I totally see him more with chaotic gremlin energy tho lmfao
But that is based on this series of “Funny clips” and him rolling over the stage during that one performance of Henohenomoheji. I heard he falls over nearly every live lol
But anyways, I think the band is quite eccentric which makes it easy to pick a honmei for new fans. It’s literally just “we have four archetypes here, just pick one lol”
That plus having VK looks makes you so much easier to draw. Thus doing VK instead of being a normal band opens up the possibility of receiving a lot of fan art, and so having a more active fan base on the internet. Having an active fan base also allows for more people to see these fan works which will cause them to have a look at the band too.
Chaotic baby germlin energy def
Childern bones are bouncy balls no matter how hard you throw, pull etc nothing happens and this is the definition of Reiki bones
I remember that dvd Lime looked over and was like “OH, it’s just reiki keeps playing”
I’m 99.999% sure Reiki is fueled by 10 energy drinks, pack of 100% sugar gummy bears and then a ball of chaos and there u go that’s Reiki!
Did you know
Reiki got very drunk at a bar on a live stream was ‘walking’ home ran HIMSELF into MULTIPLE closed GARAGE DOORS among OTHER THINGS managed to get home ALIVE flopped down onto his bed turned on music and said “goodnight”
I desire to have squishy bones like him
We got the vocalist
Lime 2’0 tall gothic germlin who pretends he’s 6ft tall with hidden platforms in all of his shoes and an oversize platform he hides behind 60% at the concert just so his germlin army can’t pull out there phones or ready the screenshot buttons and snap photos of his tiny germlin height
Reiki the guitarist
Chaotic germlin. However unlike Lime who is either 2’0 without platforms and 3’0 with platforms Reiki is a shocking natural 3’0 germlin! he’s not allowed any form of a platform in his shoes he’s way way too chaotic for that. Remember that kid in your class who couldn’t sit still and is bouncing in there seat ready to go climb the walls thats Reiki!
Never worry if he jumps off Kyono drum set, randomly is on the ground, jumps off his platform or is always falling on the ground he’s got childern bones! nothing can break him!
Yue the bassist
Unlike his germlin band members he’s acutally tall probably 6’0 very useful for tiny germlins who can’t reach well anything. Very sexy sometimes acts like a tree on stage unless he’s showing off his gymnastics high kick
Kyonosuke the drummer
Fully grown adult man but as tiktok has labeled him “he’s a lil guy, must protect at all costs.” Either has super pastel or artsty style clothes always smiling and making cute faces at the camera during dvd’s and is the calm part of his and Reiki duo
Welcome to Kizu admission cost: Your life savings every 3 months
If you want more of this sound, there’s so much more! Plenty more! Although I can’t guarantee you’ll like all of it, there’s never been an easier time for me to show how visual kei and indie rock are linked. Two genres that are traditionally placed at polar opposites mentally are actually neighbors!
But these are regular shoes with not very thick soles. He only wore platforms in LGWY and Oni, I think it’s the same pair of shoes) Mostly he wears sneakers and has never tried to hide his height, he’s 158 cm and jokes about it himself.
I also felt the same way while listening to DEXCORE. Extremely talented band, yet i think they wont get as much hype if they drop the visual kei aspect of their look. (I would also say the same thing about NB and Deviloof, but i think that’s more of a case of a single really talented member quitting)
amber gris now that’s a name I haven’t heard in a while but yes, ‘yay amber gris mentioned!’
also:
Two genres that are traditionally placed at polar opposites mentally are actually neighbors!
Who would have thought that … rock and rock are similar … wild. Sorry @zeus I just had to laugh a bit. My unpopular opinion is people don’t acknowledge enough how much of vk is just visual rock etc etc (basically agreeing with you here)
Yeah I’m gonna loop back to this topic, but only because I have something I genuinely want to add to this. Sorta similar, sorta different. And you just gotta listen to this YouTube clip.
In an age where we have serious female-fronted metal bands with insane harsh vocal potential such as Spiritbox (Courtney LaPlante), Jinjer (Tatiana Shmayluk), Monochromatic Black (Tanya Beickert), VEXED (Megan Targett), and Volatile Ways (Emilly Beekman), among others, I find it curiously odd that visual kei doesn’t have a female-fronted metal band with obnoxious vocals. When I step back a bit, I don’t see much of it in my Japanese music collection either. Clearly, Yu Umehara shows that it can be done and they’re out there! I must find them. That OBSCURE cover is nasty work! You wouldn’t expect those sounds coming out of her. I love it!
Oh and in case you’re interested in any of the bands I listed above for reference (warning: heavy shit below):
I would guess it’s more of the societal barrier of entry to the vk scene. Despite its looks it is very male centric scene. Look at the indie scene in Japan and you will find insane and also obnoxious female vocals throughout. One of the newest examples would be the band Kokeshi with insane female vocals but there are also older and well known bands like Kokeshi Doll and many others. I will list some examples here
If I tried I could dig out more. Not every of these bands is metal adjecent but it doesn’t matter in this case. I believe that there is interest for female vocalists in Japan to participate in heavy music. Their attention just doesn’t turn to vk. I guess it’s a bunch of factors. Like as I mentioned in the beginning the male centric nature of the scene, the obvious issues springing from that. The societal issue and pressures of participating in vk scene is most likely even larger than just playing in metal band in conservative society. Albeit society with long history of underground music scenes. Why risk your possible success and future by participating in vk when you have the chance of succeeding on your own without any possible repercussions later on. Also I wonder how many women would choose being in metal band when you can as well choose being and alt idol or just in plain idol group and probably make more money. Which is probably the point to consider as well.
I am also thinking about how many female musicians are connected to the vk scene in general. One of the best examples would probably be the band 101A which isn’t vk but has split release with Emmurée and has members actively playing in vk and notable vk bands at that. I know there are more female musicians connected to the scene but I think that would bring us back to the issue why there are next to none female musicians in vk
There had been DecoLa Hopping with a vocal for extremely sweet sounding tunes and then she pulled some growls out of her.
Just to mention the first name that comes up my mind (I didn’t watch/listen to any vids as well as I don’t look for any because I’m lacking the time to do so).
But with female vocals just making a very tiny part of the VK scene in general I’m not surprised it’s just how it is.
As people have mentioned before there aren’t a lot of female VKei vocalists because while you can’t tell overseas, when you go to concerts the scene is pretty much for women.
I think a lot of people use Nocturnal Bloodlust as an (older) example that vkei can be whatever just as long as the guys look good. This also goes with how vkei bands are marketed. At vkei shows you can expect to buy chekis and make easy money from photo opps. Their source of income is from dedicated bangya.
Some bands market themselves as boyfriends too similar to a host club which sounds crazy. You pick a favorite member and if you go to their concerts enough the band will remember you and you form some weird fake relationship with a guy. While that sounds insulting I am a bangya myself and like my fake relationship with my honmei
Now nothing i’ve said has anything to do with music since that’s vkei, it actually isn’t about the music.
I dabble in both scenes (metalcore & vkei) and when I first saw Damned I was like “I’m getting their CD!” just to get to their booth and they were selling chekis, photo opps (2-shots), and stickers
From all the times I’ve seen Dexcore, while they promote themselves as a vkei band Yumeto will say himself (said it during an IG live) that he doesn’t listen to vkei and I believe he tags his posts as goth instead of vkei (not a big enough fan to go back and look at his posts to confirm). Their concerts are male dominated. Kagami was part of a session band in July at Ikebukuro Edge and it was clear a lot of the bangya didn’t know who he was but he had some girl and male fans follow him there. He was eclipsed of course by all the loyal Kouryu (Razor) fans to the point that Kouryu was selling his own cheki at the venue. It wasn’t even his event
Exist Trace is an all female band with visual kei style visuals but I see them promote more with the metalcore scene since for a female dominated scene they can’t really profit off bangya with chekis and 2-shots.
At concerts vkei is all about your honmei and standing in front of them to the point some girls are crazy enough to buy multiple tickets then resell them just to be front row for their honmei.
I don’t know if the female metal scene is like this - I just know I went to an Aldious concert once and their fans scared me away never to come back to another concert again. Their fanbase was largely older men.
So really I didn’t notice how the scene actually was till I started going to concerts and there really isn’t any room for women in vkei when the way that the scene actually markets itself is towards bangya and the visuals.
I agree with your bangya-selling points. Sometimes you will have bands that sound like complete ass with fans just because they look good. That’s just vkei for ya lol
I’m a bangya too, but I don’t buy cheki (ok fine, I only buy cheki from 1 band lol) and I go to lives for the music, not my honmei. Don’t really care about getting 2shots, either. In fact I don’t even want them to “know” me as a person or “remember” me lol. I think I’m in the minority here because every time I tell another bangya this they look at me like I have a few screws loose.
Can you please elaborate? I’m very interested (nosy) lol. What happened?
Sometimes i think we (myself included!) from the overseas side hear musicians say they aren’t vkei, or don’t fw vkei - and we think they’re talking specifically just about the music, or other musicians.
But they might be talking about this, or preferring the shady backdoor dealings of another industry over the shady backdoor dealings of vkei.
There’s some bands like Slothreat who i hear and think, “i love this, this sounds nothing unlike vkei to me, nothing about this seems incompatible with the scene”
but then i remind myself maybe it’s more their marketing strategy and lifestyle preferences that have them not wanting to ride this train, rather than some hate for the music they sound so similar to.
