Number Girl

^ Um, wow. . . I think I just want to come out and say that I hate DJ SiSeN or however his name is typed. . .BLOOD, Blam Honey, Kiwamu's other projects or any "goth wave" or electronic artist/band that Tainted Reality promotes that wears glow sticks in their hair. Probably the most annoying crap to come out of Japan.

Blindman - s/t Kuroyume - Romance of Scarlet

Some chocolate protein bar.

December 2006; got a video game for Christmas with Gackt's "Redemption" on it. Liked the song, so I decided to look up who sang it and at the same time discovered the website Last.FM. From there, I discovered Luna Sea ("Gravity") and D'espairsRay ("Abel to Cain") and some others I now like today.

Hm. . .best out of Japanese rock. For visual kei: Luna Sea - Image X - Vanishing Vision Kuroyume - Mayoeru Yuritachi ~Romance of Scarlet~ Color - Gekitotsu D'espairsRay - Coll:set GACKT - Mars For indie rock: Number Girl - NUM-HEAVY-METALLIC Sparta Locals - Dreamer Melt-Banana - Scratch or Stitch The Boredoms - Poptatari Bluebeard - s/t Boris - Akuma no Uta For heavy metal/hard rock: D.T.R. - Dirty Trashroad B'z - Big Machine Anthem - Overload Loudness - Disillusion Vow Wow - Cyclone Galneryus - The Flag of Punishment Etc: Vivisick - Punks Were Made Before Sounds The Stalin - Stop Jap Spiral Chord - Nounai Friction Merzbow - 1930 Onsa - Mizuiro Sorairo Volcano - Violent

I'm just surprised people didn't catch that three years ago.

Most of those bands are not even American.

Luna Sea has so many classic songs. ^.^ It's like there's almost at least one song for everyone.

>.< Ohhh, I agree with SUBLIMINAL too about D'espairsRay. First "heavy" Japanese band I ever became interested in; I don't know, their music just has some kind of chemistry with my ears that no other similar-type bands have. I can't really describe it. . .even their less-than-perfect songs I always end up falling in love with eventually. And I love Gackt too. How could I forget the person who opened me to the world of Japanese music? He pwns in so many ways from writing songs, to singing, to being able to look like a Gyaru chick. His voice and lyrics always can make me happy when I need it. I also like his sense of humor too outside of the studio and his weird Gundam nerdiness. And I think You and Chachamaru are very talented at what they do. Basically every song with You playing the violin is breathtaking.

Everything Xcept Champ, lolololololol

Wow. . . I may have to just divide this into a couple posts because it is going to take me a while to compile all the love. >.> Well first, I love CAT5 for making this thread, because I need to vent my love as much as I need to vent my hate. Thank you very much. I love Number Girl! I love how they string so different genres of music and make the coolest, weirdest, beautiful blast of noise. I love Nakao and Hisako's sexy driving bass and guitar combinations and of course, I love Atchan's powerful, melodic drumming style that probably stands out the most for me. (Plus, he can be SOOO CUTE!) Mukai is ugly and not cute and not a good singer, poor guy - but I LOVE his compositions he makes, I love his cool hand-drawings for the album jackets, and his lyric writing is good as well -all simple, yet make a big statement. Great Japanese indie rock. >.< I love Anthem - I love Shibata's amazing riffs and songs that he writes, I love Akio's solos and his guitar instrumental tracks, I ADORE Eizo Sakamoto and I love his powerful voice and screams. They've never made a bad song or album and I bet if they make anything else it will be good too. Every song makes my heart beat fast and make me want to head bang forever. Epic metal band, terribly overlooked by the global metal community. Plus Eizo and Shibata are gorgeous - I don't care if they are 40 + years old! And I love Melt-Banana - they create the best possible form of punk/noise rock for me ever. I love Agata and his crazy, weird guitar playing that sounds like broken power tools in a blender! I love Yako's voice too, really add a lot of uniqueness to their overall sound. Their music is good for waking me up in the morning or for working out and stuff. It makes me hyper and entergetic. I'm so sad that I couldn't see them live, but I hope one day I do because they are ten-times amazing live and raw. Anytime I feel like listening to music and not worry about being too serious, I always pop in their disc! And just in the moment of it all: I really, really, really love Sunsgrind's new EP! I almost cried! Beautiful melodic hardcore, even though it is mostly Engrish. It is so much better in high quality from the CD, it really is. A perfect, perfect comeback from their hiatus. I thought it was going to be lame or something, but every penny was worthwhile. I miss Iori, but I'll get used to the new bassist. Yusuke's guitar is epic, and I just love Yusuke in general, he's so cool. *_* Okay, that's it for now. Will post on other bands I love tommorow or something. <3

The guy in the yellow sun visor is more pleasant to look at.

Can't agree anymore. I feel the same when people always reference D'espairsRay's demo tapes as their "good days." It can be a jumbled mess of crap and screaming, as long as it is "heavy" and "dark" amirite?

^ YES! I've always been curious as to what people meant by Diru "becoming American" . . . like only American metal bands sound like that? :/ And for that matter, since when was Diru specifically ever "Japanese style" in their sound?

^ Yeah, same here (only not from TW, but other forums and places as you said). Also, seeing the influences cited for Japanese bands helped me get into more non-Japanese artists too.

^

"Autority". . .

That's what I thought.

Until you can provide a factual source where such a thing is stated (not "I heard it from a friend" or some Japanese tabloid magazine), then by all means I will believe you.

@Tokage: I agree, sometimes things CAN go too far. And to respond to ShanethVarosa: Honestly, I was also sad when Jasmine You died (Versailles is a band I actually like) and it is okay to grieve and be upset, but even so I still get frustrated that in the Western Japanese fandom websites and such when a visual artist dies it is such a HUGE deal (even if they've never heard of the artist or listened to their music) and when someone legendary in Japanese music (hide somehow excluded), like Munetaka Higuchi or Kiyoshiro Imawano dies, they get shat upon or ignored completely. Why, I don't know. Also, not really fond of when people think it is "helpful" to spread rumors about artist's deaths (case in point: the comments about hide and Jasmine You in this thread) to get kicks out of "omg, itz a rumor and conspiracy!!!". It is THAT kind of thing that gets to me.

Seriously! And if the guy who died didn't have pink hair, wear makeup and a dress, or was in some obscure band that no one cares about, its like nothing of value was lost. . .

Ah, good. A positive-feelings thread in here. For me it would be: Gackt - MIRROR ANTHEM - Tightrope Dancer Luna Sea - In My Dream (With Shiver) ---> wow, Sugizo O_O Number Girl - Toumei Shoujo BORIS - Pink

I bet they won't even play. At the last minute he'll cancel the entire performance and then a few days later write an emo poem on his blog saying how sorry he is, lol.

^ "Baby's first br00tal" made me giggle. ^.^

Well, I must have misunderstood what you meant and I apologize for that. I thought it seemed like you were trying to say that people shouldn't make sweeping claims about the fandom, yet in the very first paragraph you basically did just that (by implying hardly any of them like them for the music). But I see now what you meant, so I'm sorry I made you upset. And I don't think there is anything necessarily wrong with doing those things. Especially since this is Dir en grey we're talking about anyway, what did you expect? Fans acting like patient, reserved little angels?