Youtubers React to Visual Kei

[doombox 4421]

It feels really weird to see "Kpop was the new VK" sentiment to me. But I've been into both Kpop and VK for a good number of years now. The "hallyu/Korean wave" was an orchestrated push to get Kpop into the Japanese (and other foreign) market(s), so when a lot of VK (and J-pop, J-fashion, J-everything) fans got wind of it, they jumped into it following suit of a ton of Japanese fans. BoA, DBSK, and BIGBANG were all making major waves in Japan at that time so fans of Japanese music were all finding out about it. BIGBANG especially brought this into focus in the mid-00s when I think most of us witnessed the change happening. I swear GD's solo debut literally took over my social media to the point of me wanting to puke. This coupled with VK losing steam at that time could certainly make it appear as "the new VK" I guess, but it was just a new trend like everything else from where I was sitting. People naturally jumped from anime themes to VK  to Kpop. Even the VK bubble of popularity here (I can only speak from my American view point) was due in big part from bands like Nightmare becoming known from anime.  And if you time this along with that age group growing up and looking for more "acceptable" interests, Kpop can feel like a more adult/contemporary style of music. Just like going from adolescent fandoms, to rebellious teenage ones (does anyone else remember the emo kid/scene kids? They seemed to all magically disappear by the age of 25.), to ones in line with what is generally acceptable by society. The Korean wave was just at the right place at the right time for that generation of kids into Japanese stuff. Maybe this was even more prominent in Europe at this time because VK had a larger fandom by the sounds of the posts here? 

[ぺるしゃ猫 67]

Honestly imo you have to be a certain type of crazy to accept VK especially those indiefag bands lol I have vkei bandmen friends and they also say that most people that have their arms open to vk are crazy. I mean compare vk lyrics and visuals to kpop... Vk is and never was meant to be super popular.  

[itsukoii 1300]

extras, in case anybody wanted to see em

[seikun 317]

I watched the two videos.

 

Well, most people tend to express the same thing when they are exposed to Visual Kei for the first time: too scary. Imagine their faces if they had watched Dir en grey's PVs.

In 2005 my mother thought I was a satanist when she caught me watching Malice Mizer's Garnet PV on my new (at the time) bought DVD player, haha. I had to explain to her what Visual Kei was and then she understood.

 

I agree they should have shown them Visual Kei bands of the 90's first.

 

The selection of youtubers perhaps was not varied enough. I liked the guy with the colorful T-shirt who was more receptive of what he was lestening to.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited September 11, 2016 by seikun

[IGM_Oficial 1964]

It was a long time ago, but Insanity injection noticed the video.

 

 

[nekkichi 6043]

fun HP trivia that JK Rowling never told her fans:

 

 

[Tokage 5930]

i'm pretty sure we can all rest easily knowing that visual kei/jrock will never be as popular overseas as it was in the mid/late '00s

 

unless we'll end up with sme VK equivalent to gangnam style maybe

Edited September 12, 2016 by Tokage

[Biopanda 2675]

1 hour ago, Tokage said:

i'm pretty sure we can all rest easily knowing that visual kei/jrock will never be as popular overseas as it was in the mid/late '00s

 

unless we'll end up with sme VK equivalent to gangnam style maybe

Memeshikute tried, but we dodged a bullet on that one

[nekkichi 6043]

1 hour ago, Tokage said:

unless we'll end up with sme VK equivalent to gangnam style maybe

 

 "challenge accepted" - Yohio hisses, ragetyping into his planner, licking lips exasperatedly, humming next christmas single chorus nervously to calm himself down, walking around in circles.

 

jokes aside, VK can chug out a "this is a pen" once in a decade, with both aesthetics, a very genre-specific sound, and potential normie appeal #on_fleek - 

and it never goes viral, because the only person in the entire scene to afford payola for radio is yoshiki, and he's probably not even interested in promoting anything but his self-aggrandizing fluff.

[WhirlingBlack 1043]

A lot of vk bands are on radio, problem is Japan has like two radio stations for every citizen so you're bound to never finding the right channel. 

 

I'd say the problem is that the teenagers aren't socially awkward and angry anymore. Don't know what happened but the "I dress in black and hate the world, also im misunderstood and poetic"-kids, which formed the faceless masses of casual vk listeners, are all but gone. Only the hardcore are left and they always just formed a tiny piece of the fandom.

[nekkichi 6043]

4 hours ago, WhirlingBlack said:

A lot of vk bands are on radio, problem is Japan has like two radio stations for every citizen so you're bound to never finding the right channel. 

 

I mean abroad - psy was *everywhere*. I was taking a long bus ride in, like, Russia a year after G.S. went on air first, and it was playing twice an hour, which was...surprising, to say the least.

 

apparently his global promotion was started (?)/handled by Justin Bieber's manager - which brings the next issue, CIS straight male douchebags industry ppl who do that sort of work won't push VK to their labels.

watered down miyavi that no one cares about on Ellen is as far as it goes for now.

 

I'm dreading the day when/if Yohio pulls the next tokio hotel and actually makes his big debut tbh.

 

4 hours ago, WhirlingBlack said:

I'd say the problem is that the teenagers aren't socially awkward and angry anymore. Don't know what happened but the "I dress in black and hate the world, also im misunderstood and poetic"-kids, which formed the faceless masses of casual vk listeners, are all but gone. Only the hardcore are left and they always just formed a tiny piece of the fandom.

 

I blame molly getting big again, it pushed angst out of teens

 

idk, north american sad girls cry to their halsey or whoever else is out there. I'm not sure what happened with european goth-ish stuff, though;

idk what trends the current Japanese teens are subscribing too, as well.

Edited September 12, 2016 by nekkichi

[seikun 317]

Visual Kei is an acquired taste; it simply isn't for the majority, even in its very mainstream versions. But that is not a bad thing. I don't want VK bands to please the mainstream or westernise their sound to the point it loses all its Japanese flair even though these days VK bands have lost a lot of it.

 

I don't know about the USA, but here in my country Visual Kei has been around since the mid 90's as far as I know, it has had a firm fandom since then so the music is pretty much assimilated in the correspondent circle. It already experienced a lot of exposure from 2005 to 2009 approximately on TV so many people know what Visual Kei more or less is or they have heard the term at least.

Edited September 13, 2016 by seikun

[Tokage 5930]

arent north american sad boys and girls all gushing about how deep and relatable 21 pilots is these days?

[-NOVA- 3027]

We all need to spam comment for a part 2

[mahoujin 395]

While Insanity Injection was a weird choice, the quote "it was Satan's side bitches and they didn't eat that morning" really made it worth it.