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Here’s how Harry Styles became the world’s most wanted man (Photo Credit – Instagram)

On a magical Friday night in New York, Harry Styles took to the stage for the first time to perform his third album, Harry’s House, in its entirety. The crowd, draped in feathers, glitter, and tears, filled Long Island’s Ubs Arena, creating a palpable energy that felt almost ritualistic. But this time, something shifted in the encore. Instead of closing with his usual anthem, “Kiwi,” Styles chose to end with a second rendition of his single “As It Was,” a poignant reflection on isolation and change. The crowd erupted, leaving Styles a bit taken aback.

“We came offstage, and I just wanted to sit by myself for a minute,” he recalls two months later. “After One Direction, I never expected to experience anything new. I thought, ‘Alright, I’ve seen how crazy it can get.

Japanese indie record label Kakubarhythm's official YouTube channel has started streaming a music video for a newly-recorded 2024 version of "Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind" sung by actor Narumi Yasuda . In 1983, Yasuda won the grand prize out of 7,500 applicants in the image girl contest for the 1984 anime film of the same name directed by Hayao Miyazaki. The opportunity to sing the image song for the film was a side prize for the grand prize. The song was originally composed by acclaimed Japanese artist Haruomi Hosono . It was released as Yasuda's debut single on January 25, 1984, and peaked at #10 in Oricon's weekly single charts, becoming the biggest hit in her singing career. Though the song was not used in the film, it was recognized as one of the most well-known anime songs of the year. On the occasion of the 40th anniversary of the song's release this year, Yasuda...

To call Ryuichi Sakamoto: Opus a concert film would be correct and also drastically inadequate. What unfolds onscreen is no mere performance, no mere gesture, but a face-to-face between presence and absence. Beginning its theatrical run just before the one-year anniversary of Sakamoto’s death from cancer, at 71, the handsome film is a testament to the artistic spirit and, above all, an act of love — by the performer, who was facing mortality and thinking of legacy, and by the director, Neo Sora, who is Ryuichi Sakamoto’s son.

The performances captured in Opus were filmed over a week in September 2022, at a studio in Tokyo’s Nhk Broadcasting Center that Sakamoto believed offers the finest acoustics in Japan. He and Sora embarked on this project while Sakamoto was still well enough to perform. Other than the unseen filmmakers, there is no audience. Alone at a Yamaha grand, a bright...

Obviously it’s terrible news one woke to, but more than that it seems unfair, like a balancing presence has been taken. The outpouring of admiration and affection for Ryuichi Sakamoto at least is an avenue for emphasizing the work, of which he left us so much it would seemingly take a second lifetime to ingest in full.

My mind turned to Ymo Propaganda, Makoto Satō and Saito Shin’s remarkable concert film devoted to his remarkable band Yellow Magic Orchestra––through the combined efforts of Sakamoto, Haruomi Hosono, and the recently departed Yukihiro Takahashi, more or less the best ever––that rather boldly depicts them as a fascist entity in a dystopian landscape. It’s nice that it sits on YouTube, and its seemingly less-than-ideal quality rings right; it’s an object you discover in lesser-seen circles.

I’ve yet to watch Elizabeth Lennard’s Tokyo Melody: A Film About Ryuichi Sakamoto,...

The Japanese composer won the Academy Award for ‘The Last Emperor’.

Japanese composer Ryuichi Sakamoto, who won an Oscar for The Last Emperor and a Bafta for Merry Christmas, Mr Lawrence, has died aged 71.

He died on Tuesday (March 28) after first being diagnosed with cancer nearly three years ago.

A statement from his management, Commmons, said: “While undergoing treatment for cancer discovered in June 2020, Sakamoto continued to create works in his home studio whenever his health would allow. He lived with music until the very end. We would like to express our deepest gratitude to his fans and all those who have supported his activities,...

Ryuichi Sakamoto, a world-renowned Japanese musician and actor who composed for Hollywood hits such as “The Last Emperor” and “The Revenant”, has died. He was 71.

Japan’s recording company Avex said in a statement Sunday that Sakamoto died on March 28 while undergoing treatment for cancer.

He was first diagnosed with throat cancer in 2014. In 2022, he revealed that he had terminal cancer, a year after he disclosed suffering from rectal cancer.

Sakamoto was a pioneer of the electronic music of the late 1970s and founded the Yellow Magic Orchestra, also known as Ymo, with Haruomi Hosono and Yukihiro Takahashi.

Takahashi died in January.

Despite his battle with cancer, Sakamoto released a full-length album 12 on his 71st birthday in January, stating that composing had a “small healing effect on my damaged body and soul,” according to the official statement released with the latest album.

He was a world-class musician, winning an Oscar...

Japanese composer and producer Ryuichi Sakamoto, a pioneer in electronic music and winner of an Oscar, Grammy and BAFTA awards, has died at 71. He died of cancer on March 28, the BBC reported, attributing the confirmation to his office.

“While undergoing treatment for cancer discovered in June 2020, Sakamoto continued to create works in his home studio whenever his health would allow,” Sakamoto’s management, Commmons, wrote in its statement. “He lived with music until the very end. We would like to express our deepest gratitude to his fans and all those who have supported his activities, as well as the medical professionals in Japan and the U.S. who did everything in their power to cure him. In accordance with Sakamoto’s strong wishes, the funeral service was held among his close family members.”

Sakamoto was known for his work as a solo artist and as a member of the Yellow Magic Orchestra (Ymo) group.

Experimental Japanese composer Ryuichi Sakamoto has died, aged 71

The Grammy Award-winning electronic music star, who also won an Oscar and Bafta for his film work, was diagnosed with cancer for a second time in 2021.

Sakamoto’s team annouced that he died on Tuesday (28 March).

The music star, who was inpsired by Debussy and The Beatles, began studying music composition when he was 10.

He said in 2010: “Asian music heavily influenced Debussy, and Debussy heavily influenced me. So the music goes around the world and comes full circle.

In 1978, he formed Yellow Magic Orchestra (Ymo) with fellow musicians Haruomi Hosono and Yukihiro Takahashi, playing keyboards.

Their experimental compositions are considered an inspiration for the advancement of techno-pop and hip-hop.

Sakamoto won an Oscar, Grammy and Golden Globe for his score work on Bernardo Bertolucci’s The Last Emperor (1987).

He co-starred in 1983 film Merry Christmas Mr Lawrence alongside fellow musician David Bowie,...

Ryuichi Sakamoto, keyboardist for the pioneering Japanese electronic music band Yellow Magic Orchestra and Oscar-winning composer of films like The Last Emperor and The Revenant, has died at the age of 71.

Sakamoto’s Twitter announced his death Sunday, noting that the influential artist died on Tuesday, March 28; while no cause of death was provided, Sakamoto battled two forms of cancer over the past decade, and announced in 2021 that he had been diagnosed with stage 4 rectal cancer.

pic.twitter.com/mYLMEN6HrZ

— ryuichi sakamoto (@ryuichisakamoto) April 2, 2023

Commmons, the record label Sakamoto founded,...

Ryuichi Sakamoto, the highly influential Japanese pianist, composer, and electronic music producer, has died at 71, Kyodo News reports.

Sakamoto had first revealed a throat cancer diagnosis in 2014, which went into remission after successful treatment. In 2021, he announced that he was battling rectal cancer, and a 2022 update shared that the cancer had reached stage 4.

Ryuichi Sakamoto was born on January 17th, 1952 in Tokyo, Japan and studied at the Tokyo National University of Fine Arts and Music, where he graduated with a master’s degree in music composition. He was an early adopter of synthesizers and his experimentation in early works, specifically with the Roland Mc-8 Microcomposer and Tr-808 drum machine, became foundational for contemporary electronic music.

As both a solo artist and as a member of Yellow Magic Orchestra, the electropop trio formed with Haruomi Hosono and Yukihiro Takahashi, Ryuichi Sakamoto pioneered early incarnations of synth pop as well as various offshoots of electronic music.

Yukihiro Takahashi, the drummer and lead vocalist for electronic music trailblazers Yellow Magic Orchestra, has died at the age of 70.

Takahashi’s office released a statement to the The Japan Times and Nhk confirming Takahashi’s death on Jan. 11, citing aspiration pneumonia as the cause. Takahashi previously revealed that he underwent surgery to remove a brain tumor in 2020.

Takahashi, who was born in Tokyo, launched his career in the early Seventies, performing with his brother, Nobuyuki Takahashi, in the band Buzz and glam-rock group Sadistic Mika Band, which he joined after their original drummer departed.

One of the world’s biggest pop stars is a music geek obsessed with obscure Wings tracks, a guy who named his new album after a 1973 release by Japanese pop pioneer Haruomi Hosono. As confirmed by Harry Styles’ third and most diverse album, Harry’s House, and the distinctly indie-rock-ish Number One hit “As It Was,” Styles is somehow managing to conquer the mainstream without compromising his impressively quirky instincts.

In the new episode of Rolling Stone Music Now, Brittany Spanos and Rob Sheffield — two of the world’s leading...

No need to knock—the door to Harry's House is wide open. That's right, Harry Styles' long-awaited third record is finally here. Released on May 20, Harry's House features 13 new songs that each capture a unique, singular moment within the 28-year-old's life over the past three years since the release of his 2019 album Fine Line. In an Apple Music interview with Zane Lowe, Harry shared that the idea for the album came to him while living in Japan and listening to Haruomi Hosono's 1973 album Hosono House (like Harry's House—get it?) "It started as an idea," Harry said. "I wanted to make like an...

There’s a world of Japanese cinema outside of the Kyoto and Tokyo dominated projects, each of these cities serving as the historical bases for the country’s film industry. One such location that’s always refreshing to see on the big screen is the Okinawa Prefecture, a series of islands in the East China Sea disconnected from mainland Japan. It’s this tropical setting that Okinawan filmmaker Go Takamine utilizes for his slow and meandering breakthrough feature, “Paradise View”.

Paradise View is screening at Japan Society

Days before the Okinawa Reversion of 1971, Reishu Goya (Kaoru Kobayashi) has quit his job at an American military base with seemingly little else to do in mind. Around him, various families quibble and scheme as a close-knit community comes to terms with inevitable change. Into this lawless yet peaceful environment wanders Ito (Haruomi Hosono), a Japanese who has come to marry one of the village women,...

To commemorate the 50th anniversary of Okinawa’s reverting from American to Japan, our friends at New York’s Japan Society will host, from May 13 to June 3, Visions of Okinawa, a retrospective that “documents the dynamic historical, political and cultural spaces of Okinawa around this pivotal point in history through in-person screenings and streamed films exploring the legacies of the Occupation, WWII and imperialism.”

We’re proud to debut the trailer for their series, which mixes “mainland filmmakers, native Okinawans and documentarians,” the series includes Chris Marker’s Level Five and Oshima’s Dear Summer Sister, which I don’t recall ever screening in New York—much less on a 35mm print. The Focus on the Nihon Documentarist Union (Ndu) documentaries will be screening for the first time outside Japan and streaming worldwide (except Japan and Taiwan). Being that Go Takamine’s Paradise View (another one I don’t think...

Marking 50 years since Okinawa’s reversion from American sovereignty back to Japan, Visions of Okinawa documents the dynamic historical, political and cultural spaces of Okinawa around this pivotal point in history through in-person screenings and streamed films exploring the legacies of the Occupation, WWII and imperialism. Primarily focusing on films made around the time of or dealing with the 1972 reversion, Visions of Okinawa addresses issues of identity, race and borders by presenting diverse and complicated reflections on the prefecture from mainland filmmakers, native Okinawans and documentarians.

In-theater Screenings

All in-person screenings will take place in Japan Society’s auditorium, located at 333 E. 47th Street in New York, NY.

Paradise View

Friday, May 13, 2022 at 7:00 Pm

Dir. Go Takamine, 1985, 117 min., Dcp, color, in Okinawan (Uchinaaguchi) and Japanese with English subtitles. With Kaoru Kobayashi, Jun Togawa, Haruomi Hosono.

North American Premiere of 2021 edit. Go Takamine’s rarely screened first theatrical feature is...

Japanese actor Joe Odagiri has made his directorial debut with They Say Nothing Stays the Same, a drama that premiered at the Venice Film Festival back in 2019 followed by a subsequent release in its native country. Now finally receiving a U.S. release courtesy of Film Movement on November 12, we’re pleased to debut the exclusive new trailer for the film shot by the great Christopher Doyle, longtime collaborator of Wong Kar-wai.

The drama follows an old ferryman in a remote Meiji-era community. His life is a peaceful, cyclical existence, given meaning by the essential role he plays in transporting people, livestock, and goods across the water, connecting villages and lives. When news arrives that a bridge is being built, it’s clear that his services will no longer be needed. Meanwhile, his life will be equally transformed by the appearance of a mysterious young woman whom he saves from drowning.

There are not many Japanese pop musicians that can sell out concert venues outside of their home country. Recently, a younger generation of listeners gets hooked on the hedonistic vibe of the so-called “City pop”-genre, whose catchy 80s melodies spread throughout the internet and gathered a viral fellowship. But there is more to the Japanese music industry than just flashy neon lights and songs about heartbreaks.

No Smoking is screening at Japan Cuts

In “No Smoking” director Taketoshi Sado introduces the legendary producer, singer, actor, and bass player Haruomi Hosono, who gained international success as part of the electro band “Yellow Music Orchestra” and through his work on the soundtrack for Koreeda’s Academy-Award nominated film “Shoplifters” (2018).

Proceeding from a video and picture archive-based retelling of Haruomi’s upbringing in postwar Japan, the documentary increasingly connects stages of his past with the present by showing concert clips from the latest US tour.

Andy Cabic was exploring the stacks in a Tower Records in Japan when he had an epiphany. The musician, who fronts the folk-rock band Vetiver, was on tour with Devendra Banhart in the mid-2000s when he walked into the store and found displays highlighting Japanese artists from the Seventies and Eighties, like Tatsuro Yamashita, Sugar Babe and Happy End. He spent the next few hours tucked in a listening booth, devouring this music that was at once totally new, yet somehow familiar. It sounded like American soft rock, Aor,...

Hirokazu Kore-eda’s film also took best original music, while Zhang Yimou’s Shadow won four awards in technical categories.

Hirokazu Kore-eda’s Shoplifters won best film at this year’s Asian Film Awards (March 17), although Zhang Yimou’s Shadow took home the biggest haul of prizes with four awards in the technical categories.

Shoplifters was also presented with the award for best original music for its score by Haruomi Hosono.

Korean filmmaker Lee Chang-dong took best director for Burning and was also presented with the lifetime achievement award. Japan’s Koji Yakusho won best actor for The Blood Of Wolves...

Hirokazu Kore-eda’s film also took best original music, while Zhang Yimou’s Shadow won four awards in technical categories.

Hirokazu Kore-eda’s Shoplifters won best film at this year’s Asian Film Awards (March 17), although Zhang Yimou’s Shadow took home the biggest haul of prizes with four awards in the technical categories.

Shoplifters was also presented with the award for best original music for its score by Haruomi Hosono.

Korean filmmaker Lee Chang-dong took best director for Burning and was also presented with the lifetime achievement award. Japan’s Koji Yakusho won best actor for The Blood Of Wolves...

It was a good day for both Hirokazu Koreeda’s Palme d’Or winner “Shoplifters” as well as Kazuya Shiraishi’s crime thriller “The Blood of Wolves” who both managed to clean up at the 42nd Japan Academy Awards.

For a second year running, a Koreeda film managed to win most awards on the night, with “Shoplifters” picking up a total of eight awards.

The other big winner of the night was “The Blood of Wolves”, which, despite fierce competition in most of the categories in won in from Shoplifters” and others, managed to pick up an impressive four awards, including two for its male leading duo. The other two films to get a look-in were Mamoru Hosoda’s “Mirai” and Shinichiru Ueda’s “One Cut of the Dead“.

Check out all the winners below:s

Best Film: Shoplifters (Hirokazu Koreeda)

Best Animated Film: Mirai (Mamoru Hosoda)

Best Director: Hirokazu Koreeda...

Vampire Weekend unveiled their first new songs in nearly six years, “Harmony Hall” and “2021,” which will appear on their forthcoming album, Father of the Bride.

“Harmony Hall” is a swooning tune packed with kind vibes that opens with a tumbling acoustic guitar lick before settling into a groove reminiscent of the Grateful Dead. “And the stone walls of Harmony Hall bear witness,” frontman Ezra Koenig sings, “Anybody with a holy mind can never forgive the sight/Of wicked snakes inside a place you thought was dignified/I don’t wanna live like this,...

The esteemed Japanese musician Ryuichi Sakamoto was back in the news over the summer, when the New York Times reported that he was so irked by the song selection at a favorite Manhattan restaurant, he politely wrote to the chef and offered to take charge of the playlist. Something about the story felt typically Sakamoto: the confidence, the sensitivity, the unswerving belief that music demands to be taken a little more seriously.

The 66-year-old is being honored as Asian Filmmaker of the Year at Busan, in recognition of a soundtrack oeuvre stretching back to Nagisa Oshima’s “Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence” in 1983. He’s the first composer to receive the prize, and it’s hard to argue with the choice. Other Asian film composers may have amassed larger bodies of work, but few can rival Sakamoto’s international clout, cultivated over a career that’s embraced pop stardom, avant-garde experimentation and political activism.

Night on the Galactic Railroad (1985) is an animated feature directed by Gisaburo Sugii, based on a 1930s novel by Kenji Miyazawa which appears to have some of the ethereal creepiness of The Little Prince or The Secret Garden. At any rate, it's a very odd movie, and the filmmaker's choices haven't lessened that.

For one thing, it's all set in Italy, as imagined by the Japanese, and in the 30s, as imagined from the 80s. For another thing, the characters are played by cats, for no reason. We accept this as a cartoon convention (although anime routinely present cute kids as protagonists so what gives?), although talk of hunting otters causes some low-level cognitive dissonance: if cats are people, what are otters?

The pace is wondrously slow, dreamlike and hypnotic, and we get the longest and most dramatically redundant scene of a cat setting type in a printer's workshop that...

Perry Farrell, Iggy Pop, RZA alsojoin We Are Plastic Ono Band shows in Los Angeles next month.

By Gil Kaufman

Lady Gaga

Photo: Stephen Lovekin/ Getty Images

There's no word yet if she's going to take a seat at the signature white piano again, but Lady Gaga has signed on to perform at one of the John Lennon tribute concerts taking place in Los Angeles in October.

According to Yoko Ono's website, Gaga will join a star-studded list for a pair of We Are Plastic Ono Band shows at the Orpheum Theater on October 1 and 2 that will include performances by Lennon's widow Ono, Jane's Addiction singer Perry Farrell, Wu-Tang Clan's RZA, experimental solo artist Tune-Yards, punk icon Iggy Pop and Lennon's youngest son, Sean. The shows will pay tribute to Lennon on what would have been the ex-Beatle's 70th birthday.

Gaga is slated to take the stage on...

The newly recreated Plastic Ono Band will be joined by some very special guests during its two scheduled shows in Los Angeles this fall. Yoko Ono, her and John Lennon's son Sean Lennon, Cornelius (full band) and Yuka Honda – the core of the revamped act – will perform alongside Iggy Pop, Nels Cline and Mike Watt on Oct. 1 and with Lady Gaga and Sonic Youth’s Kim Gordon and Thurston Moore on Oct. 2. It appears that RZA, Jane’s Addiction’s Perry Farrell, actress/author Carrie Fisher, Japanese songwriter Haruomi Hosono, Paul Simon’s musical offspring Harper Simon, songwriter Tune-Yards and...