OFF THE LOCK

And you thought their music was diverse; look at the albums Koshi & Tak listed as their favorite releases from the year of 2009. One of them doesn’t fit with the rest, to say the least. Certainly an interesting choice, I’d say.

Tak Matsumoto
Green Day – 21st Century Breakdown
Neal Schon – Beyond the Thunder
Superfly – Box Emotions
GReeeeN – Shio, Kosho
The Beatles – Complete Box Set

Koshi Inaba
Band of Skulls – Baby Darling Doll Face Honey
OneRepublic – All the Right Moves
Cage The Elephant – Self-Titled Debut Album
Kings of Leon – Only By the Night
Vladimir Davidovich Ashkenazy – The Second Movement of Rachmaninoff Piano Concerto

B'z related B'z, B'z related

Just the other day, and with the release of his first solo single impending, Slash did a TV interview to promote it. Given that it was for a Japanese story, the focus was obviously on his collaboration with Koshi and how it went and came about. Running at just under three minutes, it’s nice to see more and more Western artists taking notice of Tak & Koshi’s work.

You can view the interview in full here on YouTube.

Update(11/8/2009): The video is no longer available due to a copyright claim by the TV channel, so I’ve put it right up on our servers for you to enjoy.

As was noted before, look forward to SAHARA’s release on November 11th as a Japan-exclusive single (which shouldn’t stop you from importing it, of course!).

B'z related B'z related, slash

The new album, MAGIC, is set to be released in a few weeks, which inevitably meant we were in for the sample treatment. On the official band site, samples of every song are now available and they are sounding brilliant. There seem to be no shortage of hard rock tunes, either.

Check out those samples here, but that isn’t all. One month ago (as Tobias reported here), B’z were on bayfm78 to play back some songs from the new album and talk about their career. That radio show is now available online with no region restriction. (The stream is only available until December 31st, 2009) You can hear several songs from the new album in streaming quality as well as listen to Tak & Koshi on the station’s designated subsite. The songs featured are the Introduction, TINY DROPS, and the titular track, MAGIC.

Not much else to note on the new album front aside from a bit of information coming out about the CD+DVD edition. The backstage documentary included in that edition has a runtime of 67 minutes, so see if that factors into which edition you decide to purchase.

MAGIC will be released on November 18th in both a CD edition and a CD+DVD special edition, for 2940 Yen and 3780 Yen respectively.

Update: Apparently, the show proved so popular that it was viewed online 10,000 times within the first day of being uploaded.

B'z related B'z related, MAGIC

We originally planned to post this back when it was first announced, but now that the samples are out, it’ll be a much more interesting news bit.

Eric Martin, who most of you will recognize as the vocalist and chief lyricist for Tak’s supergroup project back in 2004, TMG (as well as the frontman of Mr. Big), has another “Mr. Vocalist” collection coming out. Martin has been recording covers of predominantly Japanese songs for cover collections (aimed entirely at the Japanese market, as you may expect) for three albums now.

Well, the latest one is focused on the upcoming quintessential holiday of Christmas, and you know it wouldn’t be a music Christmas without a certain B’z song.

The tracklisting is as follows:

01. Christmas Eve
02. Winter Song
03. Itsuka no Merry Christmas (English Version)
04. Christmas Carol no koro ni ha
05. Shiroi Koibito-tachi
06. Silent Eve
07. Merry Christmas Mr. Lawrence
08. Koibito-tachi no Christmas
09. Happy Xmas (War Is Over)
10. Last Christmas
11. Do They Know It’s Christmas?
12. White Christmas

As denoted above, Eric Martin’s cover of Itsuka no Merry Christmas by our favorite band will be an English cover. After quite a bit of a wait, you can finally hear a sample of it here.

Mr. Vocalist X’Mas is to be released on November 11th, the same day as Slash’s SAHARA single featuring Koshi on vocals.

For those eager to grab a copy of this CD, here are the places you can order it at:

Order at: http://www.CDJapan.co.jp
Order at: http://www.yesasia.com/us/
Order at: http://www.yesasia.com/global/

B'z related B'z related, Eric Martin

As you’ve probably noticed, OFF THE LOCK has not been updated for about 3 weeks. This is because I was on vacation. I now intend to line up all the updates in this post.

June 26th, 2008
B’z LIVE-GYM Official Website Update
[Asty Tokushima Tour Report has been added!]

July 1st, 2008
B’z LIVE-GYM Official Website Update
[Hokkaido Prefectural Sports Center Kiyatell Tour Report has been added!]

July 9th, 2008
B’z LIVE-GYM Official Website Update
[Nihon Gaishi Hall Tour Report has been added!]

As always, you can check out those tour reports HERE.

B'z related B'z LIVE-GYM Official Website, B'z related

With the release of B’z The Best “ULTRA Pleasure” just being one day away, new messages from Tak and Koshi have been uploaded so that fans will be able to read their thoughts on the new best-of album release. Of course, we here at OFF THE LOCK have already got it translated for you!

Please check it out below.

Read more…

B'z related B'z Official Website Update, B'z related, B'z The Best "ULTRA Pleasure"

The B’z 20th anniversary special website has been updated today to feature the intermediate results on the requests for B’z The Best “ULTRA Treasure”!

You’re probably wondering if your requested songs made it onto one of the 2 discs, but fear not! Song requests can be made until June 30, so this is definitely not the final result! Without any further ado, here are the TOP 40. The songs, which are likely to hit the cds.

If you can read the japanese song titles, you can check out the list on the B’z 20th anniversary special website HERE. If you want to see a transcribed version of the songs, please read on.

Read more…

B'z related B'z, B'z related, B'z The Best "ULTRA Treasure"

Yes, you’re not daydreaming! Today, the official B’z website has been updated to feature a new image on the splash-page. Check it out by accessing the page directly: http://bz-vermillion.com

The cover is really a nice piece of art.

B'z related B'z related, B'z The Best "ULTRA Pleasure", B'z The Best "ULTRA Pleasure" Cover

The B’z 20th Anniversary Special Website has received an update today. Apparently, they changed their plan of releasing a truly “limited” edition of B’z The Best “ULTRA Pleasure” to releasing two normal editions that either feature just the 2 CDs or the 2 CD + DVD package. Prices are not affected by this change.

Those worried about getting the CD + DVD package can now be at ease. Again, the “ULTRA Pleasure” package containing the bonus DVD is no longer limited.

B'z related 20th anniversary, B'z related, B'z The Best "ULTRA Pleasure"

Well, some of you might have been wondering if BURN -Fumetsu no Face- would make it to #1 on the Oricon weekly chart, since it dropped to #2 on the daily chart in only a few days. You may stop worrying now, as B’z has entered the weekly chart at #1 and have brought the record up to 41-in-a-row.

Check out the top 10 below.

Read more…

B'z related B'z BURN, B'z related, BURN -Fumetsu no Face-, Oricon Charts