energy Peptide Infusion Cream” for £5.65. The pricing is totally transparent, and the products are comparable to those in the fanciest beauty halls.

As Beauty Pie nears its first anniversary, now with tens of thousands of members, Kilgore says the key to its success lies in the “personal brand”. Rather than define themselves through designer labels, she says: “What people really want to portray is their own brand.”

Only a fraction of the cost of a luxury product is the product itself. The rest is what Kilgore calls LMAO, or “Landfill Marketing and Overheads.” Kilgore spends days at cosmetics factories: one will produce a perfect lipstick, at another she knows a product mixer who specialises in foundation. “You become quite elitist in terms of the quality. If something doesn’t have good colour payoff or the pencil is a bit too dry, I reject them.”

Of the luxury brands, she says, her voice dropping a little, 95% buy the same products she does, tweaking the colours slightly, whacking it in their own packaging and adding a few zeroes to the price – often 30 times the price it costs to make. “We had this skin brush from Korea, a rechargeable one in soft-touch rubber, for £18,” Kilgore says. “In shops it would be more than £80. I’ve seen things like it in the airport for £300.” Is there a company she finds particularly disingenuous? She puts her hand over the tape recorder and mouths the name of a brand whose moisturisers sell for £200, and whose formulations can be found for a 10th of that through Beauty Pie.

“This is luxury, but for everybody,” says Kilgore. She raises her chin, proud. “We call it ‘massperational’.”

Ozohu Adoh: ‘The luxury market was not meeting the needs of women of colour’

Ozohu Adoh: ‘I tried all the luxury skincare brands and they just didn’t work.’ Photograph: Phil Fisk for the Observer

This year Ozohu Adoh, a Nigerian-born ex-accountant, launched Epara, the first luxury beauty brand specifically targeting women of colour. The line has already been bought by Harrods, which knows its audience: in 2015, says Adoh, every £1 in £3 spent in the store was by a Nigerian.

It began by accident. “I had excessive dry skin on my face. I tried all the luxury skincare brands and they just didn’t work.” She researched ingredients, making her own concoctions using mainly oils. “It took several iterations before I got something that worked,” says Adoh. When her skin cleared up “friends started to ask me for this thing in a nondescript jar.” That was three years ago. She has since developed a line including cleansers, a mask, serums and eye cream. Many of her ingredients, such as marula and moringa oils, and mango butter, are found on African soil. “I want to take them mainstream,” she says.

Some have asked why women of colour need their own skincare line. “The market was not addressing our needs,” says Adoh. “Due to higher levels of melanin, typical problems present differently in darker skin tones. Uneven skin tone caused by hormonal issues or acne scarring can take much longer to heal.”

The controversy of toxic ingredients in beauty products aimed at non-Caucasian women has been topical of late. Many beauty care products targeting this demographic, particularly those products that perpetuate the western ideal of beauty (skin lightening, hair relaxers or straighteners, etc), often include harmful ingredients, such as steroids and oestrogen, which go on to cause reproductive harm.

Creating efficacious and “clean” products for women of colour is an ethos Adoh hopes others will adopt. It will, she says, help change the beauty landscape.

Tricia Cudsen: ‘Society hasn’t yet come to terms with the fact that we’re living longer’

Tricia Cudsen: ‘Ageing is something to embrace, not to fight against.’ Photograph: Kalpesh Lathigra

“The beauty industry assumes we are all engaged in an anti-ageing battle,” says an emphatic Tricia Cudsen, the 70-year-old founder of mature make-up brand Look Fabulous Forever. “I am determined to change this.”

Cudsen, a former management consultant from south London, has a “pro-ageing” attitude to beauty. She launched Look Fabulous Forever in 2013, “after wasting £50 on products meant for skin a lot younger than mine” and becoming “increasingly exercised” by the “insulting” rhetoric around older women and their beauty routine. Cudsen’s mission was two-fold: create products and imagery that were “honest, featuring women over the age of 55”; and to use “positive language, to represent ageing as something to embrace, not to fight against”.

Look Fabulous Forever was developed with a cosmetics manufacturer based in Suffolk, to specifically flatter mature skin, which has less collagen and is therefore more porous. The top three sellers are all primers. “Older skin is bumpy, meaning that make-up gets sucked into the skin faster.” A lip primer “seals the edges of the lips so that the lipstick doesn’t feather and bleed” while matte eye shadow, Cudsen notes, “is much more flattering on older women”.

These tips are delivered via her “how to” videos, which have had more than 4.2m views. Cudsen wants to create a platform where she can “talk about confidence and risk taking”. Her forthcoming book, Living the Life More Fabulous: Beauty, Style and Empowerment for Older Women, will be out in February. Cudsen describes it as a “handbook for empowerment”.

“Society has not yet come to terms with the fact that everyone is leading much longer lives. Ageing is still associated with catastrophe. We need to re-frame longevity,” she says. Cudsen admits that her mission may sound “incredibly grandiose – I am one woman, in her 70th year” but it’s an essential one. “Ageism has appalling consequences. It feeds into all sorts of issues, like older women not being able to get jobs.”

The success of the brand has been “staggering” says Cudsen, who put £40,000 into the business when she launched it. Less than four years later Look Fabulous Forever turns over £2m. She puts its success down to one thing: “no trickery”. And she’s only just got going. “If I’m going to live until I’m 90, I have another 20 years ahead of me. And I intend to make them really productive.”

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