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For better or for worse, visual kei is something that's had an impact on my life. I never thought groups of cross dressing Japanese men playing metal would be something that's stuck with me for so long, but throughout all the surprises, discoveries, disappointments, and developments I've stuck around in some capacity. I may not be as heavy into visual kei or Japanese music as I used to be, but there's a part of me that will always go back to the music I've enjoyed and another part of me that's always looking forward to new bands, activities, and trends. Here are five things I really enjoy about the scene which has kept me coming back again and again since 1999. So those are all the things I like about visual kei. I'm sure I missed some. What do you like about visual kei?

It seems they'll have more announcements at a later date...

My second concert while in Tokyo! Starwave Records seem to have the most attractive bands for me, atleast atm. This was a Monday and pretty early. At first i didn't find the venue since the area has tons of sidealleys and it was such a rainy day, rushed with my umbrella like a maniac. I didn't have a pre-ticket so i went in normally with others and got one. Ruido K3 was a really nice venue in my eyes, really small but enough room cos it wasn't too crowded. There was a big DJ booth at the back and a bar, so i obviously went to use my drink ticket. I'm a beer guy, so glug lug. Sooooo, let's start the talking. シンデレラキャッスル After a little waiting the show started. Cinderella Castle was the first band to perform, it was a trio, apparently? They had a drummer but he didn't look like a real member, more like regular drummer ossan. This band was totally unknown for me so i didn't know what to expect, the vocalist had a cute face and silver x purple hair and seemed utterly energetic. The songs were your basic oshare-ish vk but alot of hopping from side to side, only a few girls participated. Both guitarists looks were a little traditional japanese inspired. They played 4 songs in total, and at some point a big horsemask appeared and was put on the mic stand, hehe. Vocalist also shared some bread with the audience, how kind. Their buppan didn't get a single buy/customer 😕 ギルティア Alright, Guiltia was a big chance compared to the first band, finally some ikemen with leather and straps! Don't know their songs either but they were pretty good and heavy. The bassist had a birthday so we congratulated him, of course! He was really seducing the front row, haha. マーブル Marble was apparently a one-man show and a project. He had a speaking booth in the middle of the stage and was wearing nice renaissance blazer with flowers and embellishments. The music was pretty electronic, even techno-like here and there. He also did some nazi salutes as furis, it was cool, lol. ЯｅＶＥＬＬＩＯＮ　ＧЯＩＥＦ Yosh, time for the next one. Revellion was good, i did like them! The vocalist wasn't very outstandingly gifted but it was alright. The pig screams were better than melodic singing. The bassist was crushed in a really tight dress, corset and a pink Hatsune Miku-wig. I don't think i would listen to their music that much in my free time but the live was good to watch! Heres a pic with the boys, i went to hangout near the table to wait for next band and talked a little with them, since "why not?" ラヴェーゼ Ooooooh myyy gooooood, i wasn't prepared for them to play next. I was chilling on the floor in the back, and got up like a phoenix and rushed to the front, since there was a free spot, thank you jesus. They were fucking amazing, definetely my favourite of the event selection. Well hmmm what can i tell, Serah was pointing at me and demanded me for more action since i think i froze for a second just jawdropped, lol. Went for it. Sadly very short list, so happy they played my favourite 未完ノ刻ト悲愴ノ渦! Can't wait for the new single. ノクト & DaturA Haven't listened to them at all before so i was like "meh", let's see. Memories of these bands are kind of minimal and faint, so idk what to tell. I guess they were alright. Noctos ETERNITY was def better live than the horrendous pv they made. I relate to the vocalist for liking Westwood & leopard print. DaturA's vocalist was super sexual and was rubbing his crotch all the time, a little Lycaon's Yuuki, if i may say I enjoyed them! UNDER FALL JUSTICE The utter minute they opened the curtains everyone went on their knees and hold their hands like prayer. Did the same. I've been getting into them more & more some months before this live. They were really good, 何も信じていない was such a highlight of the set since i've been banging that shit like 24/7 on my phone. Hot nihilist boys, what can i say. Very dark and gorgeous. Scarlet Valse At this point when waiting for them i was getting kinda hungry and tired, the event started at 15.00 and i didn't properly feed myself before. Almost considred of leaving without seeing them. Thank God i didn't. It seems like their band concept changes alot, or at least the appearance? I was like "wtf" when Kakeru came to the stage and had the good judy black feather hat on. I don't need glasses yet but i rubbed my eyes a little asking myself "Is that Kyouki?" Hi Grieva, please come back, bitches. Their set was really good and they had the most fans, as you can see from the pic above, waiting with the towels on the stage handles. Lunatic Mind was really cool. The final climaxed into a banger of all bands with gyakudai and rose throwing etc. Saya also jumped to the audience and came to pick me up into the dive ❤️ Boy, i'll come if called. Feed me a cracker before Great live, great event, satisfied in every way. I got myself this nice & soft parka (been wearing it quite much already) from La Baiser and 5 chekis, got some nice ones but no Saya 😢 Next time, then! Ripped my leather joggers while jumping and everything but it was worth it! Bye!

3 members of -OZ- will participate in Gypsy's one-day revival during CLUB RIVERST's 10th anniversary event on 8.14 Other artists include Art.s.Note, HOLLOW SHADE, ブラクロデイエリズム, 侍NEW WAVE, Neo Ditzy Serpent Vary Scream Z and TEQUILA BOY しゅうや

Sooooo, this is the story. I was utterly happy to know that the bands had their second last tour final while in i'm Tokyo. A nice guy here called @Alucardiusgot me the "vip" package ticket and i promised to get him some merchandise, which i did The concert day was a bit chaotic for me, since in the end i rushed with taxi to the incounting. My look is damn boring but well kinda comfy, wearing Asos cap, Monki mesh-shirt, Hellcatpunks fannypack and some Nikes. My ticket number was 14, which is fucking great. I was really surprised that when we went in and settled our bags, waterbottles and everything in the hall, i realised that the bands aren't very popular. I thought i would be crushed in a small concert hall with atleast 200 girls, since Rokumeikan only holds 250 capacity. It was maybe 50 people there, if i'm counting right so we had much "freedom" to pick our spots, of course respecting the policies. Well, atleast i see better, so shouldn't complain. Just wish the boys had more fans, haha. One girl was cosplaying Miria as you can see a little in the left corner. My friend Jesse wanted to stay back to watch so i picked my spot pretty near the stage but went backforth to talk to him to pass the time before the start. They really were on time and started pretty soon. For the mind of the set, i can't remember the setlist order since i was kinda living the best time of my life, lol. Crucifixion played much longer than Mizeria, or then it felt like it since the songs are longer in general. Crescent Moon was very emotional, we were all wawing, the bassist 輝翠 had a serious-guy vibe to him, more reserved, very concentrated on the playing. The basslines really are killers in my opinion. The vocalist 二人静 embodied the drama and insentity of "old vk". Big beautiful velvet sleeves worked with every move and headbanging was fun as hell. Futarishizuka called out Kikyo on the stage after a couple songs to do a らせん song. I think it might have been 憐姆 but i can't for the love of god remember. They interacted so much and danced together. A sight for sore eyes. During XII i got so hot, i was wearing a leather cap since my hair is not long and suitable for the legit atama banging. Last song 哀玩人形 everyone started Gyakudai and older gentleman almost next to me was giving his all without heart attack. The curtains closed and it was maybe 30-40 mins before Mizeria. Kikyo had the same chains as in 歪屍形 and was doing marionette moves and he licked his glittery lips alot, haha. Nazuki's black braids were flying in the air like long centipedes. Dysflexia was epileptic, didn't get a seizure tho, haha. During the last song [deep] slay all the boys of both bands came to the stage and changed playing instruments, throwed stuff in the audience, glimbed each others backs and filmed also with phones. The reason of filming is unclear, possibly for Twitter or so. Kikyo strangled this 12 years old girl with his chains and also kicked her? Hmm, she was happy. Setlist: 1998.5.5目黒鹿鳴館 磔ラレタ人形ノ螺旋葬劇〜死穢 (They really did write 1998 as the year, not 2018, hehe.) 1.死宴 2.寂滅饗筵 3.歪屍形 4.揺籃 5.眩暈 6.Suicide Labyrinth feat.二人静 7.ディスレクシア 8.泡沫 9.deep[SLAY] Tbh i was a little mad they didn't play longer and i really wanted to hear the iconic 呪縛郷, since the furis are fun. I have never heard Suicide Labyrinth before and now i'm really craving for the cd... The buppan! Sadly they didn't have the bloody bandages for sale but i'll get some later I got the t-shirt obviously and a coffee mug and the new korabo cd. If someone wants the scans of the 薄紅ノ葬 booklet, let me know! After the show we had to wait kind of long for the boys to settle their stuff, prepare buppan and take enough chekis. They ran out at one point, haha. My picture with Mizeria didn't turn out very good for some reason, it's like me + Miria and all others are faint shadows. It's a good memory tho. They did prepare a nice backdrop and everything but in the end we took the picture while sitting on the actual concert stage, i was a little confused, haha. I told Kikyo that i messaged him on Peing before anonymously about me coming from Finland, he remembered me and instantly hugged, we highfived everyone and i returned to the lobby to finish my beer. I hanged out for awhile and then grabbed my shit and left. Fresh air felt pretty amazing after that. We went to get some good ramen afterwards and chat a little. Then it was time to go back to Shibuya! Me after the concert tiredly traveling the streets. It was a wonderful experience that i won't forget, hope to see them soon again! I also grabbed the new Velonika magazine with their interview, i will try to scan it and maybe someone is able to translate! Hope you enjoyed my little ramble, i haven't ever done one of these so i'm not sure about what's interesting and whatnot. Thanks!

They revived like a year ago and all they did was get red hair extensions. In theory, they've been practicing and building their repertoire, but who knows with Kon.

you go to gay conversion therapy once

Old vkei dude: "What do the vkei kiddos like these days?🤔 Idk here's some shitty synth, a little autotune. Am I hip again? 🤔

The "singles before albums" thing... OMG, you just put my thoughts into words. Even though I never use youtube, rarely watch PVs (yeah, still haven't seen a Jiluka PV other than Ajna) or DVDs and generally don't even pay attention to what bands look like, I do enjoy the way edgy fashion and music are so closely related in this scene, and the way some bands create incredible music around a visual concept. Visuals are important, whenever I chose to make it so. And I like to have the option to please my eyes with whatever weird aesthetic if I feel like it. I don't know what is it about the cheesy melodies, bad vocals and whatnot that resonates so much with me. I try other metal bands (Western and Japanese) often and for some reason, music wise, I can NEVER get so hooked on a non-vk band as I do on VK bands. And I really can't put my finger on what it is, since really don't look much at bands unless their music really resonates with me. Maybe I like being able to enjoy songs without thinking 'OMG these lyrics are so cheesy' and feeling some secondhand embarrassment over the words. Maybe. Because I pretty much never look at lyric translations unless it's D's musical novel. Maybe VK uses some kind of special formula. Maybe it's the blend of styles and genres that bands outside of VK don't dare pull off. For some reason I even like shit-kei bands like VRZEL way more than I can bring myself to like bands like Coldrain, for a reason. As for the community I am in a constant love-hate state. I do like the idiosyncrasy and eccentricity that surrounds the scene, even questionable aspects such as cheki trading and multiple-type releases, or having to kiss some Shikiri's ass to get closer to the stage... I still enjoy all that, even though I often say I dislike most fans (FB communities are CRINGE). I also like that through VK I have made lots of friends, have been able to learn about other countries and have found people with similar ideas and values. I'd say 80% of my social circle is comprised of VK/Jrock fans and I do not regret it nor feel the need to "open up to regular people". VK has also, in a way, given me motivation to achieve many things in life and many of my personal goals are still related to the scene. Is it weird that I build my life around a twisted music scene as this one? Maybe, but whatever, right? VK is a weird, twisted and questionable scene... but one that received us with open arms and constantly invites us to stay. I totally get why people jump ship all the time, but I always find a new appealing reason to stay whenever I start to feel like "ok, I should quit now..." And Shantay, I'll stay, dammit.

Natsuki sis cum back from retirement we miss u

No, i can't. Bring Lycaon back and slap me with your whip, so i may feel, maybe.

ジプシー (Gypsy) was the name of Tama and Nao's band before -OZ-. I wonder if maybe it's a one day revival? Edit: it is. The members are the same, except Zukki.

Happy big 3-0 @evenor!

CANIVAL – RASEN てんさい。 VS BUK BUK - 入場者全員に両バンドVo.によるコラボCDを進呈。 NvM – CALL MY NAME まみれた - 死因:無視 マーブルヘッド –『 - タイトル不在 - 』

DT's CD's

Sloppy late-2000's vkei, making me appreciate how even the crappiest bands of today have better production value than what was considered "great" 10 years ago

mood

haha good you're mentioning it because when i originally read that tweet from him i was also like: what the fuck!? XD also that one person who replied to his tweet by mentioning "0.1gの誤算".... ts ts tssss...

Now that their (every other) monthly consecutive self-released CD-R thing is over, Aimai Chuudoku is releasing a compilation album called 黒盤 (kuro ban) with two new songs through Baby sitter, making it the third official Baby sitter release (after ザ・シンナーズ/The Thinners and THE NOSTRADAMNZ latest albums). The CD till be released at O-West on the 14th of august, and in stores on the 15th. Tracklist (according to Puresound) 1. エートス≠パトス (Ethos ≠ Pathos) 2. はなまるぴっぴはよいこだけ (Hanamaru pippi wa yoi ko dake) 3. アダムスキイ中学生日記 (Adamsky chuugakusei nikki) 4. シェリィ=パトス (Sheri = Pathos) 5. 君のヴァニラ (Kimi no vanilla) 6. はかせのサメといぬ (Hakase no same to inu) 7. HEAVEN 8. DOWN BY LAW 9. 桃色吐息 (Momoiro toiki) 10. 修羅の花 (Shura no hana)

These dudes seem to be trying so hard to get that Major Label Acknowledgement but it just doesn't seem to be working out

this is the craziest release scheme I've seen in a long time, the infamous debut weeeeeeeeeaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaavvvveeeee must have truly ruined her budget

Dir en grey's Kisou band score Kyo's Gasou no Shi 1

btw according to Ikuma's twitter, "白蛇" is romanized as "Hakuda"

Who the fucx named these songs

Hell yeah, finally news from them ! Please formal band guys !

All tracks sound very boring...................! Very disappointment.

[tracklist] 01. DEEPLY 02. SICK 03. Don't Be Alone 04. FUCKIN' DAY 05. UP SIDE DOWN

I was joking That wasn't actually me, although it sounds like it was a fun show so I wish it was! Did the band seem to react to having a foreigner at their shows? I've seen other people say that smaller bands, especially, can be surprised that Europeans or Americans even know about them.

Man I was listening to his first solo releases all of last week. It was kind of exactly all I wanted from him, I hoped he'd find or form a permanent lineup but the work he was doing was awesome. Those KISAKI project releases too !

So, correct me if I'm wrong, but this is a recap of what is happening based on how I am understanding this thread: There are 3 versions of this mini-album: a regular edition, a limited edition, and a 🔥 DELUXE 🔥 edition. The regular and limited editions are being released on June 6th. The limited edition contains 6 songs, with tracks 5 and 6 being unique to it, and the regular edition only contains 5 songs, with the 5th song being totally unique to only it. The 🔥 DELUXE 🔥 edition comes out on June 30th, contains what looks like 8 songs total, and should not contain the same 5th and 6th tracks found on the two prior editions. In additional to all of this nonsense, a second pressing of his special edition first single will also come out on June 6th. 😩 The samples sounded okay. I need to really hear the whole thing to know if I'll like it or not, but they seemed a lot closer to Megaromania than his first songs (which were more Moi Dix Mois-ish imo). The regular edition will most likely end up on Spotify, so hopefully someone gets the other two editions

samples are out x https://youtu.be/mOJPG0pEUSQ First track has been finalized as Confession -Awakening of Genesis- The exclusive tracks on each edition have been finalized: Limited edition track 5: Ancient Resonance Regular edition track 5: Behind CD cover jackets:

kill yourself myv (cc. sexfriend) u know u done fucked up when bloody FLOW and takanori covers sound well-done and actually respectful to the source material, but with those two I literally have no words

Tbh it'd probably be cheaper to make a vector of the graphic and get it etched into a blank Zippo lighter. More effort, yes, but not 22k Yen. Holy crap.

Amen Plot twist : It's ZIN after he realized he could not make a living out of having 1 person attending ZIN's club (his mom as a guest)

I hope is Juka!!

Plot twist: It's Kamijo

New look:

xeep it

yay for more cashing in on a dead man!! bravo!!!

how many more Pink Spider covers do we need

Finally a VK look I can pull off

Isn't Keios Entertainment the label of that Swedish VK guy?

Hey guys! As you may have noticed, the news section is more active than ever before since a certain character has departed, and more and more users are able to contribute their findings without any disruption or intimidation. With more contributors than ever, we each have our own writing style; some of us simply copy and paste band announcements and then translate them - whether by machine or on our own - to the best of our ability, and some of us take a more journalistic approach by adding more details rather than the standard news format of the past. To keep our status as one of the leading J-rock news sites/forums, we've decided to add in some rules and regulations to keep the forum in order and to help future contributors post without any issue: REQUIREMENTS: - intelligible English - As English is the default language of this forum, all topics and posts should be in English, excluding the International Lounge. Also, by posting and translating into English, it is possible for Monochrome Heaven to gain more exposure and recognition worldwide as an overseas news source to sites like JROCK NEWS and Shattered Tranquility as English is one of the most common languages in the world. With this in mind, think about how you'll make your post: make sure to proofread spelling, grammar, etc., so that it can be more coherent and understandable to the reader. - Translations to romaji are required mainly for band and release names, since most of our users are not proficient in Japanese (Google Translate is fine, but you are free to request/suggest alternate translations for the sake of accuracy, especially since song titles are a bit more challenging) As elaborated further down below, vkdb or Google can help decipher any names if you need to double-check. *If there's any issues with making translations using Google Translate, I suggest using RomajiDesu! Not only will it romanize the kanji you want to translate, but also show an English translation for each character used (if you're interested ^^). - Please be sure to update the title of the post after a significant update has been announced. For example, if you start off with the topic, "MERRY new single" and the name is announced later on, please change the title to that of the release itself, ex. "MERRY new single, "Kasa to Ame" release". This gives the threads more variety and it's better than skimming thru topics that all have "MERRY new single" in the title. **Highly recommended for topics whose releases are announced after the creation of a thread. Ex. "Plastic Tree to perform OP" turns into "Plastic Tree new single, "Inside Out". This prevents any confusion, skimming through extra info, and especially unnecessary duplicate threads. - Please Please PLEASE use the report button if there's a double-post or issues in the thread. (the first thing I do when I get up in the morning is to check up the news and try to find some things that are out of order. Some days, I won't be around, nor will the rest of the staff, to do that as we do focus on our own lives too. Reporting a post is a much easier way of getting our attention rather than simply posting in the thread about the error, or even worse, unnecessary drama...) - Speaking of cooperation, this is NOT a competition. If someone else posts what you originally left out/posted seconds ago, or the reverse (some info is left out because they didn't see/understand it), don't make a big fuss (unless it's a double-post of course) ; after all, providing news is a team effort, so it's better to work together and to help each other out! ♥ - Please refrain from making any offtopic posts. This could clog up the thread with more unnecessary posts and less valuable information, especially when that escalates to drama. Any posts that have nothing to do with the aforementioned artist or release, etc., will be removed from the thread. Repeat offenses may warrant a warning for spam or misbehavior. - Make a new topic if necessary, especially if the band's previous thread hasn't been updated in a long period of time. In other words, don't necro long-dead topics, especially if you're only doing so to request an old release. That's what the Requests section is for btw. RECOMMENDATIONS: - Band/release names in kanji and romaji are recommended (makes it easier for hardcore/casual/non-Japanese speaking fans to search up their faves; may have to extend this to the download forum as well) If there's any problems trying to figure out a band/member's name, especially in romaji, google them or check out their webpage/social media/vkdb page, which can all be very helpful. - BEFORE posting, use the search function to check if anything has been posted yet. This can prevent double-posts of topics (such as accidentally making 2 threads about a band's new single), and confusion/competition between users. - When making a new topic, please don't copypaste the original Japanese text onto your post, as it looks out of place and completely lazy. At least make an effort to translate it into English so that everyone can understand it. (2019.3.19) - If you want to make any posts about an artist in general, please do so in their appropriate thread in the Artists section (or make one if necessary). This will prevent any clogging of release threads and saving some of us the trouble to going through page after page to find more relevant information about the actual release. - Put some effort in how you actually research and post news. If a band is disbanding at the beginning of 2018, and the actual date of their last live has been posted, please post that date instead of "so&so will disband in January/February 2018". Most news topics don't need a lot of digging, but for posts like these, it'll totally save up a lot of time and stress. **Also, not everyone can keep up with a certain band/release (and understandably so), so threads often tend to go dead even though new stuff is being announced via the official source. It's highly recommended that you follow a band's twitter or check their webpage ever so often for new updates so they well, won't be forgotten or fall off the face of the earth. xD - When embedding a video/tweet/social media post, make sure you also add some context even when the information is displayed in the embed itself, as bands tend to delete everything once they disband/disable social media sites, etc. If you link to a tweet for example, and it gets deleted, your post will be completely blank and worse off, valuable information/history could be easily lost over time (which makes some of us archivists have a hard time with band histories), or your post will be left completely blank. This is extremely important if you choose to start off a new topic with just an embedded post!! New threads that start off like this are considered low effort, which makes the rest of us have to do the hard work, so please put some effort into your post! - Don't go overboard on making your news look pretty or overexaggerated. We've had some issues with certain users putting in too much formatting on their text, posting too many Youtube/Twitter/etc. embeds all on one post, and it's tiresome to actually go through everything, especially when dealing with a slow internet connection or other factors. Extra formatting such as big text, abusing the bold italic formats, or puking rainbows is completely unnecessary and distracting when all we want to read is the news. If you want to proceed with posting lots of tweets/picspams/videos that are relevant to the topic, fine, but put all that shit under a spoiler.

Melt Banana - Sweeper