The Reverend

Nice!

 

(though I completely missed their drummer leaving earlier this year....)

I didn't think I'd be into Sleepy-time Kei but here I am enjoying this video.

Sweet! I've been spinning their first album a lot lately...

A... memorable video for sure.

 

Anyone else remember the dark ages before Youtube when it was like an entire ordeal to download/watch VK music videos? 

Do you think because it wasn't as 'available' as your average PV would be now that added to the mystique?

On 4/6/2018 at 5:13 PM, Zeus said:

One thing I should mention before wrapping this up is that Dir en grey threw some serious shade at men in this music video. During the orgy scenes, the women have bare faces but the men are all covered with masks. I have several interpretations of this. One parallel I immediately noticed was to (surprisingly) porn, where it's all too common for the woman's face to be visible but the man is a secondary figure, and videos are associated with the woman and not the man. On a deeper level, it's also commentary on the unequal burden pregnancy puts on women. The men literally "don't see" what happens when they orgasm (hint: the women stop enjoying the orgy and start bleeding out their mouths with pained expressions on their faces), they don't have to deal with it, and they can carry on not caring, mouths transfixed in a smile. I dug deeper into the whole mask angle, and discovered that in Japanese mythology, oni masks refer to the belief in a spirit world in which demons carry out their roles of punishing the unjust and evil, as well as spreading disease. Double dip on the whole "spreading disease" = "venereal disease" bit if you want, but I don't think it goes that far. I think Dir en grey feel that men who do this and don't care are literally demons and worse than the women, but clearly the whole eating the baby's head idea also associates certain kinds of women with demons too. The band themselves aren't exactly human either, with Shinya's deformed body and Kyo's lovely tentacle mouth, so perhaps the band thinks everyone is a demon and that everyone is responsible?
 

 

This analysis would get an 'A' in an intro to film study class for sure. I'd bet if they were telling the truth about what the video was *about* the band would shrug and say "eh, it looked really cool" haha.

Love that these guys are more active now!

 

Rega's cool, glad he officially joined.

8 hours ago, Kaleidoscope said:

I am not turned off by the image of a band often, but Ghost Bath's interviews, videos and live performances were a little too much for my taste haha

Amen. Ghost Bath were way better when we had no idea who they were and everyone thought they were from China.

So.... Tetsuya came back for the show, and is just in the band again?!?

 

From their Facebook

Quote

 

Thank you very much for tonite.

This is new line up of members.

_Tetsuya Fukagawa
_Nobukata Kawai
_Manabu Nakagawa
_yOshi (killie)
_Yoshimitsu Taki (9mm Parabellum Bullet)
_Hiroki Watanabe (Heaven In Her Arms)

 

 

 

 

@plastic_rainbowdid you go to this? How was it??

 

 

23 hours ago, chemicalpictures said:

I always fiercely hated 0801弐209XX6 name, but their sound was catchy as fuck, I firmly believe their bad taste in names heavily impairs any chance of them succeeding somehow...

 

Of course it affects your chances, most famous bands have catchy/shorter names. Imagine these two very realistic scenarios:

 

"Dude, you gotta check this band out I saw last night, they were awesome!"

"Oh yeah what was their name?"

"Exist Trace"

"Cool I'll look 'em up."

 

vs.

 

"Dude, you gotta check this band out I saw last night, they were awesome!"

"Oh yeah what was their name?"

"zero eight zero one something... y'know what nevermind they weren't that great"

 

22 hours ago, Takadanobabaalien said:

My fav. band is ＊ which is pronounced anus (http://www22.big.or.jp/~yunisan/vi/anusu.html)

LOL. Gross. Was this band serious??

 

20 hours ago, r... said:

Does the ◇ in FANATIC◇CRISIS qualify? I sure think so!

What about Ｌυτёη∀, mi'ze:lia, ∀ile≠de〔Σu〕, Loz'a≠Veria, L∞P, Lure＋Selene, Λucifer, 【zɔ́:diæ̀k】 , Mëbíus, DAS:VASSER, 【denno:oblaat】 , MARRY+AN+BLOOD, La'miss†fairy?

 

Whoa ( I had a couple of those in my 'see also' but not the craziest ones).

【zɔ́:diæ̀k】might take the cake, look at that ridiculous band name!

 

9 hours ago, helcchi said:

★STAR☆

THE DEAD P☆P STARS, PANIC☆ch, DIS★Marionette, Crazy★shampoo, ワン★スター, ★NOハウス, Anzel☆Stripper【 AKR】, ネオロックンロールスタ→☆エース, RoNo☆Cro, RABBI★STAR, Death★Rabbits

Are they related or were there seriously two completely separate bands with stars in the name that referenced rabbits?!

 

4 hours ago, Shmilly said:

 

For the record, tildes are an incorrect Westernization of the Japanese 'wave dash' 〜, which is like a lengthened tilde. Laruku's actual name uses that, not the Western tilde. And the use of the wave dash in various song titles is legitimate and not a result of bands like Laruku becoming popular - in Japanese, it denotes subtitles. So for example, Gackt's 絵夢〜for my dear〜 could be romanized as M: For My Dear rather than using tildes.

Huh, didn't know this at all. I thought they all just liked the extra flourish.

 

(Still doesn't make sense for them to be in the middle of L'arc~en~Ciel, but I guess all the subtitle song titles get a pass.)

10 hours ago, AimiGen7 said:

Voted ≠ because cali≠gari. 

Yep me too. (and to a lesser extent, I also liked Loz'a≠veria and Called≠Plan)

 

6 hours ago, doombox said:

This is a really cool idea for a list. I love it. 

 

I do have to ask though, why do you say Miko's explanation of their name makes no sense? "to leave behind the proof of living" literally, traces of existence = exist trace. Yes, it may be a bit oversimplified but makes sense so me... 

 

I put other -even though it kind of goes with Kagrra,'s comma- is the period. 

LM.C

lynch. 

…。【サイレンス】 

アリス九號.

D.I.D

UNiTE.

 

Quality. Full stop. 

Ooh, the period has some strong contenders.

 

I think Exist Trace's explanation for their name is 1. a tenuous connection to what they say it means and 2. they probably came up with that explanation *after* they came up with the name. I really like Exist Trace's name! It sounds cool, and is googleable, I'd rather they just say "yeah we thought it sounded cool" than (I'm guessing) pretending it's got some deep meaning.

 

5 hours ago, JukaForever said:

XOVER? how does it fit with the other bands?

 

I would add extensions of the band name:

凛 -the end of corruption world-

Versailles -Philharmonic Quintet-

 

I call them Lin and Versailles only

The 'subtitle' band names are so dramatic aren't they? Haha. It wouldn't fit on this list but I also really like band names that are just entire sentences.

 

XOVER fit on the list because they wanted us to pronounce it "cross-over". So the X is being used to represent a shape, rather than making any sound an X ever makes.

 

9 hours ago, Zeus said:

 

I'd love to see a companion list of all day of vk bands with the most generic, impossible to google names.

Haha, we can cross off about a fourth of the alphabet with just one letter VK names (some are solo act peoples' "names", but they're just as eminently unsearchable.) Just off the top of my head I know VK has had:

 

A, D, J, K, M, S, X

Also worth noting:

 

As of earlier this month they have a bunch of stuff (Limited Collection & The Beautiful World Never Dies included) on Spotify. Sweet!

Cool, I rather liked Catfist. (Vaguely unsettling name aside)

 

One of the small joys of being a VK fan is the unique phenomenon of enjoying a band while having absolutely no idea how to say their name. And I don’t mean because a band’s name is in Japanese, I’m talking those band names that are ostensibly written in English but because of weird characters or punctuation you just have no idea how to properly pronounce or verbalize their moniker correctly (although most of the time the pronunciation just completely ignores the extraneous symbols).

 

Let’s try and trace the history of these unnecessary symbols and letters in VK bands’ names and highlight the influence (or lack thereof) of these punctuation provocateurs.

 

 

D’erlanger

 

The band: One of the proto-visual kei bands that began in the ‘80s and had an outsize influence on the first generation of post-X visual bands.

 

The name: D’erlanger kinda makes sense as a French word, so they themselves are forgiven, but it is apparent a lot of teenagers in the 80s who would go on to become players in the golden age of visual kei saw that apostrophe and thought “oh cool!” for entirely unintended reasons.

 

I said D’erlanger makes sense as a French word… but it’s not a very ‘band name’ kind of word. Can’t imagine throwing up the metal horns to a band called ‘from Erlangen’.

 

See also: L’Arc~en~Ciel, La’Cryma Cristi, La’Mule

 

 

L’Arc~en~Ciel

 

The band: No introduction necessary really. Almost certainly on the Mount Rushmore of VK bands, whether or not you like what they’ve done since the start of the new millennium (and I don’t). Pretty and melodious songs with just enough edge to appeal to a wide swath of fans. Not to mention a sexy frontman.

 

The name: Another word that makes sense if you’re French, but L’Arc~en~Ciel up the ante by adding some tildes for no reason other than young Tetsuya and Hyde probably thought they added an even more magical feeling to the word ‘rainbow’.

 

L’Arc~en~Ciel’s (making their name possessive *does* add a certain balance to the word…) popularity in both VK circles and a mainstream audience meant that adding dumb punctuation in the middle of your name for no reason was now completely tolerated.

 

Tetsuya has specifically denied he got the L’Arc~en~Ciel moniker from a cafe near where he worked as a teenager with the same name. It may have also been stolen from the D.H. Lawrence book ‘Rainbow’, but even that story is tainted because it includes the *movie* version.

 

See also: a million song and album titles with tildes in them, E’m ~grief~

 

 

cali≠gari

 

The band: Either groundbreaking, experimental rock that revolutionized and kick-started the ‘eroguro kei’ genre, or dissonant-sounding weirdos; depending on your tastes.

 

The name: Obviously lifted from the groundbreaking German silent horror film “The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari”; an admittedly cool source of inspiration for an art-y VK band. The name even has a cool rhyme and visual symmetry when written/pronounced in Japanese (カリガリ).

 

See also: a ton of also-ran bands that have stuck unnecessary equals signs in their names: Loz'a≠Veria, D≒sire, Kar+te=zyAnose, Eyes≒Mirrorge, PARANOID≠CIRCUS

 

 

ZI:KILL

 

The band: Early VK rockers that burned out too quickly to be mentioned among the all-timers.

 

The name: Originally formed as G:KILL, which doesn’t shed any light onto the inspiration for the name, but is an interesting fact. G/Zi:Kill both *kinda* sound like Jekyll when katakan-ized, and Visual Kei has no lack of love for that story.

 

You may be noticing a trend so far; early VK bands apparently hated having blank spaces in their names.

 

See also: La:Sadie’s, ru:natic,【_Vani;lla】, ha;qch, DAS:VASSER, L'yse:nore

 

 

Aliene Maφriage

 

The band: One of the harbingers of VK starting to get really dark and almost certainly offending the middle-aged parents of the teenagers listening to it. Lots of leather and hair... and in Aliene’s case; some good songwriting to back it up.

 

The name: In the book Freakonomics the authors cite a study that shows, all other things being equal, people are more likely to be asked to interview for jobs if the interviewer/hiring manager can pronounce their name. I have to believe this is why even Kyoka & Co. started writing their name simply Aliene Ma’riage eventually; they were probably tired of having to pitch things to record label execs who looked at their name and thought “pass” before they even heard the banshee wails.

 

I couldn’t find anything about the origins of their name. It is a vast improvement over their original moniker Autism though.

 

See also: √eight, ∋elf gravity∈, ZETSURIN⚡HAGUKI

 

 

Kagrra,

 

The band: The undisputed kings of beautiful neo-japonisme in VK.

 

The name: Even Kagrra,, who peddled a very classic Japanese aesthetic, weren’t immune to an unnecessary flourish such as a comma at the end of their name which, when spoken, led to a kind of hesitant mumble as if you were supposed to continue a train of thought which was still at the station. I mean, revisit that previous sentence I wrote, should it really have been written “Even Kagrra,,”? Kagrra,’s name certainly gave the editing staff at Shoxx a headache.

 

Kagrra,, originally called Crow, took their name from 神楽 (Kagura), a Shinto music and dance tradition.

 

See also: Thankfully the comma didn’t catch on much.

 

 

+DéspairsRay+

 

The band: One of the rare examples of a band who can pull off unabashed zetsubou unironically and follow it up with soaring choruses and catchy melodies without sounding disjointed.

 

The name: Another band that dropped some of the more superfluous parts of their name as soon as they started to gain some popularity. If I had to guess, their name is probably one of the most mistagged in VK. I know for sure if I opened iTunes right now I’d have songs by +DéspairsRay+, DéspairsRay, D’espairs Ray, Despairs Ray and probably more in my artist lineup.

 

The members of the band haven’t commented specifically on how they chose the name, with Zero even saying “It's nothing special.” I interpret this as ‘we know it’s dumb, don’t ask about it please’.

 

See also: VAL+IX+LIA, MARRY+AN+BLOOD, Ti+Dee

 

 

Nuvc:gu

 

The band: Nobodies.

 

The name: I honestly was pronouncing this “nuv-ka-goo” until I heard @Biopanda say “New vogue” in a Rarezhut stream and the lightbulb went off. I almost want to give them credit for using the *shape* of punctuation to emulate letters, but then I realize that’s incredibly stupid unless you’re working with some seriously custom fonts.

 

See also: VΩID, k@mikaze, SHAD∞W, XOVER

 

 

Exist†trace

 

The band: Probably the most successful all-girl-kei band ever (which unfortunately isn’t saying much). Started out very gothy and have gradually transitioned to a more mainstream sound. They let the pretty one sing and it makes me sad because Jyou has come up with some flat out beautiful, haunting vocal melodies.

 

The name: Miko said in an interview that,

 

Quote

the name “exist†trace” means not only “to leave behind the proof of living,” but I feel that it also means “How large of an impact can I leave within someone?"

And let’s be honest, that explanation makes no sense. It sounds cool though, and really that’s what you need in a band name (and something unique that can be Googled).

 

My biggest problem with their cross symbol is that it probably shows up as a question mark or some other placeholder punctuation 20% of the time because who the hell has the time to look up the unicode symbols? (although I’m sure people who write about Witch-house bands have the code for the cross symbol memorized.)

 

See also: Serpentine†Ghost, Jail†Breaker, Vice†risk

 

 

xTripx

 

The band: A surprisingly endearing mix of oshare kei and numetal.

 

The name: Weirdly, I always pronounce the first ‘x’ in xTripx’s name but not the last one (ecks-trip). I actually think more bands need to come to terms with the fact that eventually the world will run out of new band names and everyone will have to resort to having a moniker that looks like a circa-2002 emo fan’s AIM screenname.

 

See also: xジハードx, 【TRiANGLE▼SONiX】, Noi’X

 

 

12012

 

The band: Undercode stalwarts that started out lo-fi and disjointed and nu-metal influenced but very charming, and graduated to poppier fare when they decided to take a stab at becoming famous.

 

The name: ‘Ichi ni zero ichi ni’ if you’re Japanese, ‘twelve-o’-twelve’ if you’re me. Allegedly named after a section of the California penal code that deals with illegal weapons… and that actually kind of tracks. It’s an extremely boring section though (besides we know Wataru prefers hand-to-hand combat):

 

Quote

12012.  The Attorney General shall provide investigative assistance
to local law enforcement agencies to better ensure the investigation
of individuals who are armed and prohibited from possessing a
firearm.

 

Not a cool law for a band name. I think we’ve got a retconned term a la 420 and 311.

 

See also: Plenty of other band names that need a pronunciation guide:  0801弐209XX6* (zero hachi), …。(silence), 6→7 (upper)

 

*The guitarist of zero hachi should get an unnecessary punctuation in band names lifetime achievement award. He was in all these bands according to vkdb: †Zaide†,  Diod'honneur,  カレヰド, re:Make, 0801弐209XX6.

 

Be sure to add your favorite band name with unnecessary punctuation!

Excited for some new music.... dreading tracking down some of their live-limited shit.

Awesome work @hiroki! I always find a couple new gems from your year-end lists (going to check out Lagless and Love Lock asap!)

 

Loving that Free Aqua Butterfly topped your singles list... the more love they can get the better.

I'm torn... I miss Kameleo/Hikaru for sure... but I'm not sure I've ever actually liked a VK solo project.

 

(I'll be in Tokyo during that show... kinda tempted)

Damn, not like they had any chance of 'making it'.... but I enjoyed them. 

Thanks for sharing stories from their last live you two!

 

Re: the instore.... what is 'satsuei'?

Shoutout to @indigo(I think!) for turning me on to Asthenia in the plug session yesterday.... they fit nicely beside HiHA in that kinda atmospheric metal space.

Welcome!

 

Digging the new YT series.

LOL. Wait the "Do Your Ears Hang Low" bits are in the song on the album?? I'd have thought for sure they were just in the music video.

 

Anyway, checked them out recently and Vexent doesn't really do it for me, they're one of those bands that sound like you put 10 VK bands in a blender and ended up with a bowl of not bad but not good VK porridge. Had some cool bits but not enough to make me follow them.

 

 

I hadn't seen the music video for the title track yet when I made this... where's the rest of the band (the guitarists are still in the band right???)

@CAT5I'm digging this Daoko song a lot, I like her voice over music that sounds so 'nighttime'. Is her new album mostly previously released songs? Or do there just happen to be two that I recognize as being old?

Not sure I needed another video from them filmed outside..... but I have an irrational love of this band so I can't help but like it.

4 hours ago, Takadanobabaalien said:

I voted for "visual is in the name".

 

While the music definitely is what makes me like a band or not, a cool look adds an aura that I like. When you've been into vk for a while you can also sense if you will like a band who haven't released anything yet just by their looks, which I guess is both good and bad. 

 

Both what I voted for and pretty much how I feel.

 

I guess I've never considered whether being able to tell if I'll enjoy a band from their looks with like 90% accuracy is a good thing "hey saves me time" or a bad thing "kinda lose that magic of completely unexpected discovery".

 

In what I hope will be an end of year tradition for years to come; here's my second annual countdown of 10 noteworthy VK looks. Some good, some bad, some ugly; all likely to elicit some sort of reaction. Let's celebrate the "Visual" in Visual Kei!

 

Obviously there are a lot of good ones I missed, so I encourage you to add the looks you think should be on the list in the comments below!

 

Thanks to the ORZ team for helping with the list, and especially to @platyand @suji for contributing ideas that I shamelessly stole.

 

ナタリー (Natalie) Guitarist める(Mel)

 

 

La'veil MizeriA

 

 

 

マルコ (Marco)

 

 

D

 

 

R指定 (R-Shitei)

 

 

Psycho Le Cému - then and now

 

 

0.1gの誤算 (0.1g no gosan)

 

 

Linaria

 

 

Dezert

 

 

Mejibray vocalist Tsuzuku and Lack-co drummer Higiri