Lycaon - 麻薬 / 眩暈 -めまい-

[Zeus 7997]

I may not have liked anything Lycaon has done in the last two years, but I still approached this with an open mind. I left unimpressed. Considering that 眩暈 / めまい is a double A-side, I'm amazed that both songs are so devoid of anything interesting. All three songs are generic to the core; I forgot how they all sounded by the time I finished the single. I can't even remember what the main riff from めまい sounds like!

眩暈 seems to have only a thread of melody sprinkled throughout. The band members pluck notes that don't carry a melody more than they do accent one and the ska elements sprinkled throughout do much of the same, but there's nothing other than Yuuki for everything to hook into. As such, he's the "centerpiece" of the song. It's pretty bland; nothing bad but nothing good either. It's just...there, doing nothing, not asserting itself, being a generally pleasant-to-listen-to but not at all original sounding song.

めまい is a much more straightforward rock song, except that Lycaon seems to be taking absolutely no risks. The song structure is conventional (fine), the riffs themselves are conventional (that's fine too) but what really takes the cake is Yuuki's not-at-all-emotional oversinging and the composition faking me out at every other turn. Just when I think めまい is actually going to transition into something interesting during it's almost five minute run time, the band reins it in time and time again and says "no". It's as if Lycaon is afraid to do anything that might alienate a fan or two and as such, they do absolutely nothing.

I'm sick man is supposed to be their homage to MAD NEUROSIS CHILD, I think. It's slightly interesting because it neither moves at the pace of a slug (眩暈) nor does the same few things over and over again (めまい) but what it does do isn't very interesting. More energy and aggression would have made me look over that, except that too seems to be missing in spades. It's got more energy than the last two songs, but that's like saying a slug is fast when you're comparing it to two snails.

眩暈 / めまい just doesn't do it for me. They either need new ideas, some caffeine, or both.

[Jigsaw9 6783]

Listened to the single quite some times now, it's pretty good. Yet again, we have a pointless SE track but what comes after makes up for it. Memai is kinda okay/average though it has nice guitars - I do admit that it gets kinda old quickly. Mayaku, on the other hand, is a pretty cool fast melodic VK song: full of power and drive but not on the aggressive side. Pretty badass song overall. Lastly, i'm sick man is the token fast'n'hard track and it does its job. Reminded me a bit of Kuroyume's old-school hectic songs but with that vigorous Lycaon touch; nice!

All in all a pretty standard single. If I had to rate it I'd give it something like a 7/10. Not extraordinary but totally okay.

[sai 868]

I didn't have very high expectations when trying this single. It's a good thing I didn't, because I had great trouble sitting through the entire thing.

The SE track beats the EROS SE in terms of lameness. Just some piano notes here and there, nothing interesting going on. I can't decide if it's worse than Aventure's SE though.

眩暈 I can't say much about. I listened to this single yesterday, but somehow I can't remember for even one second how this song sounded. I remember a bit of horribly incorporated jazzy sounds and Yuuki just crying it through it like a dying cat. At least I can tell you that it sounded incredibly boring and bad.

めまい is even worse. I don't know where to start. Yuuki sounds incredibly bad here, the emotional oversinging really made me cringe. I think I deserve a medal for sitting entirely through this one. Only Lycaon fangirls who are totally drooling over the fact "OH YOU SO SEXY" will like this.

I'm sick man tries to be the more aggressive song of the single, but fails due too the lack of screams, harder riffs and effort. This could've been a lot better than it is, but the chance that Lycaon will ever make an aggressive song again is pretty much zero.

Overall I give this a 3/10, and then I'm being generous.

[blackdoll 907]

lol If you cant feel it you cant feel it.

 

me 10/10 emotional great ride the energizes