diryangrey

i'm so glad i'm not the only one who loved karma, there's just so much different shit going on in that record but tbh it all really connects

I was so biased and trash and clicked on "Homura Uta" because I fell in love with this album when I had the chance to hear it live last year and for those overalls ya kno' im sayin' XD. But in all honesty, everything from the lyrics to the instrumental and the bass just clicked with me and formed this beautiful harmony for my ears (but dat intro doe <3). And can we talk about "Kaeranu Hito"? Boy that kills me every time. And freaking "Kimi ni Sachi Are"? Guuurl I wish good ol' 16 years me listened to this instead of other songs when I would be heartbroken. But now, for study purposes I will admit it has nice curse words in it, just refreshing to the ear <3. And "Zetsubou" was what I listen to during finals week after every exam \bitter laugh\. "Uso de Yagamu Shinzo" made me cry my eyes out when I heard it live. I loved this song when I got into them and to finally hear it live, shit was liiiit.
 
I also loved and still love me some "Karma" any damn time. That album has literally everything : edm songs that bring out that raver in me, Tatsuro's computerized voice that doesn't sound bad to me, Miya's toy that he used to make some futuristic sounds there (what was that toy anyway XD) that freaking broke in the end and they probably won't use it again ehehe XD, freaking Polaris just hold me and cuddle me because that song ruins me to the core and songs like "Hane" and "A." who make me straight up ugly sob worse than any rom-com ever did (I know, I'm a crybaby XD). I may sound like a peasant but I've never listened to an album like that before ehehe XD. I can say that that's what made me love them more : the fact that Miya stood there like "You know what, it's time to pull out my DJ skills and incorporate them in an album kthxbye ya'll". And for the love of everything, there's a DAMN GOAT and disco balls on a grass field just chilling on the covers of the albums. And there's also the song Lion that's just worth blasting it out at 6 am, on a summer, after getting out of the club and watching the sun rise like a G (not that I ever did that psshh XD).

In my opinion, I don't find MiA average. I admit to being biased, but I'm usually pretty good at saying when my faves aren't actually that awesome. 
 
However, I do want to see him in more situations that challenge what he's capable of as a guitarist and to switch things up a little. He went to a high school specifically for guitar, he composed most of Mejibray's music, and from watching him - not to negate his showmanship, because he's always really fun to watch, but he makes his solos look so easy I feel like he could play them asleep at this point. I'll never be happy about this hiatus, but I'd like to see him do something exciting and different. (Not to say networking isn't a factor at all, boy networks his ass off lol.)
 
Also, re: shady business practices, SO MUCH THIS.

holding my hopes up for a SERAPH cover of Agitated Screams of Maggots

unpopular opinion maybe but imho best case scenario would be all four members joining/starting new bands, w/ maybe a token meji reunion or single every few years or so
kinda feel like meji already did the best it could do & the members still have potential outside that particular band

oh hey, someone mentioned ナイトメア on here and i get to be relevant again~

i'm taking a guess and assuming your copy of ジャイアニズム is the 2006 VAP remaster, which in my opinion sounds absolutely terrible.
通常版 is two jewel cases w/ tan booklets (& separate catalog #s) [VPCC-84156 & VPCC-84157]
初回版 is one jewel case w/ the same tan-coloured booklet in a black jacket w/ gold trim [VPCC-84155]
They're the same audio/tracklist, only difference afaik is packaging & booklet contents.

i don't know why they thought this was a good idea but this release was remastered to have a similar sound quality to メア's upcoming VAP albums, which i really don't think these songs sound nice with.
i'm not 100% on where this PV actually comes from but i'm taking a guess & saying it was included w/ the first press of 自由奔放天真爛漫 [SDR-021], since that's the first release where the track shows up.
So as far as getting the ~exact same~ audio that's on the PV, check out that disc.

One thing you might want to look into is the 2003 Speed Disk 'original' ジャイアニズム [SDR-049 & SDR-050] (only 1 ver. of release across two jewel cases).
I say 'original' bc every track that's on this disc is ALSO a remaster (except for 華談 & love tripper; they're new recordings here) but imho this master is miles better for every single track, compared to both their  first appearances on various speed disk singles/omnibus and any later remaster/retakes.
I'm a bit biased here but this is definitely my favourite release of メア's catalog, if you call it one release.

I think the sound guy took every instrument's track & slammed a hard compressor on it & drowned Yomi's voice in a stupid amount of reverb, putting it kinda low down in the mix. Both the kind of decisions that should ruin a release but somehow it worked super well here, which is why i'm so pissed the later release went for such a 'normal' approach instead.

this is really just a drag @ myself but back in middleschool when i was first getting into vk, i accidentally followed a roleplay-blog of Nightmare's Hitsugi, somehow thinking it was the real thing.
I guess i was just totally ready to accept hitsu spoke fluent english and also had the exact personality of a teenage girl?

Also there was a good chunk of time when i was convinced that line in L'Arc~en~Ciel's Taste of Love was "You treat me like a DUCK"

hahaha i definitely don't KNOW more this is 100% just me guessing from when i read the articles but given the parts about 'buying various products' & 'eligible to apply for gifts,' i wouldn't be surprised if the ~grand prize~ was something along the lines of 「hang out w/ the band, we'll take pictures like an official photoshoot, you can pick instruments to say you play, and come up w/ your own reason for leaving the band we'll tell everyone like it's real.」

hahaha i definitely don't KNOW more this is 100% just me guessing from when i read the articles but given the parts about 'buying various products' & 'eligible to apply for gifts,' i wouldn't be surprised if the ~grand prize~ was something along the lines of 「hang out w/ the band, we'll take pictures like an official photoshoot, you can pick instruments to say you play, and come up w/ your own reason for leaving the band we'll tell everyone like it's real.」

i always thought that bit was mostly a joke / 'hang out w/ the band' promo
afaik you had to buy a certain number of mucc CDs and i think it was all types to enter; doesn't sound like something they'd require of finding new musicians lol

def appreciate that CrowXClass infodump tho~
& for the record the main vocalist's old band 華風月 is much better than wagakki, imho

Yeah, Mucc tried that once and one of them was just a snake who left before doing anything because all he wanted to do was be in a band, and the other had to leave because his family didn't approve of VisualKei. It was a Shakuhachi and Shamisen player, but I can't remember which was which. 
Also, yeah, they've been using them since the beginning, though the amount used has increased over time, as well as the samples themselves having improved much over the years. In their early stuff, the samples along with the types of instruments varied a lot (Jubakuai and Onigokko using different samples for the same instrument, the Shakuhachi) and often sounded fake as hell.
Now, I sometimes question whether the Koto and Shakuhachi are samples because the Koto sounds very real, and it sounds like the Shakuhachi is playing really hard to synthesise techniques. The Shamisen though is obviously still fake because it often plays way too fast (even for Tsugaru Shamisen, which are made for speed) and it sounds too inbetween a Tsugaru and a Jiuta style. (if you want to look examples of those up, Tsugaru is 津軽 and Jiuta is 地唄)
Basically, I don't think they'd need real studio musicians. Plus, some songs take advantage of the fact they're just samples and not the real thing anyway.
 
While most traditional musicians wouldn't want to do VisualKei, it's not entirely impossible. There was a VisualKei band once made up of professional traditional Japanese musicians. CrowXClass. Wagakki Band fans will recognise their vocalist and ex. Shakuhachi player (they had 2 Shakuhachi players), those being Kurona and Daisuke Kaminaga (who went by stage name Hibiki) respectively. Michiaki Shirata (Who went by the stage name Kanade) was the Shamisen player and he actually provided the Shamisen for the Naruto soundtrack (whom Kurona's brother also did Taiko for). The Taiko drummer was Hidemasa Hanahara (stage name Saku) from MUGEN. Now their Koto player, Shion, no one knows exactly who he is. It's usually assumed to be Kiyoshi Ibukuro (who is also in Wagakki), but another possibility is Shin Ichikawa, a lesser known Koto player that used to preform with Kurona a lot, and plays in a group with one of the Yoshida brothers. The band suddenly went inactive in 2016 for no reason. They didn't have as many fans, since they were an indie band, and had only one poor excuse for an album. I say poor excuse because it's not even long enough to be an album. Only 7 songs. 7 really good songs though. 
They announced a 2nd album on an official interview and said they'd release it at a certain live, but no sight of it is anywhere. Not their itunes, youtube, or even their official website (which ironically links the interview). So we're left with 7 songs + 2 only released on Youtube + a few unreleased ones that only exist as live footage.
But anyway,
tl;dr: If Kiryu wanted real traditional musicians, they could look no further than the ex members of CrowXClass (minus Kurona or Hibiki since they joined Wagakki and possibly minus Shion if he's actually Kiyoshi)

eyyy thanks for linking this - i could have sworn i remembered hearing Supernova first w/ ridiculous vocals during that niconico live but convinced myself i'd just hallucinated it

np, glad that was at all useful~!
i think ナイト's early releases are better than people think they'd be so i'm always down to spread the Good News..............esp since this is the only band i've got any real #info on.

yeah i'm not the best googler in the world or anything but i don't think i was ever able to find a copy of that speed disk master until i bought it on CD myself.
the TL;DR of it is more or less that it's the same tracks as the VAP ofc, but they all sound more like that PV's ジャイアニズム痛.

Hey thank you so much for your help! It seems like it's going to be some work to try and get my hands on this stuff. I'm only finding it on Japanese sites. 

Same. I'll maintain that 420 was their peak and I think it's a very aesthetically consistent record that stands out from the rest of their discography. I was always hoping they'd have another go at a full length that isn't just a stack of singles.
 
Now I'm heavily leaning on going to Japan for most of the tour. Got my hitchhiking guides read and my 10 euro a night lodgings bookmarked. 

Sakitooooo! SniF for some reason this new made me smile and feel happy, I think he has become "himself" and express himself more since he started this solo proyect. I read reports of the lives sakito did and apparently he seemed more relax and happier. I don´t know how true that is but for all the crazy comming and goins he does to be in all the events he plans in seems to me Sakito is truly trying hard and enjoing himself too.
 
Well I think it would benatural if there is some kind of rivalery between them and their solo projects, but I think they are all still trying to support each other, resently sakito posted a picture with hitsugi and hitsugi also went to sakito birthday live and brought him a cake on satage and ni-ya sang (and broke ears) happy birthday.  They all seem to still respect each other and support each other. or atleast for me. Ruka was allways the one that would be kind of aloof. I remember than in allot of dvds or videos Ruka would always arrive by himself on a taxi or in his own car (he has expensive cars) While the rest alot of times would arrive in a van together like alot of memebers of japanes bands drove by a staff memeber in charge of picking them up.
and in some of the afther parties Ruka eat with other people and not with them. But they did had fun together. They didn´t invented the hand elephant aloneXD  I think right now they all had to much of something good(like eating your favorit scream until you get sick), and need a rest from each oother, like the song says, everyone need a little time away, and then they will come back for their 20th aniversary.
Yomi might not make as many lives for his throat condicion, studio recording recuires less efort than live (I´ve on singig lessons for years already)
 
they would take the nightmare official web from their advertisments if they didn´t wanted people to still know about them and nightmare.
I just hope stargazer is a lovely son like world end and the song that sakito wrote and compossed for nightmare like simple life and jibun no hana.
 
 
p.d: I want to know sakito skin care I want to look as young as he does at age 32 when I reach 32 in 12 years.
 
p.d 2: and by the way... I´m newXD

Nothing new but somehow the MV and the songs are kinda nostalgic to me... When I was used to love their music

I wasn't really into Gleem, I preferred their Meteoroid sound a lot more. I'm still sad to see them split up though. 

look at how beautiful my grandfathers are 

following seikun's impeccable logic all the bangyas in vk are actually secretly lesbian because there's absolutely no reason why straight girls would be attracted to 'feminine' bandmen 
 
while we're on this topic, i also don't get:
- why there's still the weird division dictating that guys must be into vk as "ongen-gyao" who only collect cds, and girls only go to lives to swoon over hot bandmen
- why the former is somehow usually conceived as more superior to the latter.... almost every guy who's an armchair connoisseur of vk i've encountered exudes the insufferable air of making themselves sound like consumers of vk who are more sophisticated than "those bangyas over there" aka the "necessary evil" that keeps the scene afloat
- why the two are even mutually exclusive in the first place, as if being into the bandmen themselves somehow diminishes or effaces one's ability to appreciate/talk about music intelligently
 ...and i can go on.
 
basically i feel that people (mostly guys, but also girls who are concerned with being viewed a certain way) who actually have the money to spare AND want to participate are given pause because of these problematic assumptions. i've been saizen for bands (mostly very small) and have no problems with the girls or the bandmen themselves so i can't help thinking a lot of these strange ideas are self-imposed. people should just enjoy the scene in whatever way they want (yes, even if you're a guy who go to lives to fantasize about bandmen - what's wrong with that??), instead of losing sleep over what the bangyas in the same row are potentially gossiping about you.

in 2014 i saw Royz (for their 7hrs live) in beppu & Mejibray in nagoya -

Royz's audience was like 10% male but w/ the exception of i think one dude all the other guys who showed up went as fancy w/ their clothes/hairmake as any young indiez band's members look. Some gya also dressed up that much & some didn't but for the guys in particular, seems like everyone who went looked unmistakably 'into vkei' enough that they looked like members mid-photoshoot from another band.

Meji's show was a lot more balanced (maybe bc it was a more normal show not in a tiny city?) and i'd guess like 70% girls 30% guys. people still dressed up but it was a smaller percent of the audience that did that i think. Aside from the gender ratio & the maybe 30% of the fans that went full vk with their look, i feel like the audience of that meji show would be a lot easier to confuse w/ the crowd at a punk or metal, non-vk show.

I & my two friends were (i'm pretty sure) the only foreigners at the Royz show (of ~400 people); there were maybe 15-20 overseas girls at Meji's show (decently full ELL if that makes for a # for reference to anybody), but to the best of my knowledge i was the only foreign guy at either.

Oh, maybe worth noting i went to see Sadie's instore/CD-signing at Tower Shinjuku & off the top of my head it was a pretty similar ratio to Meji, maybe a bit less even though? & looked like the ages of people had a good deal more in their late 20s / early 30s. Meji's live seemed like mostly people in their 20s, Royz's felt similar but younger overall.

Out of the shows i saw here at cons (Naitomea, Meteoroid, Pentagon), seemed 50/50 as far as i could tell. but at The GazettE's oneman (as in, no anime-con attached) that was almost as 90/10 girls to guys as the Royz show. i even saw like at least three sets of a teenager who'd brought along their clearly uninterested parents.

I also showed up to Revine & Dixdriver's instores just bc they were near my hostel & why the hell not if i'm already in Japan, and i was definitely the only guy & the only foreigner at both. I'm sure i looked even more out of place than i felt.

in 2014 i saw Royz (for their 7hrs live) in beppu & Mejibray in nagoya -

Royz's audience was like 10% male but w/ the exception of i think one dude all the other guys who showed up went as fancy w/ their clothes/hairmake as any young indiez band's members look. Some gya also dressed up that much & some didn't but for the guys in particular, seems like everyone who went looked unmistakably 'into vkei' enough that they looked like members mid-photoshoot from another band.

Meji's show was a lot more balanced (maybe bc it was a more normal show not in a tiny city?) and i'd guess like 70% girls 30% guys. people still dressed up but it was a smaller percent of the audience that did that i think. Aside from the gender ratio & the maybe 30% of the fans that went full vk with their look, i feel like the audience of that meji show would be a lot easier to confuse w/ the crowd at a punk or metal, non-vk show.

I & my two friends were (i'm pretty sure) the only foreigners at the Royz show (of ~400 people); there were maybe 15-20 overseas girls at Meji's show (decently full ELL if that makes for a # for reference to anybody), but to the best of my knowledge i was the only foreign guy at either.

Oh, maybe worth noting i went to see Sadie's instore/CD-signing at Tower Shinjuku & off the top of my head it was a pretty similar ratio to Meji, maybe a bit less even though? & looked like the ages of people had a good deal more in their late 20s / early 30s. Meji's live seemed like mostly people in their 20s, Royz's felt similar but younger overall.

Out of the shows i saw here at cons (Naitomea, Meteoroid, Pentagon), seemed 50/50 as far as i could tell. but at The GazettE's oneman (as in, no anime-con attached) that was almost as 90/10 girls to guys as the Royz show. i even saw like at least three sets of a teenager who'd brought along their clearly uninterested parents.

I also showed up to Revine & Dixdriver's instores just bc they were near my hostel & why the hell not if i'm already in Japan, and i was definitely the only guy & the only foreigner at both. I'm sure i looked even more out of place than i felt.

in 2014 i saw Royz (for their 7hrs live) in beppu & Mejibray in nagoya -

Royz's audience was like 10% male but w/ the exception of i think one dude all the other guys who showed up went as fancy w/ their clothes/hairmake as any young indiez band's members look. Some gya also dressed up that much & some didn't but for the guys in particular, seems like everyone who went looked unmistakably 'into vkei' enough that they looked like members mid-photoshoot from another band.

Meji's show was a lot more balanced (maybe bc it was a more normal show not in a tiny city?) and i'd guess like 70% girls 30% guys. people still dressed up but it was a smaller percent of the audience that did that i think. Aside from the gender ratio & the maybe 30% of the fans that went full vk with their look, i feel like the audience of that meji show would be a lot easier to confuse w/ the crowd at a punk or metal, non-vk show.

I & my two friends were (i'm pretty sure) the only foreigners at the Royz show (of ~400 people); there were maybe 15-20 overseas girls at Meji's show (decently full ELL if that makes for a # for reference to anybody), but to the best of my knowledge i was the only foreign guy at either.

Oh, maybe worth noting i went to see Sadie's instore/CD-signing at Tower Shinjuku & off the top of my head it was a pretty similar ratio to Meji, maybe a bit less even though? & looked like the ages of people had a good deal more in their late 20s / early 30s. Meji's live seemed like mostly people in their 20s, Royz's felt similar but younger overall.

Out of the shows i saw here at cons (Naitomea, Meteoroid, Pentagon), seemed 50/50 as far as i could tell. but at The GazettE's oneman (as in, no anime-con attached) that was almost as 90/10 girls to guys as the Royz show. i even saw like at least three sets of a teenager who'd brought along their clearly uninterested parents.

I also showed up to Revine & Dixdriver's instores just bc they were near my hostel & why the hell not if i'm already in Japan, and i was definitely the only guy & the only foreigner at both. I'm sure i looked even more out of place than i felt.

this & ganges ni akai bara are the two best songs The GazettE's ever done & nobody will convince me otherwise

this & ganges ni akai bara are the two best songs The GazettE's ever done & nobody will convince me otherwise