Kaleidoscope

These guys sound promising. The first verse gives off a slightly old D'espairsRay vibe and his cleans are pretty strong, definitely gonna keep an eye on them.

Awesome news! I thought it would have been cool if they included their last three singles, but maybe they are confident enough in their new material, looking forward to it.

58 minutes ago, Bear said:

That depends on the genre, the type of music the band plays, how good the songwriting is and so on. But there's no such thing as a perfect album lenght, but a general thumb rule for me is that the more agressive the music is, the shorter the album should be. There's always certain exceptions of course, but just in general.

 

But for agressive music such as grindcore, thrash metal, death metal, hardcore, crust, "war metal" (aka really violent brand of black/death metal) and so on I prefer it to be between 15-50. For other genres such as ambient, (slower/symphonic/more atmospheric) black metal and doom metal I'll easily take 80-140 minutes playtime.

Yeah, I agree with you there. When I made the thread, I was mainly thinking about stuff I've been listening to recently (most of which is rooted in hardcore to some extent) plus some VK stuff. When I listen to music that is focused less on single songs, but more on the listening experience as a whole, I don't really care about the length either - even though I'd actually prefer a longer album in that case.

This is a topic I've been thinking more about this year after noticing that I have trouble remembering songs on albums that go beyond 10-12 songs. The worst offender for this is probably Mejibray for me - I do believe "420" could be an amazing album (I quite enjoy it as it is), but they sheer amount of tracks hurts the listening experience for me and makes it way more difficult for single tracks standing out. After coming across a variety of different album lengths, I feel like I remember albums with 9-12 songs the most, which equals 35-45 minutes for most bands. Unless they are a bit more progressive and have longer songs, of course. 

What is your prefered album length? Number of songs or the length in minutes, anything goes.

This is glorious

As someone who has been here since the early days of Tainted World, I can only say that I agree that a lot of the decline seems to be due to a lack of exchange online. When my interest in VK sparked again a few months ago, MH was pretty much the only place I could go to, since the rest of the international community is way too spread. It's virtually impossible to have a proper discussion about recent stuff going on in the scene outside of MH, and as @Disposable said, message boards are more or less a thing of the past (although I feel like the atmosphere here is way less hostile by now, or maybe it's just me growing a thicker skin with age). There are some large facebook pages like the Visual Loner blog which are up to date and would theoretically allow people to exchange, but somehow most facebook users can't be bothered beyond "reacting" to a post or linking some names under it. I still feel that YT plays quite a large role in the decline of interest too, mainly because it was an easy way to discover new bands through the recommended or related videos. But since YT got crippled by all the copyright nonsense, it's hard use it the way people used it a few years ago.

As for bands who could fill the void girugamesh, D'espairsRay etc left, there really seems to be no band which I feel has what it takes (except for maybe Dadaroma, they have quite a big presence on YT compared to your average VK band and recently got a big boost through the Fine Bros video). It also seems like it's never new musicians who form the more appreciated bands, but always people that have been or used to be popular before, so there is rarely this feeling of novelty that bands like girugamesh had when they started out. Plus many bands feel very inconsistent or have too much output to really leave an expression.

Here in Germany, we still have a few concerts every year though and some of them seem to sell quite well - from what I've heard, Nocturnal Bloodlust's show was very crowded.

Glad if I was of any help! Yup, that sounds like the right approach It's always good to analyze one's recordings (even though it becomes bothersome if you start regretting uploading something after you find more and more flaws ahaha), sometimes it also helps to look at your notes in a program like Melodyne, for me it helped to see where I usually go flat or sharp!

Ah yeah, with the throat singing you probably mean the false chord stuff, lots of singers use it for growling - I find it rather uncomfortable and prefer to use fry screams (there's lots of tutorials for that on YT, it's pretty cool because you can transition to raspy and clean singing very quickly with it), but it sounds pretty brutal if you can master it.

I haven't listened to AvelCain that much, but from what I remember he sounded fine. I think it's good to pick up bits from all singers you come across and like, there is always something you can learn even from singers who are technically not that good

Ich weiß gar nicht, ob ich hier jemals was geschrieben habe, aber ich sage auch mal hallo

Many bands on the list come and go, but here is a recent one with active bands:

1. DADAROMA

2. Dir En Grey

3. DEZERT

4. Gallo

5. ALSDEAD

6. the god and death stars

7. Hollowgram

8. Nocturnal Bloodlust

9. Mejibray

10. Codomo Dragon

Received my CDs last week and they were in perfect condition. The seller is very friendly and fair, I highly recommend buying here!

13 hours ago, Elazmus said:

IMHO Kyo's whole singing style comes from having this^ thought and then throwing that thought out the window XD

100% this. Kyo is a singer who has always used techniques before had learned to control them. I personally like this approach and follow it myself, but it is sometimes risky and often shows at live performances if you do songs that you can only sing in the studio.

As to your issue, I went throught really similar thought processes too when I started with singing - thinking that my range and voice might be extraordinary, talking about it a lot and feeling the need to express it. And I think it's not necessarily a bad thing  Especially when you just started out singing, it is important to have some confidence and believe in your abilities. However, a tip I can definitely give you is to look critically at your vocals and not lose sight of all the flaws you have - and I assure you, just as I still have them, you have them too. Without a teacher, it's actually fairly hard to notice them if your ear is not yet trained and accustomed to what your voice does, so it definitely helps to get some professional feedback on your singing!

To answer your initial question: Yes, it is easy for trained tenors who have the basics of belting (basically powerful singing if you are not familiar with the term) down to hit most of the notes in Saku, it's not exceptionally high except for that high part towards the end of the song. In general, as you said, pretty much everybody can theoretically learn to hit high notes with certain techniques, but it will sound different depending on your voice type. I have a fairly low voice and my voice gets a fairly piercing and thin sound when I go really high - the trick is to use your head voice and mixed voice for the very high notes (not falsetto, every guy has that by default and it's usually weak and disconnected). From my experience, I'd say that it's actually harder to learn to hit super low notes (like actual low notes, Asagi from D doesn't sing very low most of the time, he just has a dark timbre). I can sing around Kyo's highest notes (you can hear it from 1:16 onwards in my example, sorry, it's a fairly old cover since I don't have any recent high ones), but I cannot keep up with his super low notes even though I'm a baritone.

Turns out I wrote a whole essay, but I hope it helps! Good luck and have fun practicing

That was awesome, enjoyed it more than their previous stuff!

Let's be honest, if these guys were actually Japanese, people would hype them as the next big thing in VK. They sound great, look great (except for that moustache) and Yohio is a better vocalist than 80% of what is currently hyped in VK.

@helcchiOoooh, I see! Now that you mention it, I honestly have no idea what could come next. I feel like the core thing will prevail a little longer, but since VK usually tries to become more extreme with each new iteration, I don't really know what would be the logical next step (since deathcore has been done to an extent already). If anything, my guess would be that there will be some djent-y stuff in the future, but who knows

Recognizing pretty much all of these obscure bands shows me how much I used to be into this era, I miss those times

I loved and still love that XodiacK song in particular, their image is so ridiculous yet I still enjoyed it a lot, my favourite VK power rangers.

@DisposableHad no idea they sounded that good, I only have "Bastard" in my shelf and it never really got me hooked. Gonna look for their old stuff on here later!

Quote

I shudder to think how low would this scene have to sink in order to instigate a retrospection on vk-core...

But isn't that exactly what people would have thought about nu vk back then too? While I do get tired of every band doing the same style, it's no different from the nu metal period and I feel some bands are doing the core thing pretty well in some songs (DADAROMA in their heavier songs for example). But then again, I have always enjoyed Metalcore to an extent, so that might explain why I'm not sceptical at all towards it

Visage's guitar tone is sick by the way, just noticed.

EYA were great! And I remember gemmik, never heard any other song but the PV one though unfortunately. 

Actually, I think quite a few of these bands had fairly decent vocalists - the guys from D'espairsRay, Awoi, Kalimero, MUCC and Kagerou are all pretty good singers for example.

I also just remembered these guys, I think it's another Gossip than the one currently active though?

@DisposableWoah I had no idea Vidoll did a song like this, only ever listened to one album of them back then and didn't find it edgy enough haha

@helcchi  DAMY do indeed sound a lot like DEZERT, but I like it!

@Licio123 They disbanded, but some of the members moved on to form heidi. from what I remember!

Man I love this thread, so many old favourites in here. It's funny how negative people were about nu metal riffs back when I listened to this stuff non-stop, I sometimes felt I was the only one who was not ashamed of enjoying it  

Totally forgot about kalimero, such a sick song! Do they have any notable (mini-)albums? Never went beyond that one song unfortunately I enjoy pretty much all of the bands mentioned, but Awoi in particular, I always had a soft spot for this guy's voice. Dali were awesome too, but I never got into them that much because of their inconsistent discography. I think I'm gonna check out yaminade's stuff a bit more, my brother used to like them a lot but I never really actively listened to them.

And Neo Destruction painfully reminds of the fact how great Nega (and The Black Swan as well) sound, but are completely ruined for me by Jin's atrocious clean vocals. I mean, I respect the guy for how passionate he is with his projects, but he just has no idea how to sing (even though he slightly improved recently).

@Disposable Haha great memories man, I remember my parents commenting on Hizumi with "why does he scream so much when he can sing so well" too. But yeah, I completely feel you there, I was really disappointed after those three singles too, but after a while I got into REDEEMER as well, which I think is actually a pretty good album (albeit not on the level of the two albums before) - Karyu was just a really good songwriter until the very end, just a shame that Hizumi's voice was so wrecked on Monsters.

And yeah, Black:List had so much potential, when it comes to writing memorable melodies they were miles ahead of many other bands. Missed them as well when they were here with Exist Trace

Some new contributions, I also really enjoyed early 12012 and of course everyone's favourite -OZ-.

On another note, are there any active/new bands who still play this style and do it well?

Thanks for the recommendations guys, enjoying both 420 and SM! I wish they albums would be a bit shorter though, makes it hard to pick out clear favourites somehow. 

Awesome thread! This kind of stuff was what made me love VK and I still enjoy it a great deal. Never really listened to Revier, I'm surprised how good their vocalist sounds, is he in any other projects currently?

You already posted quite a few of my old favourites (girugamesh, UnsraW and MUCC), but here are some of my most beloved nu metal riffs.

My all time favourite is D'espa in their [Coll:Set] and BORN era, it's the stuff that got me into nu metal VK in the first place - Grudge, BORN and Quarter Void are among my favourites too, but In Vain was just my daily soundtrack to being an edgy teenager (and still is secretly).

I also love the riff in Bouzenjishitsu and Black:List's Throw Hope away, awesome vocals for both of them as well.

Too lazy to add any others right now, but there are countless of them I loved, maybe I will add some later. I guess DEZERT somewhat have the feeling of nu metal VK, don't they? Might be the reason why I dig them so much right now

Alright thanks, gonna give it a try!

Up until I heard their most recent single, I always thought these guys would be kind of boring, but now I actually really enjoy them and looked into their Singles collection. I do however prefer to listen to albums or mini albums, so does anybody have recommendations where to start? I have Venoms and enjoy a few tracks, but I feel it's a rather inconsistent work.

D'espairsRay for me, they are and have always been my favourite band - [Coll:Set] and MIRROR are masterpieces for me that I can still listen to after all these years without feeling bored. Add to that Hizumi is my favourite vocalist of all time and brings exactly all the characteristics I love about a voice, it's an easy choice despite girugamesh being a very close second, I loved everything up to MUSIC and do enjoy Monster too.

I really don't mind them taking a more pop-ish approach, but since their last album the soul seems to be gone completely. Both the production and how they play the songs just lacks any sort of passion I used to love these guys a lot, but this is just not for me anymore, no matter what genre they play. 

The new preview is great, really looking forward to this now!

34 minutes ago, lichtlune said:

I grew up with a speech impediment which makes it very difficult on some songs. In fact I've tried recording Utopia a hundred times I'm sure. It hurts me after all the work I put in to this project to have it dismissed as "Sounds pretty nice except for the vocalist". I'm not optimistic that I could Improve in a way that would garner the respect I'd hoped. To be honest  this whole project sounded much better in my head than it turned out. I participated out of love for 90s Visual Kei music. It's dear to me but I think I'm going to retire from the project and therefore singing altogether. I have one last single planned for this project that I intend to finish but after that point I'm done. I've given my best effort. 

I totally get you man and I know the feeling very well, but if I have learned something throughout all the years I have done the online singing thing, it's that you should not focus too much on a few negative comments and take them to heart that much. I know very well that they hurt and can take your motivation away entirely for a while, but in the end it's just some people on the internet who have issues with your singing that can reach from just not liking the sound of your voice to personal reasons. I for one did enjoy your performance overall, just trying to be positive and show you that it might be worth sticking around if you enjoyed recording this album! But it's your decision in the end, just my two cents on the matter  

Sounds like a nice project, props for finishing this! And to the vocalist: Don't let the critcism get you down, it's no reason to stop singing if you enjoy it! Accept it and try to improve, people here have always been rather harsh in the musicians corner for various reasons. 

In my opinion, there is certainly room for improvement and some parts sound a little awkward (''Utopia''), but overall it's a solid performance and you do have your moments. Your voice has a certain Post-Punk vibe to it in some songs,  which I like.