Ikna

Their live distros and demos are good too, I actually happened to like the demo of 黒い涙 a lot more than the rerecording on their グリーヴァ vs GRIEVA single. But I agree, Shuuen is really good. At first I didn’t like it, but it has started to grow on me and now I prefer it to their debut, which was just more of a 2010s Gauze.
 
I am surprised no one has spotted out how their recent singles’ covers look similiar to the covers of Dir en grey’s Zan, Akuro no Oka and Yurameki singles.

They look and sound nothing like グリーヴァ at all. As soon as the vocalist from a band has platinum and spiked hair, people immediately say they copy グリーヴァ. It's amusing though how at first everybody complained that bands didn't have an image related to the Visual in the Visual Kei, and now that they have they start comparing them to each other again. #VisualKeiSceneNeverSatisfied
 
Either way. This is a nice preview, I am always in for a more cult-like military look and sound (the announcement in the beginning), so I am all up for this.

I just signed up for last.fm a few weeks ago, as many of you may know, so if the site died or ended, I would just regret putting all the time into the site that I have. I've spent a lot of time trying to make sure I have a way to get everything scrobbled, which means I had to hunt for iPhone apps, and I've spent money on them too (only to stop using them all because of my stubborn iPhone not registering metadata changes coupled with last.fm not making a very simple artist title correction), I've spent some time uploading album artwork (it's a graphic design related obsession), I've been going through my entire iTunes library, re-tagging some of my music to make sure everything in there matches something that's already in the last.fm database... I could have spent all of that time doing other, more productive things, honestly.

I'm waiting for a competitor to arise that does exactly what Last.fm does, but with a few key differences:
A scrobbling tool that actually works! It's amazing how the official client can't scrobble from my Android but a thirty line script included with my portable media player can. Last.fm developers make web services seem like rocket science. A more sane way of categorizing artists. Categorizing artists by name was a terrible idea, although anything else has it's own warts to deal with too. If you must categorize by name, do what Wikipedia has and default to a disambiguation entry and have listener's pick the artists (or even better detect the album name and try to auto-match first!) A more sane way of handing tag corrections. It's way too cumbersome to ask for a change the way it is now. A similar/better radio streaming service. It probably works great if you're into more mainstream music and you're looking for more indie artists. Going the other way, not so useful. I don't use Last.fm too heavily. It's basically my online list of what I listened to when and I look at it because I like statistics and I'm a nerd. Other than that, the site is borderline useless to me. If it died tomorrow I wouldn't care too much.

Honestly there's no way in hell that I could ever take this review seriously when you gave all 18 songs a perfect 10/10.... is anyone planning on writing up an objective review for this album?

Funny how everyone was expected something big, just because Mast and Ray are doing something together. They both showed bad luck (or choice) with their musical career in the last years (except maybe for Nega, though I was never a big fan of them). It was clear from the start that this won’t be another Aliene and at best just a new Nega.

Funny how everyone was expected something big, just because Mast and Ray are doing something together. They both showed bad luck (or choice) with their musical career in the last years (except maybe for Nega, though I was never a big fan of them). It was clear from the start that this won’t be another Aliene and at best just a new Nega.

^ well, there are quite a few bands who sound like they could be from that era. It‘s not so obscure as actual 90s style oldschool bands. See DEZERT, Kuroyuri to kage, Gossip, AvelCain, Crimson Shiva, Sibilebashir, etc. The 00s sound hasn‘t completely died out yet. In fact, some of the bands of this era managed  to survive way into the early 2010s. I remember there were still enough Gazette copycats around in 2010. True it‘s slowly starting to fade away as Metalcore has become the next big thing, but a few bands still clinge to it.
 
Being a hopeless nostalgic I can understand where you are coming from, but can‘t agree 100%. The style has changed and the scene is pumping out one Royz-clone after another, but it would be wrong to idealize the past and say, that everything was better back then. The video and production quality seems to be the scapegaot in most discussions, but honestly: it wasn‘t as good as we claim. That doesn‘t mean that all PVs in the 90s and 00s were Matina-style low budget crap filmed on a shaky handcam with the band dancing around in the forest or wrapping themselves in toilet paper, but there wasn‘t as much budget as today. PVs nowadays look a lot better, because the technology may have become more affordable.
 
I also don‘t think that the production has gotten worse (it can‘t be worse than the ‘production’ some obscure VK bands had in the 90s when they recorded their songs in a 5m2 bathroom), maybe their instrumental just happen to sound bad. One thing I noticed with many indies VK bands emerging since the early 00s were the boring 3 chord (or less) riffs. Those were particulary bad in some low budget Nu Metal bands (plus half assed growls). My main beef with modern VK is that the bands want to play Nu Metal or Metalcore so badly, but either don‘t have the skill or the will to learn it. I am not an expert on this issue, since I am not really a big Metal fan, but I am sure that 90% of these VK bands don't even scratch on the surface of what are good growls or ‘harsh vocals’. I really can’t stand listening to random or reptitive guitar slamming and growls and screams so bad it gives me a headache. Which is the main reason why I stay away from this music (even though I listen to AvelCain and Karma‘s voice sometimes exhibits the same problem. I then often just skip the song or part…)

Their previous look had more similiarities with grieva, which even made it difficult to tell them apart when they where seen together on photos. This one is actually decent (typical early 00s style)
 
I am one of the few who liked their demo more than the first single. Hope this one will be better. The kagerou copy pasta is funny as much as their habit of reusing gazette song titles.

Old school Japanese goth bands had WTF-inducing vocals on lock. For example:
 
SADIE SADS - Angora
 
NUBILE - Spyral Totem Toler Than East Poll
 
AUTO-MOD - Deathtopia (couldn't find "時の葬列" on YT which IMO is a better example of vocalist Genet's goat-braying antics)
 
 
 
Finally - a personal all time fave ...sweetest and creepiest vocals you'll ever hear:

the only thing these bands have in common is having a japanese hue in their music. 
so basically we can also say that Kiryu is a Kaggra,'s copycat and even Memento Mori also Kaggra,'s copyband

Ugh, looking shit recently. That photo is the only decent one.
 

Ugh, looking shit recently. That photo is the only decent one.
 

Ugh, looking shit recently. That photo is the only decent one.
 

Ugh, looking shit recently. That photo is the only decent one.
 

I'll worship you, Zeus. I like being an evil heathen

I am surprised no one has posted any Minimal Wave or retro Darkwave yet. Or maybe I am misunderstanding this "retrowave" thing and it's more like a revival of more mainstream or typical 80s synth pop and electro, than being a revival of actual (New) Wave?
 
Anyway, I think this artist might still fit here:
 


 
It def has the characteristic 80s wave sound. This has been a trend for a while and I mostly "blame" it on the hipsters having rediscovered old retro music.

I am surprised no one has posted any Minimal Wave or retro Darkwave yet. Or maybe I am misunderstanding this "retrowave" thing and it's more like a revival of more mainstream or typical 80s synth pop and electro, than being a revival of actual (New) Wave?
 
Anyway, I think this artist might still fit here:
 


 
It def has the characteristic 80s wave sound. This has been a trend for a while and I mostly "blame" it on the hipsters having rediscovered old retro music.

Seeing old school mentioned here made me check this out but I don't recall old school bands basing their sound around what are essentially Korn riffs. This really sounds like a tricked out visual kei Korn. 

they have opened their new twitter
 

 
https://twitter.com/CrucifixionInfo

recording of their new mini album "不実なアンブレラ(fujitsu na umbrella)" has been finished, which will be sold in advance at their live at Imaike CLUB 3STAR at 2015/02/24
 
[track list with length]
01.不実なアンブレラ(fujitsu na umbrella) (4:23)
02.リストカットと性行為(wrist-cut to seikoui) (3:33)
03.Meu amoré (5:05)
04.流転(ruten) (4:47)
05.桜(sakura)～for waste child～ (3:45)
 

Didn't we already have this topic covered in other threads? I am sure this will too end again in a dumb "new skewl vs. old skewl" debate.
 
First define "drastic style". At the moment there are actually a lot of very visual looking bands active, such as Grieva, Crimson Shiva, Mejibray, Lycaon, AvelCain, The Gallo, Dezert and more. However none of these, except maybe Grieva, are simiiar in style to those from the 90s. The other may come close to what bands looked like in the mid 00s. I feel many people confuse drastic, visual styling with the old school look. They can be the same, but don't have too; not every band in the 90s used to dress like your average Matina group. And not every band that sports leather, spooky make up and neon hair is old school.
 
Even though I don't like the current way of visual kei styling, there are still many groups who pull it off as well as the old bands did, they just happen to look very different. As others have already said: VK isn't really a genre per se and it has to adapt to current fashion trends in order to stay somewhat relevant. The fact that so many groups look like Hosts is because this look is popular. In the 90s you had Soft Visual, in the 00s Oshare and now them.
 
I know I may contradict myself a bit in what I have said on this forum some years ago. But the more older I get the less fucks I can give about how VK bands look today. Surely, I still love and miss the old "Kote kei" style, but it's nothing that will ever come back and I have accepted it. I am not expecting all VK bands to dress like this and make music like in the 90s when it's not even trendy, fashionable or contemprary anymore. The good thing is that the old times had a large output of material, audio and visual. You can always go back to enjoy the music and look at old photos. Sure, it would be nice to see a renaissance of this style and a few bands are doing it (La'veil Mizeria for example). But I doubt it will ever get popular again.
 
I think I develop a different outlook at this thanks to all the discussions we had here. It's really a topic that pops up every now and then. I am sure we will lament over how much newer VK sucks in 40 years. I am of course biased and say "90s Veekay for da win!".

Didn't we already have this topic covered in other threads? I am sure this will too end again in a dumb "new skewl vs. old skewl" debate.
 
First define "drastic style". At the moment there are actually a lot of very visual looking bands active, such as Grieva, Crimson Shiva, Mejibray, Lycaon, AvelCain, The Gallo, Dezert and more. However none of these, except maybe Grieva, are simiiar in style to those from the 90s. The other may come close to what bands looked like in the mid 00s. I feel many people confuse drastic, visual styling with the old school look. They can be the same, but don't have too; not every band in the 90s used to dress like your average Matina group. And not every band that sports leather, spooky make up and neon hair is old school.
 
Even though I don't like the current way of visual kei styling, there are still many groups who pull it off as well as the old bands did, they just happen to look very different. As others have already said: VK isn't really a genre per se and it has to adapt to current fashion trends in order to stay somewhat relevant. The fact that so many groups look like Hosts is because this look is popular. In the 90s you had Soft Visual, in the 00s Oshare and now them.
 
I know I may contradict myself a bit in what I have said on this forum some years ago. But the more older I get the less fucks I can give about how VK bands look today. Surely, I still love and miss the old "Kote kei" style, but it's nothing that will ever come back and I have accepted it. I am not expecting all VK bands to dress like this and make music like in the 90s when it's not even trendy, fashionable or contemprary anymore. The good thing is that the old times had a large output of material, audio and visual. You can always go back to enjoy the music and look at old photos. Sure, it would be nice to see a renaissance of this style and a few bands are doing it (La'veil Mizeria for example). But I doubt it will ever get popular again.
 
I think I develop a different outlook at this thanks to all the discussions we had here. It's really a topic that pops up every now and then. I am sure we will lament over how much newer VK sucks in 40 years. I am of course biased and say "90s Veekay for da win!".

My future:
 

 
CRAZY CAT LADY 5EVAH

Didn't we already have this topic covered in other threads? I am sure this will too end again in a dumb "new skewl vs. old skewl" debate.
 
First define "drastic style". At the moment there are actually a lot of very visual looking bands active, such as Grieva, Crimson Shiva, Mejibray, Lycaon, AvelCain, The Gallo, Dezert and more. However none of these, except maybe Grieva, are simiiar in style to those from the 90s. The other may come close to what bands looked like in the mid 00s. I feel many people confuse drastic, visual styling with the old school look. They can be the same, but don't have too; not every band in the 90s used to dress like your average Matina group. And not every band that sports leather, spooky make up and neon hair is old school.
 
Even though I don't like the current way of visual kei styling, there are still many groups who pull it off as well as the old bands did, they just happen to look very different. As others have already said: VK isn't really a genre per se and it has to adapt to current fashion trends in order to stay somewhat relevant. The fact that so many groups look like Hosts is because this look is popular. In the 90s you had Soft Visual, in the 00s Oshare and now them.
 
I know I may contradict myself a bit in what I have said on this forum some years ago. But the more older I get the less fucks I can give about how VK bands look today. Surely, I still love and miss the old "Kote kei" style, but it's nothing that will ever come back and I have accepted it. I am not expecting all VK bands to dress like this and make music like in the 90s when it's not even trendy, fashionable or contemprary anymore. The good thing is that the old times had a large output of material, audio and visual. You can always go back to enjoy the music and look at old photos. Sure, it would be nice to see a renaissance of this style and a few bands are doing it (La'veil Mizeria for example). But I doubt it will ever get popular again.
 
I think I develop a different outlook at this thanks to all the discussions we had here. It's really a topic that pops up every now and then. I am sure we will lament over how much newer VK sucks in 40 years. I am of course biased and say "90s Veekay for da win!".