S.S. HANAMI

the theatrics of J-rock, the melancholic nostalgia of Visual Kei, and the soundtrack accompanying the most stirring scene from your favorite anime

[sshanami]

2013 Mascota Vineyards "Unanime" A blend of Cab Sauv, Malbec, and Cab Franc from Argentina. Serious wine. Focused. Rich and dark but with a tart acidic bite that needs a minimum one hour decant to mellow out. The adage "power without weight" applies here. Extremely long finish. If this wine were an anime character, it would be Izaya Orihara from Durarara.

[sshanami]

2014 "Halos de Jupiter" Costieres de Nimes HIGHLY RECOMMENDED -- GET THIS WINE! A blend of 80% Grenache and 20% Syrah from the southern Rhone valley in France. Remarkably fragrant and complex for such an inexpensive wine. Provencal herbs, lavender, and licorice meld together into a single sumptuous aroma/flavor, with maybe a hint of smoked meat underneath. Medium bodied, but with a silk-smooth mouthfeel – there are no rough edges. If this wine were an anime character, it would be Izaya Orihara from Durarara. $13.49 at most Total Wine stores. No decanting necessary for this one – just pop and pour.

[sshanami]

Bring your special somepony, or just come and have fun! Fundraising dance featuring live bands including: S.S. HANAMI and your favorite MLP Cosplayers. It’s not too late to pre-order your tickets -- visit http://grandbronygala.com/heartsdance.html

[sshanami]

My GPS is called Rom, the Vacuous Spider, and it pulls me towards my destination with the watery, sibilant voices of the old Great Ones.

[sshanami]

My New Years Resolution is to wear more eyeliner~

[sshanami]

That horror/Weird/secret societies MMO The Secret World is on sale for only $15 until Dec 1. (There's no monthly subscription fee btw.) It's swiftly become one of my favorite games of all time. You can get it on Steam or on the Secret World website http://www.thesecretworld.com/

Also, this post is an excuse for me to show off my new higher-rank Illuminati uniform~

[sshanami]

Soooo, all you 21+ attendees of Chibi-Pa Anime Festival this upcoming weekend! I'll be hosting a special two-hour Koto and Wine Tasting panel on Saturday night. (5:00pm in the Society Lounge) I'll be playing the koto – 13-string harp and national instrument of Japan – and we'll be tasting through a range of wines specially selected for this event.

The wine portion of the event is designed to be fun for people of all experience levels, from casual imbibers to veteran enthusiasts to those who are the tiniest bit “wine curious” – audience participation and conversation about the wines are highly encouraged.

The panel is ticketed $10, to cover the wine, etc. There's a limit on the number of people, so you'll wanna grab your tickets as early as you can. More info at http://chibipa.com/ ~Robbi

[sshanami]

"Somewhere, a trucker reads alien letters carved into the bathroom stall walls of a truck stop. He cannot look away. Pathogens in the grammar open an event horizon in his head. He spreads the scrawl in every stop on his route, carving it into the stalls. he itches and he scratches. Others see the letters. They itch. They scratch. He scratches his face, draws the runes in red with his box knife. His head blossoms into a bouquet of writhing lampreys."

~today's quote from The Secret World. (I know it's embarrassingly solipsistic for me to think this, but I feel like this game was MADE. FOR. ME.)

[sshanami]

It's the day before the best day of the year. But don't let Halloween end on midnight of Nov 1. Here are three phenomenal horror books to help you extend the spooky season well into Christmas. They’re all available on Amazon and other online stores:

1) The Imago Sequence & Other Stories by Laird Barron My favorite short-story collection of all time. Laird achieves an atmosphere of cosmic horror by putting emphasis on the inherent "carnivorousness" of existence and positioning humankind much lower on the food chain than is comfortable to think about. The protagonists in this collection are fighters -- hardened detectives, bounty-hunters, gangsters -- and watching them go up against the dark entities in these stories is much like watching that YouTube video where a rabbit fights off an enormous snake. The stories across this volume, his other two collections, and his two novels, are interconnected, and personally I find the "Barron mythos" far more compelling than Lovecraft's.

2) Songs of a Dead Dreamer and Grimscribe (Penguin Classics) by Thomas Ligotti A collection of bleak, dream-like stories with an oppressive atmosphere. Ligotti's work is often labelled as "philosophical horror" and that's not an unfair designation. For example, he takes up the philosophical notion that "all created things—appearances to the contrary—are of a single, unified, and transcendent stuff, an emanation of a central creative force," but offers a twist by asserting that this Anima Mundi --this first matter of which everything else is a projection-- is essentially evil in character.

3) Area X: The Southern Reach Trilogy by Jeff VanderMeer A trilogy of novels collected together in one book. Labeling this as merely "horror" is a gross oversimplification. There's this government agency called The Southern Reach that has been sending expeditions into a 'haunted' coastal region that goes by the designation of Area X (which has been closed off to the public ever since an unspecified 'incident' that occurred decades ago.) Past expeditions have come back changed or not at all, and the video footage that the Southern Reach does have... well, only top operatives are allowed to view it, and only in very short intervals at a time (for the sake of their mental health.) On the surface, these novels reminded me a bit of the SCP creepypastas mixed with House of Leaves, but there's so SO much more here.

[sshanami]

For my next trick, I'm going to finish off a bottle of wine that's been decanting in my Warren since yesterday evening and watch an old video of Jim Sterling playing The Slaughtering Grounds for just under two hours. It's a classic! -- https://youtu.be/LFsoajZ0sZ0

THE WINE -- 2012 "Domaine Coudoulis" Lirac (Red - France - Rhone Valley) Black cherries. Dusty minerality, like licking a rock. Very dry finish with stony tannins. Didn't care too much for this the first night – too dry to be easily drinkable. Took an entire 24 hours of decanting to fully “open” and now it's just right.

[sshanami]

I'm here~ At Duende, the culminating event of Broward County’s 100th Birthday celebration. My teacher's group, Friends of Koto, goes onstage at noon. I get to play a bunch of the koto solos at today's performance so I'm super stoked about that. We're also playing two of my favorite songs.

[sshanami]

I've got 99 problems, but Mana regen ain't one~

[sshanami]

Our new CD, FICTITIOUS, is now available! :D And we couldn't be happier for you all to hear it~ You can grab a copy right now at http://sshanami.com/store Free shipping to anyone in the US for a limited time, and flat rate international shipping.

[sshanami]

Drenched but happy after a high-energy songwriting session with the guys -- we're working on our first song of Season Three, it's very "Nittle Grasper"-esque and I find it impossible to not bounce around the room when we're playing it. Now it's 2:47AM so I'm gonna open a bottle of Pinot. Cheers! :3

[sshanami]

"Serum of a will destroyed~"

[sshanami]

Cremate this corpse so it won't rise Our love can never be revived No wine-stained teeth or Scotch-soaked sheets Just promises we could not keep (via https://soundcloud.com/s-s-hanami/no-means-yes?utm_source=soundcloud&utm_campaign=share&utm_medium=tumblr)

[sshanami]

S.S. HANAMI's first show in D.C. is gonna be with another Florida band! :D We'll be opening for Milk Spot tomorrow, Fri July 3, at The Electric Maid (268 Carroll St NW). Doors @ 8:00pm. Now get out of my dressing room... ^-^