This,
gentlemen, is definitely the weirdest audiovisual experience I’ve encountered
in a while. Mere words cannot stand up to this psychedelic inferno. Proceed
with caution.
Just to
balance things a little and to take an alternative point of view, here is
another Eve’s song cover. ‘Sakura again’, a stunning chiptune/screamo cocktail,
is a bit less renowned than ‘[L]una’ but hardly less appealing. And UTAU takes
its turn now, no one else but VMW-affined Gahata Meiji (Meiji being ‘mage’ in
Nippon; so naturally transforms to ‘witch’ ;) ).
The cover
was made by Wacky for the 3rd UTAU works festival. Job well done! I must
say Meiji’s clear and bright vocals can challenge Miku easily. Well, except for the extreme parts. I admit I adore shrills made by Eve, but here Meiji’s
overcompressed noises are killing everything :) As for the usual ‘human vs
software vocals’, the choice is yours to make. Needless to say, VMW made its
choice a long time ago :)
Absolutely
mind-fucking-blowing vocal cover of Eve's '[L]una' by Daygoro. Two things to
mention. First: Eve pitches his Mikus outrageously high. Second: never
underestimate human abilities.
Moe-P-san
has showed up on Nicovideo with one of their work, ‘Asylum’, which was released
on Piapro half a year ago. The one thing you need to know is that the song is
epic. Its epicness shines even through the horribly screwed up mixing! But let
minor technicalities not distract us, for it’s really prime example of good post-hardcore.
Though the most interesting thing that caught my attention is distorted vocals.
Moe-P uses quite a distinct technique which makes screaming rasping and, well, a
way closer to ‘natural’ sound.
Not three months has passed since the release, and Kokone-chan finally gets onto respected VMW pages :) So it’s a debut of Kokone on VMW as well as debut of Setsuma-P as Vocaloid producer. What can I say? Nice post-hardcore with lovely synthetics patterns and rather unpolished percussion part. The guitars are over-compressed a bit, but nobody seems to care about over-compression now anyway ;) The final is pretty dense.
Kokone sounds excellent... when she’s singing in Japanese. And Kokone Engrish is so fukken Engrish you might start pitying the poor girl… :)
Two years ago Mr. 69P posted a couple of works (choose your fav: nu metal, screamo, deathcore), and showed what proper sound environment for Luka should be. Sadly, the producer kept a grave silence since then. We’ve already lost our last hope, but the MIRACLE has happened – 69P-sama is with us again, and his new song is no less fucking brilliant that the old ones!
Well, we’re facing some losses, of course. The song cries badly for re-mastering. It shouts it right in your ear! In fact, you have to have some decent audio equipment to squeeze the maximum from this sound mess, but damn! Even this way it sounds fantastic! A perfect storming screamo, raging and loud yet deeply emotional.
So Luka is a NEET despite she can make quite the different impression :) Oh yeah, and Yuyoyuppe’s song “I am a superman” comes to the mind quite naturally. Both songs has similar harsh sounding. Only ‘Yuppe’s piece has quite the opposite meaning :) So can 69P’s work be a kinda answer to Yuppe’s? ;)
90% of metalcore + 10% of picoreamo equals to 156% of pure fucking awesomeness. Yeah, this is the math for serious music ;) Lego-sama has released his next masterpiece. Not to mention he’d forgotten to tell Miku that in masterpieces you should work better on balancing the levels of vocal; the higher frequencies are so pushed that sometimes it sounds like Miku’s hissing :) Yeah, like a cobra feeling someone’s stepped on her tail. Though Miku would likely hiss as well if you stepped on her twintails except she won’t bite you. Or maybe she will ;)
I hope Miku isn’t offended by my suggestions, for the vocals part sounds great enough otherwise. The video (by Junto Kurokawa-sama) is made in best metalcore traditions and with a great skill. So if you’re still wondering where this 56% has come from, the answer is simple. Synergy. It makes wonders, guys ;)
I feel overwhelmed. The sound flows through me like electricity through a wire. And I’m the happiest wire in a whole universe… Fuck, guys, what are you doing to me?..
A great guitar cover of Yuyoyuppe's “S” by tora-san. Yummy aggressive sound and nifty skill! :) Also, this is basically a cover of a cover, but I failed to recognize who is singing… orz
And another screamo work, this time closer to mainstream standards. Much like the previous one, it lies heavily on Engrish lyrics. On the one hand, Luka handles English faaaar better than Lily does. On the other hand, she sings it instead of shouting, which undermines greatly the former point. To sum it up, the situation isn’t *that* bad. Luka’s vocals are honed well enough, and she sounds rather nice.
There isn’t any synthetics here. Hyahyao’s put great efforts in mastering, the sound quality is excellent. Mainstream standards mean we’ve got mighty double bass drums support and pretty hard breakdown. Maiko tries to step in here, but there’s not much space for her actually…
A screamo song by Ikujihouki-P. It is bare of any electronic sequences, and has a metalcore-ish cast in some places. Overall, quite an energetic piece with deft guitar riffs, but the tuning isn’t my thing exactly… Lily screams nearly all her way through the song, which makes English lyrics bearable enough :)
And yet another non-Japanese work, this time from China. The song is absolutely fantastic post-hardcore, rich, intense and extremely engaging! Yan He’s vocal parts are the brightest spot here. They are of superb quality, complex, clear and just stunning. Well, screaming parts aren’t that impressive, but that hardly matters. Jiangwu Luanwan, the producer, has topped his Japanese colleagues, as a matter of fact. Maybe we’ll get something as prominent as this from the West someday :)
An excellent song from Zilart-P. The music is fierce and liquid post-hardcore with a nifty balance between electronic sequences and distorted guitars’ noise. Yeah, fierce, for Lily sounds a bit timid compared to such a forceful support. The breakdown, made with a help of Yuzen-san, has some strength too, though it isn’t as striking as the one from “When will you take action?”. Because, guys, dubstep is a much more common thing, and with a sheer sickness you cannot achieve as much as with a smart trolling courage :)
Jiwataneho-san has presented a remake of his own song, “Maboroshi”. The song was originally posted two years ago. Current version, besides generally more juicy sound, has got more evil guitars and toned down synth parts and (to a lesser degree) vocals. The sound is definitely more aggressive now. Gumi’s singing, mellow and tender, makes an excellent contrast with the brutality of the instrumental part. Though Jiwataneho has added screaming parts as well. Overall, a great remake of a solid post-hardcore.
Just when you think Okame-P cannot surprise you anymore, he comes and busts your attitude as a fucking penetration bomb. The producer’s turned to Gumi again after a pause. In my humble opinion, she sounds better than Miku in his hands... But I’d be very astonished if someone else got the opposite result :)
“Othello” is an awesome in its intensity piece of post-hardcore, fitting excellently into screamo subgenre. The title refers, at least in some moments, to the board game, but No_Ark (the author of the lyrics) has created dense and pretty complicated tangles of meanings. The music is based on the contrast of no less tangled, overloading parts with calmer melodic ones. Both sides are very impressive. One of the brightest things, at least for me – notably good quality of Gumi’s screaming.
Not a long time ago I was complaining there is too littlelesxpaulx :) It seems lesxpaulx-sama has heard my prayer, and has offered kindly another excellent song to his yearning fans. The producer has lowered the pressure a bit in “Jack of Spades”, for it is a love song, and you expect some kind of tenderness in love songs, don’t you? Well, the kind of ‘tenderness’ lesxpaulx prefers is still devastating for some weaker souls not familiar with metalcore. Because love can be painful, and merciless, and devastating too.
IA makes the song exceptionally powerful on the emotional side. The sheer force of passion is the ultimate core of this song. I said ‘perfection’. I keep on it.
This work by Daiki Ogawa is a good illustration of to where post-hardcore has drifted. Well, screamo, yes, with fancy electronic melodies framing… In “Awareness” Ogawa seems to give more attention to synths rather than guitar riffs. Luka is squeezed to sing flattering high (as usual. Why, we love it, don’t we?) It’d have helped if there had been more screaming, but Luka seems to have been unwilling to do us such a favor :) Why, Luka? ;)
And yet
another cover, this time percussion. I have to say Yuyoyuppe’s “I am a superman”
is a wonderful piece for drums covering, yet Warosu-Taitei was the first to try
it. And it is a fuckin’ serious try! Loud and rushing and harsh… Why, the very
definition of awesomeness :)
The first screamo work on VMW. Screaming parts are done by Kourimanjuu-P (the producer) himself, which might be for the good. Because – alas – Vocaloids are still uncapable of the screaming on a par with the one presented here by Kourimanjuu-P.
“Deception” is a quite intense piece of post-hardcore with a bit of untraditional, prog-like sound. Wild guitars, even wilder bassu, mad screaming vocalist – only Miku seems to be in a perfect serenity in the eye of the storm. Nice contrast…
