Zeus

12 hours ago, Lestat said:

Does anyone happen to know if Android mp3-players exist? Similar to the later iPods, on which you could download apps as well. 

https://www.amazon.com/Sony-NW-ZX2-High-Resolution-Walkman-Japanese/dp/B00S94QZF8

This is the only product I can think of that fits your description, but it's hella expensive. I have the Sony  NW-ZX1 which is the earlier model. Runs Android 4.0, takes almost every file type under the sun, and has respectable battery life even a year later! Came with 128GB of internal storage but no capability to expand it ;(

Also, if you do decide to buy this do yourself a favor and buy a back-up data cable this uses a special cable and not the typical USB connection.

So we've reached full circle in VK...

On 1/19/2018 at 7:21 PM, The Moon said:

^ I used to use foobar & iTunes simultaneously and this would happen to me all the time - I'd have hundreds of tags wiped out, albums duplicated, etc. Never figured out why it happened.

If you still care for the answer, it's because iTunes maintains its own set of ID3 tags separate from the ones that should be embedded in the tracks. If it's a certain style, the information carries over. Otherwise, you get the stuff wiped. It's why I just stuck with iTunes after multiple attempts of cataloging 10k tracks that had their data wiped out.

If anyone could produce scans of the liner notes that'd be dope.

2 hours ago, Seelentau said:

nani?

Technically Ash was re-recorded for the Myaku single since a different version of it was on Kaede~if trans~, but yes they pretend like that song doesn't exist anymore and it's one of their most badass visual kei tunes.

If I were to go back in time and have my way with the album, I would have convinced someone to split it into two discs. Slip "ain't afraid to die" and "children" in there, and "Jealous -Reverse" if they love it so much, and kept the album around 85 minutes. Move some tracks around to spread the ballads around and focus the themes. It was their most prolific visual period by far. An interesting thing I noticed is that the band left a lot of material on the table with their first two albums, but there were fewer tracks for the 鬼葬 era. Tracks that weren't remixes appeared on the album. When you take out the 3 filler instrumentals, the album drops to about an hour run-time. In comparison, this is the first time band has purposefully featured "I'll" on an album. "Jealous" was reworked in 2000, and that and "ain't afraid to die" were on the DECADE compilations, but the original version of "Jealous" has never been touched.

6 hours ago, Peace Heavy mk II said:

They're still around?

Yeah they booted their keyboardist not too long ago.

That's not good.

2 hours ago, Saishu said:

How they figured Audrey fit Macabre but ain’t afraid to die didn’t is even more baffling. Only reason I can imagine ain’t afraid to die didn’t fit was because there were already three long ballads on there (not to mention Macabre’s 11 minute long ass). 

 

Know what? Fuck it! Ain’t afraid to die should have taken Taiyou no Ao’s place!

"ain't afraid to die" would not have fit on MACABRE because it would be three minutes too long to press to CD. Should have taken Taiyou no Ao's place since it is a single and it would end the album on a more appropriate note, and 18 years later I still think the song is bunk. I can talk about all the insane decisions made for each post-GAUZE Dir en grey album and how five minutes of critical thinking would bump each of those albums up by two points, but this isn't the topic for it.

4 hours ago, StriderSubzero said:

Thank you all for the fascinating history on the lyrics and taboos. First I've heard of any of this.

 

About OP's review though, I simply cannot understand why so many people hate "audrey" so much. That's one of my favorite DEG songs.

I differentiate between hating a song and realizing it has no place on a 'best-of' compilation. I don't care for 'audrey', but including that song over '[KR]cube', 'MACABRE', 'children', '24個シリンダー', or 'Zakuro' is a baffling move. The repetitive, country-styled riff sticks out MACABRE like a sore thumb and out of context it doesn't work any better. I also don't understand the logic behind including a B-side remix of your first single over the original single, unless that is their subtle way of admitting the new version is "better". I can go on and on about all the little decisions that made the first set of best-of albums not worth it for me, but the main point is that I don't hate 'audrey' - it's just B-side material at best.

He was talking about abortion? I thought he was discussing performing an unlicensed hysterectomy.

11 minutes ago, The Moon said:

Wait, what's wrong with Sangeki no Yoru? 

That whole song is about how Kyo saw a girl he liked so much he punched her to death, raped her dead body, put her in the fridge, and then killed himself out of guilt.

14 minutes ago, Hohchicano96 said:

I can't quite remember which article mentions it, but it has been described as being so taboo that it is neither printed nor spoken unless there is censorship. Another thing to mention about a Dir en grey song is that the long beep in "Mazohyst of Decadence" is in place of kikeiji with the word "Cage" printed in the Gauze lyrics booklet.

Does this have something to do with the war and babies born of radiation poisoning or is it something else?

What about that word is so repulsive?

3 hours ago, Seelentau said:

Just as a side-note: Tsumi to Kisei was chosen because of the explicit lyrics of Tsumi to Batsu's new version.

For the same reason you won't find any original Karma/Sangeki no Yoru on any official release aside of Kaede.

I know what's up with the lyrics for Sangeki no Yoru, but what's this about Karma?

So if you didn't know, I deleted my Last.fm account when the new interface changes rolled around. That was my way of showing my displeasure with the direction the site took.

I found it very difficult to keep up with new music and current music without my last.fm account, so after much deliberation I decided I would go back. Even though they said they would delete my account permanently, the minute I came back all my stuff was there as if I had never left.

Things on the Internet never truly disappear.

I still have my last.fm account from 2015...so I guess I'm back.

| Old scars never fade, old habits die hard

Throw those DECADE-compilations out and replace them with this.

Let me be clear about one thing: those compilations were trash. The covers were ugly as sin and the track selection, despite sharing many similarities to Vestige of Scratches, gave the impression that the band spent a week figuring out the details because they forgot about their anniversary. They literally scraped the bottom of the barrel to come up with enough content - the fact that "audrey", a butchered version of "Deity", "Repetition of Hatred", and "Jealous -Reverse-" are on it is telling enough - and most of them felt like copy-paste jobs trying to hide the lack of effort. Most of all, it didn't highlight DIR EN GREY at their best and did the band disservice as a 'best-of'. It seems like the band agrees with me, because Vestige of Scratches is everything those DECADE albums wish they could be.

Before the hype train leaves the station, this compilation is far from perfect. Like much of DIR EN GREY's career, Vestige of Scratches is defined by its peculiar choices. Some are baffling, while others are smart. They come together in a frustrating combination that is uniquely DIR EN GREY. Let's start with the tracks that were chosen; we have at our disposal the single version of "脈" (Myaku); "罪と規制" (Tsumi to Kisei), the censored version of the remake of "蜜と唾" (Tsumi to Batsu); the version of "腐海" (Fukai) they've been playing live for some time (interesting); a new version of "THE IIID EMPIRE"; the reinterpretations of "羅刹国" (Rasetsukoku) [ew], "OBSCURE" [no], "かすみ" (Kasumi) [sure], "THE FINAL" [ok], "残" (Zan) [eh], and "霧と繭" (Kiri to Mayu) [ugh...]; the single version of "CLEVER SLEAZOID" [good!]; the choice to end the album on a reworked version of "Beautiful Dirt" out of all 200+ songs in their discography [wtf why]; the exclusion of "GARDEN" [what a tragedy]; and then minor adjustments to most other post-VULGAR tracks featured which work for the most part. We can already see this isn't the standard cash-grab version of a best album and that a proper sitting would be very rewarding, so I can only suggest you do that and start from "-I'll-".

Controversial opinion coming in hot here, but the production job is fantastic across all three discs. Some may disagree, but I find that I need time to adjust to a new production job before I can assess if I like the changes. There have been many albums I panned for 'inferior production values' that I eventually came to prefer. Sloppy production has always been one of DIR EN GREY's weaknesses, especially for the visual-era stuff which hasn't held up over time, so some of the older tracks have a second lease on life. GAUZE has never sounded so clean, there's a 12-string in "脈" that I've never heard, and some of the tracks from DUM SPIRO SPERO are actually listenable now that the bass isn't obnoxious. I'd pay good money to have all their albums past and future worked like this.

The way the album is structured is frustrating to describe. What at first seems like a chronological trek through their eras turns into anything but by the third disc. The first disc is an ode to their entire visual history, featuring songs from pre-GAUZE to 鬼葬 (Kisou), plus a bonus in "腐海 2018". New "腐海" sounds good, and I like it's inclusion as a way to preserve it. I'd spin it a few times, but it won't replace the original version for me. Every other song on this disc was just remastered. I'm surprised at the inclusion of "太陽の蒼" (Taiyou no Ao), since I thought Kyo hated that song, but like a few other inclusions it's here because its a single. The second disc dips back into 鬼葬 with "JESSICA", nods at six Ugly with "umbrella," and then focuses mostly on VULGAR through UROBOROS. Nothing from the disastrous UROBOROS [Remastered & Expanded] makes an appearance, which is a blessing. Personally speaking, I would have dropped "CHILD PREY" for "AMBER," "朔-saku-" for "Machiavellism," and thrown in the reinterpretation of "undecided". Disc 2 ends with a new version of "THE IIID EMPIRE" which is pretty lit and one of their more successful retakes.

Disc 3 is where most of the meat lies and unfortunately most of it is displeasing to my ears. It's packed with most of their earlier reinterpretations, many hit or miss, most of which I'd have left on the table if it were solely my choice. This is where my lack of frustration with the exclusion of "undecided" comes from, as I would have rotated out "羅刹国" (Rasetsukoku), "OBSCURE", or "霧と繭" (Kiri to Mayu) for it, the PV version of "OBSCURE", and the version of "Bottom of the death valley" from THE UNRAVELING. I would have also killed for a reinterpretation of "秒｢｣深" (Byou ｢｣ Shin) from six Ugly, or a proper version of "Hydra -666-" with more gutturals and less screaming. After comes the salvageable parts of DUM SPIRO SPERO, including a version of "激しさと、この胸の中で絡み付いた灼熱の闇" (Hageshisa to, Kono Mune no Naka de Karamitsuita Shakunetsu no Yami) superior to the album version, but not quite what the original single sounded like, a condensed serving of ARCHE, "詩踏み" (Utafumi), and then ends on a very random note with "Beautiful Dirt". Not quite sure why they set it up this way.

Maybe the unfinished feeling to Vestige of Scratches is intentional, but either way DIR EN GREY have collated a collection album worth the shelf space for any serious fan. It may not be perfect, but it's a hell of a lot better than I expected it to be. At the very least, I can argue that it's a better alternative than importing GAUZE if you don't already own it. If DIR EN GREY attack 2018 the way MUCC took 2017, we may have an interesting year ahead of us.

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I honestly can't imagine the band without him, although I think they'll manage. They've found a groove which works for them and they can find a suitable replacement.

11 hours ago, TheZigzagoon said:

Why would you go to a live to get jizzed on? Wtf

People sneak backstage for that same experience sometimes.

3 hours ago, ShanethVarosa said:

I have many opinions on this. 

 

First of all, I think something other than Kaz’s hospitalization was happening to this Band. When they reformed their music was top notch, to me anyway. Their Shinku ni Yurameku EP was... stellar. Out of this world. And then they come with Succubus which was produced well but not a great song. And then Revenir?! It sounded like it was recorded underwater and the re-recorded tracks were worse than the originals. 

 

I was hoping they would take an extended break to figure out what the hell is wrong here and come back, but maybe this is for the best so Riku can try something else. 

1 hour ago, nekkichi said:

oh...no 

 

I hope they all land into great new bands than.

I don't think there's a shortage of available guitarists in the scene at the moment, unless everyone they seriously considered already has arranged units for 2018 that would be announced further down the line.

• Recording quality takes a nosedive in the span of one release?
• Possible money problems
• No free-agent guitarist wanted to join an already semi-well-known and established band?
• Band has a history of being inconsistent and disappearing/disbanding on a whim.

I'm going to go out on a limb here, but something associated with chariots stinks to high hell. Name is stigmatic at this point. They'd be better off doing the visual thing and "disbanding", then turning around and reforming a new band with a new concept.

If you thought this story was over, think again:

https://www.yahoo.com/news/koreas-park-took-money-spy-agency-reports-042944488.html

Seoul (AFP) - Ousted South Korean president Park Geun-Hye was charged Thursday with accepting millions of dollars worth of bribes from the state spy agency, news reports said.

Park allegedly received between 50 and 200 million won (now $47,000 to $188,000) from the National Intelligence Service (NIS) every month from early 2013 -- soon after her swearing-in -- until mid-2016, prosecutors told South Korean media.

The cash -- said to total 3.65 billion won ($3.4 million) -- was reportedly delivered by NIS agents to Park's aides in uncrowded parking lots or in back alleys near the presidential Blue House.

The money came from the spy agency's "blind budget" -- millions of dollars of special funds that can be spent without receipts for anti-espionage activities -- Yonhap news agency said.

26 minutes ago, anadentone said:

When I read about the bad  boys of VK , I was  thinking the guys in royz(butt pincher  Subaru, Kuina  the creep)My definition of bad is g rate compared to  this

butt pinching is PG-13 at least. you know some stuff so share the deets!

i refrained from putting this tidbit into the original post, but I've always had a sneaking suspicion that Chaos was getting a ton of fan pussy and the other members of the band weren't happy being left out, or perhaps it was interfering with band activities. i have no proof, just a gut feeling. can anyone confirm or deny?

1 hour ago, Mamo said:

2017

this year

 

I don't think this one happened in 2017 although very naughty so I voted for him. lmao

Ha! I threw him in for three reasons:

1. I remember VAJRA in general being a messy band. There were so many rumors floating around about them (like Nobro masturbating and cumming on the crowd) that I found it hard to believe until they all but confirmed it with his departure.
2. I wanted to cover him last time but couldn't.
3. I wanted to show just how much "punishment" has changed in a short seven years. Like @Tokage said, a lot of these "crimes against VK" aren't serious by my Western standards but I've been in the scene long enough to notice a very gradual shift in what constitutes a scandal. Eru punching women in the face and dragging people across the stage was ~okay~ seven years ago but shock antics like that won't fly today.

No matter how much research I do I always miss some deets! I'll apply the corrections now thanks guys

21 hours ago, maryeon said:

The vk look always was so iconic on yuuki... his moon light down look was amazing. It's sad to see them abandoning the style. Maybe it's me who loved the shit out of chains of collar era lycaon and can't get past it. 

No, no. Not just you. I'm glad I jumped ship when I did. 2012 me would have hated to see what this band has become. 2018 me is too jaded to care.