Hirasawa had won love songs a long long time ago

 And no one could compare every since. A poem, a song, a tune, sweet words, baby breaths.

Nothing.

At this point, I wonder whether it's a blessing or a curse.

The West believes "with great power comes great responsability".

Where I stem it's the opposite. Perhaps it is befitting that no one comes close or compares.

Because this man is beyond and above everything, chief amongst them exercising his might over devoted fans. And as such, he keeps on sharing his gift with the world.

Before morning came, I turned the map to the vanished stars* into a song for you

And entrusted it to the people** at the ends of the earth

Hurry, oh ship! The west still lies in the middle of eternity***

Looking out from my sleep, I see that the cosmos is dreaming of you

I counted the things between us that won't change

And driven by our promise, I crossed countless bridges

The stars that vanished that day are now reflected on the river's surface

Oh water, rise up and spill over! Submerge me and bring me towards you.

Someday, let's look up into the sunlight and, on the day when the vanished stars reappear,

Let's sing that map-song that I entrusted to the people at the ends of the earth

Sing "Because I am you!"  Sing "Because I am you!"

Before morning came, I turned the map to the vanished stars into a song for you

And entrusted it to the people at the ends of the earth

Hurry, oh ship! The west still lies in the middle of eternity

Looking out from my sleep, I see that the cosmos is dreaming of you

Man. Grief is throwing me all over the place, coming and going. In the moments of peace in-between, I am grateful I have this to mend some of the hopelessness

This is the might and magic of Hirasawa.

On a random playlist, when I need his voice and words poured into me, there comes the exactly needed song to navigate that particular spell I'm in and it's all I need to weep my helplessness and pain away, then pick my axe up and get back to building bridges.

Translation from Hirasawa Lyrics 

ハイホ－ いきりたつ風を背に受け

ハイホ－ 遠くまで歌声を投げ
空の隅で夜に仕えた
つるはしを振りおろし 夜通しで橋を架け
ハイホ－ 遠くまでこの声を投げ

ハイホ－ 焼け落ちる街の火を見ろ
ハイホ－ 夜明けにはキミが生まれる
胸の奥で急げと声が
つるはしを振りおろせ 夜通しで振りおろせ
ハイホ－ 夜明けには キミが生まれる

※ 何千もの川辺に音もたてず降りる
完全なる地図には道が続くキミへと

ハイホ－ 息を呑む その時が来る
ハイホ－ 夜明けには キミが目覚める
胸の奥で今だと声が
つるはしを振りおろし 夜通しで橋を架け
ハイホ－ 息を呑む その時が来る

※ Repeat

—-

haihoo  ikiritatsu kaze wo se ni uke
haihoo  tooku made utagoe wo nage
sora no sumi de yoru ni tsukaeta
tsuruhashi wo furioroshi  yodooshi de hashi wo kake
haihoo  tooku made kono koe wo nage

haihoo  yakeochiru machi no hi wo miro
haihoo  yoake ni wa kimi ga umareru
mune no oku de isoge to koe ga
tsuruhashi wo furiorose  yodooshi de furiorose
haihoo  yoake ni wa  kimi ga umareru

※ nanzen mo no kawabe ni oto mo tatezu oriru
kanzen naru chizu ni wa michi ga tsudzuku kimi e to

haihoo  iki wo nomu  sono toki ga kuru
haihoo  yoake ni wa kimi ga mezameru
mune no oku de ima da to koe ga
tsuruhashi wo furioroshi  yodooshi de hashi wo kake
haihoo  iki wo nomu  sono toki ga kuru

※ Repeat

—-

Heigh-ho~  With the raging wind at my back
Heigh-ho~  I sing after you so far away
I served the night at the corners of the sky,
swinging down my pickaxe and building bridges until dawn
Heigh-ho~  I call after you so far away

Heigh-ho~  Behold the flames of the burning city
Heigh-ho~  You will be born at dawn
A voice deep within tells me to hurry,
to swing down my pickaxe and work all throughout the night
Heigh-ho~  You will be born at dawn

※ The completed map silently descends upon the shores of thousands of rivers
The roads within lead on to you

Heigh-ho~  My breath catches in my throat  That time will come
Heigh-ho~  You will awaken at dawn
A voice deep within tells me “Now!”
as I swing down my pickaxe and build bridges all night long
Heigh-ho~  My breath catches in my throat  That time will come

※ Repeat

On Hyperelasticity

I can spend hours explaining to you how you can numerically model a rubber using mathematical models with fitted test data curve.

Or you can decide to read the documentation and presentations and reports I have been making and updating for the project, and this way you avoid the awkward questiones or observations.

I can't help crying by my desk at Hirasawa's harmonics. I just can't.

Next time I am applying for a job, I will make them aware of that too: Me, his music, my tears, we are all a package deal.

Go easy on my heart. These days, it's so weary from the FF VIIR anticipation and overlove.

Reminiscing over Burning Already

I can't shake these absolutely gorgeous and heart-wrenching scenes in a masterful display from everything and everyone involved

Nor can I stop singing The Philosopher's Propeller 2 to myself as a result.

The rushing wind chips at the red-colored tower

and dances with the dust in your sky, speaking by design unseen,

and from a distance so far away it breaks your heart

you hear the words　"Answer me!“

Did you behold the cluster of towers simply basking in time,

and framed against the setting sun

the wind turbines indifferently unearthing the sky

that, together with the encouraging philosopher, go unnoticed even today?

Can you hear it –

the sound of this day

as it is born

ringing the sky?

Did you behold the philosopher who unearths knowledge

so old it breaks your heart,

ancient wisdom that sends away this day hidden in times past –

whose encouraging form goes unnoticed, even now?

Can you hear it –

this sound

as it is born

crossing the sky?

Millenium Actress on Rewatch

Melancholy over not being able to see more of this man.

But at least, Hirasawa still stands

Around 15:00-17:00 lies a peaceful tomb for my mind. There, the are the fleeting talbo moments that summarize the amount of affection I have for this creator.

Affection is a euphemism.

This is so predictable.

Talk to a bunch of self-proclaimed intellectuals about Anime culture, Kon Satoshi's art and architecture as a common character in the platform and they will condescendingly brush it off.

Show them the last and short but articulated Barbican piece on the topic, which was the indirect reason said conversation was brought up in the first place.

And they are all eyes and ears, because fucking Barbican is bringing this shit into frame.

Hell, they are NOW open to "sampling" Metropolis

I don't think I want to meet with these ladies anymore, at least not as frequently as they seem to do.

And Kon Satoshi's death anniversary was few days ago, another reason he kept popping in my mind these days.

So, I'm taking a moment to Hirasawa on that amazing man and the legacy he left.

Something is going on

And I don't know what it is exactly. I don't know why, I don't know how. It just feels like I'm on the edge of a steep slip.

I'm trying to keep up the great work. Between healthy eating, yoga, meditation and satisfying work for the classes, I cannot for the life of me understand why there are those weird disconnecting disconnected episodes. So I am clinging on to some savepoints, some reminders, in the hope this will pass or at least will make sense at some point.

Nigredo again and again

"Hirasawa urges you to "dive" into yourself and face your problems that hindering your journey to self-knowledge. Although that seems frightening, the rhytmh and melodie of the song seems so peaceful and quite happy. Maybe, that's because he wants to cheer for us to pass through this stage (nigredo) in order to unlock ourselves (albedo) and finally conquer ourselves (rubedo)..."

I can't express in words how comforting this thought is.

Individuation

Behold the red color in the infinite hues of the evening sun
Oh, behold the red color in the eternal round the flowers sing
The silence seems like a guardian watching over the desolate garden
From afar comes the sound of a voice weeping at the barrier
For them the flowers bloom freely in the garden,
flawlessly revealing to you the message of Gold
An old man slumbers in the loquaciously fertile garden
In his dreams one hears the perfect song from the day of your birth
Flowers in the garden die without decaying,
sending up into the air, like a cyclone, the melody of Gold

Behold the red color in the infinite hues of the evening sun
Oh, behold the red color in the eternal round the flowers sing
Oh, behold the red color above the endlessly spinning wheel
Oh, behold the red color within the hues of the unfading garden

The softly rustling grass seems to take your shape
From afar came a shadow that now stands on the cliff
For them the flowers, swaying, summon the moisture of the rain
The time of Gold arrives
and rains down flawlessly upon you
Behold the red color in the infinite hues of the evening sun

Preparing for the PhD qualifiers is starting to bore me. I need a lot of Shisho in my system to keep my focus and determination. This Saturday, I'm passing the exams.

Meanwhile, I caught up with a lot of good horror (For once) that piled up and it was overall delightful! I don't know if it's me or the gore/horror productions are just getting crappier to my taste. It is getting redundant to rewatch oldies of the genre.

Hereditary

The best horror I have seen in these late years. It's so visceral in its heavy realistic family landscape, and it adds up to the insane atmosphere and the story. Rewatching this many occasions to come

Suspiria

I was waiting for this one because Tilda Swinton, Tilda Swinton, Tilda Swinton. I didn't watch the original and the story was very appealing. Too bad it's confined to the Amazon platform. I thought there wasn't enough noise around it.

 The Wailing

On rewatch because I need some poor bastard thrown into something much bigger than him and us and I like my stories without decisive boundaries.

 Train to Busan

I skipped it for a long time because I'm not in zombies. But it proved a good experience.

Tag

One of my favorite directors with one of the worst choices of main characters. I skipped this until I didn't find anything to watch and had to watch it. I knew I'd like the concept but when I watched the trailer, the main actress was just ekh. I didn't like her game, her acting. She rubs me the wrong way and I'm pretty sure if someone else handled the character, it would still come off as the clueless human booger she is, yet it wouldn't be so ekh herself.

I feel rubbed the wrong way with this movie, because as much as I'm an old fan of Sono and still rewatch his Suicide work from time to time, I couldn't stomach his choice of actors. So what do I do? 

Ekh.

Shisho help me out here.

The One Who Knows the Stars

The sands of the road listen
to the songs of long silent stars
The words “the dream is certain” whirl up a cloud of dust
Waves rise up in the wind
and vanish as is their fate
What do they show this transient life? In order to eliminate
the uncertainty of a moonless night,
far away they answer me – Oh trees, what is it that you know?
Oh wind, invite me to that land!
Oh trees, protect my dream!
Oh waves, cleanse the path I take!
Oh sands, illustrate the reason why! The sands of the road listen
to the songs of long silent stars
The words “the dream is certain” whirl up a cloud of dust

Witness Report #2

文字通り、現在、世界は詐欺的、脅迫的に足りすぎており、人々は満腹にも関わらず不足感を抱き続けるというほどに飼育されております。[05:23]

Literally, the world is prospering in the manner of fraud and (threating / menacing), people are domesticated not to leave behind a sense of deprivation despite enough nourishment.

実は、既に、「夜」は存在しておりません。[06:15]

Acutally, night already has ceased to exist.

ですが、ただでさえ、「夜」が足りない「現存する人々」から「影」を引き算するのは好ましくありません。[07:01]

But it is undesirable that subtracting shadows from (living/existing) people as they are already short of night.

さて、皆様、「百足らず様」と「闇足り様」が、この仮想的夜を維持して下さっている間に、足りすぎ世界について、考えを巡らせましょう。[07:49]

Well, guys, let’s take a time for contemplating on this world full of prosperity while Hyaku Tarazu Sama and Yami Tari sama maintain this virtual night.

もしそうしなければ、町中に「影のない武者」が溢れることになります。[07:55]

Otherwise, the avenue would be full of shadow-less warriors.

Translation by Taylor Seo

Today will be fun

I feel I have steel lungs and an aquatic heart, and I'm about to step in the green jungle filled with moisture and get rusted gladly, quietly and in the companionship of myself. I can already picture myself rusting peacefully against the fresh ground of the ruins covered by the vegetation, under a continuing summer afternoon.
Under the shadow of that tree, I enjoy the fresh breeze and the warming rays as I rust at ease, my mind prisoner of the harmonics of the water.

Jeez, it's been forever since I had a night cap XD, the world is under hallucinogens right now and Master Hirasawa is not making it any more tangible.

Kyusai No Giho

1. Town-0 Phase-5 0:00

2. Moon Time 4:35 

3. Gardener KING (庭師KING) 10:55 

4. Ghost Bridge 15:36 

5. The Man from Narcissus Space ( ナーシサス次元から来た人) 21:19 

6. Strange Night of the Omnificence (万象の奇夜) 27:43 

7. Mother 34:39 

8. Bridge Builder (橋大工) 39:17 

9.TECHNIQUE OF RELIEF (救済の技法) 44:45 

10. World Cell 49:19

The comfort 2017 brought me was meeting with half of my musical raison d'etre.

I saw Nobuo Uematsu. I attended the concert. I got a picture. I looked at him in the eyes. I still have extreme mixed emotions about this encounter.

I will do the same with the master, and then I will be ready than ever to take the Leap.

Dream of a musical tomb that shall cocoon the mind into an uninterrupted and black slumber, from which even the annihilation of matter won't disrupt the darkness. Lulled to a soothing sleep that will either result in a revival by fire, or a clean quiet death. An urge for the aquatic resting place at the spine of the Atlantic, beyond the black abysses and the shiny creatures to the blue ones and the dancing plants.

Dear Master of Harmonics, dearest artist to my heart, most cherished soul of my soul, creator of skin more coherent to me than my own, how do you keep on? And how do you keep on giving and everfolding?

Tell me please, grant me an answer, please.

On Siam Lights

I made an oath not to write anything about Hirasawa's music, lest it is holy, lest it is to the extent of the pages I can type for the rest of the time I have.

I'm breaking this oath at this moment, for now, maybe I will remove this later, I don't know. This place is chaotic anyway.

There is an innocence to my heart that yearns to a place lost, I feel, to the pact of fully existing and being human in this world, this plane of existence. Thinking about it, I feel it already and my tears easily well up. If I focus enough, halcyon sensations come to me and I gather something back, then it's gone. It's very fleeting.

Then, there is this track. And it feels this innocence is somewhat lost within my heart, and it feels there is a maddening grief to it I yet have to unravel and be overwhelmed and utterly destroyed by it.

Hirasawa lost many of his friends along the years. The longing he conveyed on several tracks, the longing to another human being one connected once with, I felt it, I heard it without seeking a translation.

Siam Lights feels like the awareness of the loss is directed over an essence rather than a human, and unlike my feeling of yearning that has the hope of reconnecting in it, his is pure grief over an unrecoverable loss, doomed to be and keep on being, until one loses their mind over grief or choose to surrender completely and move on.

And the song holds me by the throat and freezes my soul. I feel my tears chocked up as the fatality of it all is consuming. What is the point of putting one foot next to the other? It's too otherworldly and has too much hold over me, and I don't know if it is yet a new level of embracing sufferance that I have to transcend to, or a notion of Hirasawa I can disagree with.

As usual, when I am at loss as to what to choose, I choose the hardest option.

平沢進 -「SIAM LIGHTS」


夢の向きから吹くという
燃える色の風が来て
にわかには思い出せぬまま
いつからキミはここで眠る？

空の見えない窓を開け
星の揺れに聞く音は
いますぐに届くはずなのに
遥かなキミはどこに眠る？

巡る日が遠く島から　ひとつだけ落ちてくる
知らないキミの夢から　ひとつづつ落ちてくる

角を曲がればまた会える
燃える色の影をした
いにしえの歌うたう人が
明日にはキミを連れ昇る

巡る日が遠く島から　ひとつだけ落ちてくる
知らないキミの夢から　ひとつづつ落ちてくる

巡る日が遠く島から　ひとつだけ落ちてくる
知らないキミの夢から　ひとつづつ落ちてくる


Hirasawa Susumu - "Siam Lights"

They say it blows from the direction of dreams,
This wind of burning color that comes
Still unable to remember all at once
Since when do you sleep here?

Open the window through which you can't see the sky
The sound I hear in the flickering of the stars
Ought to reach you immediately
But where do you, so distant, sleep?


From a faraway island, just one coming day falls down to me
From your unknown dream, the days come falling down one by one

If I turn the corner, I could meet you again
A person casting a shadow of burning color
Who sings an ancient song
Will take you away and ascend with you tomorrow

From a faraway island, just one coming day falls down to me
From your unknown dream, the days come falling down one by one

From a faraway island, just one coming day falls down to me
From your unknown dream, the days come falling down one by one

賢者のプロペラ-2

Sensations of one of these days, where I will be standing by japanese shores. Everything will cease to exist inside my head but these harmonics. I will fall out of time and be trapped within this limbo, this song constantly playing inside me. I will know I found my moistened harmonic tomb as well

BEHOLD! The magnificence of a creator!

I feel it keenly

I feel I’ve seen these sparks raining down before
Burning, they tell me to recall the day the city vanished

When did I descend the hill with you whom I’ve never seen before?
On the day the city I feel I’ve seen before vanished

There’s no reason you’d have been there, yet I go to visit you
and knock upon on a door I feel I saw that day

This house I’ve never visited seems so familiar
When did it disappear together with you?

There’s no reason you’d have been here,
yet I knock upon the door

When that song I cannot hear comes to an end,
I wonder if this voice I recall will disappear