saiko

I agree. Perhaps they tried to court everyone, but in the end failed to get them. Perhaps they withdrew behind Mana's artistic direction, and thus all MM less Gackt were dropped off Columbia; I can't imagine him, even Kozi or Yuuki playing pop, putting up 00s 64 bits softvi rockers aesthetics, surrounded by group of dancers, etc. They are artists, I think that's clear. Kozi, like Mana, even at the cost of losing their mainstream status (a thing that history has reserved to less than 10 bands in Japanese music history, even Dir or the Gazette never had the attention MM received from the media in the late 90s), decided to move on and run after a consistent artistic project within their own worldview. On the other hand, Gackt brought iconic moments to VK and J-rock (Mizerable, Vanilla, Redemption) but generally speaking he did the stuff that would attract masses.

I agree. Perhaps they tried to court everyone, but in the end failed to get them. Perhaps they withdrew behind Mana's artistic direction, and thus all MM less Gackt were dropped off Columbia; I can't imagine him, even Kozi or Yuuki playing pop, putting up 00s 64 bits softvi rockers aesthetics, surrounded by group of dancers, etc. They are artists, I think that's clear. Kozi, like Mana, even at the cost of losing their mainstream status (a thing that history has reserved to less than 10 bands in Japanese music history, even Dir or the Gazette never had the attention MM received from the media in the late 90s), decided to move on and run after a consistent artistic project within their own worldview. On the other hand, Gackt brought iconic moments to VK and J-rock (Mizerable, Vanilla, Redemption) but generally speaking he did the stuff that would attract masses.

If you haven't watched any old shoujo anime yet, I'd recommend starting with classics like Hana Yori Dango (yeah, I know that the doramas are more popular but the anime adaptation deserves some recognition too), Marmalade Boy (sometimes this anime can be way too dramatic though), Gokinjo Monogatari (especially if you're a big fan of Ai Yazawa's works), Hime-chan no Ribbon (technically a maho-shoujo but overall  it's a very wholesome show imo), Onii-sama e... (now this one is a hell of ride - it has drama and all but in the second half of the series the show gets kinda dark. Oh, and it has shoujo-ai elements later in the series as well), Kodomo no Omocha (one of my favourite shoujo anime from the 90's - amazing show that deserves more love) Kareshi Kanojo no Jijou (a decent romance series from the creators of Evangelion), Chibi Maruko-chan (more of a slice-of-life series but it's damn good), Rose of Versailles (from the same author as Onii-sama e... but this one is a historical series and that's the only shoujo anime from the 70's that i've watched) and, like i mentioned earlier - Aka-chan to Boku anime is also great. 
I think these should be enough for now xDD

Old manga, specially old shoujo manga, is my favorite field. Everything about it feels very serious, like compromised. I imagine mangaka being in a very position of treating their audience in a mature way, trying to deliver always fresh and clever stories and visuals. I guess the inmense anime industry, with all its idols, constant massive output and exitist ideology, was in diapers at that time, so I think everyone involved with creating comics and animation (from illustrators, scripters, producers, to musicians, etc.) had less commercial pressure and thus experimented more creative freedom. 
 
Also, like in VK, I crave for the overall melodramatic, tragic and sexual ambiguous aesthetics from the manga from that era, lol.
 
What old shoujo anime would you recommend?

Old manga, specially old shoujo manga, is my favorite field. Everything about it feels very serious, like compromised. I imagine mangaka being in a very position of treating their audience in a mature way, trying to deliver always fresh and clever stories and visuals. I guess the inmense anime industry, with all its idols, constant massive output and exitist ideology, was in diapers at that time, so I think everyone involved with creating comics and animation (from illustrators, scripters, producers, to musicians, etc.) had less commercial pressure and thus experimented more creative freedom. 
 
Also, like in VK, I crave for the overall melodramatic, tragic and sexual ambiguous aesthetics from the manga from that era, lol.
 
What old shoujo anime would you recommend?

Scarlet Valse is a symphonic metal band who is at the frontline of the Starwave Records lineup. They've been active since 2011, and are renowned for their charismatic and responsible nature. Read on to learn more about them.
 
READ: English
READ: Japanese
 
 

I'm planning on reading NYNY after AkaBoku because just by reading the synopsis it sounds very interesting  AkaBoku is also very relatable. At least from what i've read so far, it depicts human emotions so damn well i can't even.
I haven't read a lot of old shoujo manga but i've watched a quite amount of oldschool shoujo anime xD 

I've read New York New York from the same author. Very short and very well done series, very pleasant reading. One of the most human and touching manga readings I've had have so far.  70s, 80s and early 90s shoujo manga was a very interesting field of experimentation, which I feel it has been recently lost.

I've read New York New York from the same author. Very short and very well done series, very pleasant reading. One of the most human and touching manga readings I've had have so far.  70s, 80s and early 90s shoujo manga was a very interesting field of experimentation, which I feel it has been recently lost.

In spanish we say, "qué tiene que ver el culo con pintar", which could be translated as "what [the fuck] has ass to do with painting".
 
 

kill it with fire

In ancient times they called it "emo"...

I feel like this deserves to be mentioned here: on 2020/04/25, the 1-year anniversary of Michirou's death, some of his fellow musicians got together for an epic livestream performance celebrating his work. Thankfully the footage is still online in the YT archives of livehouse APIA40. It's a pretty long live so I haven't watched all of it yet, but it seems to be pretty outstanding.
 
The musicians involved and their connection to Michirou (where applicable):
中村達也 (Nakamura Tatsuya) - played in THE STALIN and TOUCH-ME
山本久土 (Yamamoto Hisato) - played in M.J.Q and Shidamyoujin
クハラカズユキ (Kuhara Kazuyuki) - played in M.J.Q
スガダイロー (Suga Dairou) - pianist, I don't know how he's connected but he is associated with Tatsuya for sure
西村雄介 (Nishimura Yuusuke) - played in STALIN, THE END and on some Michirou solo works
 
(The craziest thing out of all of this is that I didn't realize until now that Tatsuya used to be one of THE STALIN's drummers, haha.)
 
 

Peace heavy mk II has disbanded at 2020/05/29 due to losing confidence to M-H after being prohibited to log-on in M-H for 6 days by n' mod since the same date, and his alter-ego band "le_newtype" has been eliminated by that mod at the same date

It has come to my attention that I have nothing left to share with this board. While most people leave quietly unless they aim to make their departure a publicity stunt, I feel that saying goodbye to a forum where I've more or less spent every day for the past 10 years is the least I could do.
 
I've made a lot of good friends here, had fun as a mod for like 15 minutes, and loved being an official reviewer. In spite of all of that, I cannot help but feel it is time I move on.
 
I do not plan on fully deleting my account so I can still leech, but if you'd like to chat about music you can find me:
 
-On Twitter
-On the VKGY discord
-Adding scans and lyrics to ZombiexJuice
-Making half-assed unboxing videos of rejected vkei maxi-singles
 
 
 
It's been fun 💋

I won't call this "stealing" at all. Once again, "stealing" is something like Grieva's style, and I don't find anything like that in the examples you give. For instance, what in "Neo ark" is stealed from "Illuminati"?

I just remembered this truly iconic TV performance from 1995 where Imai just does not give a single fuck anymore and proceeds to switch between "look ma', no hands!" and tuning his guitar during the solo. Also some amusing flailing all throughout.
 
 
 
(jeez this video quality is abysmal tho, I couldn't find a better one sry)
 
Maybe he doesn't particularly enjoy having to pretend to play to a backing track (I don't blame him, lol). It seems this has become somewhat of a running gag for him in the '90s btw, like this riveting guitar wizardry during Candy (even Hide checks out at the end of the solo). I also remember some tomfoolery during another 1996 TV appearance and an earlier occasion where both Hisashi and Hide pretended to play giant-ass sitars in a song clearly not arranged for that (it might have been Dress?), but I can't seem to find those on YT sadly.

Fair point, hehe.  To be honest I can't judge if he's a good or a bad singer, I never had an urge to check anything more than just this one song.

IZAM's vocals always irritated me. I never understood why he or anybody else decided it was a good idea for him to sing such a challenging melody with almost no vocal capacity. Whereas Kaya does it smoothly and smartly. Now I can finally enjoy this classic!

@saiko Hmmmm interesting, I really love the original version while I think Kaya's is cute but not as great as IZAM's (it's close tho). But maybe that's just because the original song is so burnt into my mind.  Anyway, Kaya did a good job with it for sure!

Seems like there's no stopping Kaya with the VK covers!  Just yesterday he covered MALICE MIZER, and now a SHAZNA classic!
 
 
 
Curious to see what he will sing next~

Wow, an actually good sounding Kpop song--HEY WAIT A MINUTE

In spanish we say, "qué tiene que ver el culo con pintar", which could be translated as "what [the fuck] has ass to do with painting".
 
 

cancel moix diś moisse and give us femme fatale with Mana taking over iori 😭