*littlelamb

I don't know about Fleeting Prayer... But monochrome was an A-side as well, so that'll probably be on there. Well he did say something about "utamono" too.

Gara has some things to say about the album here: UCV1NYK2CVs I think he said there will be various interesting and geeky elements as well as very core/punkish parts...

I don't know really, since like I said I'm no audiophile, so I don't even know all the formats, let alone their differences. I actully had to Google ACC to remember what it was. FLAC would be the best audiowise I guess, but highly impractical, so maybe V0?

What does being able to transcribe have to do with sound quality? You can do that from a radio rip upped on Youtube. I'm sure the software and equipment play a part. I mean, if we're talking the difference between 192 and 320, then it's usually barely audible, and definitely not something I'm gonna be losing sleep over. Though I would opt for 320 if it were possible, since even if it sounds fine as it is, you know there's a chance you're missing out a little. But that depends on the sound production of the album itself, as you said. However, even if the album won't sound crisp even in 320, it doesn't mean it can't sound even worse in 128. Why would you make bad worse? Granted I don't know what kind of albums you're referring to. If it's VK indies recorded in someone's garage or whatever, then no one should listen to those in the first place. 128 sounds flat and/or muddy without fail though, so I can't for the life of me understand how that isn't audible *in rock*. I'm not even an audiophile, well not by conscious choice anyway, just someone who 99.99% of the time listens to music with headphones.

More like "someone thought it would be nice to give an annoying troll an answer to his/her question with a obviously made-up tracklist" fake. Can't fault the writer for the stupidity of the readers. Because that's some serious stupidity.

Well I did recognize the 320 file no problem, so I guess that would be my preferred bitrate. VLC player gave away one file due to certain reasons, but I... think I got the other two right as well. I listened with Koss PortaPro headphones though. Do the people who listened with laptop speakers usually listen to music that way? Because I shudder at the thought. I also can't believe someone couldn't tell the difference between 128 and 320, especially if we are talking rock music.

Indeed. Converge? Err no. I'd look more close to home (theirs) like The Mad Capsule Markets, AA= etc., stuff they actually are big fans of. But the chorus melody still has that melancholic kayokyoku feel, which is very uniquely Merry, so... wouldn't exactly call it a cover of anything.

Well that sums it up quite well. Haha, well I agree with CAT5 pretty much. Most music is "generic", since the truly ingenious bands are few and far between, which just makes me appreciate them even more. BUT that's not to say you have to reinvent music to be good and worth a listen. It's really all about the energy and how much of yourself you can bring into the music, for me anyway. I do use generic as a negative term though, but it's reserved for music with really... "tired" is how I would put it, melodies. It's something I just can't bring myself to overlook.

I don't know if you've seen the live version of The Cry Against... that was on the Crisis Moment DVD, but it sounds anything but generic to me. Well depends on what you consider generic I guess. Oh and they re-recorded that song, or the vocals at least, not sure about the rest. So it will definitely be on the album.

Me too! It describes them so well, in various ways.

It could still be packed into a 30-min clip, you never know. But I'm hoping not! And I'm taking the price as an indication that there will be plenty of footage. Actually I think they said something like that somewhere, but plenty is a relative concept. Heh.

I thought the A+B+C versions with Victor Entertainment were BS, but this time there's actually a logic behind it. They can't very well put a ~3-hour or more long concert DVD as an extra, they'd have to sell it separately for 7000 yen or something. And since those concerts really go with concept of the album it makes sense to use them as extras. I don't know if they're including the whole shows or leaving something out, but for anyone considering buying these, here are the setlists: 黒??羊 (Black Sheep) M1 夜光 M2 ロストジェ??レーション -replay- M3 迷彩ノ紳士 M4 モノクローム M5 クライシスモメント M6 赤???? M7 ??ら??ら??ん??る。 M8 stupid×cupid M9 頭??ザクロ M10 ????衡キ??マ M11 演説～シュールレアリズム～ M12 [human farm] M13 オリエンタルBLサーカス M14 愛国??～BURST～ M15 ジャパニーズモダニスト M16 Fleeting Prayer EN1 The Cry Against… EN2 Midnight Shangrila EN3 Schwein??椅??（DIR EN GREY） EN4 Charlie EN5 T.O.P EN6 ??イオレット??レン?? Special-EN アイデンティティー 白??羊 (White Sheep) (Apparently almost all of these had a special arrangement, acoustic or semi-acoustic) M1 黄??レストラン (Yuu on piano) M2 薔薇??片隅??ブルース M3 想????サンセット M4 クライシスモメント -UNPLUGGED- M5 首??りロンド M6 高層ビル??上??ラストダンス M7 M.E.R.R.Y.MARCH～デンヱンカウキヤウクミキヨク～ ~medley start~ M8 歌声喫茶『モダン?? M9 ??哀交差点 M10 リフレイン～土曜日??涙～ M11 ??ック・タック ~medley end~ M12 新宿ナナ（ニューロティカ） M13 アタシ??????猫 M14 真夜中（仮） (unreleased song) M15 夜光 -TAIHAI mix- EN1 「??京????る雪…??（Piano Ver.） EN2 nameless night～?も???夜～ EN3 木洩れ日??僕を探????る…

Don't think they wrote it themselves. But yes, reading that made me facepalm so hard it hurt a little. Oh I'd like for Dir en grey to drone.

Beautiful album, that.

They sound a bit out of ideas to be honest. But I still want to hear it!

I don't know if anyone here digs The Blue Hearts, but they were an important band in the history of Japanese rock, and the vocalist and guitarist have continued at it to this day, currently as The Cro-Magnons. I like their second band The High-Lows the most myself, but I recently noticed someone had started subbing The Blue Hearts videos on Youtube, and I just love their lyrics. So straight to the point. The translator seems to be Japanese too, which is peculiar. Her channel. A couple of my favourites, lyrically: yMUiNEN52Pc ES1eiS_LPbM And The High-Lows: xNT7GARSC68

I'd go! Merry and The Stalin. Well they already played at the same event once, but I wasn't there, so...

I think the nasality is mostly stylistic. Goes with the music and her flirty bitch act, haha. Thanks for all the links! Oh keme sounds very nice indeed. Do you by any chance know where I could find that album? six and サロメ??唇 sound great as well! Wish I could hear more from them. I think ミラーボールズ is more folk than Group Sounds inspired though. I think I actually prefer the first album New Fascio. The sound is somehow more varied, yet less all over the place, even though the songs are even shorter. Was that confusing enough? Haha. And I love the 7-min remix by World's End Girlfriend at the end. The original being 90 secs or something.

No it's not the same thing at all, if you think a little. As for this Opeth silliness, yeah, the one acoustic ballad is totally representative of a progressive death metal album. And even if we were to make this silly comparison, the fact alone that they manage to make a hauntingly beautiful and very uniquely Opeth sounding song on mostly acoustic, without the need for extra embellishments and overly emo vocals says enough. the Gazette could never pull that off. @relentless: What? There is surely some miscommunication going on, if you think their contract has anything to do with my opinion on their music. I only meant that their enthusiasm for their "art" is hardly proven by them still making music. And yeah, I'm pretty sure most bands, and not necessarily just VK are on a monthly salary in Japan, my favourites included. That's why they stay poor even while being major.

Yes. THE craziest comparison I've heard in a long time. Too crazy for my mind to even process.

Except that I still didn't. Not so hard =/= easy. Okay? First you go on about being able to look at music objectively and then you say that about TMOAB. I'm not a fan of it either aside from a few songs, actually can't even remember what half of it sounds, but that's still a massive exaggeration. And a perfect demonstration of why I brought Dir en grey up. DIM = Blackwater Park + Ruki? NO COMMENT. Except that Ruki is one of the worst things about the band and I don't wish to imagine him singing anything else. But I don't really have anything against them personally. It's not their fault their popularity blew up, and making music for a monthly salary is clearly their best career option, so pretty sure they'll keep doing that whether they have a single idea left or not. Can't blame them.

THEラブ人間 sounds lovely! I like folky stuff. Oh, I need to give a shoutout to HOSOME, since they're one of my faves and I seem to have forgotten them lately. They're just so fun in all their ADHD and 1-minute long songs. Sorry about the ear-rapey quality of the following vid, but it's new. RpBw2tnRZts This is kinda what they sound like on record for those unfamiliar. ovjD3QOgkYQ

LOL Well this is random.

Haha, I loved the vocals from the beginning! Really stood out from everything else and were strangely perfect in all their imperfection. I love details like that in music. Anyway, I think most of my favourites are already quite well-known around here, so I'll just mention a few I've been really into recently. キノコホテル (kinoco hotel). I downloaded their first album Marianne no Yuutsu sometime last Christmas, because they were scheduled to play at an event with Merry and nil, and it was love at first listen. I just had to go back to it everyday for a couple of weeks, haha. Then I bought their mini cover album on a whim, because I couldn't find it online and that was money well spent! They released a second full-length last month called Marianne no Koukotsu, which I love as well. I feel it didn't quite flow together like the first one, but full of great songs anyway, this one being far from the best, but it got a PV: 86MQpbtawAE Secondly, ??リヌルヲワカ (Chirinuruwowaka), who are old news, since they released their first album Iroha in 2005 already, but I only heard them recently myself. I never really got into Yuu's main band GO!GO!7188, so this was a nice surprise! Iroha is amazing from start to finish, just my kind of music. They released a new minialbum 白穴 a couple of weeks ago, and while it's not as stellar as Iroha, I do love it. Bv6e_wAy5TU And I just learned that my favourite crazy to the point of worriesome band ???ゃ人間 (Gusya ningen) is releasing a new mini in a few days. I love their first album to death, but I'm not sure how I feel about this new song. They haven't gotten any less strange that's for sure. vc8261fJmu8