November, 28th 2006

After an almost endless flight (11h) from Paris/Charles de Gaulle with Air Japan, we arrived at Tokyo’s Narita Airport and were picked up by Mr. Akihiro Hotta (Yep thats his real last name!) A&R of our label in Japan, P-Vine Records. We went to dinner where we met P-Vine’s photographer. The motto was „no time to waste“ and so I had my first photo shoot right after the food.
After that we went to the company appartement which was going to be our home for the next 6 days.

November, 29th 2006

	Rudebwoy Face, Gloria Vendor, Ill Inspecta and managers in the Rcordshop "Gloria"

The next day we had to get up early to go to Shibuya Town (Tokyo consists of many different cities whithin the metropolitan area of the capital) to start shooting the video for the first single of my album.
We went to a Reggae Record Shop in Shibuya which is called “Gloria”. There we met the two directors/cameramen who where to shoot the video for „Like Puppa San“. I name a lot of artistes in that video so the concept was to hold up their albums in the camera while deejaying their names. We also met Rudebwoy Face at „Gloria“ who has a cameo in the video pretending to be the vendor at the counter.
The next stop was P-Vine Records where we met all the other A&Rs and also had the honour to meet the Boss of P-Vine Records which was the first one to release Reggae music in Japan the end of the 70s.

Later we did a rehearsal and soundcheck at a club called Unity where we suppossed to have our first live show in Japan. At the show the Sounds played some krazy dubplates and remixes and predominantly Hardcore Reggae. As our A&R Aki said, Dancehall in Japan appearantly is bigger than Hip Hop - whatating!

Pionear was up first and introduced the Germaican Roadshow with some Germaican 45s and of course some dubs from his sound Far East – finally Far East arrived „at home“... When I came on stage the people were a bit shy at first but gave me good forwards throughout the show. I really loved the crowd there because they were really feeling the Hardcore stuff and really were able to show it when they liked something.

November, 30th 2006

The next day we had time to sleep a bit longer. Aki picked us up to go to P-Vine Records press room to do some interviews. I had a few interviews with several websites and magazines. The websites that were interested mostly were sites that distribute music or sell ringtones and other stuff for cell phones. Some tuff work that went on all day... In the evening we met the man behind Special 1 Clothing a japanese urban brand for T-Shirts and Sweaters with really madd designs like Mickey Mouse gunhands and ting...

November, 31th 2006

	Ill Inspecta with dancers during video shoot

Today we wanted to finish the videoshoot. We met in the morning to go to Akihabara Town, thats another part of Tokyo thats called “Electric City” in English. Here you will only find gadgets like cellphones, video cameras, digital cameras, DVDs, Mangas, DVD Players and so forth...
I walked through the street pretending to be a tourist and looking at all the stuff there while the camera men where filming me. I found the Miyamoto Musashi (legendary Japanese Samurai fighter) trilogy by Akira Kurosawa on DVD with English subtitles. Tuff! Toshiro Mifune as Musashi, tell you, di man haarrdd.
Then we went to Shibuya again to meet the dancers for the video. It was fun to shoot with the dancers. Dem all was really krazy! After the shot was done i handed a copy of my album to everyone and everybody including the video man dem were really happy.

Next stop was the club „Bed“ in Ikebukuro (another city of Tokyo). We did a rehearsal there and then had like 3 hours time untill we had to start the show. So Aki took us to a Manga Café. A Manga Café is a strange place. Its basically an internet cafe but there is more. Of course u can just go there to check the net in a normal way but u also have little cabins where you can lock yourself in and you have the possibility to watch DVDs, use a PS2 or use the net. There is a big chair in which you basically can lie down and sleep in. So we chilled in our respective cabins for a few hours. After that it was str8 maddness at club „Bed“. The Japanese artistes mashed up the place with speech and tunes. Nuff energy deyah trust me. Then Pionear and me gave them the Ill Inspecta experience, the musical full clip pon dem so to speak. They loved it and gave nuff forwards. Especially “Like Puppa San” went really well.

After the show Dauntless Sound did buss the place badd. They played str8 Hardcore and during the 3 „Hot Fuck“ tunes the girls went krazy doing the „Hot Fuck“ dance... the place turned into the Japanese „Passa Passa“, everybody fucking just all over the place! Wicked! Look the picchas.

December, 1st 2006

That day was pure interview day! I did like 7 interviews the whole day and Pionear - the cultural ambassador he is - went to see the Mount Fuji.

December, 2nd 2006

The day of the album release was our free day, Aki took us around Tokyo, we went to see a temple, met some soundboys and checked how my album looked on the HMV shelves... a good look indeed! So far i didn’t mention the food. I just love the japanese food today for the farewell dinner we had Japanese Pizza called Okonimi Yaki prepared at the table for us...

December, 3rd 2006

With packed bags we went to the HMV (departement store for music) in Ikebukuro to do an in-store-live-performance. It went quite well and I even had to sign some of my brand new CDs. After that we had our last japanese noodles and were off to the airport.

Big up and thanks to Aki, all P-Vine staff, all sound man and hot girls i met! Tell you, mi love Japan! Cyaan wait to get back. It was a great experience.

Illi, January '007

Japan Picture Book

www.myspace.com/illinspecta