Chiodos

Brilliant bunch of fellas. Never heard of them bef0re  'till a friend rec0mmend it to me. I y0utubed them, and because I didn't feel dizzy after the 5th s0ng, I decided to d0wnl0ad the wh0le thing.

 Each title of their s0ngs are unusual and kinda funny e.g. One Day Women Will All Bec0me M0nsters, If I Cut My Hair Hawaii Will Sink, Bulls Make Money Bears Make M0ney And Pigs Get Slaughtered, etc. They s0und t0tally emo to me even though the net said that their genre is p0st hardc0re. Oh wait, does p0st hardc0re stuff always start with min0r ch0rd? Y0u lemme kn0w. Out of 28 s0ngs in my playlist, there were only 3 s0ngs that didn't start with min0r ch0rd. The one that s0unded 'happier' to me was only Who's Sandie Jenkins. Hahah. The guys didn't look emo to me though.

The v0c's v0ice ann0yed me. Seri0usly. All of the s0ngs are high pitched. Well, it wasn't really a bad idea since the v0calist can reach it pretty well anyway, but after s0metime, I started to feel like he was trying too hard. So I w0uld say that I w0uldn't listen to them on a r0adtrip. Well maybe I can handle 1 or 2, but n0t the wh0le thing. Th0se will kill the excitement hahah.

The only thing that makes me able to keep listening to them is the music. They put t0gether hardc0re stuff with piano, strings, and synth. The piano and the strings sound pretty classical to me.  That's why I called them brilliant. Th0se things kinda add m0re 'o0omph' to the music. 

In conclusion, they're n0t bad. The strings, synth and all really make them stand out fr0m other hardc0re/emo bands. Highly recommended to those in favor of emo stuff.

Image from www.chiodos.net

Bull Zeichen 88

L-R:: Junji (dr.), Sebastian (gui.), Eijiro (voc.), Ikuo (ba.)

They're my sec0nd fav0rite band of all time after Maximum the h0rm0ne. I f0und them when I was d0ing my research on Abingdon Boys School (ABS) which only c0nsist of 2 guitarist and 1 keyb0ardist. The  bassist and drummer are additi0nals. They are b0th wicked that's why I wanna find out who they are. I f0und that the bassist named Ikuo and when I l0oked him up on yT, Bull Zeichen 88 came out. It was one of their s0ng entitled Pr0l0gue. And that first enc0unter was amazing. I fell in l0ve at that first s0ng and decided to do further research which means reading their biography, then obtaining all of their albums and singles.

So far they only have 18 s0ngs. They have no album, just maxi singles. One night, I turned on my mp3 player with all of their songs on the playlist bef0re I went to bed, then start to listen.

I c0uldn't sleep.

I was amazed by each track and I just went speechless because f0r the first time in my life I listened  to 15 tracks and l0st myself (it was 15 cuz the other 3 came out recently after I bec0me a fan). I mean, when I was listening I was just so l0st until the mp3 player st0pped playing because it had finished playing the last song. I was just staring at the ceiling like a retard. Felt just like 5 minutes, but actually it was alm0st 2 h0urs. When it st0pped playing, I was like "..man..". I c0uldn't sleep because I became too excited hahah.

Also, that night I f0und my 2nd bass hero--Ikuo. Hahah. He's one b4da55 bassist aaand kinda hawt hahahah

The s0ngs are full of surprises. There are several genres just in 1 s0ng (do y0u have a pr0per term f0r that? Lemme kn0w) and the arrangements are verrrry unique. Good stuff. Non-conventional chord progressions, and a lot of interesting twists. From punk to reggae, metal to disco but with heavy guitar riffs, and many more. N0t to menti0n the awes0me basslines and drumlines. Well of c0urse, b0th of bassist and drummer are highly s0ught after musicians. They play f0r fam0us singers such as T.M Rev0lution, Yasu in Acid Black Cherry, Abingdon Boys School, etc. In other w0rds, they are inv0lved with famous japanese singers and bands. They also play f0r s0me anime and game s0undtrack if i'm n0t mistaken.

Sometimes, I feel sad because I can't play ANY of their song :( but I feel motivated to practice harder :D So far, there are only a few people on youtube dare to cover their songs. There were only 2 bassists, and one of them can pull the bass lines of HAUU pretty well even though sometimes the fella can't keep up with the tempo especially for the solo parts. Well, it is understandable since HAUU is probably the most difficult out of the bunch.

Listening to Bull Zeichen 88 bef0re study or finishing up my assignment is a TERRIBLE idea. Because I will usually bec0me too excited, and end up picking up the bass and play rather than doing what I'm supposed to do =.="

Recently, their new maxi single came out, and there was a website pr0vide a demo feature. So i listened to it, and there was I, staring at the screen like a retard with m0uth opened. Same reaction. And it was only the demo!! C0uple of days after, I f0und the full versi0n. Wanna catch a glimpse of their awesomeness? Click here

Also, a couple of weeks ago somebody uploaded some video of them doing recording for HAUU maxi single. Aaaand finally, I can figure out what the Ikuo is playing during S.o.S.

F0r those who do n0t fancy 'n0isy' music, this is not f0r y0u :)

I'm back with some 2 cents.

yow all! The past couple of weeks has been HELL -- y'know, projects and stuff, but thank God now it's kinda calm. I did a bunch of reviews which will be posted later, and also, I got a couple of gigs. First one was a bridal fair, and the other one was a moon cake festival held by some local music academy. I was performing with a couple of friends for both gigs. One thing I love being in a band is that I got to meet new people and those that I've met so far are humble ones. They were very friendly and helpful to me too! :)

I've learned a couple of lessons throughout the week, so I wanna share with y'all.

For all of you band dudes and chicas out there, drum speech, guitar speech, keyboard speech or bass speech or any tone speech ooorr music language is VERY important. Especially when your bandmates don't speak the same language with you. Even though y'all speak the same language, sometimes you still don't really get each other. Lemme give you an example.

Drummer: "Hey, itadakimasu mitsubishi sushi sashimi daihatsu!!."
Bassist: "ngomong apa sih lu,nyet?"
Keyboardist: "char siu pau lo han guo wo pu zhi dao wo ai ni wan tan mee!!"
Guitarist: *points at the drums and say* "dukduk tak drudududuk tak", *points at the keyboard* "tulilut tulitit tulilut", *points at the bass* "du-du-
du-dumdum"
Dr & Bass & Key : "ooohhhh!!"

see what i mean? :P

I played with a bunch of Chinese guys, so basically I'm floating like a retard when they talk to each other in Chinese, and they usually tell me what were they talking about in the end. Sometimes they forgot to tell me and the next thing I know, we're playing the pre-chorus.  hahahhah. But in the end we still managed to put it together. hehehehh .V.

The second lesson is, when the amp suck and not loud enough, you can always request for a mic to be placed in front of your amp, then ask the PA guy to crank up the volume of the mic. The amp that I've used for the moon cake thing really sucked. When I crank the volume, it BUZZed like mad, and it's still not loud enough even with maximum volume. Fortunately one of the sound guy came and told me that they're gonna find a mic for me. Fiuhh. So, when you're trapped in this kind of situation and nobody offers you a mic, ask for it.

Third lesson, LEARN GRAPHIC EQ!! I learned this the hard way. During the bridal fair, there were only a few knobs in the amp which was only the master volume, gain, and mid if I'm not mistaken, and the others were graphic EQ. It was a reaaallllyyy old school amp. I was screwed during the first slot, because the bass sound was really treblish and I don't like it BLEH. But then during the 2nd slot I tweaked the graphic EQ a little bit and thank God I moved the right one that produced reaalllly solid and warm sound. I was too happy that I forgot which one did I move.

And so that lesson brings us to the next one which is NEVER EVER UNDERESTIMATE OLD SCHOOL AMP.

Fifth lesson, NEVER EVER BE LATE FOR A GIG. The traffic jam screwed us that night, so we were late for the moon cake thing, and the organizer was pissed. But then once again, thank God they still allow us to play in the end. Even though you know exactly that the organizer himself will come late, show some effort and be there on time. It creates the impression that you are professional, and you might have a chance to be contacted again for another gig.

Now I'm tired typing.

Peace & Stay clean :)