It's a story that involves good intentions, booze and DJ Krush.
Having had one too many drinks last weekend, I found myself at a friend's place watching a DJ Krush DVD. Not the worst way to end a boozey evening, as I like DJ Krush! Anyway, that reminded me I'd been on the lookout for nice relaxing work music, and that persuaded me to ask around if anyone knew of any good, relaxing, traditional Japanese music. Something heavy on the shamisen.
Surprisingly, a friend, who'd spent a bit of time in Japan, said "yes". She told me to get an album, any album, from the Yoshida Brothers, a pair who are apparently world famous for their shamisen exploits (and yet I'd never heard of them in my life).
So I did! Being new to it all, I grabbed "The Best Of The Yoshida Brothers", since you can rarely go wrong with a "Best Of", and gave it a listen. It was...good! But not great, and not really what I was after.
But then I got near the end and head something strange. Something familiar. I could have sworn I'd heard this song before....
Yup. Of all the random accidents of musical fate that I could have been led towards, all the centuries of artists toiling away on traditional Japanese music, I end up with an album that features the song from the Nintendo Wii commercials from 2006.
And I'm thankful for it! It's useless for work, but man it's a great song, especially when you can hear the whole thing and don't have to be distracted by cute cars and fibs about the motion-controlled future.