DIR EN GREY - PHALARIS

I still think Perfume of Sins is undercooked and Oboro doesn’t fit, but overall I’d place Phalaris in my top five. It’s a more focused Arche in some respects.

7 Likes

Settling in as one of their best for me. Favorite is more mood-based, but it definitely ranks there for me some days.

1 Like

I’m not sure if bookending with longbois is a good idea.
Schadenfreude, Otogi and Kamui take a half of the album. Meanwhile, other eight songs sandwiched between them in a tight space and they go by too fast (even faster than TIW).
And dunno. There are a lot of good songs, but I lose my attention quickly when I go through Phalaris from start to finish.

Pacing is absolutely a problem. Maybe put Oboro before Kamui and shift Otogi somewhere in the middle.

Perfume of Sins is great instrumentally but I don’t understand Kyo’s decision to whisper and mumble most of the lyrics. He does it a lot in sukekiyo too and I just find it annoying even though I love his actual singing/screaming.

I think this album is really good overall but there are too many ballads imo and some of the songs feel a little underdeveloped/filler-y. I think Utsutsu is good but it feels more like a sukekiyo song to me. I really think they needed another faster/heavier song between Otogi and Kamuy because it’s like 15 minutes straight of a similar vibe.

Schadenfreude is easily top 10 DEG songs if not top 5 and a prefect showcase of everything I love about this band. I almost feel like it’s a little too good because then the rest of the album was disappointing in comparison after the opening track lol.

Easily one of if not their best complete effort

3 Likes

I still say 13 should be at the end of the album, kinda like Hakudaku.

Or like how they used to end lives with Un Deux. That also has a similar vibe.

1 Like

Any bets on 13 eventually becoming their PHALARIS live closer?

I think the band will get the message though. Just like how people were hinting at “Un Deux” being equally fit at the end too.

I can see it closing the main set and then later down the road it being the first song for the encore.

2 Likes

I’m screwing with the track list to see if I can get it to flow a little better. This is what I’m currently testing out:

Two problems with this:

Oboro sounds out of place no matter where I put it.

Otogi sounds a little off for a few seconds coming after Ochita. And when I say off I mean it actually sounds like it’s out of tune and slowly correcting itself.

13 is an awesome way to close it out.

4 Likes

After many listenings I would say the best new songs are 13 and Perfume of Sins, the others didn’t really do much for me. I wonder why I dont feel so impressed by the ballads that everyone seems to love so much, they just feel weak somehow/lacking that punch to be memorable.

Hibiki is the worst ballad DEG had written in a while. Actually, no, it’s not even bad, it’s just sort of there. It falls in the same space as Tousei, Kaishun, and Followers, except all of those are way better.

I think the worst one in a while would be “Ranunculus” instead.

1 Like

Ranunculus is fascinating live. Rather than being a pop song, Kyo tends to completely break down and descend into madness.

The album version is a bit stale. It could do with being a minute or two longer with some expansive instrumental sections.

1 Like

This is one of the most uninspired DIR EN GREY albums in recent history. Outside of Perfume of Sins, Ochita, Eddie, the compositions here sound like they’re still in their demo versions or just hella flat.

Kamuy gets some points because someone on Youtube was able to beef the song up by beautifully mashing up Kyo’s vocals from several songs. I

The biggest sin of the album is Schadenfreude. What would’ve been a great contender for best DIR EN GREY long is ruined by how repetitive it is. Its clear Kaoru just wanted to have a long song on here just for the hell of it.

Cut the fat that’s 90 percent of this album and its a solid 8/10.

With all of it included, this is solid 5/10.

Aight so boom.

I purposefully avoided this topic for a long time because I was not in the headspace for this one when it came out. To this day, I’ve only listened twice. Chatted with a few peeps, especially @EvilHippy, about the organization of this album. I took a stab at reorganizing the album. Looks like this now:

I find I actually enjoy PHALARIS this way more than how it was originally presented to us. FYI, Eddie/T.D.F.F are interchangeable and the goal was to not put Schadenfreude and Kamuy at polar ends of the album because that makes it more taxing to get through than it really is. Had to drop Ochita… because it didn’t fit anywhere. LMK what you think of this arrangement.

3 Likes

In this case, I’ll leave my impression of this rearranged playlist (with T.D.F.F. instead of Eddie)

  1. Perfume of Sins is a kick-ass opener. It has that ominous electronic intro; slow, but heavy af part which engages the audience perfectly (Shinya’s first hit and Kyo’s NOSE as a first note leaves a very strong impact); and then it just goes bonkers with that blastbeat part. 13 is a good song to follow after, true.
  2. Schadenfreude>Oboro>Kamuy is a fucking roadbump. But, I can’t imagine where else they can be put. Having Kamuy in the middle also makes me appreciate it more in a sense of “I’m still not tired from listening to it”, which is usually my problem (I clock out after Otogi). Plus, it neatly separates the album in two logical halves.
  3. T.D.F.F. is a wake-up call after Kamuy. Perfect to kickstart the second half. May try to put Eddie instead just to see if there’s any difference.
  4. Maybe I would swap Mouai and Utsutsu around (Mouai could carry the aggressive tone of TDFF/Eddie while Utsutsu could mellow the mood to prepare for Hibiki)
  5. Otogi is just gorgeous as an ender. That minute-long intro with a very somber piano, strong chorus, and overall very strong mood… I dunno, that’s a bullseye for me

But I only listened to this mix once. Wanted to try it again with Eddie instead, but the thought of going through Schadenfreude>Oboro>Kamuy again fills me with dread.

1 Like

Yeah there’s not a lot of wiggle room when there’s only 11 tracks and two of them together are like 20 minutes. One long track would have worked okay but not two. I don’t mind Schadenfreude but I still don’t remember it. Kamuy is a snore though, I’m waiting for some energy to kick in but it never happens. I felt strangely bad about dropping it so I kept it in.

They probably should have just ended with Otogi…

1 Like

And some people were wondering why TWOM wasn’t on Phalaris.
I don’t want to imagine a 11-12 track album where half of it would be taken by these 3 tracks.

Kamuy is an interesting song on its own, but not sure if it needed to be in the album. Could be a standalone thing

1 Like