19th September 2011

Japanese Cartoon - Heirplanes

Let’s get this out of the way: yes, that’s Lupe Fiasco doing vocals in a faux-Brit accent in a post-punk band. A number of people were upset about Lupe taking the time to record an album that wasn’t Lasers, I personally love seeing artists branch out and try new things.

This comes up mostly after me finding this video again and remembering I missed the release of Japanese Cartoon’s album in 2010 and not being able to find it for download from their website anymore (note: their website is down). I think about music history and the internet a lot. How will we archive the millions upon millions of creations that the internet has allowed and that have never been recorded on something other than a YouTube/Soundcloud/Bandcamp account?

Japanese Cartoon’s In The Jaws of The Lords of Death (the title is a bit of an appropriate mouthful) never had a physical release. One time, for a few months after July 16th, 2010, several thousand people downloaded a file containing the creative efforts of Japanese Cartoon. It has since been given some persistence on Soundcloud, but what happens when that goes away? Are things like ITJOTLOD even considered to be moments in music history? What and how will people 20 years from now remember the music released today or last year?