Saturday 11 June 2016

monogram. | break out from your shell.

hisashiburi. it's been a long time since i wrote my last blog entry. so much stuff happend - be it privately or at work. i met so many interesting people and, last but not least, i went to japan in april again, to visit so many awesome lives of the band i adore so much. i'm really happy i found kind of my hobby, i found people to hang out with and i still have fun when i visit the country i love. to be honest, whenever i am back in germany, i really miss japan. i miss the shops, the food, the music, the people, the lives - i even miss television! i cannot really explain how much this country already kinda braindamaged myself, but until i'm still thinking quite clearly it shouldn't be a problem, right? anyhow, some of you may know, that i'll be in japan in the end of june again. i honestly can't wait to board my plane again. i will see my favorite people again, join the most wonderful hotel and it's staff, will go to karaoke and to lives and instores - fully enjoying japan as it's best, even my holiday won't be as packed as the last one - plus, best fact, i will finally meet beautiful regina, who i haven't met since i know her. like...- how many years? 6? i'm really grateful about that opportunity. and i will never let it go to waste!

anyway, the topic i wanted to write about this time, is something i have in my head such a long time. a topic, i wanted to write down long ago. so it's a blogentry i kinda had in my mental drawer for months. since nearly all of the bands from the-  let's call it 'visual kei' - genre, disbanded, died or whatever did so they are not around anymore, i really don't have any vkei bands i listen to anymore. i still had alive until this year, but they quit doing music in april (i went to their last live in tokyo and it was sad as fuck). i have only vistlip and tsudukimasite left, and when i went to an event of tsudukimasite in my last vacation, all other bands i've seen on this event really fucked up my ears. it's like i really can't stand this 'typical vkei sounds' anymore. for me, now, after so many years, every band sound the same. not only that, they even look the same for me. i don't see any difference in bands like mejibray or miztavla just to name a few. tsudukimasite also sound vkei-ish to me, but they still remind me of old classical vkei/anguro music like monokuro kinema. that's why i still enjoy bands like them. vistlip is just in my heart forever, so nobody can tell me anything about them. plus, in my opinion they don't really sound like a typical vkei-ish band. why? because tomos voice is more than unique in the music scene and also the lyrics and musical components of vistlip differ from release to release.
but now up the question: why is it like that? well, this may could be because since i started to watch anime (and also sooner), i discovered great artists like amazarashi, galileo galilei, one ok rock, spyair, the oral cigarettes or alexandros. i enjoy their music a lot and even it's just japanese rock - like vkei seems to be as well - they sounds a lot different. since i went to a lot of vistlip lives i can understand why: furitsuke is, for me, the main problem.
i need to admit that vistlip concerts are always fun to me. i love doing furitsuki on their lives, i love interacting in jumps with other vistlip fans on the concerts - yes i freakin love the hand movements that directly comes to my mind when i listen to vistlip - be it live or on a record. but on the other hand: i hate them. in vkei there are certain areas in music that direclty leads to a specific hand movement. the guitar is nearly most essential for that. much drums; much headbang. flawless voice: standing still. guitar solo: oh yea, let's do saku. in vkei scene furitsuke is everywhere - and it pisses me off. due the music and it's sounds are quite similar in my opinion this leads to less .. flexibility? and uniqueness in the songs. this is making vkei songs sounding a lot the same. guitar riffs are quite similar and many songs sound to you like you would have heard it already anywhere. i get the feeling, that, when bands try to implement furitsuke into their sounds (so their fans are having a good time visiting their concerts and interact with their songs) they try to pack and form the songs into being furitsuke material. it seems like they maybe COULD have different ideas, but don't use them. they lose creativity. and being kinda prisoned in their creativity. and thus is what i find sad. because nearly every vkei band is doing it. and yes, also vistlip. so what i asking myself all the time is; how the hell would vistlip sound when their sounds would not be furitsuke-ish?! i would love to know that. vistlip have a lot of songs that are way rockier and don't have that much furitsuke areas to do something with. it's just fine music. but still in nearly every fucking song, there is an element that leads you to a handmovement.
when i listen to songs from alexandros or one ok rock, most of the songs are just dancing arounds, sweating, headbanging or else. spyair combines furitsuke and non-furitsuke pretty good. they have some songs with elements out of it, but also have songs, that are just party ones. no movements with hands or interaction at all. just your own fucking dance. i really would love to know how vistlip would sound, when someone would tell them 'please stop being vkei now and do everything you ever wanted to try' - like tomo and rui do with daikondanchi or lill. how many songs in furitsuke style would they do? i don't want to blame their management, the fans or else that they are pushing vistlip in a direction but... in my opinion, even vistlip still kinda sound  vkei-ish, they stopped being a 'typical vkei band' - so why are they still bound to the song stlye of vkei? surely, the music of vistlip would sound a lot more different that it is now, but i'm sure, that it would be a complete new level that everybody would hardly enjoy. i really wish that MAYBE after their 10th anni, vistlip will break out of the furitsuke and vkei shell: being THEIR OWN. do THEIR OWN music and ideas. because right now i really get the feeling that they are kind of like puppets in the scene. (even i still love them and their music ok, don't get me wrong)

thank you for your attention.

Wednesday 23 December 2015

chimera. | animu trashing myself.

sometimes i am asking myself; what the fuck has anime done to you? and then i realized, that it simply ruined my life (well, in a good way!). you should know that after being in some kind of 'my own world' when i went to highschool, i quitted watching anime and reading manga, because i realized my grades were getting down. but since a recent time i started catching up so much i missed in all these years, that i gotta feeling this 'own world' is coming back. but it seems that this time, i can sort them out of being fiction - and i know what is reality.

to be honest, normally no one would think that you could learn something from a cartoon or a series. but anime for me, is no 'children thing'. it really gives you moments or situations where you need to think - and where you start to think about yourself and your life. anime shows you how a good friendship can be like, and that having an argument with your best friend isn't basically a bad thing. but it also shows you, how important you are for your best friend. it shows you how teamwork works and how it eventually work out, when you fight even you already gave up. anime even gives you chills, thrills, feels and everything in between. and when i think about how i watch anime today - i'm asking myself how i even managed to watch them when i was younger. and...more importantly..how i never ot feels out of it?

this time it seems to be totally different. like i have sympathies for all character. i laugh and cry with them (and as every animu fangirl does, sometimes i even ship them and cheer for their twinky twosome times hohohoh-). i really enjoy all the fantastic art and the more fantastic stories behind it. i love the characterdesigns. i love how easily you can also learn japanese with anime (of course not by only watching but also studying yourself a little). and maybe that's also a point why i start loving anime so much. it's just.... that i started to find myself a hobby again - even this hobby means sitting in front of the internet for around 1h a day just to watch the newest episodes of the seasons animes i am watching. but i really like it. and i really like how i also found new friends due to that. strikey. so...maybe anime hasn't ruined my life completely? i mean it somehow... make it better?
nah well, take your own guess. but i can say that i really really enjoy this stupid ass animation from japan. it's like my number one hobby and my number one topic on twitter for about a year. and i don't even mind that it may annoy someone.

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oh, just a rant by my side.... does anyone else who watches anime a lot has this feeling that when hearing a specific seiyuu you directly associate it with a character? it's like sometimes so annoying but so funny! like kamiya hiroshi for me is always yato and levi - hirakawa daisuke is always free!s ryugazaki rei... miyano mamuro is masaomi kida and...uchiyama kouki is tsukishima kei?! like everytime i hear them elsewhere i see all these character - it's so weird! :D
when i think about that a year ago i always said 'how can people even hear the differences in japanese seiyuus, they all sound the same, i'll never be able to do that!' and now i'm like this... i feel like i am total trash now. lol.
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jaaa, ne! that's all for now.
i also wish everyone who's reading a wonderful christmas time and some kickass start in the new year 2016. may we meet this year! maybe?!

Monday 30 November 2015

eve. | forever rest in peace.

hello everyone.
actually, i wanted to write an entry about the last anime i have watched, and how it bursted me to tears, how it motivated me to do my sports again, and want to go back to my old times, where i used to train in teams. but today, a very sad message dropped by and hit a lot of my friends in the neck out of nowhere.

consciously i used the songtitle "eve". because as may of you know, that was name of the fanclub from the japanese band "ADAMS". i need to admit, that i've never listened to their songs. i have never been to any of their concerts, nor did i never understood why people loved the band so much. but that feeling is something a fan never can describe. it's a feeling you can hardly share with words. being a fan, better said a fangirl, someone who really is kind of addicted to that one band or that one song - someone like that can be in all of us. in my opinion, getting a huge audience to love you, praise you, and travel around countries just to see you perform is something only a few artists can achieve. as i said; i never have been to concerts of ADAMS, but i brought friends there. i know friends that are deeply in love with this band. i know friends that travelled across europe just to see them perform. and i can see these friends breakin from the pain they feel in their heart as they heard today that one of the member of their favorite, loved band, just passed away.
let me tell you one thing. it hurts even for me. because when i read that somebody, that someone i know love so much, i can feel the pain as well. when you have friends that are as addicted with music, concerts, merchandise and getting tons of the best friends you could ever imagine out of a fandom or a single interest you are sharing - the most painful thing that can happen to you is to see, how exactly this is breaking. if you are a fan of a band, every dying message of a beloved artists will hurt you in a different way - but the point is; it WILL hurt you.

i've gone through vistlips accident a several times. i was afraid they will never comeback, after the year they promised they will. their manager died, tohya was in pain since he was driving the car while it happens - but everyone is alive. and they continued.

but shotas story is different. death can be cruel. and the most important thing is, that you'll never know when it happens. you can die in your sleep; your heart can stop beating ; you can suffer in an accident; you can get a stroke. you'll never know when. you can fight against it, but when your time has come, fighting is the hardest thing to do.
if you have any fans in the fandom of this band, please support them and give them a shoulder to cry their hearts out, as good as you can. not only when someone of a fandom dies, but also when something in their family happens. whenever they cry or have the most painful times of their life - support your friends - even support your foes. just be there. fighting alone is cruel. fighting just having someone, listening to you will be so much easier. you will never know  when something like this will happen to you. you will never know when your candle will be blown out. just give strength to people that needs you the most.

my condolences goes to every adams fan in this world. it goes to his wife, manager and nice soul aurelie, who was there for him everytime he needed support; especially in his last seconds. it goes to everyone who was working with ADAMS. it goes to everyone who needs it.
i've never known shota. i've never met him in person. but i hope he will spread his wings and collect some new friends in the place he is now.
LOVE FOREVER to SHOTA!
may you rest in peace.