God

2007 is clawing its way back in the form of visual kei bands

Dude emulators can make games look really amazing sometimes. For example FFXII which is already one of the best looking games on PS2 can look so much better on PCSX2 with a 16:9 widescreen patch, 5x resolution, and AA applied.. in some cases it looks even better than some PS3 games. So yes I totally believe there could be a sub-sect of the "PC master race" for Emulating older games to look a lot better than they were intended to.
 
The older the game though the more nostalgic it is to play on old hardware such as tube TVs, but there's definitely a fine line when the advantages of emulators overtake that nostalgic feeling. 

I've been playing Final Fantasy VIII via epsxe for a few weeks now and it occurred to me that the game looked a lot better than I remember it looking on my PSX when I was a kid.  This lead me to think of the question, because of the tweaks you can get out of the machine for the .iso to look smoother, etc, I wonder if there are people who believe in the emulator master race as a specific sub-sect of the PC master race.
 
Personally, I feel as if I enjoy playing it on an old, tube TV more, but it's a pretty easy alternative when you don't have those things.  

marijuana guy? 

It really depends on what band I'm seeing.  If it's a band I'm interested in for instrumentation aspects, then I'll probably watch what's going on from the side.  But, if it's like, a band where the music is really heavy and gets you kinda pumped, I'll probably mosh.  At first, I wasn't a big fan of it, when I was like,, maybe 15-16.  I didn't actually come to enjoy it for a while after that.  But, when I finally decided I'd give it a try and not be worried I'll get hit in the eye or something, I realized that it was one of the only times I've ever felt that kind of freedom.
 
You can feel the energy of everyone around you.  It's sort of an unbeatable feeling.  Daresay I found peace in moshing?

This one is my all time favorite.

Too many problems Champo.
1. You paid for a Last.FM subscription. What does that even do? Put a little subscriber box underneath your picture and allow you to know who came to your page. Well now you know I came to nitpick and criticize, which are the two things I do best.
2. You have artists with letters I have never seen before. How do you even pronounce Týr? Tear? It must be because I'm being moved to tears right now.
3. ｄｉｅＳ is in Unicode. I am a Unicode hater. Everyone needs to use regular letters. Fuck those oversized Japanese equivalents you can all use ASCII and lick my chocolate bum.
4. There are too many viking bands. Shirtless muscled men makes me feel insecure in my manliness.

Maybe when I was way younger, I'd have thought yes about something like that.  But, I'm third generation Norwegian because my grandma came over here with her parents from Norway.  Once I found that out, I was hella stoked on my heritage because that's just rad.

Already did.

Here are my jpop recommendations.
 
GIRL NEXT DOOR

 
HAL (disbanded)

 
Ryohei Yamamoto (inactive?)

You might give Yasutaka Nakata's projects/produced acts a go? (seeing as you mentioned Tommy february, Koda kumi and Boa)


and there's Kyary too but eh...
 
MEG might fit your taste too:

 
and ofc Ami Suzuki

 
So yeah, my safest recommendations so far

Maybe lecca?
 

Things you never hear VK bands say:
 
 
 
 
sorry i had to 

i'll start with the obvious choice...
 
Tokyo Jihen
 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nZ71VBVViG8
 

what a cutie ^

I posted a few months ago in this thread, so...this is more recent. 

I've honestly only heard one NB release, but I wouldn't spend money on it because I wasn't that into it.  However, personally, I'm on the whole I have no money, my girlfriend and I live with her parents and feeding myself is more of a priority than feeding a musician.  And, as such, pirating doesn't seem that bad when there are people who are the band's target audience in their actual country who probably can and will buy their stuff when they can--this goes for any band, not just NB.  There are certain times where I have extra cash and I buy a CD, but let's be real, it'd be virtually impossible for me to afford every single release I enjoy at this time.  But, threatening to sue your fans?  Kinda shitting where you eat, imo.

embarrassing

Bit offtopic but.
Am I the only one who thinks this analogy is really fucked up?
I mean. I don't mind pirates at all so I'd be on the "pets, not parasites" team but... how is pirating music similar to sexual harassment? And does it mean I should think of sex offenders as pets, too, because I don't mind piracy?
Sure, both are illegal and both are a violation of another persons rights but have you ever heard of some anime creator who had to go to therapy to fix his deep emotional trauma caused by neckbeards downloading his work?
How is sexual harassment related to wanting or not wanting a girlfriend anyway?

NB basically killed themselves when going visual kei lmfao
 
I agree with whoever said that today's music industry is awfully outdated, especially in Japan. There are not a lot of artists in VK that distribute their stuff digitally, and when they do it's only in the Japanese iTunes store. Websites like HearJapan offered cheaper digital releases compared to other digital distributors, so I think the website was for a good cause (especially since they also offered bonuses and higher bitrates). It's a shame that not many people bothered to pay less than 500 yen for a full album they actually really enjoyed; most full lengths on iTunes cost 2000yen, physical copies usually 3000yen. With HearJapan gone, in order for fans to buy digital copies now, they'd have to make a Japanese iTunes account and buy Japanese iTunes cards online; purchasing the physical copy from CDJapan therefore is much easier, even though it costs more (of course there's also amazon, but we don't talk about amazon's digital quality lmao). Besides, I know people similar to me who prefer to have the music in the bitrate they desire; iTunes offers 256kbps rips that sometimes sound like shit, especially on high quality headphones. Websites like bandcamp offer a solution to this, and perhaps putting their music on bandcamp costs less than putting it on iTunes, but I wouldn't dare state this as fact.
 
These artists keep complaining about overseas fans that download their stuff while they're not even their target audience. If my target audience was Japan and I had people outside of Japan buying my stuff here and there, I'd see it as something nice on the side, unless these people would encourage my Japanese audience to buy less. If that's what's going on, then I understand why bands like NB are upset. If not, I don't see how they're making huge losses from it if they're not putting any sort of money into promotion outside of Japan.
 
Not everyone can buy everything, but most musicians understand that; most visual kei fans are teenagers who are still in high school and have no income except for their montly allowance they get from their parents, and you can't blame them for not spending that allowance on CDs every single time. If you however DO have the money to support your favourite artist, I feel like you should. I know not many VK fans feel up to that, but how can you make people purchase more?
 
I feel like Korean pop companies found the answer to that question and it's called packaging. EXO for example sold more than 1 million copies of their first album, and even though Kpop has a way bigger target audience because pop music is just more mainstream than VK is, I wouldn't deny that the packaging and price have something to do with it. I know that in Japan prices for CDs are just regularly high, but Korean pop CDs usually cost about 15 euros and are packaged in boxes, books, metal cases etc. with the CD, a thick photobook, a card signed by one of the band members and usually a big poster for free as well. I love buying Kpop CDs because of this; of course I buy a CD when I think it's good, but that fantastic packaging just gives it a little bit extra. I can understand some indie VK bands can not afford this kind of packaging, but I know plenty of bands can. Make it desireable to purchase the CD, give it extra things that a downloaded copy could not give you. If VK is so oriented on looks, why not add in a seperate photobook, for example? You'd have to pay extra for a photographer and the printing, but if it made you sell more copies in the end and raise the profit, why not?
 
Though selling more copies in general only enriches the record company, not so much the artist, as we all know. In Europe, 25$ for a newly released CD is a normal price and the least you can do (legally) is listen to 30 second samples in the store itself (if it even offers that option). That alone is not going to make me buy an album.
 
Anyway this became way too long and doesn't make any sense probably but I hope you at least understood what I was trying to say lol.

Then don't try live off your music. It's fully possible to make music, release music, tour a lot around the world and keep regular jobs. Thousands and thousands of bands from all over the world does that every single year. You cannot start a band in the 2000's and expect to live off your music.

I hate people that sue or threaten to sue.  Suing is the stupidest thing ever, just my opinion.  And threatening to sue your fans is messed up, but I never really cared for this band so meh.  All I got to say is that downloading has helped make many bands known and I personally buy the music I like.
 
I know Masa has a point but I still find it annoying, and it feels like Napster all over again lol.  Seriously, how he said that it is 'killing the art and band's future.'  I highly doubt that.

Pirates don't care if we're taking food out of someone else's mouth. We don't care if we make it difficult to continue band activities. Historically speaking, pirates weren't nice people. We want music and we want it now and it's hard for a band to compete with free, easy access and still turn a profit.
It's the reality of the music scene in 2014. We suck as human beings, we care about a band enough to follow them but not enough to give them money to continue. Don't worry about us pirates because if the only two choices were to pay up or not hear the music we probably wouldn't buy it because then that band would have to compete with every other musician out there for the few cents in my pocket and honestly they probably aren't first in line. NB should just assume that pirates weren't going to buy their music in the first place so there's no money being "lost" because there was no money to be "gained".
Piracy is a double-edged sword, because at least people care enough about your band to continuously download your releases for free. It gets your name out there but it also does take food off your table. Piracy is great when you're trying to get known; not so much when you're trying to make money after you build up a fanbase. Try to profit off the free PR you get from piracy as best as you can. I have no other magic bullets or solutions or kind words.

I've actually heard of City Hunter...well, kinda. I saw someone mention it somewhere, I'm not sure where. But I looked into it and it looks pretty interesting. I'll definitely check that out. Lee Min Ho is a great actor, too.
 
I made it to, I think, the episode where
 
 
but I was mostly just watching that show with my gf. Isn't GTO the live action version of an anime? I forgot to mention I'm Sam. I haven't finished it yet because I keep forgetting to watch it, but I really dig that show a lot. I think I only have three or four episodes left. The guy who plays the teacher is a riot.

The staff wanted to try something a little different this year with our best of list. Instead of just publishing a list of all of our picks at the end of the year, we decided to have it so one is posted every day right up to Christmas! It's our own little take on an advent calendar. Each day you will see a new album posted with a few staff members giving their take as to what their opinion of the album is. Keep in mind that it is impossible to really create a list that captures all of the diverse tastes of the our individual staff members, so you will have to wait for the staff member's individual lists if you really want to know a certain member's favorites. Also, the list was limited to only Japanese album (cause, I mean, this is a Japanese music forum).

This post will serve as the "directory" with all of individual albums being featured in each reply post. The discussion for this will go in THIS THREAD.

And without further ado, the list!
ALSDEAD - Separator amber gris - AROUND CHILDREN a picture of her - C CYCLAMEN - Ashura Dir en Grey - THE UNRAVELING DIV - ZERO ONE the god and death stars - dawn of the god グリーヴァ (Grieva) - 鬼ト影 きのこ帝国 (Kinoko Teikoku) – eureka NICO Touches the Walls - Shout to the Walls! 大橋トリオ (OhashiTrio) - plugged Tam Tam - Polarize the unknown forecast - オークション (Auction) 妖精帝國 (Yōsei Teikoku) - PAX VESANIA 惑星アブノーマル (WAKUSEI ABNORMAL) - 何でも無い凶器 (nandemonai kyouki) アルカラ (Arukara) - むにむにの樹 (Munimuni no Ki) Boris – Präparat lynch. - EXODUS M-Koda - Generating Arrow Diagram ONE OK ROCK - 人生x僕= 八十八ヶ所巡礼 (88kasyo Junrei) – 0088 カメレオ (kameleo) - なう！ NOCTURNAL BLOODLUST - GRIMOIRE LAGITAGIDA - TUTELA!! 凛として時雨 (Ling Tosite Sigure) - i’mperfect