Opinion Prone

VAMPS
VAMP’s debut album
10th June 2009

You know, I really dislike self-entitled albums. They kind of make mentioning them in a [band]’s [album] format awkward. Moving on, despite being a fan of hyde, I was never really that interested in VAMPS. I mean, I adore hyde’s work with L’Arc~en~Ciel, and his one-time collaboration with Gackt for “orenji no taiyou” was also amazing, but his solo work leaves a lot to be desired (especially in his third solo album, Faith), and that’s what K.A.Z. had previously worked with him on. And as VAMPS’s debut US tour did not visit any city I was remotely close to, I felt even less compelled to familiar myself with the music.

Additionally, the overt-vampire references in all of this — in the band name, the album name, the label name, and pretty much all of the song names and imagery — kind of made me facepalm. I would expect it from Gackt, who only recently came out as a mere mortal and has a long history of vampire and goth sound and imagery. But, well, I guess it really isn’t that big of a surprise coming from hyde either… considering the fact that he’s acted as both a vampire and a ghost, songs like “Midnight Celebration,” various photoshoots, and a lot of his fashion and accessory choices. Well, whatever brings all the fangirls to the yard, right?

And in the end, hyde is hyde, and I knew it was only a matter of time before I eventually decided to pick this up. So here we go:

TRACK 01: BITE
Thirty-second opening track! Starts off with some very classic horror elements — swanky TV noises in the background, creeking door, clock striking, howling, a woman moaning sensually and a scream! Classy.

TRACK 02: LOVE ADDICT
Now some rockin’ guitar with a very catchy beat. hyde’s vocals start rough and excitedly, a welcome throwback to some of his older work. Lyrics are in Engrish and they are hilarious as usual, so I’m not going to try too hard to decipher what he’s saying. Melody is pretty negligent as the song progresses, but the guitars carry a steady beat, so there’s at least that to tie things together. End of the first chorus has a weird break before hyde comes back in slowly, in a lower voice. K.A.Z. (I guess?) providing some backup vocals here and there, but nothing really substantial or interesting. I think the repeated lyrics near the end are “right on time, let’s go,” but it could also be “let go.” It frustrates me sometimes that hyde has spent so long singing in English, but it rarely seems to get more understandable. Guitars fade out to the end. Not a good song, not a bad song.

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I think it’s a little pointless to make “best of the decade” lists when a majority of the series you’ve experienced, period, were from this decade. Excepting the random movies and shows I saw dubbed in Chinese or whatever as a kid and those from the glory days of Toonami, most of what I’ve seen debuted post-1999, including pretty much everything currently on my favorites’ list (not that I ever really figured that out).

So instead of that, here are nine series I kind of meant to watch at some point during the last ten years and never got around to, either because I was too busy or too lazy or too cheap or forgot about it. Maybe I’ll get around to some of these eventually, but some of them will probably just slip on further and further into the back of my mind where I’ll forget about them like I’ve probably already forgotten about a dozen other things I intended to watch at some point.

These are in no real order.

1. Voices of a Distant Star (2002)

After seeing 5 Centimeters per Second, I was very interested in seeing Makoto Shinkai’s other works. I was going to include The Place Promised in Our Early Days (2004) in this as well, but I think I’ve actually seen a few minutes of that, either of the beginning or the end, I don’t remember. Voices of a Distant Star seems to have a theme similar to 5 Centimeters, which is depressing in that I can relate too well, but it also reminds me a little of PLANETES, which was considerably less depressing, perhaps because it slipped in a lot more comedy. Either way, this movie is definitely something I still intend to check out eventually. I really don’t know why it’s so hard for me to sit down with movies; I never feel like I have enough time.

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So I was in Tokyo for the first time, November 27th-December 12th. I was there with something like forty other SCAD students, all Sequential Art and Animation majors. This means I was in Tokyo with forty other nerds. Granted, not all of them were otaku, but come on, it’s a trip to Tokyo with art students. It’s anyone’s guess that most of them were, and even the ones that wouldn’t admit to it had at least a few nostalgic fandoms that originated from Japan. As a college-related trip, we did do class-related things here and there, but really, the majority of it was one glorified tourist trip. And shopping spree.

On our second-to-last day in Tokyo, everyone was instructed to show off all the crazy stuff they’ve purchased during the course of the trip. And if ever I needed confirmation that I was surrounded by a bunch of weeaboo, that was it. It was like a mini-dealer’s room. I was going to save these photos for the end of my eventual series of posts about Tokyo, but I figure, hey, it’s Christmas Eve. Let’s look at all the cool stuff people got in Japan. For all the money that we spent there, we probably aren’t getting any real Christmas presents anyway…

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A lot of people from my generation like to complain that traditional animation methods such as 2D cel animation and stop-motion have been replaced by less-worthy 3D counterparts. We’re all a little nostalgic for the oldschool stuff, but I think it’s a little unfair to suggest that 3D is somehow inferior or that it somehow takes less work. Sure, the time and effort it takes to draw every single frame of a character animation may have become a little under-appreciated, but those in the offended camp probably under-appreciate the time it takes to model, texture, render and rig a 3D character animation. Appreciation aside though, I did think it was a damn shame when Disney closed down its 2D animation branch after the disastrous Home on the Range movie, and was amongst the hopeful when the company later turned around and decided to make a return to its roots.

The periodic trailers and behind-the-scenes looks released for the Princess and the Frog all looked amazing. The character designs felt like they would have fit in well with the Disney movies of the early 90’s and the animation was similarly nostalgic. In addition to being a throwback to the animated features I grew up with, I was happy to see another film focused on a slice of American history and culture, in this case, the French Quarter of New Orleans before and after World War I. The music and musical style were less of a concern for me since movies like Tarzan, Lilo & Stitch and the Emperor’s New Groove worked perfectly fine without much, if any, bursting into song. Still, the last Disney musical was Mulan, and Mulan was all kinds of amazing, so anticipation remained extremely high for this film. I finally got to see it yesterday.

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So I haven’t updated this poor blog for the past two months because classes and conventions and other obligations have been keeping me thoroughly occupied. I’ve avoided writing any sort of hiatus announcement because I hate the word hiatus. It implies that you can’t update while you’re on hiatus because posting implies that you’re “back,” which implies you’ll be returning to whatever the update schedule was prior to the hiatus. As it is, I don’t really anticipate being able to post much until mid-December and then, probably only for about three or four weeks before things get crazy again, but screw any kind of official hiatus. Mid-December is what I anticipate, but if I can and feel like posting in the interim, then I will.

And hence this post. Kimi ni Todoke has annoyed me enough to make me post about how I’m dropkicking its ass despite the delighted and downright fawning reception the rest of the blogosphere has given it.

I’ve said before that shoujo isn’t really my cup of tea. Though there have certainly been exceptions (Lovely Complex, Ouran High School Host Club), I think I’m generally disinterested in the genre because I just don’t care for what I perceive to be its stereotypical qualities: idealistic and naive characters, contrived romance, and related drama. And Kimi ni Todoke has all of those in spades.

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All in all, I’d say their reference of this particular meme was highly appropriate considering the scene directly preceding it. It’s really too bad there weren’t two other people in the scene to complete it (though I guess no one else in the series would be quite as excited).

There’s absolutely no mistaking the reference. Both Araragi and Suruga are in the exact same poses as the nearest two dudes and their expressions are nearly identical as well — just Suruga’s eyebrows seem to make her a bit more “Holy shit!” than “Hell yeah!”

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I finally got around to finishing up my review for the DOGS OAV. (MAL mirror is here.)

I put off watching the last two episodes for a while just because the first two were so… underwhelming. It’s fairly rare for me to discover a manga before a corresponding anime is made since I watch a lot more than I read, but honestly, it’s probably better that way considering how annoyingly purist I tend to be about adaptations. I don’t want to feel this way! This feeling of burning injustice when something turns out much less amazing than you’d like — when something doesn’t seem to do the original justice at all. The strange thing about the DOGS anime is that it doesn’t really seem to be its fault that it sucked (well, aside from the shitty animation). I feel like the format just didn’t suit it. DOGS is just something better read than watched, even if the voice actors all do great jobs and there are lots of action scenes.

Then again, maybe the anime only proves that underneath all of Shirow Miwa’s beautiful artwork, his story and characters aren’t that interesting after all. Maybe that’s what pisses me off the most. Nobody wants to be shown that something they loved isn’t actually that awesome. Is the love that comes from blinding nostalgia enough? The manga marches on, so I guess I’ll keep seeing what Miwa’s really made of. Viz’s release of the first volume of DOGS: BULLETS&CARNAGE came out earlier this month and I’ll be picking it up soon; might do another semi-review, but we’ll see.

Well, I kid, but by now I’m sure you’ve all heard the breaking news: DISNEY BUYS MARVEL, and I’ve always wanted to use the “[Noun]? In my [Other Noun]?” format. :P

There are only a few naysayers, and most either confused or cautiously speculative, but I honestly don’t think many things on the fandom end will be affected; there will just be more money in different people’s pockets. What’s really going to change with this acquisition? Disney is notorious for aggressive merchandising and pushing their licensed characters, but will a flood of new action figures and new Marvel-themed rides at Disneyland really affect Marvel’s artistic integrity or quality of work? As long as Disney keeps its hand out of what the folks at Marvel actually do, then I don’t see a problem. People were upset when Disney bought out Pixar too, but Pixar has, for the most part, retained its autonomy and continues to produce outstanding films. So why shouldn’t I expect Marvel to continue making comics like it always has?

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It’s always hard to ignore a title after someone writes an excellent post about it, but Solanin is also a highly attractive two volumes in length — perfect for my limited time and short attention span. And I guess there was also some masochistic curiosity to it because I knew Solanin would be painful to read. It’s about post-college life. It’s about life in general. It’s about still growing up even after you thought you’d already done so. And it hits very close to home.

Here is the review, and here is the MAL mirror.

Reading it was very hard in the beginning. Sixteen pages in and I could already relate absurdly well with both Meiko and Taneda, and hell, all their friends as well. It was depressing, but it got easier the further I progressed because they became their own people, rather than just ghostly representations of myself and people I knew. The story is how they choose to live their own lives, one path in a forest of many. Theirs aren’t the best choice, nor the worst. It isn’t an answer, but it’s there. Highly recommend.

I love Engrish. I really do. As uptight as I can get about the rampant misuse of English by native or theoretically fluent speakers, I find it ridiculously endearing when obviously non-fluent foreigners try, even when they get things wrong. Or maybe especially when they get things wrong. So it always pleases me to hear musicians stumble along with their broken pronunciation and broken grammar in anime theme songs or just in general; it’s courageous of them to even attempt singing in a language they’re not all that familiar with. I mean, Tomoko Kawase supposedly has a friend write her English lyrics for her, but she still ends up with stuff like “don’t scary.” There are a lot of great songs out there with awkward grammar and “alternative” pronounced like “alter” and “native” spliced together. Maybe they’re supposing that their primarily Japanese audience won’t notice or care, but with the significant overseas popularity of anime and related media, you have to wonder if they think about how silly they might sound to native and fluent speakers of English.

This post isn’t actually about Engrish songs though. With Engrish as such a common element in so many anime themes and inserts (and indeed, Japanese music on the whole), it’s always a real surprise when you hear a song that’s in English. English! No mispronunciations. No sketchy grammar. Minimal or no accent. They’re a rare breed, but not all that difficult to find considering a number of very popular series include them. Sometimes they’re sung by native speakers and sometimes they’re still Japanese artists, but they’re always a real treat when you come across them:

8. “living inside the shell” – Steve Conte, Shanti Snyder, and Yoko Kanno (Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex 2nd GIG ED)

It’s a huge given that there’s going to be Yoko Kanno somewhere on this list. In fact, exactly half of the songs on this list are composed by Yoko Kanno, two of which are performed by Steve Conte. Few people would argue against Kanno’s astounding skills across all styles and genres of music. Blues, jazz, hip-hop, classical, orchestral, pop, folk, rock, electronic, whatever, you name it, she’s done it. Language? Japanese, Latin, Italian, French, Russian, some made up gibberish that sounds Latin-based, and of course, English. It’s hard narrowing down her extensive portfolio of works to a handful of songs, but “living inside the shell” is surely one of my favorites. SAC’s first season ending, “Lithium Flower” was also a contender, but I prefer Conte’s vocals to Scott Matthew’s and the lyrics I find better suited to the thoughtfulness of SAC’s themes. The spoken portion by Shanti Snyder also adds an eerie dimension to the mood of the piece.

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