What do you think about the actual Visual Kei ?

[doombox 4421]

It is disheartening to not see big names like Kamijo, Kaya (thus Femme Fatale), Kisaki (thus 凛 -the end of corruption world-), D, 摩天楼オペラ, cali≠gari, Moi Dix Mois, Creature Creature and DEAD END, D'ERLANGER, KA.F.KA, Sugizo and LUNA SEA, Yoshiki and X JAPAN, BUCK-TICK or even GACKT in this thread. People only mention new names and forget about the foundations of this scene, foundations who are still very much active and alive, deep-rooted and fundamental sources who have given birth to this baby in the first place.

With this rise of this newly founded interest in metalcore that —in my very honest and personal opinion— has no place in Visual Kei, I can assume for myself that after a year or two, I am done with Visual Kei. My favourites who still remain active to this day will have vanished as they are simply pushed out of existence because their form and sound is no longer welcomed and essential, and I'll merely be left with memories.

I think you missed the part where most of us were talking about bands that have released something in 2015. Maybe a few mentioned the last couple of years. But was never personally a big fan of most of the bands you mentioned in the first place, save B-T, cali gari, and D'erlanger.

Also interesting about the metalcore reference since most people have said that same thing about every new trend that came into vk. Nu-metal, electronics, etc. The music scene will always revolve around selling current trends, it's one of the few ways they continue to gain new fans. But I can understand how you feel your favorite style is getting left behind... and you're probably right, for now. I do think some bands are trying to keep a trve aesthetic about them, but they seem to be fairly rare at the moment. Hopefully they'll pick back up whenever the metalcore trend ultimately fades out.

[Des 289]

most members have no relationship with each other, other than being co-workers.

 

Well, this is it. THE most accurate description of the visual kei scene. We can close the topic now.

[PsychoΔelica 648]

This is what I think about the actual Visual Kei. Period.

 

[JRD 5156]

I don't care for this current wave. There's a few great bands here and there. BUT it is better than the Nu-Metal wave. Omg, that was full of the WORST vk has ever produced and people would wank over it because of teenage angst, had gawd awful vocals almost overall, and shit on the osa/koteosa/kirakira bands for being musically better than knowing just power chords. Sorry not sorry, 05s-09s indie vk heavier(dark) bands sucked ass. If you were in the scene long enough to remember, you know what I'm talking about.

[doombox 4421]

I'll still take a nu-metal band over most kirakira bands any day. Lol. They were so annoying.

[anakuro 847]

I'll still take a nu-metal band over most kirakira bands any day. Lol. They were so annoying.

You can give the kirakira bands to me. The two I follow are breaking up (Oneness and Cradle).

[doombox 4421]

You can give the kirakira bands to me. The two I follow are breaking up (Oneness and Cradle).

*gives you 100 kirakira bands* unfortunately we're all losing faves. It sucks.

[anakuro 847]

*gives you 100 kirakira bands* unfortunately we're all losing faves. It sucks.

thanks There's no live experience quite like kirakira bands. But yeah the Japanese girls are even talking about the 解散ラッシュ or "rush to break up" recently and I don't normally hear the Japanese fans talking about it as much as foreign fans ? 

 

...unfortunately with kirakira (for me, at least) there aren't really new kirakira ones coming in right now. It's all ~dark~~ bands that are being made. 

[hiroki 5521]

...unfortunately with kirakira (for me, at least) there aren't really new kirakira ones coming in right now. It's all ~dark~~ bands that are being made.

i was looking at this year's venue lineups for kansai rock summit some time ago and there were certainly a lot more darker bands than last year's. i wonder how much local variation there is though? cuz i don't really see the proportion shifting so dramatically in e.g. Fukuoka and Hokkaido as it has in Osaka (especially). i can only assume that the feedback effect is pretty strong in osaka (band becomes darker -> gets more popular -> attracts next batch of dark bands), while the big 'brighter' bands like those under Resistar Records and Zany Zap are more than holding their own in Tokyo. i'll also note the irony that PCM's 'main' bands in Osaka are faring a lot worse than their subsidiary Dream Agent in Tokyo (thanks primarily to RoNo☆Cro's popularity).

that said, i'm not complaining since there are way more than enough new bands to interest me (ok i'm repeating myself here). if i'm to enumerate all the new bands my list would be twice as long as Tetora's, so i'll refrain from doing that. as of now i'm totally addicted to My Fairytale, CLØWD, アンフィル, Lig, just to name a few. they aren't exactly kirakira in the 'classic' sense (which arguably has already been dead and buried for a while) but maybe in the 'gaijin-vk-forum' sense of being antithetical to any dark vk band (e.g. Oneness, Ecthelion, ALIVE, etc. - the list can be extended indefinitely). it's interesting that i rarely hear my japanese friends speak of kirakira, and when they do, what they mean in each instance is usually quite different. (one of them uses it to refer to dance-y bands with ridiculously elitist furi hahah.) but this just goes to reinforce what i was saying about the scene being a lot more diverse than some people think.

[Zeus 7997]

I don't care for this current wave. There's a few great bands here and there. BUT it is better than the Nu-Metal wave. Omg, that was full of the WORST vk has ever produced and people would wank over it because of teenage angst, had gawd awful vocals almost overall, and shit on the osa/koteosa/kirakira bands for being musically better than knowing just power chords. Sorry not sorry, 05s-09s indie vk heavier(dark) bands sucked ass. If you were in the scene long enough to remember, you know what I'm talking about.

 

This is probably why I have an aversion to all things heavier visual kei now. I wasn't aware that there was any large-scale change occurring in the scene though. I just figured bands started adding more influences and actually built identities for themselves instead of being the newest nameless -core band of the week (which is a very good thing).

This actually got me interested in looking up some of these older, forgotten bands. I'll post a few I found here which I think describes the scene as a whole during that period so newbies have a starting point if they want to explore this sound more.

 

Synside - also known as a band that might have gotten somewhere if they didn't have such a bad vocalist. We were some picky fans back then but Rayka clearly doesn't fit with the music. The rest of the band was on one page though.

 

VAJRA - The most uninventive fucks of the last decade. I still haven't forgotten about this.

 

 

Ha;qch - I swear to fucking god this band wants to be The Black Dahlia Murder so badly...

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rRgIahZol2Y

 

Dio -distraught overlord- - One of those bands that was ~all the rage~ back in the day that I haven't heard mentioned in four years.

 

[blackdoll 907]

this and this till Lycaon members or ran come back

This world begins to rot
Impostors overflow and all lost real essence
Destroy it

[doombox 4421]

Most of my faves like Mucc and girugamesh built their careers on that nu-metal era. Nagoya kei also took a huge boost in that period. So I don't find it without merit.

There were a ton of shitty bands on both sides. The darker bands drew me into vk so I'll probably always bias them. But to each their own. *shrug*

[BrenGun 2261]

The fun thing of the VKEI now is that there is much more various music. from screemo to pop.  Still fun to see guys dressed up in those VKEI clothes and then making brutal (any kind of) METAL music. Then something isn't right... Because Metal is still for me much more the GLAM ROCK look or simple the Black T-shirt look. (or how to call it) Yah know more the thing we are used in the west. Or those "no-visual" metal looks.

And if visual kei goes more into POP sound... it somehow fits because the dudes are looking soo cute.

Also normal rock music also fits for the Vkei look as it always did fit.

But for the real METAL sound kei bands... then I always have to laugh... because REAL METALHEADS won't DRESS UP in VKEI.  haha

 

 

 

Today's vkei is fun.

But I only listen to those who really make good music, but I don't care for the looks (anymore). since looks aren't important anymore if you grow up older. XD

[doombox 4421]

"Real" metalheads? Can we cut the elitist crap? So people like Leda who play in metal and visual bands aren't "real" metal heads? Please. There are a lot of vk bands who suck at metal, but there entire genres of metal that like visual imagery, too.

[anakuro 847]

i was looking at this year's venue lineups for kansai rock summit some time ago and there were certainly a lot more darker bands than last year's. i wonder how much local variation there is though? cuz i don't really see the proportion shifting so dramatically in e.g. Fukuoka and Hokkaido as it has in Osaka (especially). i can only assume that the feedback effect is pretty strong in osaka (band becomes darker -> gets more popular -> attracts next batch of dark bands), while the big 'brighter' bands like those under Resistar Records and Zany Zap are more than holding their own in Tokyo. i'll also note the irony that PCM's 'main' bands in Osaka are faring a lot worse than their subsidiary Dream Agent in Tokyo (thanks primarily to RoNo☆Cro's popularity).

that said, i'm not complaining since there are way more than enough new bands to interest me (ok i'm repeating myself here). if i'm to enumerate all the new bands my list would be twice as long as Tetora's, so i'll refrain from doing that. as of now i'm totally addicted to My Fairytale, CLØWD, アンフィル, Lig, just to name a few. they aren't exactly kirakira in the 'classic' sense (which arguably has already been dead and buried for a while) but maybe in the 'gaijin-vk-forum' sense of being antithetical to any dark vk band (e.g. Oneness, Ecthelion, ALIVE, etc. - the list can be extended indefinitely). it's interesting that i rarely hear my japanese friends speak of kirakira, and when they do, what they mean in each instance is usually quite different. (one of them uses it to refer to dance-y bands with ridiculously elitist furi hahah.) but this just goes to reinforce what i was saying about the scene being a lot more diverse than some people think.

That's true, I am mostly exposed to Osaka and Hiroshima bands at this point. Still, kansai rock summit isn't just kansai bands. And there are plenty of darker Tokyo bands that floated to the surface and get a lot more attention--METEOROID swithced to MeteoroiD, AvelCain is super popular, DADAROMA formed and is doing so well, etc. Every time I saw any kirakira band in Tokyo it was at hole in the walls like REX. 

 

side note: Lig was quite good! I'd like to see them again.

 

To be fair kirakira≠osare/oshare kei. Osare kei is pretty much dead and the ~kei terminology is quite outdated, lol. But kirakira is quite commonly used as a term. I can't count how many times I've heard it used or if I've been asked "is ~ kirakira?" or told "I can't stand kirakira" because my friends all assume that all of my bands are kirakira for some reason. Kirakira and abare (暴れ/暴れ盤) are the two terms I hear the most often but that doesn't necessarily mean they are exclusive of each other. And as you mentioned, the terms more describe the live experience than anything now!

[JRD 5156]

Wasn't shitting on Nu-metal because I actualdly do enjoy some here and there, but a lot of what the mid 00s vk bands were chrurning out was God awful and they should be ashamed for it.

 

but real metal heads don't like vk because they dress up in elaborate costumes? I guess black metal artist aren't real metal too because they get all giddy up in their black spiky costumes and white make up then?

[doombox 4421]

Wasn't shitting on Nu-metal because I actualdly do enjoy some here and there, but a lot of what the mid 00s vk bands were chrurning out was God awful and they should be ashamed for it.

but real metal heads don't like vk because they dress up in elaborate costumes? I guess black metal artist aren't real metal too because they get all giddy up in their black spiky costumes and white make up then?

I was mostly just trying to say it's a personal preference thing. There was lots of bad music on both sides coming out then just because of the sheer number of bands flooding the scene.

And co-signing that second paragraph.

[Zein 12]

Well, some people said this before and I agree: To me any band has done something remarkable this year. Well, we still enjoy this kind of music but I doesn't have any development (kind of). Actually I'm very impressed that some bands began to lose their quality. But I admit  appeared a couple of bands (in fact some of the bands that started to like me this year are not from this year XD) that have nice sound or actually I hope they will do something -different?-  (DADAROMA really liked me, DOAK -I don't know what to think about them and a couple more).

But well, as most of the music genres are dead, we only can rescure the better mix. (Cause esthetic, I think we know them all)

[Pretsy 1343]

I don't care for this current wave. There's a few great bands here and there. BUT it is better than the Nu-Metal wave. Omg, that was full of the WORST vk has ever produced and people would wank over it because of teenage angst, had gawd awful vocals almost overall, and shit on the osa/koteosa/kirakira bands for being musically better than knowing just power chords. Sorry not sorry, 05s-09s indie vk heavier(dark) bands sucked ass. If you were in the scene long enough to remember, you know what I'm talking about.

I don't know how exactly "full of teenage angst" and "osa/koteosa mayhem" makes previous vk wave much worse than this wave of dissonant arpeggio solos #101299 (that most Deluigi-copy bands in the vein of Galeyd, Jiluka go for...and over which our vk fans here go jisming for no reason whatsoever), "BVB-went-Suicide Silence" carbon copies (Nokubura, DADAROMA, vk bandomen that try to fool around with deathcoreisms atm or just anything that is too akin to their western generic -core riffages (not that I have anything against coreisms - western acts just happen to do it better and I really fail at seeing that how vk bands are "special" on that department ffs).

 

Just give me a Mucc carbon copycat (I might as well assume that Kuroyuri to Kage (for instance) goes for partial Zekuu worship but it's just me though...I can dig it!) everyday and ditch all those uprising Deluigi worshippers. At least this "teenage angst" gave an emotional value to vk performances back in the day - now there is absolutely nothing what could make vk music (in any department, except for "oldies" - maybe) somewhat "sui generis"  in the world of music trends where good ones are ditched and most scenesters are more likely to suck in new "Pro Tools"-isms like sponges for the sake of being "rad" (technical values become "too complex" for new fandom generations to digest, and go for looks + superduper br00tal moaning breakdowns in vk's case).

 

As the matter of fact, reasoning for my old skwl favoritism is simple: 90s acts were more eager to adopt various influences and let their looks just "reflect" their general, musical visions instead of putting up some idiotic mishmash masquerade and go for out-of-context soundscapes. As the case in point, SHAZNA's (that legendary old skwl band no one cares about) visual ideas revolved around ideas of combining The Blitz Kids' (Boy George, anyone?) and old skwl culture -isms together - and GOLD SUN.../Pure Hearts (check "Magenta Story" for further examinations) were very stellar representatives of what they were going for...by that sense, we could say that even during your "dreadful" angst era both visuals and music went together hand in hand very well (even fricking RES got the idea of how to go with their looks while developing their early Sphire-Croid era-sound, ffs).

 

Speaking of which, nu metal helped to develop an emphasis on this "emotional value" I talked about - and I double-dare you to look up for various boards in which fans back in the day described that WHY they became interested in vk in the first place. Most might go with this: the rich palette of emotions and soundscapes accompanied by corresponding looks or visual themes. Now where is this "rich palette"? Vk is nothing more but one heck of a sponge of brainwashing trends and zero technical/emotional finesse now, smh.

 

I never saw legit reasoning on why people SHOULD dig vk music as it is now (other than being hushed and threatened with bans), so I decided to kickstart this circus. The stage is yours, folks.

 

*and everything above mainly concerns upcoming and current acts, doesn't have to do with most old acts that e.g. mentioned (of which some are not really vk to me anymore in all honesty)*

[Lestat 2167]

I think you missed the part where most of us were talking about bands that have released something in 2015. Maybe a few mentioned the last couple of years. But was never personally a big fan of most of the bands you mentioned in the first place, save B-T, cali gari, and D'erlanger.

 

To come back to this, all of these bands have released (or will release) something in either 2014 or 2015, with the only exceptions of Moi Dix Mois and X JAPAN — so your reasoning is slightly invalid and I think you thought too quickly when I mentioned "foundations." I also said that these groups are all still very much alive and active, so I didn't miss anything on-topic.

[JRD 5156]

I don't know how exactly "full of teenage angst" and "osa/koteosa mayhem" makes previous vk wave much worse than this wave of dissonant arpeggio solos #101299 (that most Deluigi-copy bands in the vein of Galeyd, Jiluka go for...and over which our vk fans here go jisming for no reason whatsoever), "BVB-went-Suicide Silence" carbon copies (Nokubura, DADAROMA, vk bandomen that try to fool around with deathcoreisms atm or just anything that is too akin to their western generic -core riffages (not that I have anything against coreisms - western acts just happen to do it better and I really fail at seeing that how vk bands are "special" on that department ffs).

 

Just give me a Mucc carbon copycat (I might as well assume that Kuroyuri to Kage (for instance) goes for partial Zekuu worship but it's just me though...I can dig it!) everyday and ditch all those uprising Deluigi worshippers. At least this "teenage angst" gave an emotional value to vk performances back in the day - now there is absolutely nothing what could make vk music (in any department, except for "oldies" - maybe) somewhat "sui generis"  in the world of music trends where good ones are ditched and most scenesters are more likely to suck in new "Pro Tools"-isms like sponges for the sake of being "rad" (technical values become "too complex" for new fandom generations to digest, and go for looks + superduper br00tal moaning breakdowns in vk's case).

 

As the matter of fact, reasoning for my old skwl favoritism is simple: 90s acts were more eager to adopt various influences and let their looks just "reflect" their general, musical visions instead of putting up some idiotic mishmash masquerade and go for out-of-context soundscapes. As the case in point, SHAZNA's (that legendary old skwl band no one cares about) visual ideas revolved around ideas of combining The Blitz Kids' (Boy George, anyone?) and old skwl culture -isms together - and GOLD SUN.../Pure Hearts (check "Magenta Story" for further examinations) were very stellar representatives of what they were going for...by that sense, we could say that even during your "dreadful" angst era both visuals and music went together hand in hand very well (even fricking RES got the idea of how to go with their looks while developing their early Sphire-Croid era-sound, ffs).

 

Speaking of which, nu metal helped to develop an emphasis on this "emotional value" I talked about - and I double-dare you to look up for various boards in which fans back in the day described that WHY they became interested in vk in the first place. Most might go with this: the rich palette of emotions and soundscapes accompanied by corresponding looks or visual themes. Now where is this "rich palette"? Vk is nothing more but one heck of a sponge of brainwashing trends and zero technical/emotional finesse now, smh.

 

I never saw legit reasoning on why people SHOULD dig vk music as it is now (other than being hushed and threatened with bans), so I decided to kickstart this circus. The stage is yours, folks.

 

*and everything above mainly concerns upcoming and current acts, doesn't have to do with most old acts that e.g. mentioned (of which some are not really vk to me anymore in all honesty)*

 

My reasoning for saying that is because back then people would shit on other bands that weren't "dark" or "angry" and didn't sound generic. Like I said, it was mainly the indies that made nu metal bad because it offered nothing. I DO enjoy nu metal, I have nothing against it, in fact my dai honmei band is a nu metal band. If you like at it now, compared to what it was then, I simply enjoy this djentcore wave more than back then. Bands like cloud. and vivi and the likes made nu metal unlistenable in vk and I can simply name more vk indies that just shit on nu metal because it was the thing back then.

[evilcoconut 109]

Eh, I have nothing against new VK.  I pretty much just find new bands to replace the old ones that have broken up or are on hiatus lol.  Bands I've been liking in the last few years are:

 

The Raid

LIV'ERT

AvelCain

Pentagon

Yeti

Umbrella

Grieva

Guild

Anli Pollicino

Blu-Billion

Sick²

DEZERT

DIAURA

 

Bands that continue to be solid but have been around for a little while:

 

Dog in the PW

DaizyStripper

Vistlip

 

There's probably more but I got bored trying to think of them lol

[vanivani 558]

I got into visual kei around 2006 and loved all the artists then.

I fell out of the scene around 2011 or so, and just recently got back into it.

 

I've been pretty impressed with the bands that have been coming out.

Been buying lots of CDs again, which is something I haven't done in a while.

 

• Dead Children (can't wait for my CD to arrive!!)
• ザアザア
• リベット-Rivet- (disbanding ; _ ;)
• ViV
• CLOWD
• The♡Valentine.