Visual kei among friends

[psychonnect_rozen 585]

I have had many experiences. Most of my friends listen to either some alternative music or just hip hop. I'm sort of the odd one out since I'm basically the emo kid of my friend group.  I won’t lie and say that I enjoy a lot of mainstream alternative pop artists and even some dope hip hop artists. VK is just Numero Uno at the moment.

 

So naturally, I often try to get them into Visual Kei through recommendations only to get the whole "WEEEEEEEEB" comeback.

 

Funny thing is that I have a friend who's a HUGE K-Pop fan (I know, shoot me), and we often get into roasts about which is better (this is all jokes, I'm not THAT evil). So needless to say, I'm literally the only VK fan at my school and in my whole friend group lol. Then again, I'm scared of them finding out the whole Nazi thing. So far the only Japanese artists they listen to are One Ok Rock and Babymetal. Although one of my friends have heard of Yoshiki, so that's a good start at least.

 

So I was asking, what are some funny experiences trying to get someone into VK or showing them VK?

 

EDIT: You guys are making me jealous. Meanies. I’m stuck with a people who call me a weeb and don’t have the audacity to listen to at least ONE vk songs. Mmph

 

 

Edited July 2, 2019 by psychonnect_rozen

[secret_no_03 959]

In HS I had one friend who loved X Japan, one was a metal head and loved stuff like BFMV and kinda liked the GazettE and the other who was more grunge liked the pillows. Everyone else thought it was Chinese rather than Japanese. Now, nearly 30, those friends are long gone, and the only person I talk to on a regular basis doesn't care about that sort of thing as that's not what we bond over. I've always been a loner and it's very much true that as the older you get it's harder to form new friendships, but over time you get used to not having friends and those you do you tend to only initiate when you have something to tell them, otherwise you just let them contact you first which means that you could go anywhere from a week to a month or more without speaking.

[suji 8317]

i have no friends

[GreatNorthernVK 183]

My friend circle was brought together by VK, but since then, most of them only incidentally listen to some VK. Half of them have switched over to Kpop.

[psychonnect_rozen 585]

1 minute ago, GreatNorthernVK said:

Half of them have switched over to Kpop.

They have become the very thing they swore to destroy 

[Miku70 214]

I have a one friend who listen visual kei but no the sames bands and like metal bands. My other friends listen variety. They don't listen kpop or visual kei. Kpop is most listen by younger people than me in general. Visual kei is a trend during 2000's and since 2012 who Kpop become popular in Europe.

Edited June 18, 2019 by Miku70

[raspberrynilla 85]

While in high school, I did get some of my friends to listen to some VK songs and they still listen to them to this day!  I only knew one person from my high school who also knew about VK (without me introducing them to it) and we became friends. She and I went to our first VK concert together.

Edited June 18, 2019 by raspberrynilla

[-NOVA- 3027]

I feel you that was me throughout highschool thats when i first got into vk. That was around 2011, i would get weird looks and instant rejections, no one was willing to hear me out. The one person that did was impressed by MiA (Mejibray) and his shreding skills but aside from that he couldnt wrap his head wround the makeup and the looks. Since then because of this forum ive made some amazing friends. I made one of my closest friends because of this forum, and ive met a few others at Gazette shows. So dont be sad if you really want vk buddies you already made a good 1st step by joining. Just talk around threads of some of your fav bands, share your opinions and have fun ❤️ 

 

My inbox is always open if you want to chat  

[Bangyanico 11]

2 hours ago, secret_no_03 said:

In HS I had one friend who loved X Japan, one was a metal head and loved stuff like BFMV and kinda liked the GazettE and the other who was more grunge liked the pillows. Everyone else thought it was Chinese rather than Japanese. Now, nearly 30, those friends are long gone, and the only person I talk to on a regular basis doesn't care about that sort of thing as that's not what we bond over. I've always been a loner and it's very much true that as the older you get it's harder to form new friendships, but over time you get used to not having friends and those you do you tend to only initiate when you have something to tell them, otherwise you just let them contact you first which means that you could go anywhere from a week to a month or more without speaking.

I agree with this so much.

I grew apart from my old friend circle and is finding it difficult to make new friends who align with who I am now. Sighs

Edited June 18, 2019 by Bangyanico

[libertine 125]

.

Edited December 12, 2019 by libertine

[Neigedesmannes 70]

I don't have much friends but i did show my best mate who's really into black and thrash metal some Gazette and Mejibray during highschool. Needless to say, he wasn't much into it. However years later i made him listen to Dir en grey's Gauze and he absolutely loved it! 

But i do feel you, it's quite lonely being a vk fan in real life, any other people i know cringe at the sight of japanese bandomen, and of course wouldn't give the music a chance. 🤧

[spockitty 643]

Haha, I've never had rl friends who were into vk, but I wasn't hurting for them? I was going to high-school in bumfuck nowhere and was already "that girl that moved from the big city" so funnily enough it afforded me more leeway with weird interests. I did participate in a forum similar to this one for years and that was my vk outlet.

 

I remember I used to bring my vk CDs to school, since they were my precious babies and importing from Japan used to be a big deal. The funniest thing was showing Kaya's GLITTER to a bunch of normies and see their brains steam when I told them it's a dude. I don't think most of them believed me.

 

Kaya's Glitter for reference: 

 

Spoiler

 

 

I then went on to college for japanese studies AND YOU WOULD THINK I would find fellow fans there but no. 90% of people were there because of manga/anime and even the (japanese) professors were surprised that Japan makes rock music??? 

 

My co-workers used to laugh at my "chinese metal", but no one was ever mean, so I guess I was lucky. 

 

I also don't have any kpop friends rl or online but I suppose NO ONE CARES ABOUT THAT HERE HUH

Edited June 18, 2019 by spockitty

[redaudrey 70]

20 minutes ago, spockitty said:

I then went on to college for japanese studies AND YOU WOULD THINK I would find fellow fans there but no. 90% of people were there because of manga/anime and even the (japanese) professors were surprised that Japan makes rock music??? 

 

I had the same experience in my Japanese minor in college. People liked anime and dramas, and if they liked Japanese music it was either jpop or normie jrock. Though I was lucky that the one time my school offered a Japanese music course was while I was there! But even in that class I was still the only vk fan...

 

But that aside, I always found it pretty easy to meet vk fans online and even those can be turned into IRL friendships usually. I’ve never really wanted to introduce it to people who weren’t already fans of it anyway.

[libertine 125]

.

Edited December 12, 2019 by libertine

[Gesu 1537]

I used to be friends with a fellow VK fan and I was gonna go see KAMIJO with her in September last year but we had a huge falling-out and because of that I didn't get to go and I'm still salty about it 🙃

[psychonnect_rozen 585]

6 hours ago, Neigedesmannes said:

any other people i know cringe at the sight of japanese bandomen,

Most metal fans would find it “gay” or whatever. 

[CAT5 9075]

Honestly, I hang with a buncha G's that wouldn't want to be associated with VK in the least

 

Granted, some of them look at me sideways for enjoying Japanese music in general anyways 🤣

[secret_no_03 959]

5 hours ago, spockitty said:

Haha, I've never had rl friends who were into vk, but I wasn't hurting for them? I was going to high-school in bumfuck nowhere and was already "that girl that moved from the big city" so funnily enough it afforded me more leeway with weird interests. I did participate in a forum similar to this one for years and that was my vk outlet.

 

I remember I used to bring my vk CDs to school, since they were my precious babies and importing from Japan used to be a big deal. The funniest thing was showing Kaya's GLITTER to a bunch of normies and see their brains steam when I told them it's a dude. I don't think most of them believed me.

 

Kaya's Glitter for reference: 

 

  Reveal hidden contents

 

 

I then went on to college for japanese studies AND YOU WOULD THINK I would find fellow fans there but no. 90% of people were there because of manga/anime and even the (japanese) professors were surprised that Japan makes rock music??? 

 

My co-workers used to laugh at my "chinese metal", but no one was ever mean, so I guess I was lucky. 

 

I also don't have any kpop friends rl or online but I suppose NO ONE CARES ABOUT THAT HERE HUH

What was the forum you were on? I bring up Batsu to people and almost no one knows what that is, just wondering if that's what it was.

[secret_no_03 959]

11 minutes ago, CAT5 said:

Honestly, I hang with a buncha G's that wouldn't want to be associated with VK in the least

 

Granted, some of them look at me sideways for enjoying Japanese music in general anyways 🤣

As someone who spent half a decade entrenched in the hip hop scene of Japan, which is a lot more cringe inducing than in America or the UK, I can imagine how they'd react. Japanese rappers can't be some of the cringiest, but nicest and down to earth people, at least when they're not wearing masks. 🙄

[spockitty 643]

8 minutes ago, secret_no_03 said:

What was the forum you were on? I bring up Batsu to people and almost no one knows what that is, just wondering if that's what it was.

I do know batsu but nah, it was a smaller forum that went on for several years and then died in flames of internal drama. I still follow some of the members I used to be friends with on social media, but I couldn't even tell you the name of it at this point ^^;

[ShTon 268]

I remember trying to get one of my friends into vk. She liked the aesthetics of the oshare bands but she found the music in general scary and horrible and at some point started to brag about how her circle of friends approves her NOT listening to such music. We're not friends anymore, lol. (Because of other reasons but this was annoying.)

 

I have a friend who's hugely into kpop, but enjoys some vk bands and I have a bff who I got to know because of vk.

[psychonnect_rozen 585]

18 minutes ago, spockitty said:

I do know batsu but nah, it was a smaller forum that went on for several years and then died in flames of internal drama. I still follow some of the members I used to be friends with on social media, but I couldn't even tell you the name of it at this point ^^;

What was the drama that went on there like? Is it still around?

Edited June 18, 2019 by psychonnect_rozen

[spockitty 643]

5 minutes ago, psychonnect_rozen said:

What was the drama that went on there like? Is it still around?

Haha, why? Think you were maybe a member there? ^.~ 

I did some internet sleuthing, to maybe at least find the name and through last.fm to livejournal, I found a link: http://z6.invisionfree.com/jmedia. The server's dead, so don't even try but that was it. 

 

I don't really remember what exactly went down tbh. I belonged to a tight knit group of RPers, and there was a lot of big (and sometimes angry) personalities there. some big names rage quit after a personal conflict and I removed myself from the toxic waste that remained in their wake.

some friends' usernames I can recall:  pixychild, night_of_pussy, misstressyoukai, sokstof, creepy31, maybe some of them will ring a bell? 

[secret_no_03 959]

7 minutes ago, spockitty said:

Haha, why? Think you were maybe a member there? ^.~ 

I did some internet sleuthing, to maybe at least find the name and through last.fm to livejournal, I found a link: http://z6.invisionfree.com/jmedia. The server's dead, so don't even try but that was it. 

 

I don't really remember what exactly went down tbh. I belonged to a tight knit group of RPers, and there was a lot of big (and sometimes angry) personalities there. some big names rage quit after a personal conflict and I removed myself from the toxic waste that remained in their wake.

some friends' usernames I can recall:  pixychild, night_of_pussy, misstressyoukai, sokstof, creepy31, maybe some of them will ring a bell? 

What year did it die?

[spockitty 643]

31 minutes ago, secret_no_03 said:

What year did it die?

I couldn't tell you how long it was going after I left, and I left around 2009 I think?

And wow did talking about it led me down a not-exactly-pleasant memory lane 😕