Shoxx X Fools Mate X Cure

 

Jrock magazines~~~ these three are the popular ones that I have seen other bloggers read and just seen them as the most popular Jrock magazines (I thought there was another one or two but I can't seem to remember the names of these magazines), although I understand no Japanese, I would happy to buy these magazines at reasonable prices, as they usually cover a wide selection of musicians and there is usually at least three that I like. 

Usually, these magazines cover bands and musicians such as An Cafe, SuG, LM.C, Mucc, Dir En Grey, X Japan, Alice Nine, The Gazette, Gackt, Miyavi etc. Although, I'm not sure if they cover older generation of VK bands like Glay or Buck Tick :/ which is sad... 


Shoxx is a monthly published Japanese magazine which carries the slogan of " Visual and Hard Shock " on the front cover of each magazine. Each magazine costs roughly 930 yen which is about 72 Hong Kong dollars~ and is popular with overseas fans for their pictures with the majoriy being full page, a poster of the cover star is included and advertisements, the magazine itself contains 20 page interviews and profiles on the cover star, that is awesome... even though I can't read Japanese yet. Some popular cover stars include Kagrra, The Gazette and Nightmare.

Some front covers of Shoxx magazine:
  



Fools Mate

Fools Mate is a magazine that started waaaayyyy back in 1977 but sadly, has since stopped publications of their magazine, this is really sad because its always nice to buy a wider variety of different visual kei magazines, even if you are buying for the same artist. Again, popular artists featured on the front cover of this magazine includes Gackt, Acid Black Cherry, The Gazette, Alice Nine, Vivid etc. 
 

Cure

Cure magazine is a Japanese fashion and rock magazine, that offers fashion tips and styling and has also has the latest scoop on the things that are happening in the Visual Kei scene. 

 

^_^ Thank you for reading ~~~ I just wanted to ask a question, do any of these magazines, if they do, give a large selection of mini sized posters to A3 sized posters (not those massive one) in their magazine.

I would love to buy any of these magazines and just look at the pictures and pin up the posters in my room~~~




Credits: To the original owners of the pictures and also the information that I found on the internet.
  

Daily Life Update

Hi, so in between all of my other posts, I thought I would update you on how I've been. I've been feeling sick *again* . However, in the weekend, the weather has seriously picked up a lot, resulting in my mood being picked up, kind off.

I'm really tired right now because me and my sister did one of Blogilates ab workout videos and I'm just incredibly unfit and now my muscles are stiff and I'm really tired. What about you guys, what are your plans for the summer holidays, anything interesting? 

Is anyone going to a Jrock concert? if there are any concerts coming up, I really hope I can see some of my favourite Kpop/Jrock bands one day. I think I would just cry tears of happiness. =.= I think I'm so tired that I don't even know what I'm talking about. 

Its one of those days, were you've done nothing and I mean nothing and yet, you feel exhausted and drained but why? >.< I wish I knew the answer to that. 

~~~ This post, I shall end here because there isn't much to say, except that I highly recommend you to check out Alice Nine's Channel because its super funny and hilarious, I'm trying to listen to more Jrock bands, so I'm going to listen to Kagrra, its pretty sad that the vocalist Isshi, is no longer alive :( ~~~ 

Bye Bye Bye and stay happy.... Prinxe Happiness....see you in my next post, which will be very soon.

Visual Kei

For those who don't and do know about Visual Kei, I'm going to write a short post about it from information that I found on the internet and information that I already know. (credits: to homeless visual kids website and other websites where I checked up information verify that it was correct and for having the information about the different genres). Visual Kei is predominately dominated by males, although there are some female bands gaining recognition, some famous Female bands are

Visual Kei is about music and fashion, Visual kei started from Japan and its a type of genre of rock music with pop, hip hop, punk elements etc. Depending on the band, a different "theme" or "concept" will follow and using this theme or concept, bands will dress accordingly and their music will follow this theme or concept.

Its been said that X Japan first helped to create Visual Kei, they used to have spike up long hair and heavy make up during the start of their career, Yoshiki was the cross-dresser in the group and used to have long, blonde wavy hair and wore red lipstick. 

X Japan when they first started out.

"Psychedelic Violence of Visual Shock" - X Japan

This was how X Japan described what Visual Kei was and it was truly an explosion of colour, not just Oshare kei bands but other styles, too had colourful make up or clothes, or personalities... they were just caring as much music as about the fashion and stories they carried in their music.

Some sub-genres are (okay, I can't list all sub-genres because we would be here until next week and this post would be like 10 pages long and everyone would be bored to death) :

Oshare Kei- whilst Visual Kei is darker, Oshare Kei band members use bright colours and funky and cute looking accessories, so popular clothes in bright colours that I have seen them using include  red, pink, yellow, blue, green, purple etc. Make up is lighter so its more about enhancing thei face, and the fashion reminds me of some of the clothes the kids of Harajuku would wear. This is my personal opinion but Oshare Kei is more wearable compared to the other sub-genres. Famous Oshare kei bands include An Cafe, SuG,   Paradeis etc amongst others... some popular songs are "Smile Ichiban Il Onna by An Cafe" , " Sweet Toxic" by SuG. Also, the music has a more pop feeling to it.

  An Cafe

An Cafe

 SuG

  Sug

Paradeis

Kote Kei - Kote Kei is the opposite of Oshare Kei and has two sub genres black kei and white kei. Kote kei which is also sometimes written as kotekote, this type of kei is this most traditional kind.It is also the oldest style of visual kei. Some examples of this are "Lareine" , "Dir En Grey" amongst others.

Laraeine

Dir En Grey

Angura Kei - which comes from the English word "underground" , bands in this genre will wear more traditional Japanese clothing such as the kimono, some famous bands include "Kagrra" and "Inugami Circus-Dan".

Kagrra

I chose a few of the many different genres check out the "Homeless Visual Kids website - http://homelessvisualkids.wordpress.com/2011/11/07/a-look-into-visual-kei-sub genres/ - for more information and once again, credits for this website which gave me examples of bands and the differences between each style".

Also, credits to the owners of the pictures that are used for this post.

I'm going to finish with a few pictres with visual kei bands that I like because of their music or/and style of clothing/costumes.

 

   

 

Comment in the box below, your favourite styles ~ I don't know which style I would go with? >.< create, my own style... maybe? Good bye and stay happy ~~~ Prinxe Happiness.

Happy Super Belated Birthday to Saga!

So, if you don't know yet... Saga is my favourite member of Alice Nine with Shou and Nao being close~ I think Saga is very mysterious sometimes, on the Alice9 Channel he seems more quiet and occasionally makes some jokes.

Anyways, I liked to wish Saga, a Happy Belated Birthday. I hope all his wishes come true and he'll remain happy, healthy and joyous in each day. I thought I would share some basic facts regarding Saga, so readers of my blog, can get to understand this wonderful bassist a bit more.

 Credits: The pictures of Saga and all the facts do not belong to me, so credits to the original owner. ~

Okay, here some facts and then I'll end the post with a couple of Saga pictures:

Birth Name: Sakamoto Takashi

Birth Date: 24th of June

Birth Place: Saga was born in Koriyama, which is the Fukushima Prefecture, there is a clip when Tora visits Saga's house and talks to his parents.

Saga mother is a nurse and his father is a salary man, Saga is calm person who never gets angry, he has a dog called Chiko who is 17 years old, Saga is a gentleman and is known to give his seat up for the elderly. Saga would be a teacher if he wasn't a musician. Saga is a good cook and says men who can't cook are bad. There are loads of places on the Internet for more facts~ I just chose some.

^^ Some people say that Saga looks bit like Jui (ex-Vidoll) or Yuki (Lolita 23Q)

 









 Thank you and see you in my next post :)

Alice Nine

Hi, guys I'm back and I want to talk to you about my new favourite band... Alice Nine. They are a five member Japanese Visual Kei band. The members are vocalist Shou, guitarists Tora and Hiroto, bassist Saga and drummer Nao. From various sources, that I read Hiroto is the youngest and Nao is the oldest. Nao is also the leader of the band. Usually, drummers are the leaders of bands? ^_^ The band was also formed by Nao.

 
The cover of Rainbows, from left to right is Tora, Nao, Hiroto, Shou and Saga.

I was thinking the other day, I should check out some of other Jrock bands that I had never listened too and I decided on Alice Nine, I didn't go for bands with heavier visual appearances or music such as Dir En Grey or Gigrugamesh because I don't think I would like it as much.

The first song, I listened too was "Rainbows" by Alice Nine released on August the 6th 2008 and is their thirteenth maxi single!!!... It was really cool, Shou's singing voice reminds me of a blend of Gackt and someone else's voice but he has his own style, of course. The guitarists, drummer and bassist have lots of energy and give off a cool and mysterious vibe.

Nao


Tora

Saga

 

Shou


Hiroto

I also watched a few of their Alice Nine Channel videos, and they are so funny, I thought that the video where is Saga is answering questions related to soccer, a topic which is meant to have lots of knowledge about. Hiroto was the referee and Tora, I assume is the host of the channel and provides comments and generally makes the episode run more smoothly. 

To answer a question, Saga must head butt the soccer ball which is hanging over him (he has to jump up, when it gets higher, he has to take a few attempts and even falls over on one of them). Anyways, his face was priceless was when he got the answers wrong, he seemed so shocked. 

Also, another funny episode is "whats inside the box?" so I believe there are four boxes, there's a slit at the top and you put your hand through and touch whatever is inside, it could be alive or dead, anything...I won't tell you whats inside the box (no spoilers here) but I can tell you that Nao, despite the eldest and the leader is the most scared and screams the most :/ Saga and Tora are also part of this game.

I also watched their short movie "Number Six" which was roughly 15 minutes long. Its stars all five members and has a girl that is in high school (~17)and is very heart warming, the kind of film that leaves a meaning embedded inside you.

Here are some more pictures of Alice Nine to end this post.

 

 

Credit: None of these are my pictures, credits go to all the owners of these pictures.

There is a lot of information about each member and the band already, so I decided to keep this post shorter with just some of my favourite things of Alice Nine. If you have any song recommendations, let me know~ I highly recommend you to check them out, if you aren't into heavy Jrock and prefer more Oshare Kei style bands, perhaps you will like them too?