Tokage

Yokan w/ Kyo's bird screeches

Watched Grave Encounters 2 today... I sort of enjoyed the first part, one of the better found footage horror movies I've seen (along with the original [.rec]). However, this sequel was just total, utter garbage. Characters were really, REALLY dumb and unlikeable.

Most of THE CRAZY SKB's stuff is quite enjoyable, IMO. He's sort of infamous for being both an underground wrestler and a hardcore punk vocalist, as well as the fact that his live performances usually feature lots of stuff blowing up. Check out QP-CRAZY, Hightechnology Suicide and Moudoku for some examples of his stuff. He's collaborated with Anti-Feminism's Kenzi at some points too. Dokusatsu Terrorist are also quite amusing. Angura kei/punk mixture that pokes fun at and parodies pretty much everything, from North Korea up to Ayumi Hamasaki and Ultraman. Like most of the Angura classics, I don't think they're active anymore sadly enough... Shine Shine Dan is another cool and somewhat underrated (at least among Western listeners) Japanese punk band. To me personally they are sort of like precursors to acts like KYOKUTOU GIRL FRIEND and Merry in that they blend a sort of "traditional" Japanese attitude with punk. They were signed to the legendary Nagomu Records label for a brief period of time, so you know it's good. (Not to mention the fact that they named themselves after the villains of the classic Japanese superhero show Rainbowman)

16 tracks, huh? Not expecting any 7+ min songs this time, but maybe we'll be surprised. I have semi-high hopes for this. Rinkaku was good, StU was... less good. Still, with so many tracks I'm holding onto the hope that there'll at least be a couple of good ones in there.

Last movie I watched was The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari. There's not much left to say about such a legendary movie, so I'll just keep it short. Deserves its legendary status, great set design, great atmosphere. Also can totally see where the band cali gari got some #looks inspiration, the Doc. himself at some points reminded me of Ao for some reason lmao

Recently beat Gradius 3 on dat SNES emulator and also Megaman Revolution ( a MM fangame which is relatively okay ). Started playing Adventure Island I for the NES but gave up because it was too goddamn hard for me lmao, now I'm playing the sequel instead which is much more manageable so far.

guess Full forgot about that project he was doing together w/ Dada whoops still hyped for this tho, just hope there won't be more plagiarism if they actually start to produce new material.

American Psycho - Enjoyed the novel, enjoyed the movie. The novel felt a whole lot more gruesome than the movie, but the movie's atmosphere of dark comedy bordering almost on the surreal definitely made up for it.

Dance of Reality - Visually powerful and extremely interesting. Most likely Jodorowsky's most linear narrative, but it still manages to be captivating. Apparently the movie contains autobiographical elements... I'd like to know exactly which parts were supposed to be autobiographical because some parts of the movie were fucked up, heh. Some aspects of the movie reminded me of Shuuji Terayama's Den-en Ni Shisu. The Perfect Host - Entertaining little thriller about a bank robber on the run who ends up hiding out in the wrong house. Fell apart completely at the end for me, though. Still, worth watching if only to kill time. Insidious 2 - I kinda liked the first part because it managed to startle and unnerve me at several points despite the many, many parts which fell flat for one reason or another. This part... I don't know. Not enough spoopy ghosts, I guess. It didn't really fill me with any sense of dread. I'd watch a spinoff movie focusing on those ghost hunter dudes though, they're very entertaining. The Fantastic Mr. Fox - Hell yea....... Stop motion movie based on a Roald Dahl story. Probably one of the best family-friendly films I've seen. Didn't feel like it was too childish. In fact, I could see younger viewers hating it instead for being somewhat 'different' from the traditional "funny talking animal" movies that have been released in recent years.

Klezmer-type music. I know of Asakusa Jinta, Death March Kantai and that other band whose name I can't remember at the moment, but those 3 are pretty much it. Chanson and cabaret-type music, too. I can only think of Garage Chanson Show as a pure example. Maybe Kokusyoku Sumire too

That Ligotti book is pretty damn great. Sadly its so fucking difficult to find physical copies of most of his other books for reasonable prices... Currently reading Haruki Murakami's 1Q84 in physical form and Jim Butcher's The Dresden Files 4: Summer Knight on my eReader. Although I'm getting sort of bored of the usual Murakami novel tropes and several other aspects of the book (why does he have to describe the female characters' breasts at every opportunity...?) Murakami has still managed to make me read at least 500 out of the 900-something pages of the novel. I just feel like the novel could've been much, much shorter. As for the other novel, this is my first attempt to read anything related to The Dresden Files. I'm... not quite sure how I feel about it. I prefer my fantasy to be more 'New Weird'-style, I guess. Still, it's entertaining in some way, but it also strays into eyerollingly corny territory occasionally. Nothing of substance in this one, just a simple adventurous romp.

Nice as fuck, nothing unexpected

There's no japanese post-britpop because the japanese collectively realize the genre is shit lel (also why does every genre need a post-form nowadays? Subgenres are getting fucking ridiculous, soon we'll have post-witch house or some crap like that)

Well, this one should be obvious at least, although it fits in more w/ this whole garage rock-revival thing The Strokes also belong to: And then there's these Beatles-sounding dudes right here, too Also The Mirraz' old stuff pretty much sounded exactly like Arctic Monkeys. Don't know how much you consider them to be britpop, but since every britaboo jerks off to AM I suppose it should count

Alt. important announcement: Official X-Japan Brand Chastity Belt. Yoshiki quoted as saying: "With this tool, you too can experience our next album. No release!"

Dir en grey are prolly so popular/hyped 'cuz they were at the head of the whole nu-metal/metalcore-inspired wave of VK which started somewhere in the 2000's, just like jduv86 said. Many bands have since copied their style and they were also one of the first visual-related bands to achieve some form of overseas success as far as I remember. As for Babymetal, I genuinely have no idea. I feel like at least some portion of their fanbase is only there ~ironically~ or whatever, like with artists such as Lil B. They certainly have that whole novelty factor thing going with their metal/idol pop mix, at least. I personally never understood the whole hype surrounding bands like FACT or ONE OK ROCK. I like one or two songs by each band, but I genuinely don't see what sets them apart from any other acts in the current post-hardcore scene...

Cooking With Yoshiki book confirmed for release, featuring over 20 recipes inspired by each X-Japan member.

"Fantastic Magic" is indeed pretty cheesy. Anyone wanna bet on how many times the word 'plastic' will appear in the lyrics?