Schaft Report

Yes, it's been a long time in coming, but better take long and get off well than give up halfway and never get off at all (that's what she said!)

What am I talking about, friends?

What has finally come?

Why, Schaft, of course!

By which I mean, a LIVE REPORT of Schaft's Tour Ultra -The Loud Engine- is now up over at This is NOT Greatest Site. Those of you who thought we couldn't get it up in time thought wrong! The DVD doesn't come out till next week, so this is your sneak preview! And if reading the report doesn't convince you to buy the DVD that's coming out next week, it should. The concert was fantastic and the DVD is sure to be, too.

Just a reminder, for those who are interested in the DVD and/or mini album:

Entitled Deeper and Down, the mini-album will cost 2700 yen and come with a bonus DVD with a live PV of the title track, "Deeper and Down." The ten tracks are as follows:

01. Deeper and Down (lyrics - Yow-Row/music - Imai Hisashi)

02. H.N.A. (lyrics & music - Imai Hisashi)

03. Deeper and Down (live 1/28 at EX Theater Roppongi)

04. H.N.A. (live 1/28 at EX Theater Roppongi)

05. Arbor Vitae (live 1/28 at EX Theater Roppongi)

06. Thirsty Fly (live 1/28 at EX Theater Roppongi)

07. Broken English (live 1/28 at EX Theater Roppongi)

08. The Hero InSide (live 1/28 at EX Theater Roppongi)

09. Slice (live 1/28 at EX Theater Roppongi)

10. Cold Light (live 1/28 at EX Theater Roppongi)

The live DVD/BluRay of the show held on January 28th at EX Theater Roppongi will be titled Archives 2016 Tour Ultra ~The Loud Engine~. The BluRay version will cost 7540 yen, while the DVD version will cost 6459 yen. The first press edition will come in special packaging and include a special booklet. The tracklist for the video is as follows:

SE

01. The Loud Engine

02. Vice

03. drift

04. Anti-Hedonist

05. ReVive

06. Der Zauberlehrling

07. SAKASHIMA

08. Leidenschaft

09. Arbor Vitae

10. Thirsty Fly

11. Swan Dive

12. Adam's Rib

13. Mi

....and more

If you'd like to purchase this DVD through us, we are still accepting orders! Just send us an email. As usual, we will be purchasing copies at Tower Records in Shibuya, so if you order through us, we'll send you the Tower Records limited edition sticker (for the DVD) and postcard (for the mini-album) as a bonus. Remember - Amazon may be cheaper in some cases, but they abuse their employees (read about it here, here and here!) not to mention pushing a whole lot of small business out of the market. Tower Records, on the other hand, as I wrote about in this article, has been doing an excellent job lately of supporting and promoting local artists and keeping alive the spirit of the community record store. If you care about ethical shopping, the choice should be clear.

Of course, it should go without saying that all profits from This is NOT Greatest Shopping Service go to support NGS/Blog-Tick...and we never abuse our employees except when we stay up all night reading articles for y'all, which we didn't with this article, we wrote it while sitting outside in the park smelling the flowers, so you can feel nice and ethical. (We definitely did stay up all night writing the articles about The Mortal but masochism is the name of Mr. Sakurai's favorite game so it doesn't count as abuse.)

Anyhoo, as always, leave your comments on the live report on this post, as NGS doesn't allow commenting. If you enjoyed reading, please leave a comment! We promise we wont make fun of you too much.

Too Much Buck-Tick News!

This week has brought us just about too much Buck-Tick news to post about on Blog-Tick!  But since the numerous magazine and radio appearances are fairly explicit on the Buck-Tick homepage even to people who don't speak much Japanese, I'm going to just let y'all go check that small news for yourselves, so I can focus on the BIG news, which is: Buck-Tick has announced the track list for their first tribute album, as well as the guests for the Parade Tour 2012, who will also all be performing at the Festival Tick-Buck Parade On 2012.  And for those of you who got interested in Buck-Tick because you were/are visual kei fangirls, rejoice and throw your hats in the air, because this guest list reads like Visual Kei's last cry of "I'm not dead yet!" as time drags it off to the black plague corpse cart.

First, we have D'ERLANGER!  One of the first visual kei bands ever, and we thought they were gone for good but it turns out they're BACK!  D'ERLANGER is not dead yet!  They'll be playing with Buck-Tick on July 7th at Zepp GundamCity Tokyo, and they'll be covering "Iconoclasm," just like J did last time.  Get a new idea guys.

Next, we have Cali-Gari!  Admit it, you really, REALLY thought that Cali-Gari, as a band, was dead forever...splat, kaput, just like maguro on the train tracks!  But no!   And on June 17th at Zepp Sendai you can see the Sakurai cousins onstage together for the first time ever (fun fact, Sakurai Ao is Sakurai Atsushi's cousin.  Really.  They have the same name and everything.)  Cali-Gari will also be covering "Misty Zone" for the tribute album...which I warrant can only be a good thing.

Visual kei artists who haven't yet become zombie bands include Merry and Mucc, who will doubtless be fanboying themselves out of their trousers, seeing as some of their members were at one point also members of a Buck-Tick copyband.  If you want to see Mucc, go to Zepp Fukuoka on June 24th, and if you want to see Merry, hit Zepp Nagoya on June 30th.  But even if you can't make it, you will still be able to listen to Merry's cover of "Aku no Hana" and Mucc's cover of "Jupiter."  I am currently taking bets on whether you think Tatsurou can beat Takanori at taking a formerly subdued Hide ballad and blowing it up into a big, huge, emo, screamo epic of Acchan-sensei fanboy homage.

Non-visual artists on the lineup include shameless American late-90's nu-metal imitators Pay Money to My Pain (July 6th at Zepp Gundam, covering "love letter"...because they are waaay too cool to sing songs with lyrics in Japanese), that rascal drinking buddy of Sakurai's DJ OZMA and his band Kishidan (covering "Machine," and playing on June 26th at Namba Hatch, where else?), and The Lowbrows (July 4th at Yokohama Blitz, and as an electronic unit, they're not doing a cover, they're remixing "For Elise.")

Other covers on the tribute album include Nshukugawa BOYS with "Empty Girl," AA= with "Mad," Polysics with "Sid Vicious on the Beach," and BREAKERZ with "Just One More Kiss"...I'm not even going to bother taking bets on whether you think this will top Kiyoharu's version, because I already know it doesn't stand a chance.  Will these artists also be playing at the Parade Festival?  It remains to be seen.  But if Pay Money to My Pain was only installed because Dir en grey had to decline due to Kyo having flayed his voice to within an inch of his life...well, then visual kei just may be dead after all.