Lo-Fi Blog

Last week I spent some time in Nagoya and took two days off to spend with my family. I decided to drive, even though it's not actually cheap to do that as part of my trip. Long drives for me are strangely a way to get away from my daily life, where I am unfortunately driving to many of my gigs.. the difference is the traffic though!

Last time we went to play in Nagoya we visited the Phil Jones Bass gear importer in Japan cause their office was close to where we were staying. this time I didn't have the time to visit their office but did check out some gear since I had some extra time while I was there.

I've always been unhappy with many distortion pedals for the bass, maybe because distorted bass is just not so widely used in music... but anyway I tried out the Aguilar Agro stompbox and it was one pedal I actually liked a lot.

It kept the lows intact even when the drive was high, and it was really versatile letting me dial in lots of drive to amp crunch with different mid frequencies and attack.



Also wanted to compare so tried out the level of drive on their DI pre-amp the Tone Hammer. it was a great sounding DI and pre-amp complete with boost and lots of tone shaping capability, but didn't satisfy my want for a drive pedal.


My style of playing.. especially live, requires all kinds of sound variations to be the right lead instrument and bass depending on the situation.

I've updated my board so plan to upload that on my blog soon too


5

Back when I started this band I had this concept of creating a sound that mixed both analog and digital sounds not in the digital music direction but in a live band context.

I've seen some really cool digital rock bands and then also some good live hiphop bands as well and I felt that just replicating digital music live was not enough.

What made live music really "live" for me was not just the way it was performed but what the live environment influenced you to create in the live performance.

That's how Lo-Fi's sound became more about the jamming and live interaction, instead of trying to just replicate programmed beats. (Not that we were really successful at doing that...!)

The concert we did the other day at the Duo Music Exchange was a great opportunity to reflect on the show itself too. usually we are so centered on getting the sound and playing right we never cared so much for the stage costumes or lighting arrangements unless it was a painting or multi-genre art show. But I think especially in Japan, the way you dress is an important part of the show and changes how the audience receives the sound your emitting.

We were lucky enough to have the support of a very cool designer from IZREEL to help out for this show. it was really eyeopening for me especially because it was a lot like arranging stage props for a play, how he styled our costumes for the show. this is a shot we had our manager take backstage on Yosh's phone before the show.






I have to admit it takes many people and a good team of sound lighting styling and of course performers to put together a larger scale show. it's really great though, after all is finished to look back and hear some surprising feedback from our fans!
I didn't even now people were paying attention to what we were wearing.. shows how much I know :p

5

Thanks for coming out to see the show at Duo Music Exchange!
Also a very special thanks to our stylist Takakura-san from IZREEL.
It was a really great to have him help us out with creating an awesome atmosphere on the stage with his selection of styles from his collection.



Our setlist for this night was:
Make That Change
Higher
Angel
What We Fight For
Realize


We didn't get too many songs into our setlist, but we did get to do a lot of jamming! It was great to hear some great comments about the jams too.


We'll be doing some more concerts next month too, so look forward to our updates on http://www.lofi-net.com/


- Posted by 5

Great show at the new "Cafe Vacation"!!!


This was a great photo that was tweeted by @motoji24 !!
It's great when we can get nice photos posted by the people at the show.

The new cafe was great. The place has got a really big bar counter and pretty good sound with our sound system! Most likely the best sounding bar/cafe style place we've played at.

But what made the concert great, was the fans that were enjoying the show!
really really great crowd!!
Thanks for making the concert awesome!


for those of you in Chiba, we'll be playing at the Surf Jam tomorrow!
Surf Jam HP

- Posted by 5

The other day I went to see Nori play keys for the one and only Asazaki-san at Blue Moon in Hayama Japan.

To be honest it was kinda hard to find the venue itself, but I gotta say that it's a beautiful place to play. I guess it depends what kind of music that your playing, but when you hear those waves in-between the songs in the set, it's just perfect.

they did two sets that night and not to my surprise they didn't play any songs that I would know. But it seemed like they did play some cover songs that the crowd knew.

It was awesome that she got everyone dancing and singing along to the Amami music!

Nori was playing the Nord keyboard that she always uses at the Lo-Fi concerts, but it sounded totally different this night!

Here's Asazaki-san's info if your into the Amami-traditional music.
http://www.asazakiikue.com/


5

Lo-Fi is going to be playing for an end of the summer party hosted by a good friend of the band, Itta Tsunoda.

Here's a message from him to our fans too.

------message start-----
Dear Frinends

I hope all is well,
For me, I felt like I hadn’t really done anything to enjoy the summer this year yet...
So together with my good friends, I planned a party called “DEL AZUL” at my new place in Odaiba on the rooftop... THIS SATURDAY!!!

It will sort of be a party featuring lots of music with a live band and something like10 DJs playing all on the rooftop!
I wanted people to enjoy the atmosphere and the environment fully so that party starts at 2PM soaking up the sun, till we then, watch the sun go down closing the party (at least the first half of it... : ) at 9PM.

I have already 200 people confirming to come but I can use a couple hundred more considering the spacious venue. Bring your friends too and enjoy what the last days of summer has to offer!

Admission (sorry we needed to collect some to put this event together...)
3000yen for guys (w/ one drink)
2000yen for ladies (w/one drink)

Place
2-7-4 Aomi The SOHO 1126 Koutou-ku
Tokyo, 135-0064 Japan
http://www.aomi-project.com/index.html

Best,
Itta



------message end-----

I hope you guys didn't miss that typo he put in the beginning of his email!
Anyway, Lo-Fi is planned to perform around five PM. We're gonna play a full set and maybe more....

Hope to see everyone there!


- Posted by 5

Yesterday was a good day.
I was finally granted one of my wishes of being able to play with Hank live.

He's been one of my favorite guitarists for a long time now, one of my influences that made me realize that maybe bass was my thing.


Everything was great until we got cut a few songs short... Well to be honest mid-show... Because people who live across the street from the beach said the concert was too loud and basically called the cops on us.

Well aside from the negativity of the mostly non-local people who live in the expensive beach-side apartments, I'm sure many of the local people and non-local people at our show enjoyed the show for as long as it lasted!
Thanks to everyone that came to the show and kept it happy and lively despite the angry beach security!

Nishiyama Fumio "Hankoya" is a great guitarist that's played with many great musicians worldwide. It'd be great if you guys could check out some of his solo work too! It's great stuff. Can't beat the feel he has "live" though!


- Posted by 5