Today I watched the sun set over the hills of Akashi and rambled on about Fiji, music, doing absolutely nothing and the new Japanese prime minister. I talked about everything and nothing. Check it out if you dare.

Still counting them up for ya! (With a few errors that I'm correcting in the notes here as I go--details coming soon!) This particular podcast would be our 101st file created. Posted by Rob.

As of this podcast, we have now created 100 audio and/or video files to download! (*In this podcast I mistakenly called Talk Show #15 the 100th, when the 100th was actually this one. **Also, somewhere at around number 80, I failed to mention Panic Living #6 - "Earthquake!") Who are "we?" Well, that's a good question. Let's see, there are Makiko, David R., myself, plus several other collaborators and interviewees here in Tokyo, then there are Alex, Charles, Dan, Jerry, Patrick and more in Osaka, Okha (a.k.a. Flying Koala) in Seoul, Will Spin in the U.K. (London?), Noisivelvet in Chicago, Quest and Dirty Martini (a.k.a. DJ Kung-fu Grip) in Lincoln, Nebraska, Jim and my brother Hans (a.k.a. the h-monster) in Maryland. And those are just the creators of stuff that we've made available for iTunes. Did I miss anyone? If so, please accept our apology, and add your disappointed comments below. If you browse the weblog, you'll find all sorts of links to friends in Japan and in other places who are working on a wide array of fascinating projects. Tune in for the rest of the TOP 100! Posted by Rob.

You will be glad to know that this episode has absolutely no swearing in it at all whatsoever. Well, at least it doesn't anymore thanks to some well placed animal sounds and other sound effects. I wonder if this is really OK for the "Clean" rating on iTunes. Anyway, Rob will provide the relevant links and something a lot more interesting than this terrible blurb...won't you Rob ? Mais, bien sur conard! Click here for Alex's attempt to destroy the Kanayama Washington Hotel in writing. Click here for makikomo soap and all the other makikomo links and the Groovy Groove Harvest poster art link. And the common thread? MY ART! Mine, mine mine! Ha ha ha. Posted by Alex, then censored by Rob.

To be held rain or shine, 1 October 2006, Sunday, at Minatomachi Riverplace. 10月1日 (日) 雨天決行 １２：��〜２１：��. 湊町リ�ープレイス（�ん� Hatch. More info. Artwork by Rob! Posted by Rob.

National Couch Appreciation Day. A Saturday, a holiday and no money. Luckily, a friend lent me a Hunter S. Thompson classic "The Rum Diary." And luckily, I still have internet and a battery for my iRiver! Posted by Rob.

Try the soap that looks like fudge candy, smells good enough to eat, and tastes, um well, we'll let you decide how it tastes. Makiko has kicked off an online store which you can read more about in this week's Tokyo Metropolis. Still not convinced? Then hear Alex sing his praise of the wonderfully hygenic stuff! Posted by Rob.

My college buddy Brian and his wife Amber's wedding was televised on Chinese TV. Now it's on YouTube! Required reading: Apples & Oranges. More links to Brian's blog and stuff like that soon, I promise. Posted by Rob.

The Flying Koala a.k.a. Okha has been traveling around the Mediterranean, first Egypt, then Turkey. Here's the message she left us when she embarked on her journey and here's her photo blog which she's been updating countinuously. Posted by Rob.

This was Bashiri's first time to hold a cavaquinho, or so he said. Moments before, he'd just made everyone think he was a pro at it. Once the iRiver was turned on, he got a little shy. Posted by Rob.

National Rain Appreciation Day, or whatever rainy national holiday it is today in Kagurazaka, Tokyo. Which holiday is it exactly? I have no idea, and neither do most Japanese people, because ancient holidays have been stripped of any original meaning and given politically correct names. It's pouring down rain, so i'm going to call this National Rain Appreciation Day, or just "NRA" for short. Posted by Rob.

The competition is getting fierce! This ALT Rap version is by Charles Billard. You can hear all previous versions on MySpace or download the vocal track and make your own remix. Credit for the lyrics go to John Sanders and Rob, and for the recording of the vocal track to Alex. Posted by Rob.

On my way home today I got an e-mail inviting me to DJ tomorrow night at Expansion. Don't have much info yet other than the link. Stay tuned! Posted by Rob.

A little earthquake shakes me up just after recording podcast #5, so I just missed recording during the earthquake itself, but you can hear my reaction while my heart was still pounding from it. Link to all versions of the ALT Rap on MySpace. Posted by Rob.

I've gotten a bit behind with the podcasting due to being busy from my new job, but also because there's more going on than I'll ever be able to keep up with in Tokyo, and I've only just begun to be sucked into the vortex. This podcast, recorded 7 September 2006 on the sofa out on my veranda, focuses first on Noisivelvet's audio and visual works. Then on the upcoming NFTOS CD. Finally, do you wanna help organize a NFTOS art show? If you host it, we will come! Posted by Rob.

QFWorld.tv link. I believe this is the podcast where I mistakenly call Cornelius's former band "A Bathing Ape," which of course is a line of clothing. The band was called "Flipper's Guitar." I think I also called MC Solaar a DJ. Please forgive me, I hadn't eaten for along time, and with all the excitement... Posted by Rob.

[Oops! This file seems to have been replaced with another one by the same name. If anyone finds a file in their iTunes called EXMIC030.mp3 which has David, Yuka, Kasumi and I talking about QuickFlickWorld, I would like a copy!] Last night I met up with David, Kasumi and Yuka at Combine in Nakameguro last night. They are working on a monthly film contest which will debut this month. More on that soon! In this segment, we talked about Cornelius, who lives in Nakameguro, MC Solaar (he's an MC, not a DJ as I so erroneously stated), karaoke favorites, Morning Musume, Shina Ringo, Hamasaki Ayumi, Aiko, Shinohara Tomoe, and about what is going on around town this weekend, including a samba parade in Musashi Sakai. Hope everyone's having a great weekend, but I'm crashing out early tonight. �や�����! Posted by Rob.

Noisivelvet.com.

Posted by Rob.

OOPS! I downloaded the wrong .mp3 file from my iRiver. I'll figure it out sooner or later. Just before I left for my bike ride this morning, "Kuro Neko" Yamato delivery dropped off a box from my former roommate in Osaka. How sweet & kind! I feel special and not yet forgotten. When I got back, Osaka-based Texan artist Raymond Dunlap called to tell me he'd received the copies of ZaBeat that I sent him yesterday--that was QUICK! When I got off the phone with him, I decided to google the man and see what I could find. There were quite a few interesting links, which merit being dug up and re-posted, so expect a few more links like this one soon: click! Wednesday and Thursday are my new weekend, so I'm going to kick back and take it easy for awhile, then maybe run some errands in Shibuya later in the afternoon, and maybe hang out at Taiyo Record for awhile. Not only have I noticed that I cough a lot once I started podcasting, but I've also begun to notice how much I say "basically" and "like." I'm going to try to pay more attention to that when I'm speaking. Posted by Rob.

Coming at you from Nakatsu, Osaka, and Kagurazaka, Tokyo, Alex and Rob talk about Alex's day off, and his jam session with a local cellist and an out of towner guitarist (David M). Rob talks about past events SambaNova and Flo-Union, and about the upcoming SambaNova event, featuring Beto Caletti at L'Institut Franco-Japonais in Ichigaya, Tokyo. We also talk about new albums by South American artists Affonsinho and Martin Buscaglia, an upcoming film release party called Rudy Soup which will be held at Loop-line Cafe in Sendagaya, Tokyo. I think the most philosphical questions we pondered were whether Japanese musicians are too stiff and serious when in concert, and whether one dances for the simple pleasure of dancing, to show off your skills or to get laid. In the end, I don't think we answered these questions, but I'd just like to reiterate that I like to dance, and it irritates the hell out of me when people just stand around and watch some "professional," no matter how good they are or how many awards they've won. I don't know what it is with us, but either we're way over the top, and say stuff that would get us killed somewhere, or I end up sounding like an uptight whiner. At least we can say none of it is scripted. Finally, Alex didn't mention any upcoming events for Osaka, but you all know what to do! Just go to BikeClubOsaka.com and check their event listings. I trust Alex will bring some up in our next show! Posted by Rob.

The ubiquitous Osaka web project dreamt up and run by James Russell and Erik Archer recently received its millionth page view. I had the pleasure of DJ'ing at the Bike Club Osaka kickoff party back in March of 2005, and have also presented art at their events, used their website to promote my own events, and helped promote their events and the website in a variety of ways since. Now I hear there's a Bike Club Tokyo in the works, and I hope to be a part of that in some way or another as well. This podcast is one of a couple of "interview" segments Alex and I did with Erik back in February or March of this year. Those were heady days for all of us. We were hyper-inspired and trying hard to figure out how to channel all the creative energy in the most effective ways we could. We're older and wiser now, I assure you! Since that time Bike Club has surfaced in many forms all over Osaka and Japan, including in print. Here Erik is on the cover of the Kansai Scene September 2006 issue featuring an article on alternate careers to the seemingly standard "eikaiwa" teaching job many English speaking foreigners have in Japan. Cover photo by Akif Hakan Celebi. More on the photographer. Posted by Rob.

I'm not sure why this video has gotten the most hits on Revver, but I have a couple ideas. First, I put it up during the World Cup and I think the title "La Terrazza" might also be the name of a group of Italian football supporters. Second, the DJ tag probably drew some attention. Anyway, at the moment it has over 400 views, which is not that many, but not that bad either. Although it's not my favorite video, I had fun filming it and editing it. To find the other NFTOS videos on Revver, just do a search for the NFTOS tag. Next I'll post our top video on YouTube which has quite a few more hits than this one. Hey Alex, what's the top Learn Japanese video on Revver? Posted by Rob.

Just when you thought you'd had way way more than enough, there's more! Here's DJ Kung-fu Grip (a.k.a. Dirty Martini, a.k.a. Peter Morris) with the DJ Kung-Fu Grip Mix! For other versions, incluging the vocals only track, look in NFTOS music... Peter says: "I spent 2 weeks writing this intricate instrumentation. All these alternating bass lines, drum loop changes, and synth riffs... And I just chucked it. I really like the original. And it's hard to improve on perfection. So, I just took a loop from the theme to the old TV show SWAT and dropped the vocals on top of it. It sounded so much better, and a hell of a lot more fun." -pm. Sign us, don't sue! Link to all versions of the ALT Rap on MySpace. Vocals by Rob. Credit for the lyrics go to John Sanders and Rob, and for the recording of the vocal track to Alex. Posted by Rob.