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Himeaimichu

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Posts posted by Himeaimichu

  1. Posted

    Well, since MH is closing, I thought I'd finally begin work on this project. For years, MH was THE place to get high quality downloads of rare bands. However, since MH is, well, dying, so much Visual Kei will be purged from the internet. To make up for that, I've decided to start work on a project to sort of replace MH in that regard. But, I cannot do this on my own, which is why I'm asking for your help.

    If you're interested, join my discord server where we'll organize things

    https://discord.gg/mFeJ6C3Yvm

    Ikna and BrenGun reacted to this

  15. Posted

    One other trope I'd like to mention is speaking parts. This requires literally no knowledge of music theory so I can explain this fully lol.

     

    Basically, Visual Kei bands REALLY love their spoken parts. I assume this is a hand-me-down from the Japanese goth scene. Most notably, G-Schmitt songs

    Spoiler

     

    The song CATHOLIC by G-Schmitt, which has a notable speaking part in the guitar solo, seems to have been a song that was popular among early Vkei bandmen. Popular enough for bands like Gilles De Rais, Luna Sea, Deshabillz, Missalina Rei, Dir en Grey and more to pick up on it. Why speaking parts? Well it's takes the least amount of effort, and sounds fucking cool. Initially, they were just used for intros and during certain parts, but their use eventually spread to other parts of the songs.

    Spoiler

     

     

    Arkady reacted to this

  16. Posted

    25 minutes ago, saiko said:

    @Himeaimichu I'm licking your brain.

    There are probably other people who can explain it better than I can though. What I've gathered is mostly through listening to these bands myself and noticing similarities.

    However, I don't know the actual music theory behind it, and I myself and hoping to learn more about that lol

  17. Posted · Edited by Himeaimichu

    I was actually wondering this myself. There are a lot of cliche musical elements in 90's Visual Kei that I can easily point out, but don't know the music theory behind because I'm barely a musician. There are certain drum beats, chord progressions, scales, effects, vocal techniques, and more that have become cliche in Visual Kei.

     

    One notable example is what I call "THAT" Visual Kei chorus. It's not really one thing, but a combination of factors that come together. Mainly the drum beat and chord progession.

    Compare the chorus of these songs:

    Spoiler

     

    These aren't the best examples, but they're the first that comes to my mind. From what I've seen, it seems to be a synthesis of influences from Luna Sea, G-Schmitt, BOOWY, Zi:Kill and whatnot, but I really don't know which artists made it "cool", per-se, probably Luna Sea. They don't all use the same chord progessions or drum beats, but they revolve around similar ones.

     

    Then there are the pinch harmonics. (This is where my super basic knowledge in playing guitar comes in). For those who don't know what pinch harmonics are, they're when you lightly touch the guitar string with your thumb joint while picking a note, in order to get a higher pitched sound. In Western Rock, these are referred to as "squealies" because they're often used to make high pitched squeals. In Visual Kei, however, they're used as ornaments to a riff that basically shift around the octaves of the notes.

    I would say this started as mainly a glam rock thing, as BOOWY implemented it occasionally in songs, such in the bridge of LIKE A CHILD (which has also influenced Vkei in other ways)

    Spoiler

     

    Also taking inspiration from Glam Rock, but adding in Punk and Metal twists, COLOR probably were the ones that made these kinds of pinch harmonics cool. This kind of guitar work would appear in both Free Will and Extasy bands, such as Kamaitachi, Zi:Kill and Gilles De Rais

    Gilles De Rais probably heard the COLOR and BOOWY songs, and thought that these pinch harmonic would blend very well in their mix of Horror Punk, Thrash Metal and Goth, and man they were right

    Kuroyume also played a role in making pinch harmonics cool, with early songs like &die prominently featuring them

    Fast forward to 1999, and by then, it had become a full fledged cliche, giving us songs like Zan

    And even today, pinch harmonics in this style are called for when you want to make a song sound extra 90's.

     

    There is even more that I could go on about, but I'm nowhere near an expert in any of this lol

     

    Arkady, crossparallel, saiko and 2 others reacted to this

  24. Posted

    Recently, I've been getting more interested in the Y2K aesthetic. For those who don't know, the Y2K aesthetic is a collective term for the sleek futurism of the late 90's and early 2000's that manifested itself in music videos, fashion, and technology.

    As Aesthetic Wiki puts it, "Y2K is an aesthetic that was most prevalent from roughly 1998 to 2003. Y2K aesthetics are often characterized by a distinct aesthetic period, encapsulating fashion, hardware design, music and furnishings shiny with tech optimism – sometimes literally. According to the Y2K Institute, some of Y2K's aspects include, tight leather pants, silver eye-shadow, shiny clothing, Oakleys, gradients, and Blobjects and Blobitecture. Most of Y2K aesthetics rely on the use of technology and slick futuristic looks, signaling the optimism a new era as people approached the millennium".

     

    This thread is to discuss the use of the Y2K aesthetic in Visual Kei.

    One of my favourite examples is the iconic music video for Yokan by Dir en Grey. This pretty much speaks for itself

    And while this is definitely past the era of Y2K, the music video for Mikansei to GUILT by Phantasmagoria is definitely influenced by Y2k futurism.

     

    benzaiten._, Zeus, saiko and 3 others reacted to this
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