Man, it’s a hell of a day for interviews out there. Here are three I’ve come across lately:

TokyoGraph has a translated interview with Visual Kei’er Miyavi, in which he talks about his new album “This Iz The Japanese Kabuki Rock.” Apparently he was particularly focused on expressing pride as a Japanese person, using traditional Japanese drums, the shamisen, and even geta sandals as a tapping noise on one track. The CD also apparently contains what Miyavi says is his “first erotic entry.” Rawr! I’ve heard some clips on Miyavi’s official website and the CD sounds badass.

Meanwhile Japanator’s Dale North had a chat with Nirgilis while they were at Anime Matsuri in Houston. The members talk about their history and influences, and apparently one of them admits to being an otaku; two of them mention a bunch of favorites (Keroro Gunso, Evangelion, Death Note, Gunbuster, Ichigo Marshmallow, Crayon Shin-chan…).

Now, the third interview isn’t music-related, it’s con-related: ActiveAnime talked to the founder of Zuiichi, a new kind of anime event taking place in Vancouver, WA (near Portland, OR) on August 3rd.

I’ll foreword this by noting that I have friends who run Portland’s KumoriCon, and that I believe this new event Zuiichi is being run by former K-con staffers, so maybe I’m biased, but…$150 to spend a weekend watching a handful of anime and a lot of Serenity and Firefly?

Now, there are some neat aspects to this “elite” event, which is supposed to be more about fandom than anime specifically (hence all the Whedon stuff). It actually takes place at a theater called Cinetopia, so they actually have full-on theater screens to show stuff, which is neat. And they do have a couple of relatively unique events: a sake tasting, for example, and a “pocky marshmallow roast.”

But the rest looks like pretty standard far, and the only guest so far is…PDX Browncoats, the Portland Firefly fanclub. $150 is a lot of money for that. (They also have a $60 ticket that features entry to one movie and a dinner of some kind.) I’ll be in town that weekend, but I don’t know if I’ll go.

The Hollywood Reporter talked to TOKYOPOP’s Stu Levy. Remember how TOKYOPOP was gonna do a live-action version of the manga Lament of the Lamb, about a couple of kids with vampiric tendencies (except that vampire-dom is made scientific)?

Apparently the film is still on, and Levy wants it to be the “world’s first teen-psychological-horror 3-D production.” Psychological horror? Like, along the lines of Ringu or something? That’s not quite how I remember the manga, but okay.

Hey, wait a sec…

Based on the Kei Toume manga “Lament of the Lamb,” the goth-flavored tale revolves around a slightly anemic high-school boy named Blake Edwards, who meets a beautiful girl called Jira. Their relationship becomes increasingly intense — and gory — before a final twist.

…Blake Edwards? I thought the guy’s name was Kazuna. And the girl was Chizuna, not Jira. (Apparently some casting is being done and “Jira” will be played by an actual Japanese OMG!) And the film is going to be called Love Like Blood? If they take out the incest-flavored goodness, I’ll be REALLY PISSED OFF, T-POP!

Seriously though, the anglification of the main character’s name alone makes me fear for this project. If they turn Lament of the Lamb into some trashy teen slasher flick, I’ll be damned before I see it.

I mean, if you’re going to do a movie adaptation of a manga, be somewhat similar to the manga. If you wanted to do an entirely different story, why not hire one of your OEL creators to make a comic of it and THEN adapt it into a movie? C’mon, Stu. I’m worried here. Don’t do something that’ll make fans compare you to 4Kids, for chrissakes. That is NOT a comparison you want.

The folks at MyAnimeList have translated an article in which the president of Kadokawa, Fukuda Tadashi, says that “it’s sad” to see anime get removed from YouTube due to complaints from copyright owners, because it helps spread the anime goodness (and sell character goods).

Now, if I remember correctly, Kadokawa has had some dealings with JASRAC, which has put serious pressure on YouTube to remove infringing content, not to mention demanding (and getting) the removal of 30,000 YouTube vids back in October ‘06, including a bunch of Haruhi videos. *cough* (Note: Kadokawa is not listed as one of the organizations directly involved in the request, but some of the groups include The Association of Japanese Animations and the Motion Picture Producers Association of Japan, Inc., which are bound to have some Kadokawa connections.)

On the other hand, Kadokawa now has a deal with YouTube in which Kadokawa establishes its own “channel” and provides its own content, so I guess they’re not in much of a position to diss YouTube at the moment.

ANN has posted an interview with a fansubber from the group Live-eviL talking about various aspects of subbing, from the technical to the ethical.

I have a few issues with the interview, and thankfully they don’t all involve awkward English (”ethicality”? Technically a word, but…). For example, on page 2, the interviewer– Zac Bertschy, aka Answerman –says that anime downloading can’t be compared to the anime industry because “musicians can still make money with live performances if their product is being passed around gratis. Anime companies can’t. It’s not really the same problem.”

First off, some anime companies DO make money from live performances, such as the big Haruhi event in ‘07 or anime-based stage musicals. Admittedly, that’s not terribly common, but anime companies can ALSO make money off of a little thing called merchandising (maybe you’ve heard of it?). And finally, anime on TV is paid for largely by advertising. So, theoretically, anime companies COULD still make money even passing around the product for free, though it would involve restructuring their business model entirely. Which probably needs to happen anyway.

That doesn’t make fansubbing not still a problem of course, but it’s a point to be made.

I think that the anonymous fansubber makes a really good point on page three; he’s talking about old habits dying hard, how hard it is for people to give up smoking, and then says that fansubbing is a community project. I think what he’s getting at is: it’s hard to give up a community. No one ever wants to take down the circus tents and go home when the party can continue. Perhaps a big part of the “fansubbers are big anime fans” paradox involves that idea.

Bertschy then goes on to press the subber to explain why groups OTHER than his went and subbed GitS:SAC when Bandai asked them not to, which the poor guy does to the best of his ability, and the two chat about the state of the fandom and industry in general. Fansubber-dude makes another good point at the end:

Fansubbing isn’t going to stop no matter what anyone does unless you make it obsolete.

Ghibli World just posted translations of a new interview with Hayao Miyazaki and Toshio Suzuki regarding Ponyo on a Cliff, in which Miyazaki says the following:

I moved the location of Hans Christian Andersen’s Little Mermaid to the Japan of today and cut off the Catholic color. It will show an adventure and love of small kids.

It sounds a little weird, until you realize he just means that it’s about a water-dweller that wants to become human, and not that the main fishy character will wind up literally dying for her beloved.

This is a story about a fish kid that has a selfish wish to get along with Sousuke, a human boy, and carries out her intention. Meanwhile it is a story about the 5 year old boy Sousuke carrying out his promise.

Sounds cute, no? Also, in this article I very erroneously reported that Miyazaki’s next film would involve a Japanese lullaby; in fact, it’s actually a new Ghibli flick involving cofounder Isao Takahata. So if Miyazaki will be involved, we don’t know yet. Sorry ’bout that!

UCLA’s Asia Pacific Arts online magazine (which former aO writer Bryan Hartzheim occasionally writers for, though he didn’t do this one) features an interview with the dub actors, writers, and director. Normally I don’t find much very interesting in these kinds of interviews; people just talk about what makes their roles fun or different or whatever and that’s kind of it.

But this time mentions something really interesting: the dub for Blood+ was apparently on a “fast track,” and the writing was all done while the show was still in production in Japan, which means that the dub writers didn’t actually know what was going to happen in the series.

Interestingly, they also talk about fansubs– and very positively:

I think it’s great as long as they can enjoy the show…. So if this brings something to them and if they can feel like part of the show doing that, go for it! You see, it gets it out there and I don’t think it detracts from what we end up doing because we bring something different to it.

…Of course, these guys are doing a show that’s airing on Cartoon Network, and one that wasn’t aired until long after the original series finished…

Still, interesting read.