Most Viewed Content

I went back into the statistics for this blog to see what readers have been enjoying the most. My reports on Yu Darvish have drawn some serious traffic this year with his upcoming season in the major leagues. Readers have also checked out and sent around various reports and posts on Tokyo culture. Thankfully some of my favorite pieces to write have also proven to be popular with readers of this blog. At any rate, here are the top 20 most popular pieces of content over the last year. I hope you find something interesting and maybe learn something new about life in Tokyo, Japan. Thank you for your continued support of Oyl In Tokyo!

Most Popular Content on Oyl In Tokyo:

1. Yu Darvish Scouting Report.

2. A Brief History of Nike.

3. Two Strikes Against Yu Darvish.

4. Minimalism’s Next Door Neighbor Maximalism.

5. Play Ball Tokyo.

6. Being Tall In Japan.

7. Koshien.

8. Nike Football Soccer Note.

9. Nike Football Ignite Legends.

10. Tsutaya Daikanyama Is the Future.

11. PlayStation Playfaces.

12. ‘Slurp Voraciously.’

13. Nike Japan New Beginnings.

14. The Definition of ‘Linsanity.’

15. Tokyo Ballers.

16. Nike Ignite The Game.

17. My Thoughts On Fukushima.

18. Alternative America.

19. Baseball In Japan.

20. On the Ekiden and the Existence of Finish Lines.

’Fashion Sport’

If you set yourself up in Harajuku, you’ll see it.

Competitive fashion sport. These kids live for a single purpose: to make it on a blog. The mouths of the alleys are lined with photographers assistants wearing backpacks filled with lenses. They keep their eyes unblinking on the crowded alleyways, looking for a gem amid the sea of non-ironic Japanese hipsters. They are looking for something different in a sea of similarity. They see the same things on loop. American military inspired jackets, glasses with no lenses, an endless current of plaid. They see scarves that have scarves. But every now and then these fly fishers of cool will find something that glimmers. They’ll pull aside the youngster, make them fill out a form and then have their assistant snap four photos of them at the same pre-determined angles. Then they’ll toss the kid back into the sea of regurgitated trendiness and wait again. Catch and release. Some of these kids walk the alleys for the entire weekend. Making a point to slow down before the row of photographers. They’ll casually spin and turn, hoping to be discovered. Sometimes they’ll dive into a thrift shop, pick up an accessory, buy a bandana or wallet chain or bargain sunglasses, and try their luck again. It’s a treasure hunt for credibility. Trying to crack the latest code of what is new in a city obsessed with reinvention. I’ve been stopped two times. I’m no fashionista, but I do stand out a head an shoulders above the rest of the alley. One time I was ‘dressed as’ a street baller, fresh off of playing at Yoyogi. The other time I must have had the right blend of denims to solicit their attention. But I’m not worthy of their time, there are plenty of kids whose life pursuit is to make one of those fashion blogs. They are living street snaps. Their cool is untouchable. 

They lead the world of fashion and then they break for a Big Mac.

The LED Smiles of Tokyo

They’re igniting their LED smiles in Harajuku.

Taking a concept made for a quick promotional poster, and making it real. Finding inspiration in advertising. This is how it can work in Japan. Life being inspired by the art of commerce. Andy Warhol would be proud.

Their smiles come in rainbow technicolors. They’re painting their fingernails in glow in the dark paints from Tokyu Hands, the store for people officially wanting to live a creative life. For people wanting to live their life like they are living within the perfectly cropped and art directed edges of a print ad. For whom Vogue is gospel. No smirking. No sneering here. Just pure pop culture inspiration. Something to be achieved now, or in the hereafter. Something to be dreamt about, blogged about of course, and texted until it is actualized.

One LED smile at a time. Artificial whitening. Artificial neon pinking.

The ones who live in a Gwen Steffani video from 1997. Hollerback LED girl, flash that hybrid grill and give new meaning to the meaningless and all the other day to day business of this pop factory. Reputation is currency here. Style is buying power.

What is printed on your chest is worth more than the contents of our wallet on your most financially bulging days. Hold onto your image, and keep projecting it in HD 3D over UStream. Tweet your hashtags and casually manage your street cred, until it gets you into the VIP room surrounded by Russion models, who in three months will be smiling at you with LED grins.

The street artist takes it all in. 

The advertising creative asks what is authenticity these days anyway?

Especially in Tokyo.

Authenticity is imagination. If you can think it, it is real, and something to be adapted by influencers X, Y and Z, to be published in a low gloss, high priced, limited edition art book slash magazine slash catalog.

As soon as the poster goes up, it becomes a mirror. And you see ten thousands reflections marching on Cat Street.

Followers. Non thinkers, just reactors and adaptors and remixers, of the Always Newest and Most Shiniest Thing.

Disposable, to be cast aside. Build it with the intention it will be soon destroyed. But used first, in mass.

Disposable to be cast aside and swallowed by the next outdoor advertising cycle. But embraced strong enough that the men in conservative suits get intimidated and relinquish the keys of culture to the chronically, perpetually young with their LED enable smiles.

The Beatnik Ethos of Harajuku

The Beats are taking over in Central Tokyo.

You can see it in the horn rimmed glasses affixed to every other face that passes you in the crowded alleyway of Cat Street.

You can feel it in the 1950s recreationist diners.

You can hear it in the bluesy jazz that blows in mostly every coffee shop you’ll ever wander into.

You can taste it in the all vegan plates served in the replicating Eco-Cafes.

And you are starting to get hit over the head with overt references. First there was the Tokyo Hipsters Club, a hybrid kind of shop built into a modern concrete bunker, serving locals with original beat bound volumes, as well as apparel inspired by the mid 1950s collective of San Francisco writers. The cover of Ginsberg’s Howl comes as a scene ready graphic T (for 120 US dollars) Or if you are feeling your pop culture oats, why not pick up the shirt of Kerouac in mouse ears?

It’s everywhere now.

It’s gaining traction on the Native American boon of last year.

The Beat Era is informing fashion, dictating iPod playlists, and creating a tangible sub-culture that is getting perilously close to the mainstream.

You can catch a glimpse of this emerging spirit in the eyes of all the rucksack wanderers, in this modern city, looking for meaning in the text of these graphic Ts, and in the way they rip and fatigue their denim.

You can catch a whiff of this blowing in the winds of Yoyogi Park as Bob Dylan plays on some shiny, new-fangled mp3 boombox.

The Beat definitely goes on in Tokyo.

It’s alive in all these people, desperately trying to define these times in their own way. In the way they use technology or art or music or words to lay down their vision of exactly what’s going on right now. In their pursuit of connection out of a great chaos. In their quest for true individuality, as they work their way up a ladder of fashion, to eventually achieve enlightenment out of the overload of these material things, in this consumerist capitol, there lies a common journey. For truth and understanding. People all searching their cell phones for answers in their own way.

This is the Beat of Tokyo now.

It’s a nexus of ideas, cultures, aesthetics and knowledge. It’s being combined and compiled to create a collective Somethingness, in opposition of the former collective Whateverness.

There exists now a tangible direction.

Out of the randomness, possible meaning.

The Beat goes on in Tokyo.