June Poll Results & June Calander Up

June already? Jeesh...

So the "Where Do You Buy Your Japanese Music?" poll is over, and the winner is clear! CDJapan was voted 2-1 over runner-up Yes-Asia in the physical CD category. I know that I've used them both in the past with great results. I currently use CDJapan almost exclusively to get actual CD hard-copies.

MP3s fared much the same, with iTunes also winning out 2-1 over second place JapanFiles. To be fair, iTunes has been around much long and is almost infinitely larger than JapanFiles, so JapanFiles actually did relatively well!

I'm all out if new poll ideas at the moment. I'd love to hear if anyone out there has something interesting they'd like to see. Leave a comment and let me know what you want to see.

The June Calendar is also up. After last month's record setting number of shows, this month is looking a little slim. Check out the list and let me know what's missing.

Thanks again for reading the blog. As always, there is much more on the way. Oh, like the half-year Best Of list! Hoo boy, this year's going to be tough...

And finally....

Reminder: May Poll Ends June 1st

Just a quick reminder, the May Poll ends in less than a week! You still have time to let the world know where it is you buy your Japanese music. Right now CDJapan has a strong lead over second place YesAsia. Also, just in case it's not obvious, you can select more than one option, so make sure to check all the places your regularly use. The poll is located on the top right of the blog.

While you're doing that, check out this video from Polysics
for their new single "Young Oh! Oh!" Awesome!

May Poll - Where Do You Buy Your Music?

This month's poll is a simple one. Where do you buy your Japanese music? Do you buy physical CDs and DVDs, or do you prefer digital downloads? Personally, I'm a liner-notes nerd, not to mention a huge fan of album art and design, so I need to have a physical object to go along with my music. I've picked up a few things from iTunes, but I shop at CDJapan for the vast majority of my music.

What about you? Feel free to mark a few different stores if you like to shop around, but I'm really just looking to see where you go most of the time. Oh, and if you don't see a store listed that you use a lot, then by all means share your links in the comments. I'd also love to hear any personal anecdotes you'd like to share about your experiences with any music outlets, both good and bad. Anything we should avoid at all costs? Had someone go above and beyond to help with an order? Let the world know. Thanks!

(And oh yeah, the poll is located at the top right-hand side of the blog.)

Reminder: February Poll Ends March 1st

Only one day left before the February poll wraps up! Other than band profiles, what kind of posts would you most like to see on the blog? Right now it looks like you constant readers out there would very much like to see more album reviews. A distant second are the calendar posts, with a sprinkling of new video posts.

Have you voted yet? If not, time is very quickly running out. The poll will close March 1st, so make your voice heard! Thanks!

Poll Results & New February Poll

Finally, the results are in! The readers have voted, letting the world (well, just me, really) know what genre of music they (meaning you) would like to see more of on the blog.

The biggest vote was for keeping things "as-is," meaning just allowing me to go about my usual totally random path, letting my whim be my guide. While I'm very happy to see that result (I mean, that should be part of why you're reading the blog regularly in the first place, right?) I'd still prefer to at least try and find things that people want to read.

With that out of the way, the next most popular choice was a tie between indie rock and vis-kei. This is also a pretty nice result. Since we know that vis-kei is pretty popular right now, it's good to see that old-fashioned indie rock is just as important to readers.

After that, it was electro, then punk. I know I haven't been really heavy on the punk coverage, so I'll see what I can do about that. Everything else came in distant places after that, with pop being dead last. Again, not entirely surprising since I don't think most readers are coming here looking for coverage of the latest idols. (^_^)

Overall, the results fell just about where I was expecting, and secretly hoping. It's good to know I'm hitting all the right notes with my readers, or that I'm at least getting close to the mark. As always, I'd love to hear anything you have to say about what you see here.

Finally, the new February poll is up! This month I'm looking to hear about what other kinds of posts you want to see on the blog. Do you like the calendar posts? Want more album reviews? Single reviews? Like to hear about new PVs? How about just any old music video that's cool in some way? General music news? Or should I just skip all that and focus only on the band profiles? Again, you can only pick just one, so choose wisely. You have until March 1st.

Thanks for taking the time to help make ZB's A-Z a little bit better for everyone. Make sure to pass the word on to anyone else you know that's into the Japanese scene. Thanks!