enyx

Nice to meet you! I lurked for years before becoming more active too, so it's all good. Also, although VK is probably the most popular style of music on here, there are still a lot of members with tastes other than VK, so that's no problem either

Holy shit. I literally only noticed this earlier today too! xD

It was only a matter of time before they started introducing some sort of subscription model. So long as they only keep cosmetic/superficial stuff behind the paywall, I don't mind. If they ever start requiring subscriptions for access to basic functional aspects of the site, though, that's when I'll start having an issue with it.

Nightcrawler Directed & written by Dan Gilroy and starring Jake Gyllenhaal, Nightcrawler is basically a character study centred around its sociopathic lead character, Louis "Lou" Bloom. Gyllenhaal's proven himself to be a very capable actor in the past, but if there's one area in which I think he particularly excels, it's when he plays darker, more morally ambiguous characters (case in point, his performance in his previous feature length film Enemy). In that respect, this feels like a film tailor-made for him to take centre-stage, and he absolutely nails it. Lou is morally nihilistic, sociopathic thief turned nightcrawler - somebody that shoots footage of crimes and accidents in order to sell to news outlets. As you can probably guess, things get more and more disturbing as we see the lengths to which Lou will go, without showing any regards for ethicality or social norms, to get the best footage possible. What I love about this character and his portrayal, however, is not his disturbing mentality, but the fact that I was actually able to emphasise with him for large portions of the film. I think this is partly down to Gyllenhaal's performance, but also due to Dan Gilroy's script and directorial decisions. Gilroy was, of course, a largely unknown quantity going into this film due to the fact that it marks his directorial debut, and for the most part I think he did a very good job with Nightcralwer. There are some subtle decisions that show that he possessed an intricate understanding of both what he wanted to portray with this film, and how to portray it. For example, whilst the film primarily centres around a person of questionable moral character, the film is rarely presented in a way that tried to force a particular impression upon you. A great example of this is how the movie score is utilised. Gilroy could have easily asked composer James Newton Howard to compose a bunch of dark, eerie sounding tracks for use during the film's more disturbing scenes, but instead, the score is often written and utilised in a way that instead emphasises how Lou himself would see a particular situation. For example (minor spoilers): there's a scene in which Lou encounters a scene of a tragic accident and decides to move a person's (presumably dead) body in order to get a more dramatic shot of the scene; rather than playing music designed to encourage a feeling of disgust from the viewer, the scene instead utilises a more uplifting piece of music, because as far a Lou's concerned, this particularly incident is a positive thing. It's sublte elements like this that allow the film to explore its central character's psyche in a very non-judgemental way, allowing the audience to interpret things how they wish. Nightcrawler isn't perfect however. Despite everything I just said in the previous paragraph, there are some occasional moments where it tries to force-feed you with certain moral judgements in a way that feels rather awkward. Perhaps the most notable example of this is the existence of a particular character whose only role in the film seems to be to criticise the moral ambiguity of his co-worker's/boss' decisions. Pretty much any time she decides to use an edgy piece of film for a news broadcast, Mr White Knight feels the need to interject with "That's immoral!" or something to that effect. I understand what Gilroy was going for here, but I think most people would have come to this conclusion themselves without needing this character to explain it to them over and over again. Even if they didn't come to that conclusion themselves, well... if anything that would have made discussing the film with others more interesting in my opinion. Either way, having a character in a film whose only purpose seems to be to blatantly tell the audience what they should think during a particular scene is just a case of sloppy writing in my opinion. On the whole, however, Nightcrawler is a great film that's worth seeing, particularly if you like morally ambiguous character studies. It's not perfect, but I enjoyed it a lot and I'll definitely be keeping an eye on this director going forward.

I typically don't care too much for a vocalist's voice when judging a band as a whole, but I have to agree with regards to him being the weak link in what could be a much better band. Hopefully they bring in a better vocalist.

To be honest, I agree with you. Although I found the title track to be the most notable case of this, I do feel that the single as a whole is a bit more of a refinement of previous sounds than say, reflection was. ブラインド is the most 'fresh' sounding song on the single in this regard, but even that doesn't sound as different to their previous works as mirror did when it kicked off the previous single. But like I tried to get across in the review, that really doesn't stop this single from being a great entry in their discography.

This video is so spot-on that I had to post it here.

ハイスイノナサ - 変身 01. 変身 02. 地図にない街 03. ブラインド The Japanese indie scene is a treasure trove of interesting, quality music; particularly in the genres of math and post-rock. Of all of the quality bands to have surfaced within these scenes in the last ten years, perhaps none are as entrancing to me as ハイスイノナサ. Their utterly brilliant soundscape is comprised of guitar, bass, piano, synth, drums, soft female vocals, and occasional electronic aspects. These elements combined with phenomenal compositional ability, atypical song structures and odd time signatures all come together to form a sound like nothing else out there. It’s hard to adequately describe ハイスイノナサ to somebody that hasn’t heard them before, but if you’re into technical, rhythmical brilliance and also happen to have a love for ostinatos, then this band has you covered. For all of their merits, however, one aspect of this band does leave something to be desired: the rate at which they release new music. Their last single, reflection, came out in the middle of 2013, and since then only one new song has managed to creep out of the woodwork as a part of last year’s Zankyo record Compilation vol.4. It should come as no surprise, therefore, that 変身 was one of my most anticipated releases of the year so far, but how did it stack up? The single kicks off with the title track. Initially I was somewhat underwhelmed by this song. It bears all the hallmarks of a typical ハイスイノナサ track; complex rhythms, a constantly repeating phrase that persists throughout the majority of the song, and increasing instrumental layering as the song progresses. Where 変身 disappointed me, however, was not in its compositional qualities but in its apparent stylistic regression. ハイスイノナサ have always had a habit for changing their formula in subtle but effective ways over the years, but 変身 doesn’t feel all that different from what has come before. Despite that initial disappointment, however, I’ve slowly warmed up to the song over the last month, and I have to admit that, due to its iterative nature, it’s actually quite a good track to introduce somebody to the band with. It may not be the most experimental or unique song in their discography, but it has all of the core elements of a quality ハイスイノナサ song. We then move on to 地図にない街, which so far is my favourite track from the single and probably one of my favourite songs by the band as a whole. Whereas the title track opted to utilise Ai Kamano’s vocals as more of an additional texture than as a method of lyrical delivery, 地図にない街 brings her to the forefront. Kamano has always been one of my favourite vocalists despite her somewhat limited range as her understated delivery is often an effective contrast to the rhythmical chaos that tends to lie beneath it. 地図にない街 is an interesting case in the sense that the song gives off a very chilled, relaxed vibe despite clearly still possessing a considerable degree of instrumental complexity (which is particularly noticeable between 1:47 and 2:17). It is this juxtaposition between these two elements that makes this song so enamouring to me, and I can comfortably say that this is one of my personal favourite songs of the year so far. Finally, ブラインド (blind) constitutes the final song on the single. Anybody that’s been paying attention to the review team’s Best New Tracks of March 2015 thread will have already seen CAT5’s own impressions of this track, and in many ways I concur with his general sentiment. ブラインド is one of the most catchy, accessible songs in the band’s discography. Yet despite somewhat streamlining their sound in order to achieve this, the song doesn’t feel lacking in its finesse. Quite the opposite, in fact, as it’s this change in sound that helps the song to stand out from the rest of their discography in a way that the title track struggles to do. Kamano’s subtle changes to her vocal delivery, singing in a lower register than usual, also helps to give the song its own distinctive flavour. It’s been a long wait for ハイスイノナサ’s 変身, and though it may only have been a three track release, I think that the wait was worth it. This is a band that simply doesn’t release material unless they have something worth releasing, and it is for that reason that I get much more mileage out of their music than I do out of most other bands’. Though the single as a whole may be a bit of a stylistic regression for the band (noticeably, the IDM elements introduced on reflection have pretty much disappeared from this release), it’s still very much a worthwhile release that currently stands tall as one of my favourites of the year thus far. ハイスイノナサ, esoteric as they are, may not be for everyone, but to put it simply: no other band does what they do as well as they do it.

I don’t think I said anything to suggest that need ‘help’ or indeed even that I care about sensationalist morbid media stories in themselves; quite the opposite in fact, since my initial post was me stating that the plane crash story is essentially a non-event to anyone not directly involved - which I’m not. The thing that aggravates me is people’s morbid obsessions with stories like that, which is less a case of the media in itself and more fundamental human nature. The two are holistically linked, media influences social perception, social perception encourages and ‘validates’ the media, etc. I’m well aware the reasons behind it. Some of which you stated yourself. I appreciate the sentiment of your post but it seems to be a bit of a misunderstanding of what I was trying to get across; a sort of moot point considering that I already ignore the vast majority of “hey look somebody died let’s talk about it constantly” news stories. Once again, I have to repeat that my post wasn’t about me being depressed by the news, it was about me not understanding why other people care so much about such stories. Anyway, I think this has derailed the thread somewhat, sorry about that. I guess just PM me if you want to carry on?

I think I actually orgasmed at 3:00. This band...

I despise mornings. It doesn't matter how early I go to bed, I wont wake up until about midday the next day unless I have an alarm set. Any time I need to got to work or attend a lecture in the morning I'm basically a walking zombie. Despite that, though, I'm not really a night owl either (depending on how you define the term, anyway). I always get tired around midnight, but the weird thing is that I wont fall asleep for a good 2-3 hours after I go to bed, so typically between midnight and about 3am I'm in this weird state of feeling too tired to do anything yet seemingly unable to fall asleep.

Because people kill people all the time. Whether it's a school attack, civil war, terrorist attacks, gang violence, genocide, etc. It happens. It will continue to happen. It's beyond tragic for everybody directly involved, but it's irrelevant for humanity at large. Just another large scale killing to join the billions of other examples throughout human history that simply wont stop because the cause is inherent within human nature. I'm aware that I'm probably coming across like an insensitive asshole here but that genuinely isn't my intention. I've just always found this strange morbid obsession with death in the media to be rather disturbing. You even stated yourself that it "deserves plenty of media attention because of all the lives that got lost", but why? Why does a higher death count increase the need for news outlets to descend upon the story, sensationalise it, and leave the privacy of the victims and those grieving compromised? I've experienced the premature death of a loved one and not once did it feel like a sensational experience that I felt everybody needed to know about; quite the opposite, in fact. Death is one of the very few certainties in life (if not the only one), every single person on this forum will die, so will everyone we know, just as the billions upon billions of people that have preceded us all did. I feel that it's something we should all just acknowledge already, and just accept that when it happens, particularly in a sudden incident such as this, it's better the leave those directly affected to grieve and stop turning the entire world's attention to it. Sorry if that seems overly fatalistic and gloomy. It's never my intention to be depressing with this sort of stuff; I just think that it would be a disservice to sugar-coat the reality of topics like this.

As I told you before, I agree wholeheartedly with regards to teikoku. I'm not too familiar with indigo la end or Seiko, though, so I can't comment there. It's a shame really, I think that too much of a focus on aesthetics can result in a rather narrow/closed music taste, which is why I feel that a lot of 'indie' communities tend to develop rather elitist, anti-VK/pop/etc sentiments. Hmm, they sound pretty decent. Nothing amazing like you said but worth giving a listen, particularly considering their age. Thanks for sharing. In other news, HaKU seem to be fully embracing their poppy tendencies. I think it was just a matter of time considering how their sound has been developing over the years, though I'm not sure if it's really my thing based on this sample.

I've never understood the sheer amount of media attention that plane crashes get. If you send thousands upon thousand of planes into the air, eventually one or two will crash here or there; same thing with cars, trains, etc. As tragic and unpleasant as it might be, it shouldn't really be such a shock whenever it happens.

I had a sex dream. It was... interesting.

I've used the name 'Phoenix' (or some variation of it) on forums, video games, and the like for years. I don't even remember why I first chose it, I think I just liked how it sounds. Anyway, I started getting tired of it after a while (particularly since it was spelled as 'Pho3nyx' on here) and pretty much everybody started calling me 'Pho' after a while, so I changed it to that.

Welcome. Always nice to see another Sigure fan

I have to second the opinions mentioned here when it comes to both fox capture plan and tricot. The former just sound like a less-interesting version of jizue in my opinion, and even jizue has a habit of just sounding like background/study music to me. The latter sounds like nothing more than an average run-of-the-mill indie band with some math elements; and let's be honest, math isn't exactly uncommon in the J-Indie scene these days. It's funny that Cat mentions their vocalist as a weak-point though, since I consider her vocals to be one of tricot's only (somewhat) distinguishing elements. So yeah, I don't really get the hype behind either of these bands. Come to think of it, I tend to find that it's not uncommon for some bands to generate massive amounts of hype in the indie scene despite seemingly lacking any particular flair that separates them from everyone else. Sometimes I think that this can simply be the result of effective promotion/exposure (such as performing an anime opening, etc), but sometimes I wonder if it's also largely because a lot of people tend to be far more into the 'indie aesthetic' than the quality of writing itself. Has anyone else thought this before?

I typically don't buy live DVD's these days but I'll admit that I'm rather interested in this one. I think that sukekiyo's music tends to lend itself quite well at a live setting.

Aha, you can tell that they're pretty much all thinking "Man, this tour seemed like a much better idea in my head" xD

Generally speaking I don't have a preference. I do tend to listen to more bands with male vocalists, but I think that's just a side effect of the fact that I tend to stumble across more of them in general. Typically, the most important things for me are a band's compositional qualities; instrumental & vocal melodies, rhythmical synergy and interplay, song structures, etc. The aesthetics of the band and their range of timbres tend to be secondary to that, so the sound of a vocalist's voice doesn't tend to play a huge part in how I feel about a band unless I feel that its significantly at odds with what the band as a whole is trying to get across.

Interesting. I'd always assumed that this was more of a group project but, judging from those credits, it's predominantly kazuhiro's work with only a very small degree of involvement from yukihiro and 345.

I have a habit of getting lost in musings that feel rather sisyphean in nature. I don't consider myself to be a 'depressing' person, but I do find that there are certain depressing realities that tend to go largely ignored by society in general that I just can't overlook. I think that the last year or so has seen me trying to find a way to deal with these realities. I'm still working on it.

I'll be there at approx 20:00 UTC. I'm in a bit of a visual mood today...

Kojima has constantly stated that every MGS since MGS2 would be the last in the series, and he hasn't exactly been shy about the fact that he wants (and has wanted for some time) to work on other IPs, but Konami obviously doesn't want that and hence the series has been dragged out time and time again. This is all pretty much common knowledge nowadays to be honest.