Reizoko

I read　a couple of threads in the lyrics forum because I was bored and for some reason feel like doing romanizations now. The songs I will romanize will obviously be songs I enjoy and I want to share those so other people can enjoy them too. There might already be romanizations of the songs I do somewhere on the internet, but even so I will just do my own romanizations. Maybe I will also start translating at some point, although it's kind of hard because lyrics can often have several meanings due to the way the Japanese language functions and the way it is used in lyrics a lot of the time. So for now I'll just do romanizations. I will use the Modified Hepburn System for my romanizations. If you have any questions about the pronunciation look it up on wikipedia or just ask me, if you still don't understand it. Maybe I will also romanize some requests, depending on my mood and such. Feel free to request any song but please don't expect too much. I don't know how much time I will spent on the whole romanization thing. For now, I'll romanize a song that I've been listening to a lot lately. It's just awesome, I hope there's people out there who share the same opinion Matenrô Opera - Lawn Daisy Acid Black Cherry - Yes -OZ- - Butterfly

Hey guys! I came across MH and decided to register. So yeah, here I am. Due to some random occurrences I started to listen to a couple of Visual Kei Bands again recently, haven't listened to them for years. To name them: Matenrou Opera, Acid Black Cherry, Deluhi, Sadie and maybe 1 or 2 more that don't come to mind right now. Other than that I listen to a lot of Metal, most of it being (Symphonic) Power Metal as of late. Fairyland is by far my favorite band, followed by bands like Blind Guardian, Rhapsody of Fire, Dragonland, Amberian Dawn and so on. I also like a couple of Japanese (non-Visual) Symphonic/Power Metal bands like Galnaryus, Unlucky Morpheus and Ark Storm. I also got into Japanese Idol music a little bit. I don't know many Idols though to be honest. AKB48 and such. It's fun to listen to every now and then. No personal stuff for now because I don't know what exactly to write about. If you have any questions feel free to ask.

How the hell has there nobody posted here yet? I used to play Diablo2 about 7,8 years ago and it was so fun. Haven't really been playing games a lot in the past couple of years, but I preordered Diablo3. Looking forward to it!

oh yes they make us in europe to learn english in school since 5 years old. you have to learn it.and you can't function in life with out it. japanese i think they don't have english at all at school. don't have to learn them & don't need them in their everyday life as much. edit:i think they want to learn and like english very much but nobody teaches it when you are kid and nobody cares and then you are old and it's a little late They do learn English　starting in middle school, which means that when they graduate High School they have learned English for 6 years. And still, they don't speak a single word of English, that's how terrible the (English) education is over there. @Arithmetica Yes, I know there's a lot of English teachers in Japan that don't speak any Japanese. I don't know how exactly class is supposed to work, but I think they try and get native speakers because the average Japanese English teacher is terrible at English. If the teacher sucks, students can't learn anything.

@Nyasagi It's not that Japanese people don't want to learn English, it's quite the opposite. They DO want to learn English. The problem is that Japanese education system sucks, and I mean it really does. If you knew how they are supposed to learn English (or anything, really) you would just facepalm. The whole education system is about reproducing things 1:1. Not about logical thinking and such at all. The average Japanese person who graduates High School doesn't speak English. At all. That's how terrible it is.

Thanks for the replies so far. @futoshi92 While I don't disagree that adding 'j-' is kind of foolish, I've seen 'J-Rock' signs in Japanese CD shops, so it's a legit word, although it's used different in the foreign community as I explained in the OP. Also, when talking about music I've been asked if I like J-Rock by a Japanese person, although this only happened once. But this person was definitely not talking about Visual Kei bands. @Nyasagi I wouldn't actually agree with Japanese people not being open about foreigners. Of course, there are people who aren't, but in general you are pretty welcome if you are white and speak Japanese as they don't speak English just like you said. @all the others To sum it up, all of you have your points. Nothing I really disagree with so far yet. I especially like Zesshokus post about the illusions many foreign Visual Kei fans have, which is sad but true. I haven't been active in the foreign Visual Kei scene for a couple of years, so today I browsed the forums a little bit. Correct me if I'm wrong, but are bands like Acid Black Cherry and Golden Bomber not known very much? Because those are two of the most popular Visual Kei Bands in Japan right now. I couldn't even find threads for them in MH. So either I just didn't find them or there's also a pretty big difference in what's popular. I also noticed Kiryu seems to be not so well known in the foreign community, while it's not one of the most popular, but a rather popular band in japan. I actually wonder how all the information about those indie bands gets into the foreign community. I'm not familiar with recent Visual Kei Bands at all, basically I only know what's popular from mixi and from people I know, but there's a bunch of band names I read on MH today that probably even the more 'hardcore' Japanese fans don't know.

Before I start with this, let me tell you that this post might become long, so prepare to read a long text or feel free to leave if you don't feel like reading. This thread is supposed to be about the way people in Japan/Japanese people see Visual Kei as opposed to how it's seen outside of Japan, by people like us. I used to like Visual Kei back in 06/07 and certainly had my weeaboo moments back then, trying to dress veekay and stuff, although it didn't last that long. My interested faded with time and for the last couple of years I've only been listening to exactly 1 Visual Kei band, which is Versailles, probably due to the fact that about ７0% of the music I listened to in the past couple of years is Power Metal and similar music. When I graduated High school in '09 I decided to major in Japanese Studies in University and me liking Visual Kei in the past certainly was a factor that led me to do this, although before starting University I knew that Visual Kei is basically not popular in Japan and that studying Japanese Studies will have nothing to do with Visual Kei. Even so I wanted to know more about the country where Visual Kei originally comes from. From October 11 till March 12 I studied abroad in Japan and I don't know if it was destiny (haha) or just some random coincidence that I indirectly came in contact with Visual Kei over there　without ever planning to. For the first couple of months I had no contact with it whatsoever, but at around Christmas time something that I would have never imagined happened: I was scouted by a Host Club. I don't even know why. At that time my hair was too long to look hostish and my cloths looked NOTHING like a host at all. So anyway, after thinking about it I decided to go to the job interview because this was an opportunity that I certainly wouldn't get a second time. Before the interview I even went to a styling salon with a manager of the Club to have my hair done there. As mentioned before, I didn't really look that hostish because my hair was too long...But whatever. In the end I didn't get the job because it's illegal to work as a host with an exchange student Visa. Anyway,　this experience got me interested in Mizushôbai. I wanted to get to know people who do this kind of work and talk to them, so I logged on mixi, joined some Host/Hostess/Kyabajo and so on communities and started to get to know people, even in real life. What I immediately noticed when looking at profiles of those people on mixi is that a lot of them (let's say about 60% to maybe 70%) like Visual Kei.　Which is not that surprising considering the fact that Visual Kei hairstyle has similarities to Host hairstyle. Another thing I noticed after getting to know a couple of people is that they have a different relation to Visual Kei as opposed to foreign fans. While foreign fans tend to see themselves as 'visual', 'visu', 'vk' (call it however you like) I've not met a single Japanese person that does so. They much rather just say things like 'I like Visual Kei', but that's about it. From what I've experienced so far, there doesn't really exist a 'Visual Kei subculture' in Japan (or if it does, it is really, really small) while it does in foreign countries. There is a subculture that can somewhat be related to Visual Kei though, which is Gyaru　and Gyaruo. But even if you are Gyaru or Gyaruo, it doesn't automatically mean that you like Visual Kei. There's tons of them that don't, but probably more than 50% of them do like it. To sum it up, my experience is that foreign fans who like Visual Kei want to be just like the bands and try to be 'visual', while Japanese Visual Kei fans do not consider themselves 'visual', even those that have similarities to Visual Kei in their looks (Host, Gyaruo). Another thing that I noticed is that the term J-Rock is used differently in and outside of Japan. While outside of Japan it's mostly used for Visual Kei Bands I've never heard a Japanese person use the word J-Rock to refer to a Visual Kei Band. Visual Kei bands are called Visual Kei (surprise!), most of the time shortened to 'VKei' in Japan while J-Rock is used for...Well, Bands that actually make rock music. And let's be honest, there's a ton of Visual Kei bands that do NOT make rock music and are still considered J-Rock outside of japan. Ok, I think that's about it. I'd like to hear your thoughts. Have foreign fans 'misinterpreted' Visual Kei and created something that has nothing to do with the actual Japanese Visual Kei? Why does this gap exist? Please note that most of what I wrote is my personal experience and not any kind of absolute truth, so if you have made different experiences, feel free to share them.

Before I start with this, let me tell you that this post might become long, so prepare to read a long text or feel free to leave if you don't feel like reading. This thread is supposed to be about the way people in Japan/Japanese people see Visual Kei as opposed to how it's seen outside of Japan, by people like us. I used to like Visual Kei back in 06/07 and certainly had my weeaboo moments back then, trying to dress veekay and stuff, although it didn't last that long. My interested faded with time and for the last couple of years I've only been listening to exactly 1 Visual Kei band, which is Versailles, probably due to the fact that about ７0% of the music I listened to in the past couple of years is Power Metal and similar music. When I graduated High school in '09 I decided to major in Japanese Studies in University and me liking Visual Kei in the past certainly was a factor that led me to do this, although before starting University I knew that Visual Kei is basically not popular in Japan and that studying Japanese Studies will have nothing to do with Visual Kei. Even so I wanted to know more about the country where Visual Kei originally comes from. From October 11 till March 12 I studied abroad in Japan and I don't know if it was destiny (haha) or just some random coincidence that I indirectly came in contact with Visual Kei over there　without ever planning to. For the first couple of months I had no contact with it whatsoever, but at around Christmas time something that I would have never imagined happened: I was scouted by a Host Club. I don't even know why. At that time my hair was too long to look hostish and my cloths looked NOTHING like a host at all. So anyway, after thinking about it I decided to go to the job interview because this was an opportunity that I certainly wouldn't get a second time. Before the interview I even went to a styling salon with a manager of the Club to have my hair done there. As mentioned before, I didn't really look that hostish because my hair was too long...But whatever. In the end I didn't get the job because it's illegal to work as a host with an exchange student Visa. Anyway,　this experience got me interested in Mizushôbai. I wanted to get to know people who do this kind of work and talk to them, so I logged on mixi, joined some Host/Hostess/Kyabajo and so on communities and started to get to know people, even in real life. What I immediately noticed when looking at profiles of those people on mixi is that a lot of them (let's say about 60% to maybe 70%) like Visual Kei.　Which is not that surprising considering the fact that Visual Kei hairstyle has similarities to Host hairstyle. Another thing I noticed after getting to know a couple of people is that they have a different relation to Visual Kei as opposed to foreign fans. While foreign fans tend to see themselves as 'visual', 'visu', 'vk' (call it however you like) I've not met a single Japanese person that does so. They much rather just say things like 'I like Visual Kei', but that's about it. From what I've experienced so far, there doesn't really exist a 'Visual Kei subculture' in Japan (or if it does, it is really, really small) while it does in foreign countries. There is a subculture that can somewhat be related to Visual Kei though, which is Gyaru　and Gyaruo. But even if you are Gyaru or Gyaruo, it doesn't automatically mean that you like Visual Kei. There's tons of them that don't, but probably more than 50% of them do like it. To sum it up, my experience is that foreign fans who like Visual Kei want to be just like the bands and try to be 'visual', while Japanese Visual Kei fans do not consider themselves 'visual', even those that have similarities to Visual Kei in their looks (Host, Gyaruo). Another thing that I noticed is that the term J-Rock is used differently in and outside of Japan. While outside of Japan it's mostly used for Visual Kei Bands I've never heard a Japanese person use the word J-Rock to refer to a Visual Kei Band. Visual Kei bands are called Visual Kei (surprise!), most of the time shortened to 'VKei' in Japan while J-Rock is used for...Well, Bands that actually make rock music. And let's be honest, there's a ton of Visual Kei bands that do NOT make rock music and are still considered J-Rock outside of japan. Ok, I think that's about it. I'd like to hear your thoughts. Have foreign fans 'misinterpreted' Visual Kei and created something that has nothing to do with the actual Japanese Visual Kei? Why does this gap exist? Please note that most of what I wrote is my personal experience and not any kind of absolute truth, so if you have made different experiences, feel free to share them.