violetchain

To overflow evidence's new album "Clear" is coming out June 7th. 1. 足跡 / Ashioto 2. back to back 3. たられば / Tarareba 4. rev 5. 跡に幻 / Ato ni maboroshi 6. リピート / Repeat 7. エンドロール / Endroll 8. ただそれだけ / Tada sore dake 9. 舟を編む / Fune o amu 10. Clear Tada sore dake Ashioto Fune o amu

I felt like there was something familiar about him. Maybe it was a subtle hint of Canadian-ness I was picking up on...

Someone did a drag performance lipsynching to parts of this at Anime North, and I'm still not sure WTF I just saw... I can't deny that the impersonation was dead-on though. They had the watercolours and everything.

Yeah, it was really sad to watch how badly their debut was botched.

I've never listened to D before, but that spot is so ridiculous that I kind of love it.

I don't see any VK acts on the regular Oricon Top 100 Albums of 2016, so I think the Indie Top 20 is probably the easiest way to gauge it: http://jame-world.com/us/articles-124002-oricon-2016-top-20-indie-singles-albums.html Unless you count GACKT as VK, it seems like you're probably right by saying Kiryu sold the most albums - at least among the artists whose releases came out on indie labels. There must be some major bands that sold more, but I can't think of any really popular ones that released albums last year either.

I really wish Kis-My-Ft2 weren't given such bland, sub-par songs, because the rollerskate choreography is fabulous and Kitayama Hiromitsu is super cute. Shake It Up and the pre-debut Kis-My-_ songs are great and Fire Beat gets a pass because of the choreography, but almost everything else I've heard from them sounds like a filler track that got rejected by ten other groups before they ended up stuck with it. I mean, I'm not expecting high art from Johnny's groups or anything, but the songs aren't even catchy most of the time. Then again, I haven't been paying much attention to them for the past few years. Maybe they released something good recently?

Yeah, some of it sounds promising.

You can really tell how much Ina loves Phil Anselmo.

To be fair, all they had to go on was the angsty concept and hearing them talk on the phone - no music or images of the band. Could have been just about anyone.

I like the song, energy and the costumes - I really feel like they have potential to be cool - but the "sexy wrist-cutting" aesthetic is so not for me. I really hope they'll drop that aspect going forward.

Those moves at 2:19 and 4:14 in Forgive Me, though!

Oh, I see. You probably know better than me then, because I've never spoken to him. I'm just going from a vague memory of what I've read on the NMFT blog. He definitely mentioned them as an option, so I assume he likes them well enough, but the thing that makes me feel like he's not super into them is that he always seems to just kind of throw them in as a last resort. For example, he mentioned them as an option for NMFT 9: http://www.nextmusicfromtokyo.com/?p=6168, but it just seems like he was saying "Well, I can get them, but I'd rather have Ame no Parade, or any other band on this list" He brought Kinoko Teikoku, who were on the same label as THE NOVEMBERS at the time, so I don't think the label is the issue. He also wrote that he held two NMFT events in one year mainly so he could bring Maison Book Girl before their major debut, so I feel like if he really wanted to bring them he would make it happen, you know? Regardless, I think it's actually more fun if you don't know anything about the bands before you go, because the acts he brings are usually much better live than the recordings suggest. otori didn't sound like the type of thing I would be into at all from the samples on the website, but they killed it.

I remember he mentioned THE NOVEMBERS as an option once or twice, since their label apparently offered him the chance to bring them the year after Kinoko Teikoku, but it didn't seem like he was terribly excited about them. I don't know if he still has the connection now that they're not on UK Project anymore. You can always suggest them whenever he makes one of those posts asking for input, though.

http://www.nextmusicfromtokyo.com/ Line-up: The Taupe, Yukueshirezutsurezure, Hyacca, Bakyun the everyday, Yubisaki Nohaku Dates: May 19 Toronto @ The Rivoli May 20 Toronto @ Lee's Palace May 22 Montreal @ Divan Orange May 24 Vancouver @ Biltmore Cabaret Is anyone going to NMFT 10? I've gone to all of them since vol. 5 and it's become a bit of a tradition for my friends and I - especially because it's so cheap - but I'm not sure I'm feeling it this year.

Nice to see Hibiki starting something new. Was wondering what he was up to.

Just to throw in another obvious one, Akihiro Namba (Hi-STANDARD, NAMBA69) has three sons that he talks about a lot.

I thought the new metronome album was pretty good, but it's literally the only 2017 VK release I've listened to so far. I'm debating giving the April LIPHLICH single a shot, but the video track felt pretty underwhelming.

It took a while, but I think I'm finally sold on Hysteric Panic.

Aki from NOA's new band finally uploaded a full song <3

So glad to see that they're finally past the demo stage, but I wish they would release something I can actually buy. There's something so charmingly sincere about the mix of Pocky's awkward emo engrish and their super budget DIY videos.

The stream is over, but they made a video for "diva", which was my favourite song from the release, so:

Good Charlotte and NCIS on the same day - nice. Curious to see if this will lead to more random moments of my favourite bands from my teens randomly collaborating with Japanese bands I'm into now. But yeah, there's 10 Japanese artists on just the Osaka line-up alone, so I don't know where the OP is getting 4 from...

I thought the singer looked familiar for a second, but I think he's just giving me flashbacks to this:

I'm kind of sad that they're calling it quits so fast, I liked White ray of hope. Wasn't really feeling the samples of the other tracks or Let It Die, but I still felt like there was potential for something cool to come out of Yuusuke and Inzargi singing together after a few more releases.