sakuran

But you know what happens when you cry wolf too often xD

we got it fam, that graphic design community college certificate valor won't let u exhale that easily

Lyrics aren't the best, but they have that kotekei sound down. At least that's what me and her think. I usually agree with most of what you post, but please don't shove your opinions down our throats. Especially when you have the audacity to compare them to Avanchick - that's insulting. But this is only their first song, so only time will tell whether or not they keep this sound.

So it's end of the year best-of list time, and I wanted to get involved... but I realized with more and more streaming of music rather than mp3s, and more and more me being lazy and not really listening to as much new stuff as I should: my best of 2016 list would be incomplete and hard to make because what I've been listening to isn't as easily organized by year in Spotify.
 
But I'm a narcissist who still wanted to get in on the fun and write *something* so I decided to highlight some of my favorite, or at least notable for one reason or another, looks from the VK world in 2016. Visual is in the name after all! I know hipsters, such as myself, say that the looks don't matter and it's all about the music, man... but I'll freely admit even though I'm not looking at a picture of the band for 98% of my listening to them, the aesthetics matter and part of the reason I like VK is that I enjoy looking at pretty boys in elaborate costumes rather than bearded dudes in black tshirts.
 
With that in mind here is my partially tongue-in-cheek but also I seriously thought about it 10 Notable VK Looks of 2016:
 
 

Garak’s Vocalist ジュリ

I call this the James Dean x Jesus.
 

Insanity Injection Vocalist Kyouka

Because of that YouTubers react video, this look may be the VK shot heard ‘round the world. “Looks like Kerrigan” is pretty accurate shorthand for Kyouka’s possessed crab/snake cannibal spirit costume that is almost elaborate enough to explain what the hell he’s been doing for the last ten years.
 

ペンタゴン Bassist Minpha

The kawaii-ness is undisputed around these parts… I’m embracing dark Minpha and his crown of demonic scallop shells.
 

乙女国家 Band

I know it’s a VK trope, but I seriously like it when band members all pick a different color and just commit. I’m never going to learn their names, so it helps to just be able to reference “the yellow one who borrowed some gloves from Ensoku’s This is a Pen PV”. Also for anyone else who’s been there: was this photo taken at the ramen ‘museum’ (read: food court) in Yokohama?? It kinda reminds me of that spot.
 

Doak Band

As a rapidly balding dude, I appreciate when even fake-baldness gets some shine in VK. Shout-out to the dude from Codoma A!
 

Avelcain Vocalist Karma

I bow at the altar of Avelcain… and I’m on the record as loving black-suit-wearing VK looks. Add some fucking palpable *zetsubou* and a sword for no real reason!?? I’m sold.
 

Elysion Band

They get my vote for best golden age Matina cosplay of the year. I saw them in June and there was just tons of vinyl and straps and lace and bare thigh and a frilly white dress and… there’s no joke here they just had an awesome/classic look. I don’t even remember what they sounded like, but I remember thinking their outfits and makeup had to take hours to get right before the show.
 

Lack-co. Vocalist Tenten

What you thought I wasn’t going to include this transcendent “it’s coming in nice” puberty mustache dyed red?? You don’t know me very well. He’s got some sort of black sequin freckles happening too for some Annie vibes.
 

Nihilizm Band

Just a look that I think really kills. Those red lace blindfolds are just cool IDK. The member with the bob is a cutie.
 
ギャロ Vocalist Jojo

I always love Jojo’s extremely sparkly lipstick…. And in this video (and others this year) he wins the award for most dangerously low-rise pants in VK. Got them side abs! I also don’t really understand his fork hat, but fuck it if you can’t get weird in VK where can you?
 
Close but no cigar: Hollowgram's grown up/understated black looks, vocalist from More's curls and one satyr horn, Plastic Tree vocalist pushing the bounds of how cool he can make cutting his own hair look
Purposefully Omitted: The Black Swan blackface, any boring not-quite Kamijo look
 
Let me know why I'm wrong and what should have been on this list!
 

Marco - Kindai Black (w/ photoset)
 
May sell this extra copy later on since I mainly wanted the photoset xD

 
Merry - Sakashima Endroll ~phantom of the gallery~

 
Should be getting some more goodies this week....

This is my view from the decade of being involved in the J-rock /vk scene.
 
I think the current slowdown of VK over the last few years has a number of factors behind it.
    
The first is the over saturation of bands in the scene. Not only did there seem to be more bands than ever in the VK scene but they more or less all sounded the same. It kinda makes sense that following the rise in the number of VK bands, there would be a huge number of disbandment's with the competition being so stiff, and very few bands actually innovating or at the very least making decent music. A vast increase of bands with the same cookie cutter sound and low quality output is a brickwall for any genre. This also has the effect of making labels and even fans, tired of VK bands, thus further ensuring a downward trend. 
 
Another reason is that VK is usually horribly promoted either by the labels or the bands themselves. They make such dumb decisions that end up costing them a ton of money, either by squandering it on ventures with very little to no returns, or over looking untapped but very potentially rich opportunities. This has always been a problem with the scene, but it becomes magnified on an even greater scale when you have a whole bunch of vk bands rise up and almost simultaneously implode back to back, month after month, year after year.
 
A big part of what I believe plays a major role for those outside of Japan is the accessibility to VK, and music in general. To an extent this has always been a problem with VK, but with a ton of file sharing sites, music blogs, and forums getting axed in the last couple of years, it is harder to find access to VK or Japanese music in general. There used to be a time where you could literally google some obscure Japanese band and get your hands on their releases without much effort. Today that’s rarely the case. Not only is the quantity of releases down, but it’s a lot harder to actually access them.  And while there has been good strides for Japanese music to be obtained legally for foreigners, it still leaves a lot to be desired.
 
As others have pointed out, the erosion of the VK community is another contributing factor for the decline of VK. I’m specifically talking about the online community outside of japan. I believe the online VK community is what kept the scene invigorated with interest and a steady supply of new bands. As to why the community has been drastically reduced I’ll point to the first reason I made and the one written above. This along with the fact that many listeners probably either outgrew the scene, and those that remained retreated to refugees like MH. So you’ve gone from a widespread but scattered ardent community, to a centralized but much smaller passionate community.  
 
VK was always a niche market, and I don’t think that will change anytime soon. I do think it has reached it’s critical mass and what we’re seeing now is the implosion of the scene. It’s not it’s death, but a remission after being over saturated, and with no new bands pushing forward, it’s established bands retiring and it’s community mostly gone and unable to keep it relevant and interesting as it once was. I don’t believe  EDM, or K-pop or whatever killed VK, or even affected it. I believe this was the inevitable direction VK was always heading in, and those genres just happened to coincide with it’s downfall. 
 
I do think there are less people getting into rock and metal but that has to do with an age difference. I believe the majority of us here grew up and were exposed to some sort of rock, metal or genre that used actual instruments. While most of the newer generation today is primarily exposed to electronica or mainstream pop and thus they end up heading down that route and have less of a chance of discovering rock, or something like VK. This wouldn’t be so bad if the electronica or pop they listened to weren’t soulless vapid unoriginal turds. It’s not impossible, but a lot harder for younger generations to get exposed to rock music in general.
 
I don’t think VK is dead or that it ever will be. Yes genres and styles fade into obscurity, some much more than others, but I think VK will definitely always stick around. Part of the reason is because bands like Luna Sea , and X  Japan, among a few others,  have made enough of a significant impact on the Japanese music scene to remain relevant and inspire younger generations, either directly, or indirectly.  The other part is that VK is super diverse in terms of  aesthetic appearance and in terms of genres, so it allows a ton of creative freedom, and makes it more likely and appealing for musicians to take part in it.
 
Another benefit from that genre diversity is that it keeps the door open for VK to enter different realms. While a strictly metal band would only have certain paths or opportunities in which to grow, just like pop would only have certain paths, VK has the advantage of covering a wide base of opportunities. Of course you still need a band that can actually makes good music and can play.  
 
On a side note I do think EDM and electronica get’s a bad rep. Like everything else there’s a lot of good and bad  in every genre and electronica is no exception. There’ s a ton of mainstream crap, but a lot of amazing stuff that has come in recent years too. And although it may be a different skillset , it still takes lots of skill and talent. You’ve got to synthesize lead synths, and sound design elements,  select or create your drum tones, know about music theory since everything is still based on chords, notes, and rhythms, be good with programming and on top of that do your own mixing and mastering. Kinda dislike this idea that electronica is just pushing one button, or that it requires no music theory or talent at all.   
 
Then again there's always those exceptions.
 
 

couldn't you hypothetically shitpost places like vkdb or visunavi by adding hundreds of fake bands and musicians like they're discarded sonic the hedgehog OCs or something?
 
or make up fake turborarez releases for oldies bands or smth

1.) this thread is amazing and restored the braincells i lost listening to deviloof
2.) how did i not read this earlier
3.) @Disposableis a jrawk god and the day he leaves us is the day god will DIE
4.) if anything was to happen to MH i'd point blank quit vk until i magically end up in japan and maybe then entertain it
5.) this was insanely informative, i didn't get into the scene until 2014 and i literally could not believe that an cafe video. its cool to hear about these relics and weird memories that exist only in the minds of u old farts so thanks for sharing
6.) @hirokihow you aren't some world renowned vk academic authority is beyond me...please make my dreams come true
7.) imma cite this for a pending weeaboo course you are ALL my people

how do u shitpost visunavi tho
 
***asking the important questions***

I understand that the situation might look a bit deformed from overseas and by looking at the internet medias, but visual kei has been dead for years in Japan already.
Now that many fans from overseas could visit Japan I thought it is common knowledge, but it is a fact that filling livehouses is becoming more and more painful especially for indie bands. Of course there are established bands with some following and  some exceptions, but most indie events have like what? 40 or 50 people in the crowd when they are lucky (and we are talking about events with like 6 to 10 bands performing). It's ridiculous that now bands who have a regular attendance of 15/20 people on events are considered fairly popular. Still it is cool how most bands can hide that by paying from their pockets and tave expensive photoshoots/music videos and release tons of material, but the truth is a bit different. 
 
People who have been in bigger bands before now do small live houses, and bands who are spending a lot of money on advertisement and media promotion are probably not even getting their money back. I was disappointed when Kamijo held his birthday live last summer, as he rented two venues, had a jazz orchestra and a choir play, invited a bunch of fairly popular musicians and band (including TV comedians), and even revived both Lareine and Versailles for one night, but the tickets were really far from selling out. An event of this scale would probably be full house 10 years ago. The Black Swan got featured on major TV shows because their drummer is raising a stray cat, and they are still getting little following.
 
Of course there will always be some sort of fanbase, but we are really far from that time when WHATEVER band, regardless of how bad or cheap looking they were they, could get a decent following with 0 promotion. Common sense norma (number of tickets a band has to sell at a multi-band event) in 2017 is 10 tickets or less, while it used to be 20-30 few years ago, and most gigs I have been seeing recently hardly had 5 people in the front row for each band. 
 
It feels like probably the visual kei core fanbase pretty much got a family/grew up/moved to something else and consequently the independent scene is slowly dying every year. Of course bands with bigger promotion and a decent management desk will still manage to keep going somehow.
And there is like huge following of male fans who buy the CDs but do not go the gigs. But their contribution to the scene is probably too small as most money comes from concerts and merchandise.
Japanese people already know visual kei, it has 0 shock value and conceptually connected to stuff that is like 30 years old like X Japan and so on. That makes it hard to get a younger generation of fans (and let's not forget about the negative exposure the scene got with people getting caught for sleeping with underage girls and so on). 

How did the vk boom of '09 affect you in your country?
 
A lot of people don't know about this but in 2009, Kagrra came to my country [Brazil] and did a complete gig in the city of São Paulo, this was my first time watching a Vrock band playing live, it was a cold night and the concert was outdoors. There are some unofficial footage if you search for "kagrra anime friends" on youtube.
Here is the setlist: http://www.setlist.fm/setlist/kagrra/2009/mart-center-sao-paulo-brazil-13d745c1.html
 
I have no words to explain how good it was; What an amazing atmosphere, I don't know If I'll ever experience this again in my life because I still really care about this band even though they're gone forever.
 
About the scene:
 
It looks like the Neo Visual-Kei scene is still going strong in Japan but many bands sounds just like each other, not all of them, but most.
I'm sure everyone knows these websites, but I'm putting them here because I think that they are examples of how Vrock isn't dead in Japan.
http://www.club-zy.com/
http://www.visunavi.com/ 
 
Anyway, here in Brazil we have a band once in a while; Jupiter is coming to play here this year.

As far as my knowledge on the topic goes, gender non-conformism in the aesthetics of Visual Kei is not necessarily from a social cause perspective though... I mean, they are not dressing like that for awareness and empathy with gender non-conforming people; the looks of Visual Kei started as disruptive and  provoking elements to shock a very conformist and rigid society and, as time went by it became just a form of artistic expression which can be exerted from many angles.
 
Being gender non-conforming isn't a ticket to liking Visual Kei. The interest in it is a matter of personal taste regardless of gender expression.

I think I'm going slightly off-topic here, so I apologize for that, but this seems like a good time to mention this anyway.
 
I've always found it a little perplexing that people often tend to consider electronic software, turntables, and other things associated with electronic music to somehow not be instruments. I mean the literal definition of an instrument is "a tool or implement, especially one for precision work". In a musical context that essentially just means a tool that you feed inputs to to generate music. A voice, a flute, an acoustic guitar, an electric guitar, and musical software are all instruments; they're just tools you feed inputs to generate a desired sound. The only thing that changes between them is how 'artificial' they are in the sense that some are entirely driven by natural means (the voice), some are a fusion of natural and artificial elements (an electric guitar), and some are primarily artificial (musicial software), but all of them still need a good talented musician feeding them inputs to create truly good music.
 
I think by arguing that, due to the increasing prevalence of electronic software and the like, musicians are
is a bit of a dangerous train of thought. Mainstream pop music has been doing this for quite a while now, long before electronic software became as extensive as it is today. The fact that mainstream pop is incorporating more and more electronic elements shouldn't be conflated with the mistaken belief that all music made with electronic instruments follows this approach of making music. The truth is that great musicians will produce great music no matter what tools they use, and if anything the only thing determining their choice of instruments should be the aural qualities of the music they're trying to make. There are plenty of really talented musicians making really brilliant, primarily electronic music. At the same time there are plenty of musicians making music with more traditional instruments that, as @Zeus said, is utter garbage.
 
Basically I think we should pull away from assuming that the development of electronic music is one of the main contributors to the decline of VKs popularity; at least not in the sense that music created with these sorts of tools is inherently more simple, catchy, and poppy than music created with more traditional instruments - that just feels snobby to me. It could have contributed in the sense that musical fads have transitioned from the emo/scene music of the mid 2000s to the DJ/Club music of today, but implying that this transition is the result of some sort of inherent flaw in electronic instruments versus traditional instruments feels wrong to me.

Huh, by 2009 I was heading into my longest break from visual-kei so to speak. Especially after disbanding of Kagerou, Rentrer en Soi and Phantasmagoria. Some of other favourites followed soon after, cementing the break for me. The fandom in my country fragmented itself few years earlier, and I had no idea how to approach the groups of young, new fans. I was way too old for this stuff in their eyes.
 
I also remember it was the time v-kei fandom started losing its presence on manga convention - before there was always j-music dedicated room, or even two - one for prelections, events, contests, make-up presentations etc, and other for pv viewing.
 
Global fandom wise I think it's a combination of several factors. Tightened anti-piracy grip which made it harder for new people to find something and gain their introduction, could be one thing. Fall of myspace and great livejournal exodus too. I still fondly remember numerous communities either focused on band, label, or other kind of activity, like live reports, magazine scans, making pretty graphics, lyrics translation, fanart and so on. Fansites died a bit before too.
 
Tumblr might be okay for pretty graphics, but it's hard to hold a discussion there. You can have a blog dedicated to one thing, where you only reblog things related to that - but it's a blog, not community of people who interact with each other. 

Even D'espairsRay took a huge financial loss on their MONSTERS tour in the USA. Like I said in my last post there were plenty of online fans begging D'espairsRay to come but not everyone could make it. I remember by the end they were begging people to buy a ticket. I would have...if they didn't play shows exclusively on the West Coast
 

So then what really matters is the red line and the blue line is extra? That falls in line with what everyone is saying; visual kei was a fad that died out overseas but more or less remained a constant force in Japan (however weak that may be). What's very interesting is how the interests seem to be converging between Japanese fans and overseas.
 
 
 
 
I also forgot to mention one pivotal event around the start of 2010 2012 that was a real kick in the ass for visual kei. The death of MegaUpload took out so many archived files it wasn't funny. There's still some stuff you can't find today! Byouto went offline. The lossless website Gakuon had to move to P2P exclusively. Private servers got even more private. The files being seized were one thing; the paranoia that came after hasn't really gone away. @CAT5 has plenty of stories from the indie side.

There's a few things I want to point out while the topic is still young.
 
This is only reliable to gauge foreigner interest in visual kei. I do not know if Japanese fans of visual kei use Google, a different type of search engine, or if they avoid the process altogether and share privately. We have to combine this data with some other sources of data for more info. But this is a great start. The focus is on March 2009 but the rate of decrease is at its highest in 2010 roughly a year later. Then it peters out. What gives? Well, that's when Tainted World died off and we had to navigate to our ZetaBoards replacement. We used it until the end of 2010-2011 when we are able to get some real hardware and hosting providers (before we were running on total crap and the forum could barely stay up...oldies remember that). In that time I imagine a lot of people's interest died off since they couldn't get free music anymore. Tour managers shitting the bed bringing visual kei to the masses; fans shitting the bed asking for bands to come and then not going to the concerts. The sound changing. 2009 is where I'd peg the overall direction of visual kei to change to what it is today. I can't describe it aurally but we all know VK in 2016 isn't the same as VK in 2006. I think this lost a lot of people too when their favorite bands disbanded and there was no one to fill the void.

^ This. To all these people acting like, "oh noooo, MH won't have any news posts now that Trombe is no longer here!! such pointless, much dead forum, wow"
 
Other people are perfectly capable and willing to post news. I imagine the reason very few people tried to before (myself included, though I did make a few attempts) is because they felt intimidated by the fact that Trombe had such a monopoly on the news section and there was no point in trying to post news yourself, even if you managed to post it before Trombe, because some ghost thread would show up five minutes later anyway. It's not as if we're all a bunch of helpless babies that can't do anything on our own. Trombe was impressive because s/he managed to do most of this single-handedly, and it was certainly appreciated, but there is no reason why a single person has to keep doing it. You can sit around whining in this thread all day, or you can think about contributing in some small part to help keep things just as active as they ever were.

A universal truth about visual kei is that it is forever changing. The tiniest of bands can grow into an influential force given a few years, the largest of bands can end a legacy with one tweet, and there's an ever-growing catalog of unique and defunct bands lost to time whose talents will never be truly replicated. However, since nothing is original anymore, I'd love to see someone try their hand at it. I've listed a total of five bands or musicians who at one point had a unique, definitive sound I'd love to see come back.
 

D'espairsRay (1999-2007)
Sound: Dark, depressing, gothic industrial metal
 
 

Kagrra,
Sound: A classic rock sound with a cultural twist
 
 

愛狂います。(Aicle.)
Sound: Quirky, turn of the century rock and metal
 
 

RENTRER EN SOI (up to Sphire-Croid)
Sound: undescribable
 
 
 
 

A (Anonymous Confederate Ensemble)
Sound: Rock with a cultural twist
 
 
That's all for me! Given time, there are plenty more bands that I would love to see reincarnated in some fashion. What bands do you want to hear again?

I made this because I'm petty

Every once in a while I'll wander into these "new band" threads and then get a painful reminder of why I try to avoid them.

Additionally all of those photos were taken by me.

2016, people bitching and moaning about being charged and shit for weed.
Here I am, personally wondering why if it isn't a "big deal" to you guys then why do you do it when it's 100% clearly illegal?
 
Like, jesus fucking christ, guys. I don't care if it's literally the shits of God, you don't fuck like that with your government. You've got the means to challenge laws, go do so, but don't do it by being a dumb fuck cunt rebellious teenager and then bitch about it later when it finally bites you in your arse.

X Japan finally releases the album. It comes packaged with three unreleased songs only, and at the end of the day, it's still three new X Japan songs too many.[2] 
 
Anfiel disbands amid a bangya debacle; band claims that the vocalists aunt is sick. That's not the end of it however, and every other band Hiroki likes is soon to follow. 
 
A new DADAROMA single gets released sometime in 2017. It gets uploaded on MH six months later but only as a youtube rip. The thread is not locked because everyone is desperate. 
 
The world is torn in fiery debate whether blackdoll's ban ending or Lycaon's continuing activity is the greatest tragedy the international community will face in 2017. 

X Japan Album doesn't come out Mako (of deadman) comes out of hiding, releases something small like some poems, and then goes back and hides again. D'espairsRay teases us again with a return, but it is only a single show Ryo of girugamesh continues to be a cocktease with his youtube stuff all year, finally announces something at the end of 2017 toe does another North American tour aie starts a new band 2017 will be considered a much better year than 2016 for VK There will be more shitty drama on MH