Ikki

The first batch of pictures was what I got last week, but due to my job, I haven't had time to post it. This is what I got today along with some Morning Musume singles that I didn't take any pictures of.

I have too many things that I am proud to own. A lot of the things I'm listing have been posted in the "Your last music-related buy" and "Show your collection" threads. I know some people will be disappointed with what I have listed as I do have some releases that a lot of people would be proud of if they had it in their collection (Baiser's Hana and Amphibian's DOPPELGÄNGER, for an example). I'm listing my non-VK stuff first as no one is here for that crap. Items that are bolded are my most prized in my collection. G.D.Flickers Rebellious Heroes on vinyl Independent Rock'n Roll - I had to buy this album since this was the last album Color's Marry played on before he passed away. Lazy Hello Lazy photobook - This is the oldest item in my collection, being release around late 1978 or early 1979. It is probably also the rarest due to the fact that two members of Loudness (Takasaki Akira and Munetaka Higuchi) were in this group along side with Kageyama Hironobu. Loudness Sawada Taiji bass pick Black Widow: Once and for All poster Aura That VHS tape that has a pink case (indie era) - This was release before Aura were signed to Sony's Life Size label. I think this was released in late 1988 or early 1989. It doesn't have year printed anywhere on it. Dreaming Now/Debut store poster Thesauras store poster BY-SEXUAL/BY-SEXUAL related bands The BY-CHAN comic book that Pati-Pati magazine released. NON Fanclub card - I got this from buying a lot of B-S stuff from someone when I was super into BY-SEXUAL. Probably the most random thing I have received since I started buying Jrock merch 11 years ago. Autographed copies of test-No. 002 and test-No. 005 CDs - For those who don't know, test-No. is one of the two bands that Ryo and Den formed after Zigzo disbanded. Color Molt Grain EP Gekitotsu!! on vinyl Fools! Get Lucky on vinyl Autograph board - I'm just disappointed it doesn't have Toshi's autograph Fools! Get Lucky-era tour flyers Ask the Angels promo/radio press vinyl - I have no idea if there's a retail release of this album on vinyl, but I would love to get my hands on it if there is. Marry bass pick Dynamite Tommy's Attitude movie - This is one of those things I bought because I wanted to see how hot of a mess this movie was. Old punk and visual kei musicians should never be actors. Kamaitachi/Kamaitachi related bands A muffler towel from their 2017 reunion tour Both my Kamaitachi and Genkaku Allergy autograph boards The picture of Kazzy that my avatar came from Mogwai bass pick that probably from around mid to late 1991 due to his stage name on the pick Genkaku Allergy-era Kazzy guitar pick My autographed copy of Octopus Cult's Kamikaze Blues album. The Alien 9 Ball sticker that I got when I bought one of their CDs from someone that knew the band. Justy-Nasty Pleasure of the Sluts on vinyl - Because I am a Lezyna fangirl, I had to own the only album he was a member for. Also, it's on vinyl and not CD because I like vinyl more than CDs. Ladies Room Sex Sex Sex on vinyl Swapping Party EP Their post reunion CDs that are hard as hell to find. A random fanclub pamphlet that's autographed Rouage Mind on vinyl - This isn't even my favorite Rouage album, but I had to buy it when I saw there was a late '90s VK album on vinyl.

Since the majority of my favorite visual kei bands are from the early 1990s, I pretty much have to buy magazines or magazine clippings if I'm looking for harder to find pictures. I own an 18 gallon plastic container that I have to put my magazines, photobooks, magazine clippings, and tour pamphlets in and I still have 20+magazines/folders of magazine clippings stashed away. However, I have like two years worth of Shoxx and Cure magazines from 2014-2016 in that container with my early 1990s magazines. I mainly only by magazine/magazine clippings featuring Aura, BY-SEXUAL, Color, Genkaku Allergy, and Kamaitachi. BY-SEXUAL has been the hardest to buy since they super popular their first two years, were featured in some magazines every month during that period, and were often in the same magazine issues as Buck-Tick and X Japan. So that raises the prices of the magazines if I do find the magazine I'm looking for. If you can't tell by looking at my avatar, Kamaitachi is my bias when it comes to VK bands. I like to collect everything related to this band. Too bad my least favorite member is the only one still active in music. Outside of what was published from the end of last year to this year due to their reunion, I have almost all of the magazines/articles that Kamaitachi were featured in. Of the early '90s articles/magazines, I'm only missing 6 articles featuring them that aren't from fanzines. Outside of a few magazines and their 1991 tour pamphlet, I have scanned everything I own that features Kamaitachi. In most of the folders in my screencap below have anywhere between 50 to 100 pictures.

First off, Rouage's Mind album on vinyl. The rest of my recent haul that's not as fun. BY-SEXUAL - So Bad Boy promotional single cassette tape Zeta Volume 2 VHS Aggressive Dogs - Truth & News! Media!! (I only bought this because Color's Marry and Decameron's Take-chan sang back-up vocals in the chorus in one of the songs.) Pierrot - パンドラの匣 Pierrot - 気狂いピエロ Aura - 20th Anniversary Best (Only for the two unreleased songs.) Bellzlleb - Mr. Ree Bellzlleb - Section II Red Tail Cat - Sixth Sense Balance Sister's No Future Max - Naked in the Rain single Sammy (Billy & the Sluts) solo album Billy & the Sluts - All That Billy greatest hits

I finally decide to use Tumblr again. My account is mad-screw-mind. It's probably going to be 50% Morning Musume/Hello! Project gif sets, 40% Loudness spam, and 10% visual kei scan posts once I start getting active.

For me, I think I would have been exposed to Japanese music sooner or later as I did grow up with my dad playing Japanese metal/rock groups like Loudness, EZO, and Earthshaker due to all of the '80s metal bootlegs he used to trade around back in the day. However, for my general taste in music, I probably would be listening to bands like Fall Out Boy and Panic! at the Disco as that's what I was super into when I was in high school/college as well as the glam rock/metal groups my dad used to play when I was growing up.

Here's my chart from my ancient Last.fm account I had since 2005. Yes, I have some questionable taste in music. I haven't really used my Last.fm account that much since 2012 as around that time, it started to delete my iPod playlists everytime I would tried sync it. >.> There's been times I've thought of starting a new account, but I'm too attached to the one I have, even with it's questionable username.

Dada has been working for Free-Will for at least the past 12 years as a graphic designer/illustrator. He did a bunch of DEG tour shirt designs during the mid to late 2000s.

Yes, I bought the new UHQCD greatest hits album by BY-SEXUAL that came out last month. I would have prefer Pony Canyon just releasing the albums as UHQCD/remastered instead of another best of album, but I'm just glad an older VK band still gets a little love.

Currently using Eole as my Foobar2000 skin on my good laptop that only has the visual kei and '80s - mid '90s Japanese rock releases I ripped personally. My shit laptop uses iTunes and has all of my ABBA, '60s - mid '90s Western rock rips/downloads + all of my Kpop & Hello! Project downloads.

Had to take my picture on top of one of my J-music CD shelves due to me taking care of my sister's children as of this moment. SuG - Agaku (Limited Edition) Blu-BiLLioN - The Awakening of Revolution (Type A) On another note, I won an auction for a copy of Rouage's Mind on vinyl the other day. ♥

I know BY-SEXUAL went major within a year, but that might had to do with the first "boom" of vk than anything else. I can't remember if they had any notable feats that make them stand out from other VK bands at that time. Formed in early 1989 with all of the members only being 18 years old at the time First live was on April 1st, 1989 Released three demo-tapes through out 1989 Were signed to Pony Canyon by October 1989 Released their first single on February 21, 1990 Released their first album on April 21, 1990 Did the theme song for the 1991 movie Bakumatsu Junjoden that starred Watanabe Ken. They probably had one of the biggest drop in popularity, too. After their producer, Korenaga Kouchi, left them after the release of 1992's "Hurry Up, Let It Go!", their popularity plummeted big time. You can also tell that Pony Canyon cut their budget by how poorly mastered/recorded their later releases were and how far spaced out their later singles were. But that's probably a topic for another thread.

I'm posting some grandpas because this thread needs more of them. KoREDS (Aura/AZZ/Piranha 69 Kingz/HeavensDust) Cindy (Color/a bunch of tribute bands) The original line up of Decameron

I just got my most recent old school vk haul today. Pins - Ladies Room, Sleep My Dear, and two Tokyo Yankees Baiser - En Fleur special video box Aura - Fantastic Aura Show '90 + 8 Clips DVD With the Aura DVD just being a limited release via Sony's order by demand that were shipped out back in May, I was super happy I hadn't shelled out any money for their major label VHSes yet. This DVD has all three of their tapes Fantastic Aura Show '90, First Vision -Into the Aurand-, and Big-Bang We Love the Earth. Media Youth - Song For Scar People La'Mule - 時ノ葬列 La'Mule - Climax Stella Maria - Un-titled La'Mule - inspire Basier - 時ノ葬列 Sleep My Dear - From Inside of Brain La'Mule - Curse Everything in this picture is still factory sealed, but I will be opening them as I didn't buy them to just look pretty on my shelf. Baiser - Heaven Aliene Ma'riage - La Matinée La'Mule - Berlin La'Mule - サイコダイヴ

Well, for KATZE, they often get lumped in the visual kei genre the same way that 44MAGNUM, Dead End, and Gastunk gets placed as a vk band. They're not really a vk group, but they inspired a bunch of groups that would later shape what would be come the visual genre. The magazines that KATZE were featured in back in the day were the same magazines that bands like Color, BY-SEXUAL, and Ladies Room would often frequent the pages of, so in the end, it's not surprising.. I'm really shocked how many times Ladies Room got mentioned. As much as I love the group, I wouldn't expect a band with such cheese ball music to be listed as other musicians' favorite vk groups. I'm hoping these guys that selected Ladies Room as a favorite prefer tunes like "Get Down" and "Dance in the Back", because I would be sad if they meant pop fluff songs like "'Clock Strikes Ten" when they picked Ladies Room for their lists.

My boyfriend pointed this one out to me a long time ago. The guitar riff in the verse parts sounds too similar to one in The Boys' 1977 single, I Don't Care.

My dad: Kiss, AC/DC, Black Sabbath, Santana, EZO, Van Halen, Prince, David Bowie, Judas Priest, Iron Maiden, Saxon, Motorhead, Skid Row, Guns n' Roses, Meat Loaf, Queen, Megadeth, Slayer, New York Dolls My mom: Alice Cooper, Chicago, Led Zeppelin, ABBA, Ace of Base, The Beatles, ELO, Aerosmith, Fleetwood Mac, Three Dog Night, Bon Jovi, Cinderella, Warrant, Lady Gaga I was super blessed with my dad being very open with music when I started to discover visual kei when I was ten. He dug a lot of late '90s and early 2000s bands; plus he loved the "crazy looks" because it reminded him of Kiss, Bowie, Prince, and the 'Dolls. My mom, on the other hand, hated visual kei and tried to stop me from listening to it because I shouldn't be listening to music in another language. To the point she would delete all of the mp3s I had on the computer a couple of times.

All of the stuff I own that's signed were all second hand buys because most of the bands/musicians I like are disbanded, are retired, or are dead. Also, I'm too cheap to take a trip to Japan to stalk go to shows of the musicians I do like that are still active. It actually might be a good thing, now that I think about it. XD But I have the following autographs: Color - 4/5 of the band, Toshi is the only one that didn't sign the board I bought. From what the seller told me, Toshi was sick the day that the autograph session happened. Marry's signature says "Sex For You" as it was his slogan at the time to female fans and Cindy's says "Sexy Girl". Kamaitachi - I did get some live show/backstage pictures with this autograph. My avatar is the Kazzy picture that came with it. Genkaku Allergy Ladies Room - My favorite part of this autograph is that George's signature says "Suck My Dick". How cute. Octopus Cult - They're probably not a VK band, but all of the members were from VK bands. (Sceana - Kamaitachi, Genkaku Allergy; Naoki - Decameron; Take - Decameron; Yayoi - Seamonkey) Yes, I have a lot of Sceana signed items. test-No. (the original line-up) - Not VK, but Ryo and Den have a history with the VK scene. Mejibray - Both were posters that came with CDs I bought.

Well this sucks. I just saw Soundgarden live last week. Weird to think Chris would be gone the next week.

This haul was just pure old vk/J-rock related items. My Loudness bias is strong today. XD Kamaitachi micro-fiber towel from the current reunion tour Jacks 'n' Joker autograph board test-No. - test-No.006 test-No. - test-No.007 Puela - Shadow of Wizard Passion Rose - Under the Rose VHS + maxi single SHOXX volume 12 [cover artist: hide with Kyo (Die in Cries)] plus the Sawada Taiji & Yamada Masaki poster that came with the issue (I may have only bought this just for the poster.) Fool's Mate volume 128 (cover artist: Loudness) Rockin' F volume 202 (cover artist: Loudness) Fool's Mate volume 198 (cover artist: Luna Sea) Fool's Mate volume 202 (cover artist: Luna Sea) Fool's Mate volume 138 (cover artist: Ladies Room) P-5 January 1991 issue

I loved the whole Daishi's & Ami's sudden marriage announcement because the all of the Hello! Project and gravure wotas were losing their shit because Amitan was getting married to a criminal/junkie. A few old wotas were upset that they can't fap to her anymore knowing she's married a "visual kei loser". The best part of the idol/gravure fandom side of this whole thing was that some Western teenage Hello! Project fan made some huge rant about how Amitan was being a negative role model for young female fans because she was getting married to someone that used to do drugs.

Mejibray - SM (Limited Edition) <- This was actually a late birthday present from my boyfriend. XD Dog in the PWO - Heart (CD+DVD Limited Edition) D=OUT - バクチ / 魁swallowtail (Limited Edition) Ignore the Pusheen box in the corner of the picture. I was taking pics of it for a friend.

I don't want to be a pain in anyone's butt, but as a huge Color fan I have to point out that Dynamite Tommy's real name is Tomika Hiroshi, not Tomika Yuu. When his scandal was originally translated into English, the person that translated it misread the kanji for his name. For the scandal itself, I do believe the other two guys involved were found guilty. However, I can't remember what ended up being their punishment. I remember when the Daishi scandal unraveling when I was a sophomore in high school. My weeaboo friends and I made it into a inside joke for years to the point we drew an anti-drug stick figure comic about in our school newspaper. I had a hard time picking, but in the end, I picked Kisaki because he seems like he has the crap personality to go with his 'bad boy' scandal history to make him the ultimate bad boy of vk. Dai's and Takahiro's scandal put them a close second and third due to the fact they were gutsy enough to pull or try to pull off what they did. If Sakura or Daishi had another scandal to go along with their drug bust, then they might have had a better chance of getting that bad boy title. Most of the other guys brought up just seem to be dumbasses with poor life choices instead of bad boys.