frayed

So basically him and Koichi are legit married now right?

The writing was on the walls for awhile; I literally ‘jokingly’ guessed this back as far as January. Tsuzuku used to go on tirades on those tweet-casts about why people actually liked visual kei and kept referring back to jpop, like, “Why is Arashi so bad? Jpop is awesome. Why do you only listen to visual kei? Is it just for the make up?” (Obviously this is super abridged.) And I remember wondering back in the November of 2016, “well why are you doing visual kei then?” I’d heard from other people that his anti-visual rants dated back way further than that.
 
It’s like I don’t want to be pegged as close minded for not giving it a chance, because I am. I like a lot of genres of music, and I’m super invested in Tsuzuku as an artist. But it’s super weird to hear him use his voice like that, and it’s not like I hate it, but I don’t love it. And I’m not just a face fan that will just love anything he puts out because it’s him. I just hope that this leads to more experimental pieces in the future since Tsuzuku himself likes so many different kinds of music. I want to believe he won’t limit himself. Otherwise it’s kind of a waste.

The writing was on the walls for awhile; I literally ‘jokingly’ guessed this back as far as January. Tsuzuku used to go on tirades on those tweet-casts about why people actually liked visual kei and kept referring back to jpop, like, “Why is Arashi so bad? Jpop is awesome. Why do you only listen to visual kei? Is it just for the make up?” (Obviously this is super abridged.) And I remember wondering back in the November of 2016, “well why are you doing visual kei then?” I’d heard from other people that his anti-visual rants dated back way further than that.
 
It’s like I don’t want to be pegged as close minded for not giving it a chance, because I am. I like a lot of genres of music, and I’m super invested in Tsuzuku as an artist. But it’s super weird to hear him use his voice like that, and it’s not like I hate it, but I don’t love it. And I’m not just a face fan that will just love anything he puts out because it’s him. I just hope that this leads to more experimental pieces in the future since Tsuzuku himself likes so many different kinds of music. I want to believe he won’t limit himself. Otherwise it’s kind of a waste.

So basically him and Koichi are legit married now right?

So basically him and Koichi are legit married now right?

Oh, I thought I was the only one who thought that it was bad 😂

So basically him and Koichi are legit married now right?

So basically him and Koichi are legit married now right?

So basically him and Koichi are legit married now right?

Yeah the weirdest thing about him is how fucking hard he went at the lives, in the lyrics and the music and allegedly in his personal life; and then all he wanted to do all along was to play baroque covers. 

The writing was on the walls for awhile; I literally ‘jokingly’ guessed this back as far as January. Tsuzuku used to go on tirades on those tweet-casts about why people actually liked visual kei and kept referring back to jpop, like, “Why is Arashi so bad? Jpop is awesome. Why do you only listen to visual kei? Is it just for the make up?” (Obviously this is super abridged.) And I remember wondering back in the November of 2016, “well why are you doing visual kei then?” I’d heard from other people that his anti-visual rants dated back way further than that.
 
It’s like I don’t want to be pegged as close minded for not giving it a chance, because I am. I like a lot of genres of music, and I’m super invested in Tsuzuku as an artist. But it’s super weird to hear him use his voice like that, and it’s not like I hate it, but I don’t love it. And I’m not just a face fan that will just love anything he puts out because it’s him. I just hope that this leads to more experimental pieces in the future since Tsuzuku himself likes so many different kinds of music. I want to believe he won’t limit himself. Otherwise it’s kind of a waste.

The writing was on the walls for awhile; I literally ‘jokingly’ guessed this back as far as January. Tsuzuku used to go on tirades on those tweet-casts about why people actually liked visual kei and kept referring back to jpop, like, “Why is Arashi so bad? Jpop is awesome. Why do you only listen to visual kei? Is it just for the make up?” (Obviously this is super abridged.) And I remember wondering back in the November of 2016, “well why are you doing visual kei then?” I’d heard from other people that his anti-visual rants dated back way further than that.
 
It’s like I don’t want to be pegged as close minded for not giving it a chance, because I am. I like a lot of genres of music, and I’m super invested in Tsuzuku as an artist. But it’s super weird to hear him use his voice like that, and it’s not like I hate it, but I don’t love it. And I’m not just a face fan that will just love anything he puts out because it’s him. I just hope that this leads to more experimental pieces in the future since Tsuzuku himself likes so many different kinds of music. I want to believe he won’t limit himself. Otherwise it’s kind of a waste.

The writing was on the walls for awhile; I literally ‘jokingly’ guessed this back as far as January. Tsuzuku used to go on tirades on those tweet-casts about why people actually liked visual kei and kept referring back to jpop, like, “Why is Arashi so bad? Jpop is awesome. Why do you only listen to visual kei? Is it just for the make up?” (Obviously this is super abridged.) And I remember wondering back in the November of 2016, “well why are you doing visual kei then?” I’d heard from other people that his anti-visual rants dated back way further than that.
 
It’s like I don’t want to be pegged as close minded for not giving it a chance, because I am. I like a lot of genres of music, and I’m super invested in Tsuzuku as an artist. But it’s super weird to hear him use his voice like that, and it’s not like I hate it, but I don’t love it. And I’m not just a face fan that will just love anything he puts out because it’s him. I just hope that this leads to more experimental pieces in the future since Tsuzuku himself likes so many different kinds of music. I want to believe he won’t limit himself. Otherwise it’s kind of a waste.

Well, that was something.

WTF IS MARUEI CLOSING? MY NAGOYA IS DEAD.
 
Anyway i liked little hearts because of the point cards stuff, but felt pretty akward going to this one because it was inside of an anime center where all that weird otaku used to go..... (not like bangyas are really different from otaku tho)

I half-agree with this on multiple fronts. First off, while Koichi’s aesthetic surely brings in a hefty number of fans, that’s really underplaying Tsuzuku’s appeal both overseas and in Japan. For almost every live I went to, the spaces in front of them were what filled out first, and there would be a huge gap left in front of MiA.
 
It’s funny, too, because it’s not like MiA isn’t good looking. But he’s not nearly as popular as Tsuzuku and Koichi, and I think a lot of that is due to his princely SNS presence and his own awkwardness with how he relates to the crowd at lives and instores. A lot of overseas fans I’ve talked to have the impression that he thinks a lot of himself (which may or may not be true, it’s not like I know him personally), and both overseas and Japanese fans poke fun at the plastic surgery angle. 
 
And as for Koichi neglecting his bass, you’re right. I’ve seen him straight up stop playing before. However, this is usually to engage the audience - and I can’t speak for anything before 2016 (anyone can feel free to correct me), but initially I found MiA to be a whole lot less engaged with the audience. He was pretty still on stage, maybe doing some cool guitar poses while he played, but generally just kind of doing his own thing. Then progressively throughout the year, he started grabbing people during Negator, he started seemingly throwing out more stuff, and just generally seemed to be trying a lot harder to captivate the audience. (Sort of too little too late? I didn’t really see him making any new fans at this point, but I digress.) Again, this is just from my own recollection, so anyone can feel free to shoot me down on that. Tsuzuku and Koichi never really had any problem with that as far as I could see, which yes, led to Koichi neglecting his bass more. He was also responsible for a lot of the merch designs, furthering playing into the aesthetic appeal box, and honestly a lot better at playing the popularity game than MiA.
 
And then there’s Meto. Lol. He was silent and surrounded by big personalities (‘big’ for better or worse). Personally speaking I fucking adore him, and what fans he had were super devoted, but he flew under the radar for a lot of people I think.

Adding on to my last post: I can possibly give a bit of insight as someone who casually and mildly enjoys their music even though I'm not a hardcore fan like a lot of the teenage western gya that salivate over scantily clad men that the band seems to attract.
 
Perhaps it's uncommon, but the thing about MEJIBRAY that actually gained my attention and sort of attracted me to them was MiA. Not for his looks, but for his guitar playing. Whether you love or hate MEJIBRAY or are somewhere in between those two, I think everyone can agree that MiA is a rather skilled guitarist. The fact that MiA composed almost the entire discography increased the liking I had taken towards them. The compositions were always so versatile and—as a result—I never knew what to expect for their next single or album, and that's what I liked. MEJIBRAY constantly kept me on my toes, and while I strongly dislike songs like 盈虧 (Eiki), I was able to respect the fact that the band was trying something new, not to mention that it was still somehow conjured up by the mind of the composer who also did songs that are very different in sound and ones that I'm fond of such as 砂に帰りしキミ走る (Suna ni Kaerishi Kimi Hashire) or DIVERGENCE.
 
The same goes for their drummer: meto. I consider meto to actually be skilled in drumming and I always thought that he certainly doesn't get enough praise from fans.
 
In addition, Tsuzuku's vocals are unmistakable as someone has mentioned. You can pick his nasal (and also sometimes extremely irritating) voice out of a crowd. In addition, he proves himself to be a decent composer, for he composed one of my favorite MEJIBRAY songs: baby crossing. Something that people constantly critique Tsuzuku for are his screams. While his screams are admittedly quite strange, I'm not sure many vocalists could imitate that strange sound in the outro of the aforementioned baby crossing. His voice is very unique and distinct although sometimes it made me want to grind my teeth when he hits obnoxiously high notes (i.e.: some live versions of 原罪の林檎/Genzai no Ringo). 
 
However, I have a suspicion that a majority of the attention to MEJIBRAY comes from their bassist: Koichi. In the comments of MVs and live videos alike, there are a myriad of comments about Koichi and how attractive they find him and/or his clothes to be. Refer to the latter portion of the first line in this post: "gya that salivate over scantily clad men". Hopefully I've made my point. I don't have anything against Koichi (although I do have my suspicions that he sometimes pretends to play bass during lives for a reason I can't figure out), but it's a shame that a band that—in my opinion—had potential gained most attention because of their wardrobe. It is visual kei, but I think too much attention went on their appearances rather than the (mostly) decent content they were producing and releasing.

Personally speaking, my biggest issue has been with jealous overseas fans. I’m a lot more guarded than I used to be. People have spoken ill of both me and my partner online. It really upset her, and frankly annoyed the shit out of me since I was never anything but kind and helpful to anyone I came across. 

I was expecting another European Tour ;; Maybe they will reform under another band name ?

Personally speaking, my biggest issue has been with jealous overseas fans. I’m a lot more guarded than I used to be. People have spoken ill of both me and my partner online. It really upset her, and frankly annoyed the shit out of me since I was never anything but kind and helpful to anyone I came across. 

When it comes to the chronology of GazettE albums, I like to pretend everything between DIM and DOGMA never happened. 

I don’t know if this is helpful, but MiA was the main composer with Tsuzuku throwing a few odd songs in here and there (Agitato Grimoire to name one). I’m also going purely by speculation here but given some of the crap observed, I do think the rigorous and really repetitive schedule they slipped into (or their label pushed them into) didn’t do them any favors when it came to putting out new material.  Not to mention MiA was involved in I don’t even know how many little side projects, musical and not, all throughout this. 
 
Granted, generally speaking I stayed a fan of Mejibray’s music; I do think their music production suffered though. The last truly new song came more than a year before they went on hiatus (Nanaki), and it wasn’t even a formal single.

I don’t know if this is helpful, but MiA was the main composer with Tsuzuku throwing a few odd songs in here and there (Agitato Grimoire to name one). I’m also going purely by speculation here but given some of the crap observed, I do think the rigorous and really repetitive schedule they slipped into (or their label pushed them into) didn’t do them any favors when it came to putting out new material.  Not to mention MiA was involved in I don’t even know how many little side projects, musical and not, all throughout this. 
 
Granted, generally speaking I stayed a fan of Mejibray’s music; I do think their music production suffered though. The last truly new song came more than a year before they went on hiatus (Nanaki), and it wasn’t even a formal single.

I don’t know if this is helpful, but MiA was the main composer with Tsuzuku throwing a few odd songs in here and there (Agitato Grimoire to name one). I’m also going purely by speculation here but given some of the crap observed, I do think the rigorous and really repetitive schedule they slipped into (or their label pushed them into) didn’t do them any favors when it came to putting out new material.  Not to mention MiA was involved in I don’t even know how many little side projects, musical and not, all throughout this. 
 
Granted, generally speaking I stayed a fan of Mejibray’s music; I do think their music production suffered though. The last truly new song came more than a year before they went on hiatus (Nanaki), and it wasn’t even a formal single.

I just wonder if Mia is doing this to keep his name relevant, if he’s excited to be able to do any project he feels like since his full time band in on hiatus, or if he has a hard time saying ‘no’ to people because he wants to help his friends/colleagues out. Please no burn out, and please no more obnoxious YouTube antics. That’s all I ask.