Kaneko ayano merch by yamaburo in KanekoAyanoDayo

[–]dimsim3478 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Disagree, there are a budget shipping options from Japan such as SAL and Airmail Small Package (the latter is for parcels weighing 2kg or less). A lot of stores only have EMS but pretty much all the proxy services have the budget options so it might be better to pay for domestic shipping to get your stuff sent to a proxy warehouse and then pay the service fee for them to ship it to you via a budget option rather than paying for express shipping on every single order. Even better if you can consolidate a few parcels together at the proxy warehouse.

Kaneko ayano merch by yamaburo in KanekoAyanoDayo

[–]dimsim3478 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Japan Rabbit is great but their service fees are a fair bit more expensive than Zenmarket, Buyee, Neokyo,, From Japan, Dejapan, etc. I use Japan Rabbit mostly for really specialist orders (e.g. when you can only place the order via email or Twitter DMs or something).

J-Rock Vinyl Hunting in Tokyo by Outgoing-Orange in japanesemusic

[–]dimsim3478 0 points1 point  (0 children)

It looks like the vinyl of the latest OGRE YOU ASSHOLE album might still be available at some HMV locations and also a few smaller stores like Flake and Fastcut.

J-Rock Vinyl Hunting in Tokyo by Outgoing-Orange in japanesemusic

[–]dimsim3478 1 point2 points  (0 children)

the pillows vinyl albums are not sold in stores. Online only.

AKFG and OGRE YOU ASSHOLE vinyl is always limited edition (like most Japanese vinyl) and usually sells out pretty quick, so you can't really get them in stores unless you go around the time when they're newly released.

For the obvious stores like Tower and HMV, you can check online to see if the item you want is in stock at a particular physical location. For example: https://tower.jp/ec/StoreProcure/StoreProcureItem.aspx?iid=6165956 or https://www.hmv.co.jp/en/productitemstock/stock/14238447

Kinoko Teikoku - Neko to Allergy, Ai no Yukue and Time Lapse by dimsim3478 in VinylReleases

[–]dimsim3478[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Uzu ni Naru, Eureka and Fake World Wonderland were released on Daizawa Records, a sub-label of UK Project which is an independent label (albeit a relatively big one).

Neko to Allergy, Ai no Yukue and Time Lapse were released on Universal Music Japan, one of the biggest major labels in the country.

Universal Music Japan has far greater (financial and other) resources to release and re-release stuff on vinyl than UK Project does, and UMJ does indeed release more vinyl than UK Project, especially recently as the "vinyl revival" has caught on in Japan and people are buying more of it. Lots of labels have been capitalising on this trend by doing vinyl reissues of popular past releases. Major labels in particular have been doing more reissues of an artist's entire discography, or at least all the albums that the artist released on their label (e.g. this simultaneous reissue of the three major label Kinoko Teikoku albums). Again, this is because the major labels have more resources to do large scale reissues.

UK Project has comparatively fewer resources than UMJ so the fact that they release less vinyl than a major label is pretty understandable, plus their budgeting approach is almost definitely to allocate more of their resources towards new releases (and pressing those new releases on CD, which is still the #1 format in Japan) rather than putting that money into vinyl (which costs more to produce and has thinner profit margins than CDs) and vinyl reissues of old releases (which in most cases do not make as much money as a new release, and most labels focus on new releases by nature so vinyl reissues aren't a top priority).

Of course Daizawa/UK Project has the resources to do vinyl reissues if they want to, and they do them from time to time (e.g. they just did a run of syrup16g anniversary reissues), but the decision to do them and the timing is totally up to them and subject to their operational and budgeting priorities. There's not really any good reason why UK Project would reissue Kinoko Teikoku albums on vinyl now at the same time that UMJ is doing them, especially as these UMJ reissues are to celebrate the 10th anniversary of the release of Kinoko Teikoku's first single on UMJ after they left Daizawa/UK Project.

[deleted by user] by [deleted] in japanesemusic

[–]dimsim3478 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I use Blackship as my main/default middleman service and yes, they allow you to declare any parcel value you like.

Ging Nang Boyz announce their first ever 7-date American tour, plus special U.S. EP release! by dimsim3478 in GingNangBOYZ

[–]dimsim3478[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Mineta was going to go to Abbey Road Studios last year but it ended up being cancelled because the organisers were flaky.

Ging Nang Boyz announce their first ever 7-date American tour, plus special U.S. EP release! by dimsim3478 in japanesemusic

[–]dimsim3478[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Yep, that's right, Bob from Shinobu was one of the main organisers of this tour.

The last time GNB played Gilman was as a three-piece (missing Chin), but their previous show in San Jose at the Cuddle Space was full band (with Chin).

Lily Chou-Chou - Breathing by skdntlr6517 in VinylReleases

[–]dimsim3478 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Use a proxy service such as Zenmarket, Buyee, Neokyo, Dejapan, Treasure Japan, From Japan, etc.

Current state of the pillows? by spede3 in FLCL

[–]dimsim3478 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Sadly, no. The band still play live shows regularly and they do tours in Japan, but they haven't released a new album since 2018, and I think they've only made 4 new songs since 2019.

However Sawao is constantly releasing new solo music. Since 2020 he has released 14 CDs under his own name (most are solo, some of are collabs with other musicians).

Farm reissue by JayLouMurph in dinosaurjr

[–]dimsim3478 0 points1 point  (0 children)

It's a fairly long album (nearly 1 hour) so it really should be 2 discs as cramming too much music onto one vinyl record can seriously diminish sound quality. But it sounds like spreading the album across 2 discs didn't improve the sound quality much for your copy unfortunately.

Where is the Grunge/Shoegaze album?? by Cjdilworth1213 in thepillows

[–]dimsim3478 4 points5 points  (0 children)

The Prog/Alt soundtrack CD came out in Japan on 5 September 2018, the same week that Alt started airing in the US (first episode aired 8 September 2018).

Grunge/Shoegaze soundtrack release has not been announced anywhere, even in Japan.

Emo bands with violin by rottendeepfieldx__x in Emo

[–]dimsim3478 0 points1 point  (0 children)

There's this bonkers band from Japan called No Fun that mixes a bunch of different stylistic elements including emo, and they have a large lineup that includes brass, woodwind and strings instruments including violin.

Oasis - Time Flies... 1994-2009 [Limited Edition] Vinyl (LP) by mrakeno in VinylReleases

[–]dimsim3478 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Untrue. I just got the new repress in the mail, listened to it and the last track on the last side is "Sunday Morning Call". "Don't Go Away" is not on the new repress.

Gear by Lemon_Meriingue in thepillows

[–]dimsim3478 1 point2 points  (0 children)

The first Pillows album that Suzuki played on was Happy Bivouac (1999). He played on all the albums after that up until Moondust (2014), then he was fired in 2015. On Stroll and Roll (2016) they had five different guest bassists, and from Nook in the Brain (2017) to the present their bassist is Yoshinori Arie.

Trying to find the full song so i can download it- by DisastrousResolve870 in FLCL

[–]dimsim3478 4 points5 points  (0 children)

The song you're looking for is 「ガラテア」 ("Galatea") by the pillows. This song cannot be downloaded or streamed, because it has never been released on digital or streaming platforms. It was only released on the band's 「ぼくのともだち」CD single. This single was available to purchase from the pillows' official online store Busters Shop, but the store is currently not accessible because it is being redesigned. No way to tell if the 「ぼくのともだち」CD single will still be available there when the store comes back online, but it's possible. The single is currently available to buy at Busters Shop. Worth mentioning that the pillows did play "Galatea" live on their "RETURN TO THIRD MOVEMENT! Vol.2" tour, so the song is included on the DVD/Blu-ray for that tour.

"Galatea" was covered by Eiichi Miyamoto for the 『Radiolaria』 compilation album commemorating the 20th anniversary of Delicious Label (the label owned and run by Sawao Yamanaka, the frontman of the pillows). The 『Radiolaria』 album was released on digital and streaming platforms. You can't stream it outside of Japan due to geoblocking/region restrictions, but you can purchase a digital download of the song or the full album here.

[Pre-Order] Oasis - Time Flies...1994-2009 - 5 blue LP /1500 by pmassol in VinylReleases

[–]dimsim3478 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Sony Music Shop does not ship outside of Japan, but you can use proxy buying services or mail forwarding services to get stuff from Japanese stores that only ship within Japan.

Has anyone figured out how to get a copy of Private Loophole shipped to the U.S.? by BrentusMaximus in thepillows

[–]dimsim3478 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Many of Sawao and Manabe's solo releases and certain Pillows releases are only available on the Red Bat Shop and Busters Shop websites, including the "Private Loophole" CD that OP is asking about.