colorful人生

While much of my interest in J-genres were founded on VGM, early-to-mid 00's internet, and anime via CTN/Toonami (shoutouts to the now defunct "Toonami Jetstream"), it wasn't until the YouTube + Google Videos era ('06+'07) where I really discovered bands. Got into indies bands in '08 and '09 w/ bands like Cold Kitchen and OCEANLANE. It was initially hard to get into Visual Kei ('09~'10) b/c it honestly weirded me out. It wasn't that long ago (in the US) when homophobia was the norm and any semblance of makeup was considered "gay" (esp. in the south w/ like 90% devout Christian friends), and I had that shared perspective. It didn't take long to embrace the genre, and it helped me come into my own (and formulate my own opinions) in my teenage years. J-rock: No Regret Life - Sign UVERworld - Timeless Janne da Arc - ダイヤモンドヴァージン (Diamond Virgin) One Ok Rock - 感情エフェクト (I started with "Beam of Light", but I vastly preferred Kanjou Effect) Crossfaith - The Artificial Theory For The Dramatic Beauty Visual Kei: ギルガメッシュ(Girugamesh) - Girugamesh (self-titled) シド (SID) - 星の都 Royz - eve:r xTRiPx - [-Re:evolutioN-] + Siesta vistlip - Strawberry Butterfly ユナイト (UNiTE.)- ミドルノート

That Astronoid song is pretty gud. It's like a very atmospheric DGD (probably b/c the vocalist sounds like Tillian.) Morgan Willis is up my alley b/c of synthwave. I listen to Purity Ring and Ryo Fukui, but I'll concur that Astronoid is my stand-out of that list. I'm in the middle of deleting artists locally that are already on Spotify, and since they don't have a "followed artist shuffle" yet, most of these songs will be from my cluttered af music folder. I'm curious what random things shuffle mode will dig up... コンシャスTHOUGHTS - Summer Lady EllDorado - Refrain やなぎなぎ (Yanagi Nagi) - Little Forest MK & R.Cena - Rise ピコ(PIKO) - Maker÷Breaker the GazettE - GABRIEL ON THE GALLOWS ステレオポニー(Stereopony) - do it -instrumental- My Fairytale - グリムソナタ AAA - チューインガム 天野攸紀 - 真昼の月～PLAY I don't think I've ever listened to the last artist before, but the song is REALLY good.

I totally forgot this came out o_o...

Art for Type-A and Type-B, respectively: This is godawful... 👀

aw fuc my heart

A bit of my own manga trash talk: Slave heroine deuteragonists in isekai series NEED TO STOP. I enjoy isekai b/c of RPG mechanics, but you can't tell me you're unable to inject romance to a series w/o having a protag w/ a savior complex picking up slave chicks. Also, if you have "ero-mechanics" in any part of your series, I'm dropping it on the spot. I'm glad there's been an increase in shoujo isekai mangaka, b/c most of them aren't hot garbage.

The video is spliced weird and the song structure is a bit iffy, but... SONG'S A BOP

I've been hype on her and Chanmina the past few days. Bangerssssss

Someone's going to bring up TXT at some point, so I might as well give my thoughts: They basically remind me of NCT Dream to some extent w/ their "cutesy and clean" vibes and whatnot. It's not bad for their first release, but I feel like using BTS as a point of comparison is not only unfair, but irrelevant imo. They're basically like every other "new"/nugu boy group, just w/ BigHit-level production (which isn't bad at all.) All the tracks on the mini are pretty refreshing tho.

ＡＥＳＴＨＥＴＩＣ But yea, I had no clue city pop was popular enough to be played in H&M. They have their in-store playlist here: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/0eeKZp7perkDfgJQt4pc6I ...which seems to have quite the assortment of genres. I don't trouble myself going to malls as much as I used to, but my observations are that the internet has pretty much bled into real life at this point. I remember being shocked that Hollister was rick-rolling people in-store in '08/''09, but now Fortnite dances are like the new sign language to 10 year-olds...Everyone is getting old I suppose.

I'm hearing quite a bit of BMTH - Shadow Moses (and general BMTH-ness) as well, so I think the band is heavily influenced by Western metalcore/post-hardcore acts. Naturally, I like the sound, so I kind of dig it.

My only gripe w/ this is the post-solo transition (sounds kinda off imo), otherwise this is pretty great!