Hello all, its been a while since ive done an into post on a forum and it feels pretty good. Hopefully this place is as active as it looks at a glance.
Ive been into J-Rock/Visual Kei (if what i like is considered that, im not good at keeping with all the off-chute genres) for a long time, since 2005 in fact. Back then i was very active on a lot of forums. After a while though the internet seemed to change and forums in general seemed to die out and my social interaction with people on these niche topics with it. Since then ive relying on accidentally stumbling onto things for new music. Though that can be fun, more and more im not finding out about bands i love disbanding until years later. Yesterday i found out all at once that 3 more are gone and thats a lot to take in a day so i decided to see if i could find anywhere if there was a news forum (because im old and forums is all i understand). Thank you google for Monochrome Heaven which is a site i do recognise from back in the day. No idea if i joined back then (again, very old, bad memory).
So here i am, with only a few artists im a fan of that may or may not still be active looking for news, friends and recommendations.
My first stumble onto Japanese music was, as i said in '05, i was downloading things via limewire and somehow ended up with yuuyami suicide by pierrot and fell in love with what i heard. It took a hella long time but i was eventually able to get their entire discography though limewire, learning to stay up into the wee hours for the best search results to get what i needed. Though i have since been able to purchase most of their albums, i do still listen to those old files. From there the fascination grew to the point where it completely overtook wastern music. In the last 14 years ive purchased only 1 English album. (Even that was a shock, i was so out of the loop this band i had liked as a teen had broken up and made a comeback without me knowing lol). Pierrot are still my all time favourite band.
I cant really explain what i like in music, i think at least the bands i like a miles apart in style and tone but i defiantly dont like operatic or screamo vocals which unfortunately seems to be what a lot of VK falls into. Admittedly a lot of it is on the softer side and sometimes veering violently into pop. This makes taking recommendations hard because "you like this, so you might like this which is similar" doesnt seem to work. So heres a weird list (all names romanised because my pc gets upset when i switch it into japanese):
Back in t' day(so were talking back before 2010, these were my gate way drugs so to speak):
PIERROT
An Cafe (early stuff, everything while Bou was still with them)
TMR (told you it got pop-y)
Nightmare (early stuff, when it was weird and interesting)
More Recent stuff:
Angelo (kinda obligated into this one since i love Pierrot so much but admittedly their last few albums have been too samey to hold my interest)
Lycaon (not so much as Initial'L, their first single was fine but then it went down hill real quick)
Pentagon
Kameleo
i.Rias
Purple Stone
Zin (and Yusai even more but well, that didnt last long did it)
Anli Pollicino
Codomo Dragon
Royz (other than that weird phase they had trying to scream)
Zonbi
Neverland
Blu-Billion
ViViD (the early stuff before it got TOOOO pop)
FEST VAINQUEUR
And a few others that, i like what theyve done so far but its too soon to tell OR did like 1 single and dropped off the face of the earth.
Other Japanese interests:
Despite having a 800+ book collection of manga i dont consider myself an anime fan, i dont keep current and like most things i seem to be stuck loving things that are pre 2010 that the young 'uns have never heard of or never seen. Since anime seems to be most peoples gateway into other aspects of japanese culture just wanted to put it out there that thats not what im into these days. This being out of touch affects my business as i have a side-gig as an artist selling at conventions and struggle between drawing what i like and drawing what will sell with no knowledge of, or interest in what is currently popular.
I am a big fan of games that delve into traditional folklore though and do try and buy art books when i can.
TLDR;
Hi, im new and i like some stuff and not others. Lets talk.
