EPISODE 37: THE RADIO GEMPEG SHOW

2027Text: Kurando Furuya, Hitoshi Odajima, Tomoki Kurokawa

2027 - The Radio GEMPEG Show

K “Hello, hello. Hello. Test, test” 2 “Check. Check. One two” K “No fucking checks. This is live broadcasting” 2 “Oh! Pressing this button to start live broadcasting. Oh, yes. That’s right” K “Hello to the world” 2 “I am Haruo Minami” K “What’s that?” 2 “Well, I am 21LO, a Zakuian. Listen to this voice” K “I am K. My voice is like this. It’s a very attractive voice with a heavy bass sound” 2 “Hahaha” K “Let’s see… Well, this is radio, you know. I will tell you what this radio program is about” 2 “Yes” K “We, 21LO and me K made a book. It’s called GEMPEG” 2 “Yes. Well, we printed the limited edition of 2,000 copies of the book. And to advertise it, we are speaking like something funny and would like you to know the uniqueness of GEMPEG” K “That’s right. You’re good” 2 “Danke schön (German). And speaking about advertisement, well, the book we made, well, it’s quite hard to say. It’s actually illegal. We can’t actually make books now” K “Yes. As you the listeners already know, it’s been almost a decade since the end of paper media. And we are not sure about the abolishment. Well…” 2 “Well, we can’t talk about the deep part of it. But anyway it’s about why Kleenex is ok, but magazines, newspapers, and self-published books are not” K “Yeah. First of all, I think you, ladies and gentlemen can probably understand it. Oh god. Who is listening to this program” 2 “No. Don’t speak the negative words” K “Oh, yeah right. This program is delivered to you all to the world” 2 “Yeah right. Be positive. And be an upper. We proudly would like to talk about it” K “Yeah. Let’s see. Let’s talk about the contents of the book” 2 “Yes. Well, where should we start? Let’s start from this. We’ve been saying GEMPEG, GEMPEG. Do you like to know what kind of book GEMPEG is?” K “Yes, yes” 2 “First, GEM out of GEMPEG means a piece of GEM” K ” Is it English?” 2 “Yes. PEG is a computer term used before, you know. It’s about light image format” K “You know Steely Dan, a rock band of the 70’s? Isn’t there a track, PEG?” 2 “I know it! It’s their masterpiece. Yeah. So there is a meaning piling up of treasures” K “It’s something about whether you can find treasures in something like trash” 2 “ There are treasures in trash” K “Absolutely” 2 “So we’ll tell you how we collected the trash. It was tough” K “Yes. I’ll tell you. We collected trashes = treasures around town” 2 “Yeah. We staked out for a couple of days in front of the house of Umitaro Nikaido, the wizard of the porn novel” K “Yeah, we were in the cold outside for hours” 2 “So then, we found scripts out of the trash that were put out in front of the entrance” K “Yes” 2 “ And we completed it as a book. Oh, I spoke well. Well we’ve been to many places. You know, well, there were many things going on with trash. There was nasty trash like puke” K “Yeah, right. Condoms too. But basically the most trash is papers. Oh I remember there was a hard disc. The one that was from a design firm” 2 “Oh! It contained big things in it” K “Various images and graphical diagrams” 2 “Yeah. There were many parts that were best for T-shirts” K “Oh yeah, the wrist cutting one with that i-D card” 2 “That one is cool” K “Yeah they were full of things. Most of all, how should I put, it was like a stakeout. We were wandering around the high residential area late at night” 2 “Yeah” K “That was impressive” 2 “Yes. Everybody would better to do it. Well, but I don’t recommend so much, ‘cause it’s nasty. I never imagined gloves were so important” K “Oh, I knew how to use them for the first time in my life” 2 “Hahaha” K “Looking into trashes, I feel like tripped out” 2 “Oh I know. Did you feel that too?” K “Sure, I did” 2 “Yeah right. You know, well, the ball” K “Oh what?” 2 “You know ball. Looking closely it moves you know” K “Oh it moves slowly like mollusks. Same as Zakuians?” 2 “ Yeah it’s the same” K “Right. And then?” 2 “Yeah. Looking into the ball moving limply, it’s like looking down at it, like looking down myself from space” K “Huh” 2 “Well, I thought I just looked like a ball. The example is like we go to work, have sex, and hang out to clubs, right? Everyday” K “Hmmm” 2 “I think it’s like all those acts are something similar to limp balls when looking from the sky above” K “What? How does it anything to do with collecting trash?” 2 “Oh, right. And what should I say. Well, it was kind of natural act as it is like a ball” K “Oh, you mean it’s like unintentional?” 2 “Yeah right. Sorry talking in circles…” K “Couldn’t get what you were talking about! You said balls too much at the beginning” 2 “Well sorry. I should have said like ‘as if an artist draws an abstract’” K “You make me laugh. But I guess it might be so really, apart from balls (laughs)” 2 “Oh, but we have 2 parts of the ball right? And we have 2 parts of our brain. It definitely has something to do with a ying and yang thing” K “Crap. But I understand it” 2 “The world is divided into two regardless of whether you like it or not” K “Wow you’re quite philosophical in a way” 2 “May be. Well getting back to the book… Well we got a nice drawing of the Mona Lisa. It was found in a garbage bag in front of the Yamano Hospital” K “How can you remember all that?” 2 “You know Mona Lisa is drawn as if she looks at you from many angles” K “You cannot get away from her eyes” 2 “Yeah. It’s scary” K “It’s like Somebody’s Watching You, you know” 2 “Scary. Well… We’ll deliver this song next” K “Obviously we are illegal. Please forgive us, Mark” 2 “DEVO’s Timing X” K “The song is the best!”

Text: Kurando Furuya, Hitoshi Odajima, Tomoki Kurokawa
Translation: Mariko Takei
Photos: Kurando Furuya, Hitoshi Odajima, Tomoki Kurokawa

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