Once upon a time, I meant for this page to be one of my most updated pages, with a different featured band every week and a couple mp3s available each time. Needless to say, that never happened, and all that is left of that once grand ideal is the below blurb about B'z, written sometime in 1999. At least there's a couple options on the sides and the nifty little "Now Playing" object that I used to get through a nifty XMMS tool from Patrick but now occasionally get from either a Winamp, iTunes (Windows) or iTunes (Mac) plugin. Hint: If the "Playing since" time is a really long time ago, music's probably off (the time left displayed is the time the last song started playing).

Now playing:		Yello: Alhambra
Playing since:		2-20-2005 19:0:27
Play location:		Takako (iTunes Mac OS X)
Rating:		Unrated*

*: Because iTunes doesn't let me share ratings across my computers if I want to Party Shuffle (it's complicated and makes me cry), "Unrated" might only mean that the song is unrated on the computer that's actually playing the song.

B'z

Though I've been enjoying Japanese music in the form of anime mp3s and soundtracks for over a year, it's only recently been the case that I've truly gotten interested in J-Pop as a genre of its own. The transition occured when I began borrowing B'z cds from Brian this last Spring Quarter. A far cry different from the typical anime theme song (usually sung by a woman with a voice too high to be taken seriously), Takahiro Matsumoto's guitar and Koshi Inaba's vocals took hold of my ears and refused to let go. Their music spans over 10 years and 15 albums, which, when added to the fact that every B'z single has gone to number one, makes B'z one of the most long-lasting and successful bands in Japan.

B'z music ranges from pop to rock to blues, with their adventures into each genre being well worth listening to. I've included below a sampling of 4 of their songs, which I hope might inspire someone to investigate B'z more on their own.

For More Information:

B'z (Official)

B'z Fanatics

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