kuboRECIPE
Make Your Own Gloomy Bear!
Serves 1

Ingredients:
1 Carebear
6 6-inch long claws
1 Tablespoon rubber cement
1/2 Cup human blood
A dash of psychotic drugs

Directions:
1. Attach claws to carebear’s hands using rubber cement.
2. Splash human blood liberally around carebear’s mouth and newly attached claws.
3. Use psychotic drugs and envision your newly made carebear-turned -gloomybear chasing your friends around.

We at kuboTEN like things on the cheap. So when the Gloomy Bear craze hit Japan, we decided to try our hand at DIY and came up with the above recipe. Having trouble procuring 1/2 cup of human blood? kuboTEN heartily recommends this handy tool.

If you’re still having trouble finding that human blood, we guess we can forgive you for having a peek at the current auction listings for a pre-fab Gloomy.

Legendary Japanese animator Hayao Miyazaki is at it again, this time releasing a new feature film that returns to a simpler, lighter story akin to My Neighbor Totoro.  In Ponyo on the Cliff by the Sea, Miyazaki has focused on the ocean as the inspiration for his cellulose canvas, and with over 170,000 hand-drawn frames he has created a visual masterpiece worthy of Jacques Custeau’s envy.  Some of the cels have even made their way into the public’s hands, and you can own your own piece of Ghibli history for yourself!

The adorable little Ponyo and her ridiculously addictive theme song has taken Japan by storm, making it all the way to 3rd on the Japanese charts after the release of the film last August.  You can now find Ponyo encapsulated in a variety of cute trinkets and toys, and you can get a taste of Ponyo for yourself while you wait for the film to release worldwide!

But where can one go to have one’s ears melted? As ear-melting parlors seem to have gone out of fashion in recent days, the most reliable way to have an ear-melting session is to do it in the safety of your own home. This has the added benefit of keeping your audio “o” face private as you reach your auditory climax.

For your very own ear-melting experience in the privacy of your own home, kuboTEN is bringing you the new Denon AH-D7000 headphones! The D7000’s promise to better the already fantastic D5000’s, and the initial impressions from Japanese headphone blogs is that the D7000’s have an incredibly romantic and lush midrange while being more resolving than the D5000’s. The D7000’s have also been said to have incredibly fast, high-impact bass which remains beautifully articulated.

In addition to the impressive sonic upgrades, the D7000’s mahogany wood cups now have a fine glossy finish. These new Denons might finally give some competition to the hand-lacquered Audio Technica woody line as the most dazzling headphones ever made. What they won’t do, however, is melt your eyes… which we hear is actually a horrifyingly painful experience. So feel free to put an order in with kuboTEN for the AH-D7000 and we promise your eyes will stay safe!

One part anime queen, one part J-Pop starlet, and one part otaku imagination, the Vocaloid synthetic voice generator has given millions of wannabe songwriters a face to go along with their music. Using Yamaha’s Vocaloid computer music sequencing software, anyone could create lyrics and music that sound remarkably realistic and professional.

Enter Miku Hatsune.

With samples from anime voice actress Saki Fujita (of Bleach fame), Yamaha introduced one of the finest and most realistic voice synthesizers to date. The extremely moe-like characteristics of Ms. Fujita’s voice make songs recorded with the Miku Hatsune Vocaloid2 package sound like they could have been taken straight from the soundtrack of the latest anime series.

But what’s a cute voice without a cute face to match? Miku Hatsune’s character design in conjunction with her sweet and innocent voice has created a pop force to be reckoned with. She is now featured in copious amounts of fan-based internet videos, drawings, and songs, and is fast becoming a cosplay favorite along with keychains, figures, and other goods. Miku has also crossed into the video gaming world, as she was recently featured as a character in the Nintendo DS game 13 sai no Hello Work.

There may be no limit to how far she can climb the J-Pop charts. Will this usher in a new era of synthetic pop darlings?

STAX Electrostatic Headphones

A few decades ago, on an island far, far away…

Pursued by the Empire’s sinister agents, Princess Omega-II races home aboard her SRM-007 starship, custodian of the plans that can bring sonic equality and balance to the galaxy.

And thus began the epic battle that is the electrostatic transducer against the dynamic coil. Audio enthusiasts have long debated the benefits and detractors of vibrating electrocharged film as a means of generating sound, but what is not up for debate is that STAX creates the finest in electrostatic amplifiers and headphones that money can buy. And if you like saving money, you’d do well to take a look at what STAX stuff goes for in Japan.

Dig Deeper

Auction | Baseball Card Menko

Auction | Sumo Menko

Auction | Ultraman and Astroboy Menko

Video | Kids Battling… Menko-style!

Sadaharu Oh’s rookie card.  Godzilla getting beat down by Mothra.  Mario eating ‘shrooms.  Doraemon helping Nobita.  A ninja with glasses.  What do all these have in common?  Aside from being Japanese and being awesome in their own right, they are also all featured on highly collectible menko trading cards.

Back in the day, kids played a game with menko cards in which the object was to flip over your opponents cards using only the force from the wind generated by throwing down your own menko card.  Flip the card over, and it was yours.  Many lost friendships and throwing stars to the eye resulted.

In the 21st century, a new dawn of enlightened thinking is upon us.  No longer are there scuffles between best friends forever owing to the gust of wind that flipped over little Akira’s favorite Pokemon card.  Instead, the monetary battle for collectibles has begun in a virtual world.  And we, being the blood-thirsty wretches that we are, would like to facilitate this battle by bringing you menko cards straight from Japan.  With production spanning from the late Edo Period all the way through to the early 1990’s, we’re almost certain you’ll be able to find nostalgic menko in your particular area of interest.

* No Googling to find the answer. Cheaters suck.
* You get 1 HP for every tune you know.
* You get -1 HP for every tune you don’t know.

1. Whistle the Super Mario Bros. Theme Song.
2. Hum one of the Tetris songs on the original gameboy.
3. Clap the rhythm to the Street Fighter II intro music.

How’d you do? If you ended up with positive HP, good for you! You will most definitely enjoy the J-indie group YMCK. They are a super fun, high energy, kawaii trio that sample exclusively from 8-bit sources and layer gleeful lyrics on top of their catchy melodies. Give them a listen, watch them on YouTube, and we promise that you too will be instantly hooked on YMCK!

And if you ended our little game with a negative HP total… you may not be down with the hardcore gaming crowd but you might still enjoy YMCK!

It was a time when Axl and Slash were still wailing together; a time when Andre the Giant roamed the earth; a time when arcade games were synonymous with dark, claustrophobic spaces and Chuck E. Cheese pizza.  Yes, I speak of the 80’s, a magnificent era in which the legendary Gunpei Yokoi of Nintendo came up with the idea to put a 200 lb. arcade cabinet into your pocket.  As legend has it, Yokoi was inspired by watching a bored business man playing with his calculator on the train. Thus, the predecessor to the Gameboy was born.

Boasting LCD screens and colorful/robotic plastic shells that just scream “look, I’m from the 80’s!”, Game and Watch versions of classics like Donkey Kong and Mario Brothers were indispensable on those long road trips with the fam.  The portable games even doubled as a fully functioning watch, so you knew exactly how long you had been pushing little LCD Mario around!

Game and Watch portables have earned a soft spot in the hearts of video game collectors worldwide.  Check out the original Japanese versions designed by Gumpei himself!

Drugs and candy don’t mix.  That’s what purveyors of the Just Say No campaign from the swinging 80’s would have you believe.  Well, never being the ones to align with convention, the magical oompa-loompas at the Glico chocolate factory have gone ahead and laced their chocolate with gamma-aminobutyric acid (GABA).

Ok ok, so this isn’t the same GABA known in some circles as liquid ecstasy, but it is a neurotransmitter that has been linked to relaxation of the mind and body.  These little chocolate balls aren’t just packed with state-changing amino acids either; they also taste really, really good.

For the past year and a half, GABA chocolates have taken Japan by storm and are fast becoming the sedative of choice for stressed-out OL’s and salarymen across the country.  Whether it’s because of the taste of the chocolate, the possibly addictive powers of the GABA neurotransmitter, or a clever marketing campaign, we here at kuboTEN can’t get enough of these things and heartily recommend you try some too!

Being kuboTEN’s landmark first kuboBLURB, the anime series known as The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya gets a nice little plug as we bring you some of the coolest figures to come out of… HEY! OW! What are you....

Thanks. You aren’t an alien, time traveler, or esper, so I’ll take it from here.

Greetings, normal humans of the internet.  Suzumiya Haruhi here.  It has come to my attention that a great number of you have come to worship me as a deity.  While I don’t find that entirely surprising, it is quite taxing on me to always be present for all your worshiping needs.  So, as a way to appease your desire to continually bask in my physical presence, I have commissioned Figma Japan to create an effigy in my likeness.  Now you can have me around all the time so you will never get lonely!

Notice: Putting my likeness in fanservice poses will not go unpunished.  You have been warned by the omniscient one (Haruhi).