Zeus

I appreciate that you actually averaged your score.

EDIT: Review time from an obsessive fan of Ambrozia - Royal Order era Lycaon. Expect this to not be pretty.

First things first, the announcement of the title of the next song is quite possibly the stupidest thing I've heard in quite a while. In general, there are just superfluous bits added to almost every song. This is JUST NOT NEEDED! It ruins the flow of the entire mini and I don't want to hear Yuuki's garbled pronunciation of MALIGORRODU every time I want to hear Marigold, for example. I'm contemplating butchering the mini just to get rid of all the excess noise. Mini title is also atrocious and the cover is fittingly awful. I'm also going to give you a pro-tip right now: divide this mini straight down the center. Disregard the first half and listen to only the songs beginning with "I love sex blah blah blah I better be using protection".

The first track sounds like the intro to an "Adam & Eve" bondage porno. It's not outright terrible but my greatest gripe with the song is that it takes too long get started. There are plenty of good ideas bubbling under the surface but none of them get any time to shine or get aggressive. Could have used some work, more progression or an extra minute. Not too sure which would have provided the best results. 5.5/10

I liked Jesus when I first started listening to the single but after two or three spins I was done with it. Low replay value here and there isn't anything new or inventive going on. It could be tons worse though. 5/10

Nibame no Onna is terrible. It's like EROS had a love child with Pierrot and it was then set aflame and thrown in a garbage can. Listen Lycaon, you cannot write jazz songs. Yuuki's range does not fit with these songs. Your 'jazz' compositions consist of Rito hitting the same fucking note for eight measures. For the love of God, if you're going to continue writing this abominable trash, take lessons from 8-eit. Oh, and drop the fucking horns and the wannabe slut antics and beg your tranny drummer to come back and write good music for you again. Yuuki's lyrical content is also garbage. I don't have to speak Japanese to know he's just babbling. Literally, he just babbles. You do not sound sexy. 2/10, one point purely because I hate giving a 0, one because Hiyuu has nice bass lines.

"I love sex, I love drugs, I love rock'n'roll" is where things start getting better, pardon the bad title. Intro is like Jouyoku no Acme except more sinister. The rest of the song is surprising, ranging from decent to good. I could do without the gratuitous amounts of Engrish and I feel like the chorus is repeated once too much but the songwriting is there and the ideas are at least 80% executed. 7.5/10. Needs a better title.

Marigold tries to take the place of Kesshou Hana. Sorry but you can't usurp my favorite ballad by them. A few points for trying though. I actually almost might take this mini seriously if it weren't for the first three songs being lame. Intro doesn't fit but when the actual song part starts (remind me to cut that out guys) everything picks up. A LOT. Not too much to say here, but a good change of pace. 8/10.

...and here I thought that this was going to be a terrible song. Hello, The end of [Delusion] x Mental Help. This makes me wonder why they chose to dick around for half of this mini. I had to go back and lower almost every rating by a point after hearing this since the rest of the mini is clearly unacceptable in the wake of this song. The guitar line in the chorus is a little grating, but I'll deal with it. Good song. 8.5/10.

This averaged a 6/10. Mini could have been so much better but the last half made up for it. They should have chopped that off and sold this as a single. I would have been much happier.

Ambrozia remains the better mini of the two.

Also, Lycaon, quit queefing around. Start taking your music seriously again.

I'd like to hear a re-recorded version of Kiri to mayu or Ash

If we're counting songs that haven't been re-recorded, then they wouldn't do either of those. Kiri to Mayu was re-recorded as Sangeki no Yoru and Ash was re-recorded on the Myaku single, both from the Kaede ~if trans...~ "single". I would definitely love to hear a new interpretation of these, as long as they don't try to force their new style on a song that doesn't work. The interpretation of "undecided" was perfect.

Anything of Six Ugly would be AWESOME re-recorded.

as long as not Byo Shin And Children, both have been re recorded.

Esp. Children, have been 3 times and having different sounds each,

though not as radical as current re-recording.

If any, re-record jessica, berry or [kr cube] please.

make this punk pop song into something harder!

Children has been re-recorded THREE times? I thought it was just two, once for the Taiyou no Ao single and once for six Ugly. Where's the third one?

There's not too much they can re-record on Missa but if they went with a re-recording of Ugly I think I'll be pleased.

^ I'm sorry relentless but I couldn't contain my laughter. You missed will by a few months. I don't think you two would have gotten along very well...

Dir en grey seems to be all about presenting "FUTURE!" representations of themselves, so my bet is on a dressed up, heavier, remake of Rasetsukoku. They've been playing it a lot lately (especially overseas).

Definitely, this.

I also don't mind the B-sides as being remakes. They've hardly ever released "new" songs as B-sides anyway and they used to have really shitty remixes instead. Even if some of them are hit and miss, it's still a step up from what we used to get.

Creepy covers, lol. Looking forward to it!

They also put All this I'll give you on the album! FUCK YEAH!

I preferred Oceanborn era the most. When she switched to less of an operatic style of singing I felt her voice lost some impact. Oceanborn is still a great album though.

If not "metal", what to call them?

iPod Touch. As others have said, Zune's completely dated, no last.fm support (if that's applicable) and the player is awful. Just awful. It's slow, buggy, crashes, completely butchers your tags and has a smaller store selection than iTunes' store does (even if iTunes sometimes butchers the translation of the names).

I'm in America (and school) so no festivals for me. Also, this thread needs more Moonsorrow. Just sayin'. I stopped putting off listening to them today and gave their latest album 'Varjoina kuljemme kuolleiden maassa' and so far it's been really great.

Surprisingly enough (with all this talk about LOTUS), I didn't really enjoy it that much D: there was no climax, the song sort of drifted in and out. Granted, the musicianship was amazing, just the composition was lacking incredibly!

I might be wrong, but I read somewhere that the album version of LOTUS will be longer and reworked. Perhaps that's when it will feel complete, because right now I feel like I have half a song.

Oh and: The guy mixing this single is Tue Madsen, who has worked with August Burns Red, and The Black Dahlia Murder.

So for those expecting something like Hageshisa to, expect that (as am I) but with a stronger break down presence.

I don't think his mixing of the CD will have anything to do with whether or not Kaoru/Die will compose more songs with breakdowns. Perhaps I'm being too optimistic though.

I also heard similar about EITS's newest album. Haven't listened to it but if that's the general consensus then I don't need to.

This is going to be a little heretic of me but... What the actual fuck is with a name like Dry Ice Scream?

This + I'm angry they chose to put Judicial Noir on the album -__-. I don't like that song much.

Those titles r nt original gtfo. I mean,

SCREAMING PARTY!!! SuG

LiLLY of the VaLLeY SHAZNA

Re:gret gazette

and the most important of them all

blindness MARIA FLAWLESS QUEEN OF VK MARIA CROSS

Srsly, I don't even

Bite the bullet~

paradox

The helpless fanboy in me wants this. I will say though that's an unusual title coming from them. I could definitely see this coming from a VK band.

Hopefully the production is better then their last two singles.

The hell? ALREADY?

As much as I hope that this is good, I already know I'm not going to like it.

They even started to steal from lynch. Compare SHADOWS to Before I Decay, it's just ridiculous.

it's even more ridiculous that both of them stealed it from this band:

gCUDgzmzaP8

The only problem that I have with this comparison is that there's no end in sight. As long as you keep going farther and farther back you can keep stating that "x band ripped x song off of y artist" because of similar construction to an earlier song. It's not as if song structure itself can be plagiarized so I don't understand why people keep saying the GazettE stole this from lynch. and they stole that from NoGoD. Search around, I'm sure a song before Saikou no Sekai used the same pattern, and then a song before that, and then a song before that. Claiming that's a ripoff is akin to saying that breakdowns in metalcore are all plagiarized from one another since they all sound the same.

/rant

Maki (ex. HIGH and MIGHTY COLOR)

huh? wasn't he who did stab his girlfriend?

a Japanse guy at facebook

For any fan of the v-kei band Neo, the vocalist stabbed his gf today so ...say good bye to Neo! Apparently 'I'm leaving you' was not acceptable talk.

Vocalist? This topic's about the bassist.

I can start

I thought that Electric Red's two singles were pretty good, especially Magical Astronomy. Thousand Leave's newest album "End of Endless Night" was also pretty good and right now I don't know which one I prefer more (in comparison to DEAD NIGHT BLIND). I still haven't given Onmyouza's new single a listen although considering their track record it's most likely solid. BORIS's NEW ALBUM was also a pleasant surprise, although I found parts of the album to be a little flat. Dir en grey's LOTUS single was average; LOTUS needed more progression and OBSCURE was crap but Reiketsu Nariseba was amazing. I also enjoyed Krypts' EP and felt that the production was fitting for the music. Maximum the Hormone's long awaited new single was OK, much better than the pre-Buiikikaesu material IMO but not as good as Tsume Tsume Tsume / F, although that's probably bias. I also downloaded Amia Venera Landscape's THE LONG PROCESSION and Scale the Summit's THE COLLECTIVE, both of which were great underappreciated releases.

The few visual releases that I anticipated sucked. Raise a Flag sucked. Cold Blood sucked. Lycaon's Jesus was OK - Pierrot sucked. DOGMA sucked. I'm at the point where Visual Kei is dead for me and I'm looking forward to new bands that have members from older bands that I enjoyed.

Right now I'm looking forward to Wintersun's potential new album, which is taking until the end of Time to be released. They've started making headway, so having hope that it will be released this year is warranted. Electric Red's new mini will also be interesting. I'm also looking forward to anything from Setsuna, whether it be under Kokuyasou or Ahnenerbe. UI-70's album was supposed to be out by now but with the earthquake postponing everything I don't know when I'll get to gear it. Despair's also releasing a new album and I found REWIRED RIOT TECHNOLOGY to be lame so I hope it's more in the vein of DESERTED TECHNOLOGY RIOT or BEAUTIFUL JAPANESE SCENE. Kyotaro's COCKROACH is releasing a new mini and I guess I'll give that a listen too, even though I haven't listened to THE EIGHT or Black:List in a while. Demetori's releasing a new album sometime this year and everything they do is epic so I want that definitely. Hopefully Diru gets their shit together this year and finally decide to release another album, although I'm iffy on this one since my preferences for their recent material go Warsaw no Gensou > LOTUS > Hageshisa... and I'm not sure if I want a completely new direction or a rehash of Uroboros.

Scratch that I want not a repeat of Uroboros.

As for visual kei the only two things I really want now are 'Helios' by Matenrou Opera and lynch.'s 'I Believe in Me'. I don't really care about Lycaon's new mini and BORN needs to stop releasing material and go on a creativity hiatus since they've been shitting out new material like clockwork and the quality's starting to dip.

Invierno would have been cooler.

Difficult to return because of family issues or difficult to physically return?

That's completely true. Cheesy > horrible.

Oh, and someone needs to kick K for me. He's in the same exact position in almost every picture.

Yeah, I'm a fan of this band but I have to say that the new look is pretty cheesy. Horns, really? C'mon >__>