Featured Review #22: THE HISTORY OF GENESIS by Jupiter

[CAT5 9075]

Artist: Jupiter Album: THE HISTORY OF GENESIS Score: The Birth of Venus. The Death of Creativity.

Visual Kei is a world of its own; a patchwork scene that mixes and matches various established genres and reinterprets them under its own musical and aesthetic niches. The peculiarities found within the scene - which can range from vocal style, visuals, songwriting, marketing ploys, to general band ethics - are usually recognizable, but also fleeting at best. When you add in the fact that any given Visual Kei band can have an entirely different set of musical influences, this renders comparison to the "source" of those influences a fruitless task outside of music historicism. Visual Kei is best appreciated from within, with some kind of inside narrative. Something that explains how Visual Kei operates or the rationale behind a band's artistic choices. However, sometimes you'll come across a band that defies a narrative - for better or worse. Jupiter is one such band.

On their sophomore effort "THE HISTORY OF GENESIS", it's painfully apparent that they fall in between the cracks of being a successful metal band with Visual Kei aesthetics and a Visual Kei band that has effectively appropriated metal into their repertoire. Instead, they sound like a lukewarm imitation of both - neither delivering from a metal standpoint, nor fully embracing the artistic nooks of Visual Kei. Some of the most "thrashing" moments of the album, like opener "The Birth of Venus", single track "LAST MOMENT" and "ARCADIA", are marred by hackneyed power-metal songwriting and technical, yet emotionless instrumentation that fails to engage. It's as if guitarists HIZAKI and TERU are literally riffing in one ear and out the other. Even the harder hitting songs like "Darkness" and "絶望ラビリンス" lack punch and wouldn't warrant headbanging, much less a simple head nod.

But beyond the lackluster songwriting and sterile musicianship, THE HISTORY OF GENESIS suffers from a host of other issues, one of which is ZIN - Jupiter's vocalist. As a metal vocalist --power-metal in particular-- ZIN doesn't cut it. He lacks the soaring, dynamic range and the theatrical bravado necessary to be compelling. His harsher vocal attempts, as heard in tracks "SACRED ALTAR" and "Darkness", are weak and struggle to be heard amidst all of the drab riffage. Even by Visual Kei standards, ZIN's vocals are thoroughly uncharacteristic. There are no tortured quirks or endearing imperfections to add charm to his performance. So while ZIN isn't a remarkably good vocalist or an offensively bad one, he still occupies an awkward musical territory - one that simultaneously falls short of the expectations of metal and the appeal of Visual Kei.

The final nail in this album's coffin was hammered in by its wearisome length and seemingly asinine arrangement. Of course, metal albums are usually protracted affairs, but with 14 tracks and a duration 10 minutes shy of your average feature-film, there just isn't enough quality material here to justify sitting through it. Omitting a few tracks or trimming some of the fat would have done some good. Running at nearly 8 minutes, title track "The History of Genesis" is a progressive behemoth that feels like more of a chore than an immersive epic. Even with the track being placed near the end (it's the last track on the limited edition), it just feels like a tired recap of the entire album, as opposed to an actual climax. Instrumental guitar ballad "Church Candle", as dull as it is, would have served more effectively as an intro or an outro. Instead it's slapped right in the middle of the album and adds no sense of progression or logical flow. "Shining" is another unfortunate curveball in which Jupiter delves into an oshare kei-esque pop-punk number. Normally, a band's attempt to diversify their sound would be laudable, but in the the context of the album it comes off as half-baked filler.

Though for all of its weaknesses, THE HISTORY OF GENESIS isn't without some merit. One of the band's strongest showings was, ironically, the only song composed by ZIN - "Red Carnation". This track revels in everything Jupiter tried but failed to accomplish with the rest of the album. All of the symphonic and neo-classical elements are kicked into high gear, and ZIN even duets with a female vocalist, giving their music a much needed spark. "THE MOON", however, is the album's most standout track. It's a groovy, mid-tempo ballad where HIZAKI and TERU put the power chords and the chugging on hold to embrace smoother guitar tones. There's even an unexpected, but extremely welcome jazz breakdown. Unlike "Shining", this is an instance in which Jupiter tried something new without deviating from the tone of album or abandoning their core sound.

It's obvious that Jupiter has all of the tools to impress; they're just misusing them 80% of the time. If HIZAKI loosened his compositional stranglehold and allowed more new ideas to flow in and if ZIN were a bit more convincing, then Jupiter could become a force to be reckoned with. But as THE HISTORY OF GENESIS has shown, Jupiter is stuck in an uninspired artistic limbo devoid of a narrative. Whether your musical inclinations lie with metal or Visual Kei, this album is sure to leave you entirely apathetic.

[nullmoon 784]

Great review Cat; although you didn't like the album you gave an unbiased and informative approach.

 

Initially I really liked Jupiter's first album but I've since found a reason to bother with it all. As I haven't listened to the band since then, should I even brave this album?

[Zeus 7997]

Thanks for the great review CAT!

I was originally going to review this album, but after sitting through seven tracks of it I found myself having very little to say. I can't finish "THE HISTORY OF GENESIS" in one sit either. It's amazing how I, CAT5, sai, and Des each attempted to sit through this album on different occasions and felt similarly towards it despite our wildly different musical tastes. I can't even say that Jupiter sucks because they're instrumentally proficient and their songs aren't the easiest things to play. But their X-Factor is obviously missing, and anyone can see that there is a gulf of space between where they are and where they want to be.

Part of it is the tame compositions. It reeks of "been there, done that, heard this already play something new". The cheese, charisma, grandiosity, and full execution of concept found in early Versailles and to an extent Kamijo's solo project is what draws me into this type of music. Without an epic feel behind the composition, this type of music gets tiring to listen to. Jupiter insists on taking a step back and being taken as a more mature alternative and I think that hurts them in the end. IMO they should do everything in their power to be Versailles 2, because being Jupiter isn't working.

I'm not quite sure if Jupiter wants to be a power metal band, a thrash metal band, some mixture of the two, a visual kei band with some aspirations, or none of these. All I can tell you is that I can't distinguish most of their songs from one another. There are cases where Hizaki lifts riffs from earlier in his career for the album, such as part of the solo in "The Birth of Venus", which uses the same chords that he played both in "Silent Knight" as Versailles and "Aphrodite" in Hizaki grace project, which also comes from a classical composition that I don't remember right now. Perfect example of what I mean when I say that they want to do something different with all the same tools.

I won't even begin on ZIN, but I will casually mention that projecting one note and varying the intensity that it's projected is bad singing, even for power metal and visual kei. You said everything else that needed to be said.

I don't consider this a disappointment because I wasn't expecting much in the first place, but after the release of CLASSICAL ELEMENT I said they have until their second album to win me over. Now I've gotten all the information I need to make a well-informed decision. For me, Jupiter will be infinitely inferior to Versailles and Kamijo, and is around the level of HGP at it's worst. I just feel that there's better power metal and better visual kei bands out there than this. So even though I've been following the members of this band for some time hoping for something great, it's time I step away and find other things to listen to.

[beni 2149]

As Aoi Mochi said, brilliant writing and response to an album you didn't even enjoy all that much. Quality reading!

 

Well, even as I type this, I'm re-listening to CLASSICAL ELEMENT. I had already guessed I'd favour this one over THE HISTORY OF GENESIS and I'm not surprised I guessed that personal preference rightly. I was honestly not expecting to hear and see how well received KAMIJO's solo work was in contrast to Jupiter's at the start of these two releasing their works. But now, having given them both a good and fair listen, I can see what everyone means. As said much better by CAT5 and Zeus, I felt the album sounded rather samey. Sure, it has that epic and majestic sound to it, but it ultimately falls flat to me. Others might find that surprising in itself because I also think this album of theirs has more going on in it but, for some reason, I didn't feel tired or distracted with their first album unlike this one. This is not a complaint on ZIN though. I actually like his vocals, so that'd probably the one point I'll have to disagree with. It's not as misfitting than a certain band which comes to mind... Just give AREA51 a listen! ZIN's vocals are actually quite fitting, clear and strong, even if it's not as captivating as KAMIJO's or portrays any sort of emotions most of the time. But I guess, this is also why I felt the album kept at the same sort of mood and tempo throughout. I do have one request of ZIN; please do more high vocals!

 

There's no outstanding point I personally heard when listening to it in one sitting. The only actual thing that stood out to me was the female vocals in 'Red Carnation,' which was pretty attention grabbing after 7 tracks beforehand which didn't really have any sort of climax at all. And even ending the album, that was my highlight of listening to it. I'd like to say though, 'Luminous' at track 12 might be my favourite song by them at the moment. It caught my wavered attention towards the end at least, and definitely reassures me of why ballads are my favourite sort of music. So in the end, even comparing to KAMIJO's Heart album, the contrast and dissimilarities are pretty large. I enjoyed KAMIJO's debut solo album because of how many directions it took in sound and style, and while THE HISTORY OF GENESIS sounds like it did a better job in this department then their first album, I just couldn't feel as attached to it due to its exhausting length and similar sounding and all too familiar instrumental playing throughout. This is one album I know I'll probably keep at the back of my mind when wanting to revisit already listened to albums.

[Ito 2438]

Glad a checked this out before I clicked the download button. Frankly, CLASSICAL ELEMENT was a bit of a bore for me, so I was hoping Jupiter's second attempt would be a lot better. Everyone's opinions are certainly pointing in the opposite direction.