Read part one of super awesome Gazette review.
I have to say… I’ve been listening to the songs from the first half, and have been liking them a lot more than what I say in the review. I knew it’d grow on me. However! I haven’t listened to the second half of the album just yet. Actually that’s a lie, I listened to a little of Taion and liked it.
Continue the listening
8). Barrette. So D.L.N left us with a rumbly guitar, and then Barrette spins off into a sappy, sparkly song. Ruki sounds especially nasal, but picks up in the chorus which is also rather heavier than the verses. What’s important to note here is that it’s not overdone at all, and it doesn’t make the song seem utterly random… still not a favourite.
9). Cassis. Pretty accoustic guitar. And then piano. It all sounds magical, but the vocals make everything serious again, yet still gentle. It does rise up at one point, which is good! Stops the song from being repetitive mopey angst. Ruki sounds awful, and this song would have been way better with a better singer.
10). Silly God Disco. HEY, I’ve heard this song before. 
I love the way it starts, with cheesy brass instruments… all dancey with that rumbly guitar in the beginning, and then the lead singer ruins it. I like to listen to this song and pretend I can’t hear him. Apart from that, it’s a kickass song and I loves it.
11). DISCHARGE. You know you’re in for a lulzy metal song when it starts with a hardcore “OOOOOOHRRRRR” (don’t ask me, I can’t spell sound effects!). There’s a lot of angry babbling and screaming, and right now I think he sounds a lot better doing this than singing, even though I don’t prefer it. Not much to the song, but the babbling’s good. I like his fast-paced babbling, screamed or not.
12). Taion. I like the singing in this (just not at the beginning), and that rumbly guitar makes an appearance. The drums, which I haven’t noticed in this entire album, are finally prominent! Ruki hops between angry yelling, something low and apathetic, and then a soarrrrrinnng singing voice. The last one, that’s perfect. I like how there’s an anger to this song, but it’s still somehow mellow.
in conclusion!
Is it a fantastic album? Not really, but it’s not disgustingly bad either. It’s all right, and a few songs are growing on me. Concerning the vocals, I’ve realised I’m not too fond of them… but there are instances where they sound really good and really ties the whole song together. The psycho-angry songs I wasn’t too happy to see, but if only because I wouldn’t want another Marrow of a Bone to happen (not bad, but weak in comparison with previous albums). It sounds like the album following Nil, Stacked Rubbish, was just that which is a shame. But anyway! The guitars are amazing. Yes. :O
It’s disappointing when the first song you listen to is super-awesome, and then every song you hear after that is only average. Bearable to listen to… but is it worth it? This is pretty much Gazette for me, only slightly more positive – there’ll be something in a song that I’ll like, but then the rest of it will put me off.
I heard NIL is the album that any Gazette fan had to make sure they listen to… and so… I’m gonna do so. Not as a fan, but rather someone trying to rediscover the awesomeness that was with that first song.
(Which was Filth in the beauty, by the way. Those guitars. ♥ ♥ ♥ )
LET THE LISTENING COMMENCE
1). THE END. It starts off promising to be awesome, and then a whole lot of voices come from different angles. It’s bizarre to listen to, and ultimately heads nowhere. Repetitive stuff. Is this not supposed to be a real song, but an intro? As confused as I am, it’s the background music that I like the most. I’m getting the idea this album could be utterly anticlimatic ORRR…!
2). Nausea and Shudder. HERE WE GO~ Hard guitars, which then let up into something which really cruises along, with a vague dance element. What makes this song unique to me are the vocals – having been recorded, they’ve been mixed up, and played around with a whole lot, and on top of that Riku sings normally and growls, with great variation. I’m approving!
3). Bath Room. Echoing drips, and then. What is this? Ominous hip hop? Briefly reminded of Linkin Park’s earlier stuff. The guitars… are nice. Riku is just as nice, singing low… and until you get two-thirds through the song he sounds bored. However the song sounds a little sad, but it’s the miscellaneous high voices and noises in the background which do that.
4). Maggots. This starts off like “RAWR WE’RE CRAZY”. There’s screaming, and heavy guitars, that’s basically it. Riku generally babbles and screams underneath static, which I find hilarious and awesome. It’s for people who think they’re hardcore, but would rather run around and dance than headbang.
5). Namaatatakai Ame To Zaratsuita Jounetsu. This song reminds me of jazz and swing… and also Dir en grey’s “Ashita muki koufuku, komaeminaki myounichi”. Everything bounces, but in a serious “I’M A HARDCORE ROCKERRR” way. It’s very yay.
6). D.L.N. I have no idea what instrument they’re using in the beginning of this song. Accoustic guitar and a piano? It’s very soft and ~*~mysterious~*~ and I like Ruki’s singing in this – as well as what may or may not be spooky children, but not so fond of the random sparkling noises. I’m already bored halfway through though, but thinking it’d grow on me.
7). SHADOW VI II I. The beginning of this song makes me swoon. All the guitars, so dancy and so rockkyy, to the point where Ruki taking over annoys me. The chorus in particular is very upbeat, but I wish Gazette was a band without vocalist. That would have been awesome.
Anyway! There’s a part near the end with a SEXY GUITAR thing that makes me laugh, and Ruki’s more interesting to listen to after that.
thoughts so far…
I have mad respect for the guitarists. Like, a lot. But Riku ultimately bores me, and the drums are unnoticeable. I’d listen to this band for the guitars alone, and everything else I consider a bonus. I’m also understanding why people get stroppy and compare Gazette to Dir en grey; it was “Maggots” and “Namaatatakai Ame…” that got to me in particular, but not so much that it’s worth flipping out over. Yess, we haven’t been let down and there are some killer songs.
Because no, I don’t have a life! no one seems to know, and the numbers change from time to time. 5’3″ to 5’2″. The only thing people really can agree on is that he’s short like an itty bitty leprachaun.
Besides, the imperial system sucks big time, and mere inches aren’t specific enough for me, hahaha (…please don’t think I’m serious?). THEREFORE:
IT IS TIME FOR… MATHS.
Unfortunately, anyone who knows me should also know that I’m hopeless at even basic addition and subtraction, so with the money I was planning to use for university costs next year, I have instead brought over a brilliant mathematician all the way from Germany for this experiment. Georg Cantor, everybody!
Make sure not to Google him, by the way, he’s very shy.
Shinya says himself that he’s 170cm, and so, short. This surprised me – I always thought he was very very tall. Tall enough to be a model. Like that. But oh no, he’s six centimetres taller than me; there’s no modelling career in store for him. However, as short as the elegant drummer is, he’s gonna help us out here.
From the picture on the right… not the exact one, because I’ve got a bigger version hahah. Measuring from their heel to the top of their head I got Shinya to be 501px. Kyo was 478px, and yes, I was careful to not count his fluffy hair.
Then I handed over the numbers to Mr Georg Cantor (remember, no Googling!), who was making sure I was getting their pixel-heights right. He didn’t do it himself because he’s pretty wary of computers in general. I can understand where he’s coming from. He doesn’t even use a calculator.
478px / 501px = 0.95409 (to five decimal places!)
170cm x 0.95409
…is 162.2cm
Now you know.
…Stuff to bear in mind.
a). I measured from their heel up. Shinya may have been standing a tiny bit back, but… CLOSE ENOUGH HAHAH.
b). Don’t even Google ‘German mathematician’. Please allow Mr Georg Cantor some privacy.
c). Kyo is 1.8cm shorter than me.
d). Metric pwns imperial, in every way.
The release of The Golden Compass makes me weep. As much as I’m loving the idea of having Nicole Kidman playing Mrs Coulter, and the lulz that comes from people declaring the movie anti-Christian (my favourite part is when they flip out after hearing people’s souls being referred to as ‘demons‘ – when if they’d done their our research, they’d know it was actually ‘daemon‘, hahaha you guys ♥ ♥)… the way it was approached, well…
Let’s just say: I (probably) could have done it better.
Anyway, I decided to reread the His Dark Materials a while back. Then the more I heard about the movie, the more I read it out of protest…. and then the book itself, which I’ve liked since childhood… It got to me.
How many times do things have to be described as “profound”, Philip Pullman?
I’ve never seen it used outside of this novel, but within it… it’s everywhere. Every so many pages it’ll pop up. Lyra will read the alethiometer and her concentration will be profound. Then it’ll be nighttime, and of course, that nothing less than profound. It’s inescapable!
I’m started on the second book now, The Subtle Knife, and I’ve realised such use of ‘profound’ isn’t a quirk solely in Northern Lights. Ohhh no. Thirty pages in, and I’ve counted around four to five “profound”s.
I love this book. It’s undeniably good – the style is simple, it doesn’t try to impress with overly elaborate sentences, which makes its plot that much more real. I like reading about Christianity-related stuff too, I’ve noticed.
…It’s just that everytime I come across that stupid word I want to hurl it across my room.
stuff that was awesome
- I’m less of an antisocial loser now. Never mind that I was invited to parties and weasled my way out of going all the time; the horrible panic from talking to people from day to day lessened, yay.
- Year 13. Because you can go on about hating school and everyone there, but it suddenly changes when you hit your last year. Or for us, anyway. A whole lot of unity, practical jokes, mufti, being mistaken for a teacher, graffiti – and as our morals declined even further (lawl), we’re supposed to be role models to the rest of the school.
- Looking forward to university. It’s very very fun to take all the free stuff you can about various universities, and deciding what to major in.
- The discovery of the word ‘synaesthesia’ (for which I’m grapheme » colour), which subsequently has led to me linking a lot of the weird things I’ve said on Panda Duh to the Wikipedia article. I realised I wasn’t the only one in 2001, and this year at last I found out what it was called. Happy happy happy.
stuff that was not quite so awesome
- I’m bored of Subway. Sad, but true. But what else do you expect from going there at least twice a week for a year? You can only have chicken teriyaki so many times!
- Exams. And that I’m really happy with what I did, so naturally I’m expecting a string of Excellences…. and at the same time realising that I’m going to be incredibly disappointed.
- High school finished, and yes, this is a bad thing. I want to do the last year all over again.
- The funny obsession with an itty-bitty tattooed Japanese man. I’m really disturbed by it. He screams, vomits, and bleeds everywhere and I think it’s hot. What the hell.
- Using parentheses all the time – I like using them, but… it’s bad bad English, isn’t it? Arrhh.