RazorGenesis

pretty sure this is old considering the link but Yoshiki x iCarly at a Hello Kitty event
 
i'm sHOOKETH
 

This is my opinion, for me the best 5th album from the band (after GALLOWS, The buried, greedy dead souls and avoided sun)
 

 
 

I keep forgetting they formed in 2004 despite someone recently pointing this exact fact out fuuuuuuuuck

PM me your location, fuck the Corona virus.
 
i just wanna figh....I mean talk.

So, Zinnia is an old idea of Yusuke, I guess?

If all the songs were like Allergie it would probably be my favorite album of the year. Too bad we got a bunch of mediocre ballads with 0 personality instead.
 
Will have to give it more playthroughs but don't think my opinion would change much. 6/10. 

So, I'm surprised by how much of the album I actually enjoyed. It's like @YuyoDrift pointed out, but there is some musical semblance to an older era of jrock. For me, I hear some throwbacks to lynch.'s own "I Believe in Me" and even a touch of "Inferiority Complex".  That being said, I think the album is an inconsistent pile of concepts frankensteined together into a seemingly complete project. 
 
I want to start out by saying that there are absolutely some great tracks on here. The highlights for me (in order of appearance) are Barrier, Eros, Idol, Zinnia, and In This Era. The only real dud for me is Aster which I think is the worst ballad lynch. has ever written. It's just boring and the climax of the song isn't a good enough payoff to have to sit through 5 and a half minutes of serviceable song writing and none-too memorable melodies. The choir-like vocals at the end seem tacked on as there aren't really any other moments in the album with anything like that. And that leads me to my first real issue with "Ultima" as a whole.
 
A lot of tracks show lynch. playing around with new ideas but they seem like half-baked afterthoughts. Ultima features a female vocalist for a short 15 seconds, Allergie shows just how brutal the group can be with a heavy-as-lead breakdown and vicious growls from Hazuki but is tonally set miles apart from everything else on the album, and Aster & Eureka include some underutilized choir vocals . I'm all for experimenting, but my issue here is that none of these ideas really come together into one cohesive effort.
 
The female vocals in Ultima are there for literally just the intro before the song even takes off. What was the point of them? They hardly add anything. Why are they using choir voices in the last two tracks? I've already made comments on the choir voices on Aster but why are they also in Eureka? If they had been incorporated throughout the song somehow I think I would've warmed up to them more, but what the band has done is literally write an unrelated minute-and-a-half break just to fit in an extended choir section. The song would've worked fine without it, if not better, because it's bloated in its current state. You might also be saying, "but ghost they used choir voices in Zinnia too" and, yes I don't think they're really worked in all that much better there either. But it sounds more natural to me there because it goes well together with the flute acting as a sort of orchestral support.
 
And this is probably an unpopular opinion, but I think Allergie should've been left off the album. It's not a bad track, but it's tonally entirely different than anything else on the album. "Ultima" has its heavy moments, but this is such a stark contrast. It feels more like lynch. decided to add it in to throw a bone to fans of their more hardcore sound.
 
Everything else for me is just par for the lynch. course. Xero is yet another paint-by-numbers lynch. track down to the breakdown countdown. They've done songs like this to death and I don't hear Xero offering anything different or better. It's this album cycle's Evoke/Antares, F.A.K.E., Blood, or Joker (Except, I really like Evoke). Rudeness and Machine are too short and don't offer anything impactful in their short run lengths. I think these tracks definitely could've used more development.
 
Although not their worst offering, I think "Ultima" as a whole just doesn't all come together. In total I'd say there are 5-6 tracks I can say are solid with the rest either being average or in need of some more time in the thinking chamber. If anything I'm quite pleased because the tracks I do enjoy I find refreshing and somewhat set apart from other songs in their ever growing library. They strike this perfect composition of throwback sounds, balance between melody & heaviness, and new direction that's re-ignited my interest in the band. But the album could've used more work and that's my main criticism; they need to give themselves more time in between albums. I'm not sure what their contractual obligations say about how often they need to pump out albums, but assuming they're not in a release-an-album-a-year situation, I really wish they would slow down and refine their work. 
 
That being said, don't sleep on this one. I think it's their most interesting release since D.A.R.K.

I was going to buy the CD, but its so expensive   , almost 6000 yens,  ( hate my music taste because its expensive)

Damn only 2 days into 2020 and Xa-Vat have already served the best look of the year.

Allergie was a decent song until about the 1:35 mark when harsh clipping was inexplicably inserted into the track. Really? You're going to write something somewhat passable as a metal song (core knock-off nonetheless) and then you take away from the song with that nonsense? 
 
The rest of the album? Well, what do you expect? It's bland pop metal with the band stealing ideas from the GazettE (does XERO sound familiar?). If you want decent pop metal, just listen to the GazettE and throw this album into the trash. 
 
 
2/10

Finally, it's done now~
 
OFC, sorry if there's mistakes. I'm still learning, so xD
 
ULTIMA:
 
Kanji:
 
Romaji:
 
XERO:
 
Kanji:
 
Romaji:
 
BARRIER:
 
Kanji:
 
Romaji:
 
EROS:
 
Kanji:
 
Romaji:
 
ALLERGIE:
 
 
IDOL:
 
Kanji:
 
Romaji:
 
ZINNIA:
 
Kanji:
 
Romaji:
 
IN THIS ERA:
 
Kanji:
 
Romaji:
 
RUDENESS:
 
Kanji:
 
Romaji:
 
P.S.: Hazuki whispers some lines in this song, but they're not on kanji lyrics and it's kinda impossible to hear :'D Sorry 'bout that~
 
MACHINE:
 
Kanji:
 
Romaji:
 
ASTER:
 
Kanji:
 
Romaji:
 
EUREKA:
 
Kanji:
 
Romaji:
 

Somehow Lynch. was able to keep my interest in those string of Albums that dropped back to back.  Once AVANTGARDE came about, it was VERY clear that they were running on fumes but were starting to break out their shell a bit.  BLOOD THIRSTY,  and SINNERS were more great steps in the right direction even with the absence of AK. 
 
That momentum went out the window when AK came back. XIII was a mess.  It was worse than that one album ppl always killed me for hating...what was it? OH "I BELIEVE IN MID." Easily one of the biggest let downs  of 2018.  
 
ULTIMA is what XIII should've been. This album is LYNCH showing in length that they're evolving while still staying true to their sound. This shit is a breath of fresh air, dawg. Maybe they realized how they let a nigga down, and they channeled that energy and really  crafted something amazing. The energy in this album feels like a huge fuck you to me and anyone else who doubted them. They had something to prove here. 
 
Like dawg, why do I wanna do dirty things to my woman...but dance at the same time while listening to EROS?
 
Why do I feel like the band sat through a couple of the GazettE's recording sessions and used that influence to create the BANGER that's MACHINE?
 
Who told them to make DEVIL better by making IDOL?  WHO?!!!
 
What the fuck is Reo and Yusuke smoking?  Did AK give them the same weed he got caught with? The fuck is up with the nasty riffage in these songs?
 
Why do wanna cry after listening to ZINNIA? 
 
I have so many questions after listening to this album. This shit SLAPS. What the hell man.
 
Even XERO, which i killed sounds good with the rest of the album.
 
Man 20/10. Fuck the proper rankings.  
 
Unless DECAYS or KEEL is coming back,  I aint tryna come back on here and talk about J-rock for the rest of 2020 with yall. This album sealed the deal.  Corona virus can take its time. The endless replays this masterpiece will get shall hold me over. Have y'all seen someone so happy with a release that they quit  a forum over it? No.  Congrats, I just did it. And you just saw it. 
 
Bye.  I love you all  and ill see you in 2021. 

my favorite songs from the album?
FACTS:
1- ALMOST ALL THE SONGS ARE SO FUCKING GOOD!
2- YES ITS BETTER THAN XIII  DEFINITELY!!! (doesnt mean XIII was a bad album)
3- In the future im gonna buy the album

I'm shocked that Ultima isn't an intro. (2)
 
idk who does their synth arrangements on this album, but I really hate the 90s europop/late sukiyakikyo sounding keyboards in ultima
allergie sounds like a 2011 gazette b-side, idol is v good I loved it, 
 
I really would like them to re-record the avoided sun with their current sound production tbh; they still realy on the same pastiche composing approach way too much for most of the album to sound enjoyable but like whatever, I honestly expected less from the entire thing.
 
my fave tracks so far are ultima, aster and in this era; xero is garbage bin jús.

did you make the five star rating text just for me!!!
 
anyway to drop the stan mask for a second my favorites are EROS, ALLERGIE, IN THIS ERA, ULTIMA, IDOL & ZINNIA.
IN THIS ERA has been on repeat for a few hours, it's very melancholy but pleasant to me.
tbh one problem i have was that ALLERGIE completely mopped the floor with any other heavy songs on the album. like i'm sure MACHINE is very fun live, but when listening to this as an album experience, there's not really any coming back after ALLERGIE. also i understand the vibe they were trying to achieve with EUREKA but i feel like PHOENIX already did it better...
 
 
also shameless plug but i translated the lyrics.

This is my opinion, for me the best 5th album from the band (after GALLOWS, The buried, greedy dead souls and avoided sun)
 

 
 

my favorite songs from the album?
FACTS:
1- ALMOST ALL THE SONGS ARE SO FUCKING GOOD!
2- YES ITS BETTER THAN XIII  DEFINITELY!!! (doesnt mean XIII was a bad album)
3- In the future im gonna buy the album

リリース： 2020年3月18日
レーベル： キングレコード
 
▼収録曲
1. ULTIMA
  2. XERO
  3. BARRIER
  4. EROS
  5. ALLERGIE
  6. IDOL
  7. ZINNIA
  8. IN THIS ERA
  9. RUDENESS
  10. MACHINE
  11. ASTER
  12. EUREKA
 
 
 
 
What do you all think of the album?

Share your thoughts on the album here, please, ladies and gentlemen~
 
 

the album is good (better than XIII for me) but i think the comment about their diversity shining more in mid tempo and ballad songs remains true. ALLERGIE however is a p*ssy melter

Hazuki said on Twitter that there will be no preview this time, he prefered something new as a promo (the full lyrics video for IDOL)
3 days left anyway ! 

So... boring

Ah, feels like just yesterday when everyone was ripping on DEATHGAZE for having only 1 song they re-used and would big talk lynch. as a better alternative.

Totally agree! 👍👍