Page 51 - e-magazine391R

The Scene in Japan and before committing to
writing full time. He has
Read any Haruki also professed that Jack
“There was a small coffee “Murakami novel Kerouac, a prolific mem-

shop near the university and it is easy to tell the ber and one of the pio-
neers of the Beat Gener-
inescapable grip jazz once
where I hung out with had on Japan,” Taylor ation, serves as one of his

friends. It wasn’t much of Bond declares in her blog inspirations.
post “Back in Swing: The
Interestingly enough,
anything, but it offered Secret Subculture of Jazz you can trace the reflec-
Cafes” for the English-lan-
certain constants: hard rock guage news and opinion tions of the evolution of
culture through the de-
and bad coffee. website, JAPAN Forward. velopment of music, and
these
transformations
himself
Murakami
She’d always be sitting in the once owned a jazz club, were present in cafés,
same spot, elbows planted Peter Cat, after graduating dives, and halls.
from Waseda University
on the table, reading. [...]

Always her coffee would

be cold, always her ashtray

full of cigarette butts. The
only thing that changed was

the book. One time it’d be

Mickey Spillane, another

time Kenzaburo Oe, another

time Allen Ginsberg.

[...]Those were the days of

the Doors, the Stones, the
Byrds, Deep Purple, and the

Moody Blues. The air was

alive, even as everything

seemed poised on the verge

of collapse, waiting for a
push.”

Haruki Murakami

A Wild Sheep Chase, p. 4-5
Image courtesy vinyloftheday.com
Murakami, at home with his vinyl collection.