Location: Karaoke Epoc at Adanami Shobo

Karaoke is a marmite activity. Here in the UK or Ireland you’ll often roll into a bar, have a few drinks and jump on stage (you may be in drag or in costume), where a ponytailed man will hand you a microphone and you bang out something like ‘Living on a Prayer’ or ‘Don’t Stop Believing’, possibly while shaking and sweating nerviously. While some guys get off on this, the majority of people find it too stressful to be any fun.

Karaoke Japanese-style is a much different story; you and your friends get your own private booth (or you can go on your own, I won’t judge), pay by the hour, have food and drink brought to your room, and sing cheesy songs in front of good friends or work colleagues rather than strangers. It’s more relaxing, more comfortable and much less awkward.  London caters for those with the need to vocally cut loose with quality karaoke joints like Lucky Voice and Karaoke Box, but for that real Japanese experience look no further than Karaoke Epoc.

Karaoke Epoc is housed within Adanami Shobo, an easily-missed second-hand Japanese bookshop in the heart of Soho (especially easily missed because it has kept the sign from the laundromat that used to be in the space). In the front is a a selection of manga comic books, old magazines, slightly yellowed posters, DVDs for sale and rent, and old video games.  However, talk to the older man or the English language student behind the counter and a world of reasonably-priced authentic Japanese karaoke will open up to you.

The prices above are per hour for the times specified, which are reasonable as far as Soho goes.  This is probably due to the sheer age of the genuine (and slightly creaking) Japanese karaoke machines and the fact that the booths are made from some form of painted particle board, but this adds to the experience.  You book the room (max 4 or 6 people) for blocks of time in advance, but providing there aren’t any reservations after you there’s often the chance to extend your time if you don’t feel like leaving.

Once you are shuffled into your not particularly well ventilated but definitely air conditioned room, you’ll be given a slightly confusing remote control and a massive book of songs for the karaoke machine.  The happy surprise about the size of the book will soon be dashed when you realise only 2% of it at most composed of English langauge songs, and what an eclectic selection they are – never before will you have seen Alice in Chains, Frank Sinatra, Lauren Hill and Journey so close together.  Don’t be afraid to ask the staff for help.

Despite what the sign says I’ve never had an issue bringing my own food and booze.  In fact, it’s impossible to imagine indulging in karaoke without at least one person drinking.  Which brings me to the most important point; the singing itself. You only need to know one thing – you do not need to be able to sing. Karaoke is not a singing contest. If you can bang out a tune then great, but karaoke is more about letting off steam, having a hairbrush in the mirror moment.  It is open to everyone; you don’t mock a bad singer, and everyone gets a turn.

Take this, which combined with the dark lighting, sounds of Japanese students singing spilling out from other rooms, and liquor is as close as you’ll get to going to karaoke in Japan without hopping on the next flight out of Heathrow.  And I guarantee you will love every minute of it.

Converse White Leather Hi-Tops

These white hi-tops are one of my favourite purchases of last year; I was originally looking for a very similar pair from G-Star, but these have been a more than satisfactory substitute. They are made of white leather, with a white rubber toe and a rubber converse logo on each inner ankle. It’s impossible to keep them as white as they are when you take them out of the box, but the fact that they’re made of leather  means that they are easier to clean than the usual canvas shoe.

I love them because they’re perfect with jeans, and go well with both casual and smarter clothing combos. They also come in black, which are equally cool but I just haven’t taken to quite as much.

Location: Sengaku-ji

Tokyo has some wonderful, must-see temples and shrines such Sensou-ji in Asakusa, Meiji Jingu Shrine, the controversial Yasukuni shrine, and Gokoku-ji – home of the tea ceremony. Once you see a few temples, they get increasingly repetitive (I have the same problem with churches), but there’s something special that keeps me going back to Sengaku-ji.

Sengaku-ji’s history is tied in with the story of the Forty-seven Ronin (leaderless samurai), also known as Chushingura; a fictionalised account of the tale. The story took place in feudal Japan where Lord Asano, who hailed from a territory outside the capital, came up for a scheduled ceremony with the Emperor. He ended up having to commit ritual suicide (seppuku) for the offense of drawing his sword on Kira, a senior courtier who he felt was embarrassing and humiliating him. Asano’s crew were disgraced, and according to the rules of bushido (samurai code of honour), they were bound to get retribution by killing Kira.

The story goes that Lord Asano's blood stained this stone red when he committed suicide

However revenge-killings had been banned by the Emperor, so naturally Asano’s men (led by a man called Oishi) were being watched. A core group of them made a resolution to throw away their reputations so they would no longer be seen as a threat, and then striking when Kira’s guard was down. They succeeded in both through drinking and whoring themselves into disgrace, then coming together on one Winter night a year later and launching an attack that killed Kira in his home. They took his head across to Sengaku-ji temple after they did the deed, as this is where Lord Asano was buried, and offered it up to his tombstone. The ronin turned themselves into the authorities, and despite the fact that they broke the law the shogunate permitted them to commit seppuku rather than be executed due to intense public pressure.

It's common to burn incense under the headstones

Despite the fact that it has obviously has been enhanced over the years, Chushingura has been told and retold across multiple media and especially resonates with Japanese people as at its core the story is about traditional values versus modernisation. Sengaku-ji is the spiritual home of the story, and is fittingly located in now what is a primarily a business district, a stone’s throw from many corporate headquarters for leading blue chip firms.  It has the general features you would find at a Japanese temple, such as the gates, main hall and cemetery (where the forty-seven ronin are buried) but there is also a statue of Oishi and a small museum that contains pieces such as the ronin’s armour and a receipt for Kira’s head (seriously). Everything in the museum is in Japanese, so you’ll need to be able to read it or be fairly good at guessing.

Stoic, truly stoic

Sengaku-ji is a short walk away from Shinagawa Station on the Yamanote or Keihin Tohoku lines, or across the road from Sengakuji Station on the Keikyu Main Line. Shinagawa is culturally bereft as an area – if the shinkansen bullet train didn’t stop there, there is very little reason to visit unless you work for one of the many nearby businesses, or have a hankering for the Outback Steakhouse (you have two to choose from) – so this may involve a special trip.

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Lady GaGa goes live

The massive oversaturation of Lady GaGa in the media is hard to ignore – be it the tabloids and celebrity mags, regular plays on the radio and almost all music channels as well as anything else from billboards to TV stints late night talk shows. Add to that comments like the one she made on Jonathon Ross (“I have no influences”), her ever-shrinking outfits and general put-on insane behaviour when she’s not really insane, and the result is a large amount of people become irritated.

I admit to liking her myself – I generally enjoy things that are a fusion of music and fashion – but it was on hearing an acoustic version of her oft-played hit Poker Face that she did for Radio 1′s live sessions that I started to really take an interest.

The strong bluesy voice, the genuine joy in her face as she sings and the character she gives the song were all a surprise to me – I’d expected that under all that make-up and autotuning she was an average singer, guided along like a nice little marionette. I imagine it must have been a decision she made early on to give up on this style of singing for what she’s doing now – it’s obviously made her more successful, and she’s never denied that she’s been about more than anything but the fame.

I’ll wait here until she gets through her current Ziggy-style supernova, and hope that she’ll eventually revert to singing like this, but until then I’ll have to make do with the occasional live session.