In the comments of the 4th anniversary post, jimpac asked for a post sharing pics and details about TACO che. I've had dozens of photos saved up and now that I've been kicked in the pants (and found a happy solution for hosting lots of pictures with PictoBrowser), it's time to post everything!
Folks reading on RSS: PictoBrowser doesn't play nice with you, so please click through and come see the 100+ photos! Mouse over 'Notes' to read the photo captions.
If you've been reading Same Hat for a while, you've probably heard me talk about the Nakano Broadway Mall. It's located just west of Shinjuku, and home to a sprawling complex of strange, otaku stores-- including the massive 15+ Mandarake shops. It's like a more underground and less commercialized version of Akiba, minus the foreign tourists with cameras and with more of the stuff we all like. How to get to Nakano Broadway and maps/pics from the Mandarake shops can be found here.
Last Spring, my GF and I went to Japan for two weeks, and I managed to fit two trips to the greatest shop in Nakano Broadway (and quite possibly, my favorite shop of any kind in the world), TACO che!! I was originally told about the shop by my German buddy Ben (who gavee me the Shintaro Kago Bullying kit from there back in 2007). TACO che is pretty much THE underground manga shop of your dreams. They don't have a specific tie to any one publisher, but I heard that the owner is close with the folks that fun Seirinkogeisha. The shop carries fan zines, dojinshi, along with nearly every title by Seirinkogeisha, EnterBrain/Beam and all the other indies we love.
The shop is located on the 3rd floor, in the general vicinity of the northwest end of the Nakano Broadway mall. Here are some shots from inside the store. The place is tiny, but every square foot is something cool and tempting:
These photos are all from March 2008, and reflect the books and goods that were hot at the time. Kazuo Umezu's 50th Anniversary (of his career in manga) celebration was in full force, and the store was crammed full of incredible Umezz goods:
In my two trips to the shop, I spent (eeek) over 300 bucks and filled a suitcase with books. I didn't really have 300 bucks to spend on comics, but I. JUST. COULDN'T. HELP. MYSELF. In addition to the bigger pubs and indie zines I mentioned above, TACO che also publishes their own occasional zines and pamphlets (which are insanely excellent, like this). Here is just a small smattering of the manga gems I am talking about:
Not content to be simply the BOOK store of our dreams, TACO che also carries limited edition shirts, toys and DVDs, including Suehiro Maruo posters made just for TACO che (sorry, I can't find that pic at the moment, will take one of the miniposter on my wall). Here are some of the shirts:
And here are some of the goodies:
They also carry lapel pins by all our favorites:
I tried to include good captions for all those pics, but if you have any questions (or corrections!) leave a comment here! You can see the photos directly at the non-flashy Same Hat flickr, which I'm using just to store pics for PictoBrowser to pull from.
TACO che continues to be the epicenter for all the manga and art we all love so much, so I'll keep my eyes ope on their blog and post interesting news. In the coming month or so, TACO che will be hosting signing events with Takashi Nemoto and Jun Hayami- hopefully Nate or Schultz can check those out for us!!
In the comments of the 4th anniversary post, jimpac asked for a post sharing pics and details about TACO che. I've had dozens of photos saved up and now that I've been kicked in the pants (and found a happy solution for hosting lots of pictures with PictoBrowser), it's time to post everything!
Folks reading on RSS: PictoBrowser doesn't play nice with you, so please click through and come see the 100+ photos! Mouse over 'Notes' to read the photo captions.
If you've been reading Same Hat for a while, you've probably heard me talk about the Nakano Broadway Mall. It's located just west of Shinjuku, and home to a sprawling complex of strange, otaku stores-- including the massive 15+ Mandarake shops. It's like a more underground and less commercialized version of Akiba, minus the foreign tourists with cameras and with more of the stuff we all like. How to get to Nakano Broadway and maps/pics from the Mandarake shops can be found here.
Last Spring, my GF and I went to Japan for two weeks, and I managed to fit two trips to the greatest shop in Nakano Broadway (and quite possibly, my favorite shop of any kind in the world), TACO che!! I was originally told about the shop by my German buddy Ben (who gavee me the Shintaro Kago Bullying kit from there back in 2007). TACO che is pretty much THE underground manga shop of your dreams. They don't have a specific tie to any one publisher, but I heard that the owner is close with the folks that fun Seirinkogeisha. The shop carries fan zines, dojinshi, along with nearly every title by Seirinkogeisha, EnterBrain/Beam and all the other indies we love.
The shop is located on the 3rd floor, in the general vicinity of the northwest end of the Nakano Broadway mall. Here are some shots from inside the store. The place is tiny, but every square foot is something cool and tempting:
These photos are all from March 2008, and reflect the books and goods that were hot at the time. Kazuo Umezu's 50th Anniversary (of his career in manga) celebration was in full force, and the store was crammed full of incredible Umezz goods:
In my two trips to the shop, I spent (eeek) over 300 bucks and filled a suitcase with books. I didn't really have 300 bucks to spend on comics, but I. JUST. COULDN'T. HELP. MYSELF. In addition to the bigger pubs and indie zines I mentioned above, TACO che also publishes their own occasional zines and pamphlets (which are insanely excellent, like this). Here is just a small smattering of the manga gems I am talking about:
Not content to be simply the BOOK store of our dreams, TACO che also carries limited edition shirts, toys and DVDs, including Suehiro Maruo posters made just for TACO che (sorry, I can't find that pic at the moment, will take one of the miniposter on my wall). Here are some of the shirts:
And here are some of the goodies:
They also carry lapel pins by all our favorites:
I tried to include good captions for all those pics, but if you have any questions (or corrections!) leave a comment here! You can see the photos directly at the non-flashy Same Hat flickr, which I'm using just to store pics for PictoBrowser to pull from.
TACO che continues to be the epicenter for all the manga and art we all love so much, so I'll keep my eyes ope on their blog and post interesting news. In the coming month or so, TACO che will be hosting signing events with Takashi Nemoto and Jun Hayami- hopefully Nate or Schultz can check those out for us!!
Evan and I celebrated with a bout of Warriors head-to-head on PS2, Rock 'N' Roll High School and lots of junk food. wheeeee! Here's to another year of comic depravity, hilarity and ... obscurity? Looking to bring out shorts by Suehiro Maruo (lord, he's the patron saint of Samehat), Junji Ito and some fresh blood, more original horror and gag comics by us and our friends, etc. etc. SO MANY IDEAS, just gotta work on the whole 'execution and follow through' part of the process.
FRESH MEAT OFF THE BURGER PRESSES:
1. NEW COMIC by AARON K MARTIAN FLANEUR Another gem by our friend-- this one, a 5-pager about hanging out on Mars.
2. UNCLE MARUO on the cover of JUXTAPOZ NEW ISSUE The entire issue is a pretty weak rehash of the Japanese art/comics/graffito scene of like 2 or 3 years ago... and the Maruo article doesn't offer any new details, but it's worth the cover price for the superlovely full spreads of Maruo paintings and panels. Plus you get two short articles on Chiho Aoshima & Hysteric Glamour. But jeez, seems like Juxtapoz is biting Giant Robot's layout slightly in this issue as well. Even with their johnny-come-lately take, it's always nice to get more Maruo in print!
3. NEW KOJI AIHARA STRIP! as usual, please read from right-to-left.
Evan and I celebrated with a bout of Warriors head-to-head on PS2, Rock 'N' Roll High School and lots of junk food. wheeeee! Here's to another year of comic depravity, hilarity and ... obscurity? Looking to bring out shorts by Suehiro Maruo (lord, he's the patron saint of Samehat), Junji Ito and some fresh blood, more original horror and gag comics by us and our friends, etc. etc. SO MANY IDEAS, just gotta work on the whole 'execution and follow through' part of the process.
FRESH MEAT OFF THE BURGER PRESSES:
1. NEW COMIC by AARON K MARTIAN FLANEUR Another gem by our friend-- this one, a 5-pager about hanging out on Mars.
2. UNCLE MARUO on the cover of JUXTAPOZ NEW ISSUE The entire issue is a pretty weak rehash of the Japanese art/comics/graffito scene of like 2 or 3 years ago... and the Maruo article doesn't offer any new details, but it's worth the cover price for the superlovely full spreads of Maruo paintings and panels. Plus you get two short articles on Chiho Aoshima & Hysteric Glamour. But jeez, seems like Juxtapoz is biting Giant Robot's layout slightly in this issue as well. Even with their johnny-come-lately take, it's always nice to get more Maruo in print!
3. NEW KOJI AIHARA STRIP! as usual, please read from right-to-left.
Quick post today... Just wanted to mention another book you might want to add to your ERO/GURO/COMEDY 'SAME HAT LIBRARY' !
If Koji Aihara's name sounded familiar, it might be because he was 1/2 the team behind the infamous and slick parody manga instruction book, "Even A Monkey Can Draw Manga!" This is a really sweet marriage of picking on otaku nerdboys and outright self deprecation (He is awesome, YES, but the the dude does write queef & poo jokes, for god's sake!). A really hilarious book for anybody in the know-- Evan has a copy from waaaay back that we broke out again this week. It's still available via Amazon or Viz's homepage.
Thought it'd be a good mention as we move into a big batch of his 4-koma gag stuff in the coming week(s)! PLEASE ENJOY! Does anyone know - is there any truth to the rumors of a second volume of this title?
SAYS THE ABOVE REVIEW:
This mock-instructional tome is actually a hilarious parody in graphic novel form of those books which seek to advise one on "how to draw manga." But it is also a gripping comic book narrative in its own right about the struggle of two bumbling and desperate would-be know-it-alls — the authors of the book — in their vainglorious pursuit of comic book technique, wealth, and fame
Here is the first of a bunch of short strips by a weirdo manga artist we like. Straying from the absurd Sensha stuff into more... colorful pastures (read: BODY HUMOR!!). We're talking: Grandpa farting on his deathbed, a dying warrior seeing a cow shitting as his last earthly moment, highschool boys begging for a peek at their gf's nekopai's-- you know, the USUAL STUFF.
We'll do our damnedest to translate these as smoothly as possible; I've already put in extra hours looking up the precise term for various types of farts, and Evan's is sharpening his WACOM sylus to be sure we get those wanking off sound effects just right. As always, any kind of comments/suggestions are VERY appreciated by both of us.
