Kaleidoscope

Any opinions on "Shin Homura Uta"? I'm positvely surprised with it, the rerecordings sound modern, but still have the raw intensity of the original. I honestly didn't expect Tatsurou would still be able to sound that raw and emotional! 

Really glad these guys are still around and are looking back at their past, their latest album was also great.

I think that this album is actually pretty strong vocal-wise, the thing is that Kyo is using his full range in pretty much every song, so it's somewhat hard to surprise anyone with that anymore. Still some pretty amazing performances of him on this album, especially on the first MV song, forgot the title.

Very good impression from my first listen, 白濁 is stunning.

/edit: Disc 2 seems pretty hilarious, the collaboration with Gara sounds like a karaoke evening with Kyo

No deathcore once again, still sounds great though. I like that death metal riff at the end, haven't heard something like this from them before!

I've got the feeling that the verses of this will actually be heavy... Either way, the preview sounds great, really nice and somewhat memorable chorus!

Just checked out Aussitôt Mort, fantastic stuff!

Anyone familiar with Au-Dessus? Just discovered these guys and really digging their stuff so far, their first album is available for free on Bandcamp! Sounds like a mix between Sludge and Black Metal with surprisingly strong vocals, intense stuff.

During the karaoke contest you guys liked my Gackt stuff apparently, so have another one

Good to see that it will be possible to get their stuff after all! Not a fan  of having to get both editions for all songs though...

Haven't been doing much VK on my channel in the last few years, but I felt like returning to it recently. Hope you enjoy!

I'm actually looking forward to this one solely because I can appreciate lynch. more if there are less songs, I actually can tell them apart better like this. That being said, the samples sound decent, I find them more appealing than their last album to be honest.

I somewhat agree with you, I thought the mini was rather average unfortunately. Masturbation is the only song that I immediately liked as a simple, but pretty fun song - sounds like catchy industrial rock/metal, which fits them well. I'd say that the album grows on you a bit after a few listens, I actually thought that ロマンスグレー was one of the stronger songs. In general, there is not really a bad song on the mini, but there is just nothing that really stands out as amazing either, even though there are some fantastic parts like the end of 狼少年と毒林檎.  On a more positive note, I do think that they are becoming more consistent and polished when it comes to songwriting and Yoshiatsu's performance, plus the jazz-y songs are finally absent for once. 

I'm still pretty convinced that the deathcore-inspired stuff is where their greatest strength lies, but it doesn't seem like they want to pursue that as their primary style. 

Pretty tough to decide on only 9, but here we go:

1. D'espairsRay - [Coll:set]

2. D'espairsRay - Mirror

3. Deafheaven - Sunbather

4. 9GOATS BLACK OUT - devils in bedside

5. Epik High - Remapping the Human Soul / Tablo - Fever's End (Can't decide on one, but only want to include one Tablo record)

6. Subway To Sally - Herzblut

7. ONE OK ROCK - Niche Syndrome

8. girugamesh - girugamesh

9. Dir En Grey - Uroboros

D.I.D's Akane is a terrible vocalist especially when he attempts high notes. The super unnatural sounding pitch correction doesn't make it any better, making  it incredibly hard for me to enjoy their great instrumentals.

/edit: Just to be fair, his screams and mid-range singing are alright.

The other two songs were definitely a bit more memorable, but this is pretty nice as well. I went from disliking this guy's vocals to actually really enjoying them

Oh my god I live for this

I find enjoying myself this band more and more, even though I agree that the triggered basedrum really makes it hard to enjoy some of the heavier parts. The voice is indeed quite cool and has grown on me, I prefer the more natural/messy sound of the new song.

That shriek in the beginning is one of the coolest things I've heard in a while. Clean vocals are pretty messy and the pitch correction does more bad than good in this case, unfortunately it makes his voice cracks stand out more. Solid first song though, interested to see what they are up to!

@Bear I gave Emperor's In the Nightside Eclipse a few spins so far and enjoyed it, thanks for the recommendations! Not sure what to think about they keyboards yet though

@VisutoxPantheion sound great as well, good stuff. Also love the artwork, might actually order this one.

@pazzi314 I already knew and like Harakiri, gonna order their Aokigahara vinyl that is coming out soon! Never heard of Downfall of Gaia, but I enjoyed what I heard on YT so much that I ordered their latest album Their sound reminds me more of a heavier/more sludge-y version of Deafheaven, Ghost Bath and the likes, but I enjoy them way more than the latter at least. Thanks for the recommendations!

I found something nice too a few days ago, they are called Archivist and seem to have some members of Fall of Efrafa. If you like the bands I mentioned in my message to pazzi314, I highly recommend checking them out, really high quality stuff and their album is free on Bandcamp!

I agree with everything that has been said about the language of the music, but I also think that the image of the band plays a huge role. If band A and band B both play similar music in style in quality, but band B has an amateur-ish look/a terrible band logo/lame cover artworks, whereas band A has a great look/great artworks/seems professional (which is all subjective of course), a lot of people would say band A is better. I don't know why some people have a problem admitting it, but for me the whole image of a band plays a large role and influences the way in which I enjoy or don't enjoy their music - this applies to VK as well as pretty much any other genre or style imaginable. Aesthetics are just something a lot of people look for when it comes to any form of art. Even scenes  like the metal scene who often claim they don't are about appearances suddenly care a lot if a metal band doesn't fit the visuals a band in this genre is supposed to have.

I got back into Black Metal a bit recently and dug through some of my old favourites, really starting to enjoy some stuff like Darkspace, Xasthur and Midnight Odyssey again. Just recently, I also rediscovered the whole Post-Black Metal whatever thing, I still love Lantlôs, An Autumn for Crippled Children and now Deafheaven, which I actually had never heard before despite their huge popularity (they seem to be quite controversial though).

You guys are probably familiar with most of the stuff I named, so I guess I will share some of the lesser known bands which I only know through the local scene.

Der Weg einer Freiheit have some pretty good stuff, I interviewed their guitarist and vocalist a couple of times when they had their first releases. This one is the last album by them that I listened to - they do have some modern influences, but are rooted in the Norwegian scene according to themselves. Very good live band also!

Ära Krâ are also nice, but they could be rather described as Blackened Metalcore I suppose? Especially the vocals take some time to get used to, I'm still not sure if I really like these guys or not, but they definitely do have some great melodies.

Not from Germany, but a band I also rediscovered in my collection. Resplendent Grotesque was one of my favourite albums at the time, really creative and twisted Black Metal with an amazing vocalist. Curious about what they are up to nowadays, even though I heard that their old vocalist left.

Gonna look through some of you guys' suggestions, I already saw Bear mentioning Cultes  des Ghoules a lot, so I guess I will give them a try later. Also looking for a good starting album to get into Emperor, is anybody familiar with their discography?

I'm interested in any other recommendations that might fit my taste - I usually enjoy more modern takes on Black Metal, but definitely like the more traditional stuff as well.

Much better than their first song, Juri's vocals actually have improved quite a bit since Deluhi.

Only had one listen so far, but really enjoyed it - might be their best since Shion for me.

Love the previews, the whole thing sounds pretty oldschool. I like that they moved away from the party rock thing a bit and sound more organic again, looking forward to this one!

Ah yeah, I loved the Shokran album too, good stuff!

My most played albums from last year are probably Napoleon's "Newborn Mind" and Architect's "All Our Gods Have Abandoned Us". The former is just the most passionate and inspired Metalcore (even though they seem to be rooted more in Hardcore) album I've heard in a long time. The lead guitar is clearly what makes this band, but the new vocalist is also an amazing and very fitting addition. As for Architects, I've heard that quite a few people don't consider it their best work - I definitely do and think that the removal of most of the clean vocals and the cold and aggressive atmosphere work perfectly for them. And those vocals man, holy shit.

As for non-core related stuff, I recently got into Dødsengel. "Imperator" is definitely one of the most interesting (and longest, two and a half hours) Black Metal albums I've heard in a while. The linked song is pretty straightforward compared to the rest of their stuff, but it's definitely worth to check out the whole album. Pretty mindblowing stuff in my opinion.