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User
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Last Active 12-16-22 8:35 pm
Joined 10-03-13
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| Guiltless Visual-kei Bands?
Not that you should feel guilty about what you listen to, but there are certain
breeds of music that bear a stigma. Visual-kei is a movement amongst Japanese
(predominantly) rock/metal acts where they dress up in flamboyant costumes and
wear their hair big and sprayed all sorts of ridiculous colours a la glam rock. It's a
highly marketable style and a lot of bands rely solely on their visual appeal and
play really generic and derivative music (see: DIAURA, Mejibray, post-DIM the
GazettE, Deluhi, Moix Dix Mois, Blood, Vistlip etc... just my opinion of course but if
you've listened to at least one Dir En Grey album or any one song by Malice Mizer
you'll see what I mean). Of course, just because there is a lot of terrible music in
the movement, does not mean that this is entirely the case. Here are some visual-
kei acts that I believe are well worth their salt. | | 1 |  | X Japan
Art of Life
One of the biggest names in visual-kei (hell, even Japanese metal in general) are undoubtedly
X Japan. Often cited as the Godfathers of visual-kei, X Japan are well known for their speedy
and theatrical prog-metal as well as their emotionally powerful ballads. Their world famous
ep, Art of Life, is what I believe to be their crowning achievement and a culmination of all of
the best parts of their work. Hell, I'm not alone, it's on the Sputnik "all genres, all time"
chart. [Progressive Metal] | | 2 |  | Luna Sea
Mother
Alongside X Japan (whom the group were a prodigy of) Luna Sea were one of the biggest
forces of the visual-kei scene in their hey-day and greatly responsible for pioneering the
movement. Their style of music is a glittery alt-rock/prog rock fusion combined with elements
of post-punk to create an erratic and yet elegant style that is very much their own. Mother is
a visual-kei classic, but Image and EDEN provide a better look at the sound that makes the
band truly special (be prepared for a lot of chorus and reverb on the guitars). [Alt
rock/Progressive Rock/Post-Punk] | | 3 |  | BUCK-TICK
Kurutta Taiyou
One of the most prolific (although their influence has waned significantly since) acts in the
visual-kei scene are Buck-Tick. Also cited as one of the godfathers of visual rock, Buck-Tick
have an intriguing (albeit somewhat hard to swallow) Gothic influenced rock flavour with Post-
Punk inclinations. Defined mostly by Hisaishi Imai's frequent use of strange effects and
theremin and frontman Atsushi Sakurai's wicked stage-presence, romantic and dark lyrics and
his God-gifted baritone. Buck-Tick are easily one of the most interesting to listen to of the vk
big names. [Rock/Gothic/Post-Punk] | | 4 |  | Dir En Grey
Uroboros
Death Metal goliaths Dir En Grey are a major part of the Visual-Kei scene, gaining reputable
note in both their home country and overseas. They have recently begun tapping into western
influences in their music, masterfully combining their traditional Jrock appeal with western
metal. [Death Metal, Progressive Metal] | | 5 |  | Plastic Tree
Toroimerai
An odd little enigma from visual-kei's teenage years. Plastic Tree have a hard to nail down
sound (best to play it safe and umbrella it as "alt-rock") they play some highly addictive Jrock
with a faint hint of shoegaze tones on the guitar, heavy bass and Ryuutaro Arimura's bizarre,
child-like vocals. [alt-rock/very, very, very subtle shoegaze and noise rock tenancies] | | 6 |  | L'arc-en-Ciel
REAL
Easily one of the most popular visual-kei bands, though they're not really so much a visual-kei
band any more. Poppy, catchy rock music with superbly tight writing and musicianship. Every
individual member shines in their own way. [Pop Rock/Discovolante-core] | | 7 |  | Malice Mizer
Merveilles
Perhaps one of the only acts in the visual-kei scene that were clever enough to make their
theatrical costumes part of their act in a big way. Rather than dressing up for the hell of it,
Malice Mizer would use their costumes to play characters and create a story that immerses
with their music on stage. Their sound is, fittingly enough, highly theatrical progressive rock
and gothic neo-classical (sometimes, along with Buck-Tick, referred to as Dark-wave). Their
earlier work had a lot of french influence. [Progressive rock/neo-classical/art rock] | | 8 |  | Versailles
Noble
Symphonic power-metal group with strong emphasis on aestheticism. Very similar in ways to
Malice Mizer. It is also worth looking into the solo career of vocalist Kamijo, stay away from
Jupiter though. [Power metal/neo-classical] | | 9 |  | Nightmare
Livid
Despite their flair and general sense of originality having waned significantly since they
abandoned the VAP label for Avex Group, Nightmare still stand as being one of the most
entertaining and respectable of the new wave of visual-kei groups that grew up listening to all
of the big names. Their sound is an erratic and ambitious alt-rock/metal with progressive
tenancies. Livid is the band's most complete sounding work while the WORLD Ruler stands as
their big melting pot of ambition with experiments with brass, ambience and electronica as
well as an overall gothic feel. [Alt-rock/progressive rock/metal] | | 10 |  | MUCC
Houyoku
Though not the strongest overall, metal outfit MUCC do have their moments. Best for enjoying
with your mates at parties rather than on your own in deep thought. [metal/anime-core] | |
Jasdevi087
01.27.15 | aaaaaand I spelt Houyoku wrong. This list is not getting the r infection, I worked hard on this. | Jasdevi087
01.27.15 | Also holy fucking jesus the trick with the backslash actually worked. I'm a genius! | AnimalsAsSummit
01.27.15 | solid as hell list, good to see mother and livid on here
as far as I'm concerned visual kei is just a visual aesthetic. musically, bands that do it vary quite a bit | RunOfTheMill
01.27.15 | musically, bands that do it vary quite a bit [2]
X Japan are one of my favourite bands but I've yet to really find another visual kei band that I've really enjoyed, seeing as a lot of them tend to go towards the alt rock/J rock road (not my thing) | AnimalsAsSummit
01.27.15 | try luna sea if you haven't already. they're pretty progressive with their sound. | emester
01.27.15 | Cool list
of the 3 bands on here I know off, X Japan is really the only band on here that I really like. Dir En Grey is inconsistant as all hell imo and I havent heard Luna Sea enough to formulate a final opinion on them. | Rik VII
01.27.15 | @RunOfTheMill: try Versailles - Noble. Once you get over the cheese it is an amazing metal album. | Jasdevi087
01.28.15 | Yeah, my point was that visual-kei is just an aesthetic, but a lot of the newer bands only focus on that and not on their music.
@RunOfTheMill you may like Versailles or Malice Mizer. I doubt you'll like Nightmare, Plastic Tree or MUCC but it's pretty hard to go wrong with the others.
@AnimalsAsSummit have you heard Plastic Tree before? You might dig them. | AnimalsAsSummit
01.28.15 | no, but i will check for sure | discovolante
01.28.15 | Hmm... try some Strawberry Fields, By-Sexual, Kamaitachi, Genkaku Allergy, Raphael, La'cryma Christi, Pierrot, old Penicillin (Hakuei's "Angel Trip" album is to die for), Merry Go Round and Color for some solid old-styled visual kei. Devil Kitty is probably the undisputed king of avant-garde visual kei, although Vidoll and Kagerou can have their moments too. As far as newer bands go, NoGod, Deathgaze, Merry, Monolith (JPN), Matenrou Opera, D and Kiryu are pretty good. VK's my main specialty lol. Oh, and thanks for the brief shout on L'arc. Pretty cool to see my name on another Sputnik user's list for once lol. | discovolante
01.28.15 | Oh! And Lareine can be pretty awesome too, speaking of Kamijo. | Jasdevi087
01.29.15 | @Discovolante some of those are on the senpai list so I should probably make the effort to hear a full album from them. Never enjoyed Penicillin for some reason. | iamamanfromspace
01.29.15 | You can get recs here and fill up your list until you get to 25 ;)
Sorry idk shit about vk, I used to listen to girugamesh in high school though, before they went pop. Had some good times with their self-titled and all that | Jasdevi087
01.29.15 | @sixdegrees yeah Plastic Tree are cool.
@iamamanfromspace I should probably just fill this up with all of Disco's stuff but I really don't want all of the rs it'll summon from the coding abyss and I don't know if the backslash trick I used on the L'arc-en-Ciel album will hold. | iamamanfromspace
01.29.15 | Lmao sputnik is so shit, why don't they fix these issues everyone is literally constantly complaining about | Jasdevi087
01.29.15 | As far as I'm aware, it's because mx isn't here to fix them. | iamamanfromspace
01.29.15 | Oh what is that / him / her ??? | Jasdevi087
01.29.15 | The site's creator; the big cheese. | iamamanfromspace
01.29.15 | did God leave us again | Jasdevi087
01.30.15 | God left us unfinished. |
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