World Visual Festival at Shibuya’s Sound Museum Vision marks the first time Japanese visual kei bands perform together with visual kei bands from overseas, including a band from outer space, and they make a good show out of it. Thanks to the festival's MCs being bilingual, the show is comfortable for everyone. Between sets, the MCs speak with the band who’d just played, asking them about their experience at this festival, if they liked it, and when and where they’ll be playing next.
Scarlet Valse, a band with a strong visual side, are the ones to start things off. With a piano melody and red lights, the curtains open to reveal a stage decorated with roses. The band wore uniforms, and don’t hesitate to get the fans moving. During the first song, towels are swung in the air, and bassist
Takuya and guitarist
Jun plays back to back, showing off while also entertaining the audience.
Scarlet Valse’s sound has a “classic” visual kei feel to it, being rather dark with organ intros and heavy riffs. Vocalist
Kakeru takes his character to a new level, talking in a high-pitched voice and gesturing dramatically. He isn't afraid to interact with fans, and at one point, he hops offstage to walk around the audience. Their heavy sound and headbanging is one side of the band, but they can also be playful. As the set draws to a close,
Takuya twirls here and there around the stage, pointing the neck of his bass towards the audience as if to ‘shoot’ at the crowd. The band’s set makes for a fun start to the afternoon.
Set List:
01. Story
02. Agehachou no yume
03. Virginal Blood
04. Secret Eden
© World Visual Festival
The next band to come out is Swedish-Finnish band
DIE/MAY. The trio gets ready with an electronic introduction, backed up with a heavy beat, which is more a mix between heavy and electronic tunes. The music is upbeat and easy to move to, and is suitable for a good amount of headbanging. The
DIE/MAY members themselves are energetic, moving to all sides of the stage to interact with the audience.
The band starts encouraging the audience at the start of the second song,
13 steps to the GALLOWS. During this dark and eerie number, vocalist
SEIKE lets out a maniacal laugh, and the guitar parts are as gloomy as the rest of the song. This is the only song with such an atmosphere, an interesting break from the rest of the set.
DIE/MAY ends with
V.A.G., and guitarist
TSUOMASU gets his moment in the spotlight, starting out with a heavy riff. The song stays heavy, involving screams from
SEIKE, and they go all out with their headbanging. As the first foreign band onstage,
DIE/MAY makes a good impression, proving that visual kei isn’t Japan-bound.
Set List:
01. VIVID DREAM
02. 13 steps to the GALLOWS
03. JOKER
04. V.A.G
© World Visual Festival
After a twenty-minute wait, it is time for
Ninjaman Japan, who start out with a comedy skit. The American comedian
Atsugiri Jason, famous for his catchphrase “Why Japanese people?!”, appears in this part of the show, and his gimmick is used as a call-and-response between audience and performers. They create a cheerful atmosphere before playing their opening song.
The band is joined by two dancers for the happy and upbeat
Shinobu no senshi NINJAMAN, and the audience catch up with the dancing happening on stage. There’s a particular focus on the guitar, and for every song both guitarists play their own solos, either completing one big solo, or combining their guitar strokes to make an impressive riff. The heavy songs contain happy tunes, but are still heavy enough for lots of headbanging. The band is generally energetic, running around on stage, getting close to the audience and interacting with them.
Ninjaman Japan end their set with
BATTLE FORCE, starting with an impressive call-and-response and lots of jumping from left to right during the song. Like most of their set, the song is quite fast and cheerful, and includes another impressive guitar solo. After thanking the audience, the band leaves the stage.
Set List:
01. Shinobu no senshi NINJAMAN
02. Hanamuke
03. Fly Away
04. Aoi tori
05. BATTLE FORCE
© World Visual Festival
The guest artists of the evening, Osakan band
Lin, are quick to start with a heavy tune, sparking energy as they moved about lot onstage. The band mixes organ and piano samples into their music, creating a gothic atmosphere. The piano tunes dilute the heaviness of
Misery is Nothing, but the guitar solo and bass parts keep the heavy end up.
Vocalist
SUI takes a moment to talk to the audience, asking them where they come from. As he calls out the names of prefectures, it soon becomes clear most people in the venue hail from Chiba. After the MC, the band starts back up with another headbang-worthy song,
The Psalms and Lamentations.
Lin continue interacting with the audience, many of whom are busy with all the furitsuke movements.
MIZALY shows off, holding up his guitar to the audience while
CERO plays a skillful solo.
Lin show themselves to be experts at putting on a great musical show. Their last song,
Schwarz Vrain, starts out with a happier tune than previous songs. The band encourages the audience to jump to the song, and they themselves jump onstage while performing.
Lin give their best, and leave behind a contented crowd.
Set List:
01. Nightmarish...
02. Cross Peagent
03. Misery is nothing
04. The Psalms and Lamentations
05. Schwarz Vrain
© World Visual Festival
MaleRose, a band from Thailand, started out as a
The GazettE cover band and that band’s influences are still visible in
MaleRose’s visual style, such as with one member’s nose band. The members get underway with
Yak, a song that’s both heavy and catchy. At one point, the vocalist shouts “Shibuya!” in an attempt to connect with the audience; he gets some responses back. During the instrumental break, musical influences from the band’s home country appear in the melody, showing that
MaleRose’s sound has a uniquely Thai edge.
The second song
Black Heart starts out with a wrenching shout and a heavy riff, showing a different side of the band. Bassist
Thames supports singer
Eak and gives the vocals an extra boost. After a brief introduction to the members of
MaleRose, the vocalist incites the audience to give it their all for the last song.
The band decides to end their show with something funky and upbeat, presenting their wide range of musical skills. The band encourages the crowd to sing along, and after a bit of hesitation, the crowd does so. Finally,
Eak’s microphone is directed towards the audience as they shout along. As the song ends,
MaleRose thank the crowd and take their leave.
Set List:
01. YAK
02. Black Heart
03. Road Runner
04. Cruel World
© World Visual Festival
Jinmachine demonstrate how well comedy and music go together. As this is an international party with bands and fans from abroad in attendance,
Attsu shows off his English skills in an entertaining way. In no time, the whole crowd engages in furitsuke and claps along to the songs.
During
Shangorilla, a song that starts out heavy but has a happy upbeat refrain, the band divides the audience in half and initiate a wall of death. Later on in the song, the crowd mellows, simply dancing and jumping instead of moshing. The band switches from heavy music with grunting by vocalist
featuring16 to happier tunes, and these fit well with the show the guys give.
Attsu is the entertainer during the last song, showing the audience the furitsuke. They immediately begin copying him. The first word of the song’s title ‘Maguro’ translates to 'tuna', so it comes as no surprise when a flag appears on stage emblazoned with the image of a large fish. Fish plushies are thrown into the audience, and are tossed back and forth. It’s an entertaining way to end the set and
Jinmachine leave a smile on the crowd’s faces.
Set List:
01. Gorilla
02. Tanoshii nihongo
03. Shangorilla
04. Hell's Kitchen
05. Maguro ni kaketa otokotachi
© World Visual Festival
The last band to take the stage at
World Visual Festival comes from a place even further away than Scandinavia or Thailand—outer space, to be precise. Every member of
UCHUSENTAI:NOIZ is announced and introduced as they go onstage to prepare for the start of
PRECOG. The band immediately bursts with energy and bounce around freely, creating a fun and carefree atmosphere. The song starts out as uptempo electronica, but soon turns heavy and flows into a softer melody in the chorus. Throughout, fans keep busy, jumping in circles or performing furitsuke.
UCHUSENTAI:NOIZ mix different styles into their music, such as jazzy tunes with electro and metal flourishes. The band knows how to make these combinations work and keep the music interesting. Vocalist
ANGEL-TAKA entertains during his MC with some call-and-response, getting the whole crowd to join in and do what he tells them to.
During
Laika, the band shows a whole different side of their music. With robotic movements done by the guitarists and vocalist, and a distorted microphone, the band’s music suddenly takes on a more cosmic feel. To end their set and the evening’s show,
UCHUSENTAI:NOIZ switch to another upbeat, energetic song:
CINDERELLA BOYs DOn’T CRy. After striking one last group pose, which the crowd join in on, the extraterrestrial visual kei band head offstage.
Set List:
1. PRECOG
2. THE PARADOX IN IDEOLOGY
3. 3DAYS BOAT
4. Laika
5. CINDERELLA BOYs DOn'T CRy
Additional Interview with MaleRose
By: Kai . W . Rose
Editor's note: As this interview was conducted last year, readers should view all references to time in perspective.
Ever heard of "Thailand's Got Talent"? Do you know that
MaleRose is the only band semi-finalist of the world-wide variety hit show? Following their upcoming performance at
World Visual Festival at Sound Museum Vision.
MaleRose gave JaME an action-packed exclusive full of unsolicited laughs and even a few juicy secrets to their upcoming plans.
Thanks for meeting with us today! Can you introduce yourself and tell us something interesting about you?
Thames: Hi, I’m on bass. I enjoy cosplay and producing digital illustrations. I even cameo part time in movies!
Eak: I’m
Eak on vocals. When I’m not performing, I enjoy watching AVs and creating websites.
Mine: I’m
Mine on guitar. I’m a guitar teacher and I’ve won a
hide guitar cover competition back in 2013, judged by
X JAPAN’s
PATA.
Shiro: I’m
Shiro on guitar. I enjoy cooking thai food. I also own a café called coffee pink and hostel called romanee in Thailand.
Top: I’m
Top on drums and a drum teacher. I have a killer smile.
How did you get introduced to Visual Unite and get invited to play at the event?
Thames:
MaleRose was invited by the Sweden organiser,
SEIKE. The band was formed in 2008 and we were inspired by
the GazettE. I started the band because I wanted something different from other bands in terms of music and image.
Shiro:
Thames and I were also high school friends when we first started getting into music.
Which of your songs would you each recommend newcomers to listen to?
MaleRose: That’s hard!
Thames: Hmmm, I think after all that,
Road Runner really expresses everything we’ve built up since the very beginning as
MaleRose. It has a strong message of chasing your dreams and not giving up. I think that with that in mind,
MaleRose is a great song to start with.
Eak: I think
MaleRose is a good choice but I also really want people from overseas to come to our lives and let loose, and in that case they should listen to our new song
YAK and go crazy.
Mine: In my case, there’s a re-arranged song on the album to be released called
Cruel World. I really want people to listen to that song. It’s the type of really cool song that
MaleRose hopes to make this year. I want people to listen to it and have a good time.
Shiro: It’s really, really hard to choose one song. If I have to narrow it down … I really want people to listen to all the songs we release this year. I’d like people to judge what kind of band we are from this year’s music.
Top: Well, we want people to easily understand our musical style, so we decided to express our sound through a song called
Rose. It’s our first single and it showcases the appeal of our sound in an emo-melodic way.
How do you feel about your first upcoming live in Japan?
MaleRose: We are full of excitement and nervousness. We hope to make an impact on the crowd in Japan!
Lastly, what are your upcoming plans?
Thames:
MaleRose is releasing an EP targeted to be released this year. We are aiming for the world from Thailand; we plan to export some great music, so please support us.
Eak: We are also releasing a photo book and PV by end of this year. You can follow us at
www.facebook.com/malerose.fanpage to know about our latest updates.
JaME would like to thank MaleRose for this interview opportunity.
