News from DJ Kebi in Tokyo:

There was a gathering of Prince fans here a couple weeks ago. About 30 or 40 people showed up, all Japanese (except me!) and almost all members of the NPGMC. Several had flown to Minneapolis for the celebration last year and plan to do the same in 2002; one young woman is going to study English at a school in Minneapolis just so she can be near Paisley Park! The DJs played a wide variety of Prince and related-artists stuff, leaning heavily on post-Rave tracks but also pulling from the early albums and the Time LPs. The event was also a Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis tribute, with lots of Janet, SOS Band, Alexander O'Neal, and so on.

Also, The Rainbow Children will finally get a proper release here in Japan on February 6 through Victor Entertainment. The CD won't have any bonus tracks, but will have a translated lyric sheet (into Japanese), limited-time access to a special website, a sticker, and a chance to win a t-shirt. (Record companies in Japan tend to load domestic releases of foreign CDs with little goodies to justify their high prices.)

A friend of mine works for a radio station here and she hooked me up with a promo flier (in Japanese) and a one-track "Last December" promo CD single, which comes in a slim case with the album cover on the front and info in Japanese. I scanned both below:

http://www.hoops.livedoor...Jflier.JPG
http://www.hoops.livedoor...single.JPG

"Last December" is currently number 23 on the J-Wave Tokio Hot 100 chart, up from number 29 last week. "The Work (Part 1)" is number 97 on the same chart. I don't know about the requests, but my friend tells me that the directors of that station are crazy about Prince.

http://www.j-wave.co.jp/o...kiohot100/

One more Tokyo mention:
On Inter-FM, another big Tokyo station, "Last December" is at Number 9 this week, up from Number 18!!

http://www.interfm.co.jp/.../index.cgi

[Cool, thanks for the report from the East; sounds like you guys had a ball, and that's what it's all about! -Ben]