Lestat

I got into X Japan and Loudness around age 10 or 11. I was typically following anything that was 80's based and those two fit the picture. It wasn't until three years ago though that I discovered the actual term of Visual Kei mostly through anime and friends' interests.

Believe it or not but I prefer studying while listening to death/black metal. I think it is because it just usually creates somewhat of a static ambience because it is either atmospheric or I can not quite understand the lyrics if it is the case that I haven't looked them up yet. It's less of a distraction than poppy songs that are easy to sing or live along with.

Updated with prices. I'm out of money, this really needs to go.

I mostly fall back on melodic death metal or thrash metal every so often like I had for the past few days. I've been spitting through my Atheist collection and found myself to get extremely nostalgic up to a further point of almost no return.

Current? That's the most difficult thing, I hardly ever listen to anything new that comes out anymore. D GACKT 己龍 摩天楼オペラ Creature Creature amber gris BUCK TICK CELL GOTCHAROCKA Black Gene for The Next Scene

What I meant to say about not specifically classifying those bands as VK alone, is how they (in that time of 80's and 90's) weren't labeled as your typical Japanese nutbags just trying to be over the top about everything. It was normal at that time, look at KISS, Alice Cooper, Twisted Sister... These guys fitted right in and their music reached out further than Japan itself and didn't only reach the distinguished fan of Japanese music at that time. X JAPAN, Loudness, they were being pushed right in to the glam rock label of that time and as this trademark died with the grunge era, the entire experience around it changed as well. And well, the fanservice thing: it's been evident ever since Hakuei's thighs haha, but it wasn't a necessity to most people in those days. The job of being a fan changed a lot over the years, I am sure. As did the audience. I bet had you stood in a Penicillin crowd twenty years ago, the majority of the audience was male, because metal/rock used to attract a nearly strictly male audience rather than it did a female audience because of its toughness. When you look at it now, step in to a Japanese crowd of people at a VK concert, most are female. And it's not to create a negative image but I think it's safe to say that a lot of 'fans' these days do indeed only care about the 'Visual' simply because they are used to judging on looks. Just because I didn't live through these years as an avid music fan as I am now, doesn't mean I haven't studied music of all sorts of genres for myself for the past ten years. My preferences range from the 50's up until these days and in a few years time I have seen and come to know a lot about music and the way it works. I've been to over 200 concerts, lived a few years fully high on moshpits and thrashing my way through every sub-label of metal you can think of. So yes, I think I have somewhat of an idea of how different the music scene was thirty years back from now and that 'specifications' didn't really matter to the eye. -Also, sorry for offtopic, I tend to write a lot.

BUCK-TICK - Angelic Conversation

Everything has been said here.

Does anyone know if for ordering small items like cheki or photosets from CDJapan, there is an actual envelope option? I've looked this up before and I can never tick the option because the website automatically states that the items are too large/heavy. I think that for ordering a few cheki off of the website it's sort of ridiculous how the large parcel ends up in customs and forces me to throw up another €25...

Morbid Angel - Maze of Torment.

Back in the 90's, Visual Kei wasn't really filled with (excuse me for the word) weebo fangirls screaming at the sexy thighs of whoever a guy and that entire drama. People enjoyed the music over the looks. And I don't really consider Penicillin, SADS and BUCK-TICK any VK, they're in the league of X JAPAN and stuff, with worldwide fans because they're overall just 'general' rockbands having the capability of reaching out overseas with their music, other than with their face full of piercings and happy kawaii neko neko childplay consisting of creating a fanbase with fanservice.

Really not into anything on that list. ALSDEAD is the only thing that still sounds somewhat good to me. 1. 黒夢 (Kuroyume) - DRIVE 2. Moi Dix Mois - Divine Place 3. 己龍 (Kiryu) - 見セ掛ケノ飴ト自己満足ノ鞭（再録） 4. UnsraW - 廻黙に照らされた夢は涙に枯れて 5. NéiL - RHAPSODY 6. Ｄａｌｉ - 殺意の馬鹿 7. 凛 -the end of corruption world- - In stin ctive 8. サディスマリィ (Sadiesmarry) - 発狂パラサイト 9. 十神 (Tokami) - The Under of Garden 10. D - 炎の回廊 Really tough choice, there's quite a few really good tracks on this one. I really love 凛's instrumentals, so I guess I'm going for that one.

Really anticipating their sound.

Finding myself suffering from a lot of doubles in UNDER CODE Luckybags again. There's another coming up soon, so await this post to be probably updated. - All payments done via Paypal. (unless you're from the Netherlands, then it'll be done with a simple bank transaction) - Shipping is from the Netherlands. (Europe) - Fragile items will be shipped in a special bubblewarp envelope. - I ship worldwide. - Prices are all open, everything is negotiable, please bid! - Buyer pays shipping price. (t.b. estimated) - If you buy in the same currency as I sell my items for, please pay notice to the 'friends and family' option in Paypal, this saves you from Paypal fees! - Posters will be shipped in a special tube. (quite expensive, it's your choice if you want me to neatly fold them if you want to avoid extra shipping costs) - I'm not responsible for any lost or damaged items after payment once they have been shipped out. For sale: CD's: 12012 - Shin ~deep~ (sealed, brand new) €10 CindyKate - Dekotora no Hoshi, type C (sealed, brand new) €8 Megaromania - Quintessence Voyage, type B (sealed, brand new) €10 凛 -the end of corruption world- - VALUE EXCLAIM (sealed, brand new) €20 凛 -the end of corruption world- - The Psalms and Lamentations, type A (sealed, brand new) €15 凛 -the end of corruption world- - As if forever exists, type C (sealed, brand new) €10 Phantasmagoria - Actuality, type A (sealed, brand new) €15 KISAKI PROJECT feat.砂月 (Satsuki) - 壊詞～an ideal of beauty Desperate～ (sealed, brand new) €15 KISAKI PROJECT feat. 宮脇渉, 樹威, and 戮 (Wataru Miyawaki, Jui and Riku) - Shinki ~Graduation&Departure~ (sealed, brand new) €10 Crazy☆shampoo - 1☆Scream €8 Lustknot. - Angelus €8 BLOOD - Unseen the NEW WORLD (signed by all members; Dora, Hayato, Kiwamu, Kazuha) €10 PIECElang - YeeeeeeeeeLL⇒ (without obi, it was ruined when I received it) €5 BLACK LINE poster (two available, one signed, one unsigned) signed: €15 / unsigned €10 Megaromania poster €10 Orochi poster (signed) €10

Going with the Alice Cooper track simple for the sake of Alice. 1. VIDOLL - Cherry 2. Art Cube - Blue Heaven 3. Vior gloire - 狂い果てた現実に見た世界 4. KISAKI PROJECT - fragments voice 5. LAREINE - fiançailles 6. Para:noi - A forlorn hope 7. X JAPAN - Longing 8. ＬｕＬｕ - Sick 9. HISKAREA - 体温 10. ROUAGE - ゆめはまたゆめ The choice isn't hard to make with one of VK's best tracks, I'll go fiançailles all the way.

I don't listen to any of those bands above. Perhaps I'll go with the D=OUT one. 1. Jeffree Star - Size Of Your Boat (feat. Muffy) --- (Not shameful at all, crap) 2. DEAD END - Skeleton Circus 3. Vallquar-ワルキューレ- - dependence 4. KISAKI PROJECT - 描写風 5. GOTCHAROCKA - Full bocco! 6. Metis Gretel - Fairy Tale... Gothic 7. MALICE MIZER - Regret 8. ClearVeil - 色彩モーメント 9. LAREINE - 蒼の巣窟 10. Moix Dix Mois - Lamentful Miss I love this playlist to be quite honest. So difficult to choose a favourite but I think I have to go with dependence by Vallquar.

I actually need some good recommendations. Something in the range of Akira, Hellsing, Trigun, Cowboy Bebop, just about anything old (and with much better art than those pretty lover boy plastics nowadays). Or something considerably close to an action explosion in movies such as Redline.

I think with your general pricing of Japanese merchandise, ¥500 is fairly reasonable. You often pay about ¥2200 for a single including three songs. That's over ¥700 for one song. If you start picking at every single thing in the Japanese music industry you aren't done yet in five years. What other merchandise other than t-shirts and mugs do you see from your average American band that isn't milked like huge sellers like KISS or the Rolling Stones? Shouldn't you be more grateful that there actually is something to collect for collectors? It's not like they have numbers and come in packages, but having a collection of cheki is indeed valuable to most people. See it as collecting baseball cards; technically there's nothing interesting about information you already know printed on a small card with a picture of an old man on it, but these things sold like crazy and the market was an insanely well-working business. That's the same for cheki. Bands need to make a profit. And if you weren't aware yet; an actual business, if you do it right, is to slowly milk people of their money with smart marketing by bringing products on sale that people are interested in. That is business.

The people ripping you off are second hand sellers, not the bands. I see individual cheki go for prices going as high as €60. That's incredibly insane. Cheki aren't specifically 'rare', in my opinion. All of them are bought at an average price of ¥500 at lives. People's excuses are things like: "But the shipping, but the bidding on mbok, etc." It doesn't change their value. I'm not selling my €600 television for €1200 either just because it's used. Most livejournal sellers just buy in bulks to get a nice profit of it themselves as they sell their merchandise for over the top prices. My maximum bid on most cheki is €6,50, except if it's ex. bandmembers or of bands that are already disbanded, then okay, I can understand you'd ask a little more. But seeing cheki from Mejibray go for €25 I think it's just plain scamming since they really aren't that expensive on lives.

Shingeki no Kyojin (surprise!)

Richie Sambora - Church of Desire

You'd think I'd part with that?! Noooo, it's my treasure

A bottle of rum.

Not my whole face, but I'm always keen on sharing this one

Oh, and I have another one. Közi.