Shonen Knife

I would very much like to gather up the members of Shonen Knife and snort them. Just suck their hair into my nostrils and inhale all three of them.

Welcome in my home at all times.

I once adored an Xbox game called Jet Set Radio Future. I just could not stop playing it, at a time when I was more or less addicted to numerous games. It was cel-shaded; a new innovation in 2003, that made games look like cartoons. You roller-bladed around an endless, thriving future metropolis, tagging graffiti in hard-to-reach places.

I was a pig in shit with this game, except for one quibble: you couldn’t change the background music, which was a percolating mix of contemporary electronica. Almost all of it was good, particularly “Do The Shaggy”, cut by moonlighting Beastie Boys. But when it came to choosing a Shonen Knife track, JSRF really blew it.

Or did they? See, this is where I have to fall on my sword. Shonen Knife didn’t contribute a track; Cibo Matto did. That’s who did “Birthday Cake”, the song I’m complaining about. Five seconds of research would have kept this from happening. The long and the short of it is that oftentimes I totally fuck up.

I don’t even know how I confused Shonen Knife and Cibo Matto, or if they’re even similar. Obviously I got it into my head that I was being annoyed by Shonen Knife. Cibo Matto is two Japanese women, who sing about food. Here is the terrible culprit:

https://youtu.be/gdl-LIH1XgM

That off-key yowling would bust right in on a nice roller-blading groove, like a petulant little sister, and kick over all the good feelings. Then it would cross-fade into a trite surf-lounge puddle, where a woman whispered “ooh, make you feel so good, ooh” ad nauseam. I haven’t played Jet Set Radio Future in over ten years. That’s how deep the Ohrwurm burrowed.

As CRAZY magazine once taught me, repetition is the cornerstone of memory. Repetition is the cornerstone of memory.

So, I must apologize to Shonen Knife, and my readers. Every once in a while I just biff one. As the great Jay Maeder said, it’s impossible for a cartoonist to draw day-to-day without a goof. Interestingly enough, it’s usually women who correct me on strip mistakes, and they’re really nice about it. I do not fuck up on purpose because of this, however.