Review: Nega - Haunted Jealousy

I can't say that I was looking forward to Nega's Haunted Jealousy as much as I was hoping for something that could redeem them and put them back on the front of "UC bands to watch". I wasn't particularly impressed with Grave of the Sacrifice when it came out because I thought they went a little over the deep end and immersed themselves too much in their softer side. I have no problem with a band experimenting with sound but Grave of the Sacrifice just didn't live up to the standards Nega has set for themselves in the past.

I wasn't expecting a quadrangle or an utsu out of this single but with it coming in three editions I hoped that out of these seven tracks there would be something redeeming here. But by just looking at the tracklist I wanted to vomit - there are THREE DIFFERENT INSTRUMENTALS WITH THIS SINGLE.

Goddamnit can Nega get any more Kisaki? >_>

Dorje avoids the pitfalls of most Nega instrumentals by having a set melody and then expanding on it. Short pieces that they've done in the past like death warrant and Psyren were well thought out pieces that weren't fully realized so it ended up becoming redundant quickly. Dorje has a beginning, middle and end. Nice except instrumentals are dick moves.

Ganesh isn't as stellar. The electronic effects take away from the song because it doesn't feel like it lends itself well to the entire ambience of the single. Ganesh manages to expand as it goes along but when it returns to the pattern from the beginning it makes the track loop. I'm starting to appreciate shorter instrumentals that pack a punch and this is simply too long for something that doesn't reinvent itself.

Islamic is the only instrumental that I consider as appropriate to the mood of the single and this is the one i believe Nega intended for us to associate with the single. islamic does some experimentation that makes the other two instrumentals look safe in comparison (0:59 - 1:04) for example is something that might not work out but doesn't really matter in the long run since it's an instrumental and instrumentals are gay.

Haunted Jealousy destroys most of what was on GRAVE OF THE SACRIFICE and seriously sounds like something the GazettE would do if they had Jin as a singer. The mix of symphonic and hard rock similar to Soul Cry saves this song from totally sounding like a GazettE ripoff but I really cannot shake the feeling that they got a hold of DIM and took some tips from them. Then again, when one band with a crap vocalist copies off of another band with a crap vocalist the result are songs that are alike. Nega hasn't sounded like this before and even though Haunted Jealousy is nice it suffers from the addition of his ear-raping vocals. Jin really needs to improve because his voice is strikingly different and there's a fine line between ear-raping vocals and different but wonderful vocals - he hasn't found that balance quite yet.

As a matter of fact, EVERYTHING on this CD sounds like it came from the GazettE. I've been bitching about it the whole time but this is actually a positive since the last time we heard something distinctly Nega it swallowed giraffe cock. Oboro and Ogress are pretty much crap whereas the final track sounds much better.

Ogress has a nice breakdown and solo but after that pretty much everything blows chunks. I don't like Jin's voice in this track since he sounds very monotone and the beat once again sounds very GazettE-ish except it's lame and doesn't change up sans the solo. Oboro is slightly better but it fails at this chorus which comes out of nowhere and changes the flow of the song. In fact, this chorus is the only distinctly Nega portion of music on this entire single. Jin's hardkoar kvltic rapping actually started clicking with me after a few listens. It's lame and it gets repetitive quickly but I'll give Nega a few points for at least trying something different.

淫 雨と暗澹 is an interesting song and feels like a spiritual companion to Haunted Jealousy. Even though the influence is here in this song, it's not overwhelming like it is in the other two songs and Jin sings like something other than a drugged Muppet. It really sounds like the most balanced song on the single (even though I'm hating Jin's screams which sound like they're sampled from guilt trip >_> ). The only thing remotely unique about this song is the way it ends and I'm unsure if that's intentional or accidental.

I'm ambivalent on this single. On the one hand I like the fact that this isn't a continuation of Grave of the Sacrifice but on the other hand this is too GazettEish for me to fully appreciate. I like this single but at the same time I don't and there are one too many crap tracks for me to give it a high score. I'd grant this single a 6/10 if you give me numbers for these three reasons

1) too many instrumentals
2) Ogress and Oboro aren't as good as the other two singing tracks
3) this isn't Nega's core sound. it's a nice deviation but if I want to hear gazettE i'll hear GazettE.

At least it's better than Grave of the Sacrifice - it has redeeming qualities.

Review: Nega - illegitimacy

I'm actually feeling rather drained today and I haven't done a lone post of anything of Nega since that atrocious album I believe so today I decided to put a mixture of effort and laziness together and talk about a single that has two songs that haven't made an appearance anywhere else.

HOW KEWL IS DAT? Not very but it's something, and I'd have to do this eventually.

01. PSYREN
02. illegitmacy

I don't know whether to classify Psyren as an instrumental or not but it fails either way. I'll pretend it's both and discuss why. On a two track release having an opening instrumental is lame and a waste of time and space. If it is an instrumental it's a bland one. It obviously includes sirens going off in the background but that's the most interesting part of the song since everything else seems to loop for two and a half minutes. Psyren is also very short for a song but very long for an instrumental, leaving this track in that grey area of unclassifyable. I'm not even going to mention how annoying Jin's vocals are in this but it's very fucking annoying. His screams are off-beat and disgusting, his whispers are repetitive and the entire track lacks any sort of pacing. As a song Psyren doesn't do anything other than repeat itself and suck.

So we're left with the track I suppose Nega wanted us to hear and that would be illegitimacy. The track is heavy, dark, full of nicely fitting ambient sounds, listenable singing and nice transitions. There are a few things that I dislike about this track. The first is obvious: it's 7:22 and the last minute is completely unnecessary and doesn't come to it's own until the last seven seconds. It would have been epic if it had just ended without the piano. The second IS the little slowdown with the piano. It doesn't feel right and the hard, horrorcore atmosphere was so much better. I could live with two if it weren't for the first since I actually think that the abrupt ending would have been cool. The beginning is also a little shaky since it transitions from sirens to heavy guitars but that's a bit of an excessive reason for me to not like this song. What illegitimacy does right it does excellently but everything else is meh at best.

So now I know why Nega didn't include this song everywhere else but this really could have been re-recorded for Grave of the Sacrifice. Psyren is unsalvageable but fix up illegitimacy a little and you have a pretty ominous track. The way it stands is that both tracks suck but illegitimacy (the song) is worth taking a second look at (if you can sit through it two times).

Recommended:

illegitimacy

Score: 56%

Review: CROSS GATE 2007 ~ Strawberry Seeds~

Yesterday's omnibus was rather interesting so afterward I decided to trace it as far back as I could to see how many CROSS GATES I could put out. I found one as far as 2006 so expect another review on that one as soon as I get a good idea of what it sounds like. The good thing about reviewing omnibuses is that the only thing they share in common are the names: everything else about them makes it feel like a completely different item (which it should be treated like).

Why it's called Strawberry Seeds I will never know and I don't think I want to. It's not angsty or emo enough. Hell, it sounds too fruity to be associated with anything rock-related...

Nega and Siva both make a repeat showing here. That's going to be fun to listen to...-__-

1. Mitei - -OZ-
2. Riot - Siva
3. MOTEL Sapporo - Mello
4. -Ao- - Bergerac
5. terminal care - Lulu
6. Born - Nega

I'm disappointed and pleased at the same time that CROSS GATE 2007 wasn't as good as the one I reviewed yesterday. It means overall that they're getting better with picking the bands that appear on these omnibuses but at the same time anyone that listens to this is going to be assaulted with "less than stellar" songs.

The first up to bat to assist the suicide of this compiled fail is -OZ-'s Mitei. I expected more out of -OZ- out of all the praise I've been hearing about them for the longest time but what I got here is a song with full-on screaming and guitars and drums that sprint along at breakneck speed. Compile that with weak, repetitive death vocals and an ending that falls apart and Mitei doesn't sound all too good. It definitely doesn't belong at the beginning of the omnibus.

I think they recorded Mitei just for this omnibus, which brings me to say if they knew where it was going to be placed why does it sound so ill-fitting?

Mitei is average. Moving on...

Siva's Riot is the best song here, far and away and I'm digging this more than I did concealment yesterday. It's literally the only other song here I'd recommend you listen to and the only one that fits coming after Mitei. The most positive aspect about this song is that the hip-hop faggotry I heard yesterday is replaced with a pretty cool dual guitar rhythm that stands out more than the usual fare when that Middle-Eastern inspired guitar comes twanging in. Riot also changes pace enough to keep me interested but not excessively as to lose me in all it's constant changes (like Jade from yesterday). The only problem I have with this song is that the ending is repeated once too much and that a measure of four would have been more effective than repeating it twice for a total of eight beats. Other than that, Riot is a solid rock song and it greatly surprised me. I dreaded this release thinking I was going to get another concealment.

As this album continued on I started to realize how much these first two tracks shone in comparison...

MOTEL Sapporo tries to come off as some jazzy oshare-rock hybrid but it fails to catch my attention in any manner whatsoever. I had to listen to this seven times in order to remember it came third and then when I actually committed myself to memorizing how it sounds and when what comes where I found a very dull and uninteresting track. Coming off the heels of Riot, the placement of this track does it no wonders (no one cares about placement on omnibi (?) though...) but having it well placed could have done it some good. The song subsequently slows down to an almost painful pace and if this track were to have a pulse it would have flatlined before the two minute mark. The solo doesn't do enough to pick up the pace and this entire song is just...slow beyond reason. I hate oshare with a passion as it is but even before knowing what style MELLO played I was not getting a good reaction to this song. This is five minutes of your life you will not get back.

Ao sounds like an anime opening to a 4Kids dub of some obscure sub-par anime aired on Saturday mornings targeted to seven year olds that don't know any better. It's the epitome of generic visual kei: songs played by a bunch of old men with weird hair and no musical sense which any good person with taste cannot get into. I apologize half-heartedly to the fans of Bergerac but Ao isn't that good of a song. It does well to continue the trend of increasingly disturbing sounds emnating from my earphones and it's complete with a vocalist that irks me beyond reason AND fails to stand out among the countless other faceless vocalists with similar vocal ranges and with that said it fails to stamp an impression upon my cerebellum compelling me to return to it at some other time to try and get into it some more. In simpler terms, this song is so bland I don't have a reason to play it again once I'm done. The pace does not speed up any from the last track and Ao comes off as uninspired as it's name (which means VERY). Just skip.

terminal care contains the same slow, lumbering pace as the last two tracks but thankfully it doesn't come off as dead and lifeless. In fact, this song is somewhat interesting in that slow, semi-ballad manner. terminal care plays it as a simple ballad executed with skill, instead of sounding like some bioengineered hybrid freak of nature that botches every musical style it tries to incorporate into it's swirling vortex of sonic fail. What makes it better is that it's not one of those glam metal throwbacks that explode in an emotional finish but lacks any sort of give in the beginning of the song. The vocalist is solid throughout and isn't annoying to listen to. Having a singer that doesn't sound like a musical circumcision is always a plus. What neuters this plus is the ending; I know that it was supposed to simulate an EEG but it repeats nine times over a course of 35 seconds and it crawls to such a slow pace and inaudible volume it causes terminal care to overstay it's welcome. Three beeps would have been optimal.

Even with that inaudible trip-up terminal care is as good as it's gotten since Siva.

Nega's Born sounds horrible. Instruments sound too low and Jin's voice sucks more than usual. This isn't the hard and heavy Nega the way I prefer it and even if it's from their first album the quality of this song all around is so atrocious I cannot gloss over it. Do yourself a favor and skip this.

If this is a sampling of songs from 2007 that must have been a dark year for music in Japan. With only the second and the fifth track being recommended....yeah don't bother tracking this down.

Recommended:

Riot
terminal care

Score: 54%

Review: Nega - 2009.3.14 OSAKA MUSE

I'm feeling rather lazy today, and I had a choice between doing a single and doing AZN PRIDE. I figured that doing the single would be a bit more interesting and I decided on doing a live-release single. Then, I saw that I never actually did this one even though I should have around the time of Nameless Alice's review so here you go. Wow, in an effort to not do any work whatsoever I'm actually putting more effort into my opening paragraph than I would have had I tried to pull together some cheesy five sentence paragraph just for the sake of having a nice block of text before the picture.

Not like anyone reads the blasted thing but it just makes me feel like I do something here.

01. labia (Live)
02. Muddy Cult (Live)

Labia (live)	Remember here when I said I feel embarrassed for Jin singing this? Well, apparently so does he, because most of the time he doesn’t even repeat the English words. Hell, he isn’t even singing in parts of the song. I think it’s also very pathetic when you have to have the track playing in the background for you to sound half-decent live. I don’t give a fuck about what you have to say; sing the fucking song. Might as well be labia with commentary.	3/10
Muddy cult (live)	It doesn’t even flow from the last track, and Jin sounds like he singing “cry, stick, die”. Not to mention his English his horrible and he doesn’t even sing the whole FIRST FUCKING VERSE, not to mention about half the song afterwards. It has the track doing all the work. Does Nega have no shame? Shit, all Jin does is talk up until the chorus and then the whole talking portion in the middle of the song is omitted. Makes no sense whatsoever, and it doesn't even end right. This song gets a higher score just because muddy cult is a better song.	4/10

The good news kicks in now: it's a digital download, so you don't waste anything but your time listening to this. If you want it, go download it from their website. Or, you can just heed my advice and go listen to something else because this isn't worth it unless you just have some fetish with vocalists sounding like shit. 35%. Beat it.

Review: Nega - Grave of the Sacrifice (Audible Grave Type)

I'm not happy with the album but I figured putting these two together was logical.

01. Hold a Funeral
02. the Grave
03. Soul cry
04. muddy cult
05. Baku - Kono Akumu Kurai Tama e-
06. Nameless alice
07. HATE HATE HATE
08. guilt trip
09. 17sai no Kodoku
10. lust[er]
11. reminiscence
12. in the shadow of the rain cloud
98. Kuuhaku

Kuuhaku

It’s another soft track, backed by piano and soft guitar. Not what I was looking forward to hearing from Nega but I suppose it only makes sense seeing as how it’s 86 tracks after in the shadow of the rain cloud. I do think that this could have replaced 17sai no Kodoku at any rate, but it’s nothing special. I’m actually getting sick of this album so I’ll cut this short here.

7/10

Both editions are exactly the same objectively and subjectively, and I'm actually feeling the balance on this album is unequal. Too many hard tracks at the beginning, too many soft tracks at the end, too many singles spaced throughout the album. All that ruins the flow of the album a lot and when it comes down to it, there isn't anything new that Nega has given us that really gives this album some meat. One new track cannot support the entire album.

Not enough screamy Nega.

67%

Review: Nega - Grave of the Sacrifice (Visual Grave Type)

I've actually been looking forward to this album for quite a while and I suppose I raised my expectations to the point where Nega could not actually satisfy me with this album. Then again, I expect a lot from this band so it should work out. It's also their first album proper, and looking at the tracklist I was both enamored and repulsed. Newcomers to Nega should enjoy this, but all those that have been following them for a while will cringe at all the re-recorded tracks that feature here (roughly half the album, excusing the bonus track which I will review later). Let's get this over with.

01. Hold a Funeral
02. the Grave
03. Soul cry
04. muddy cult
05. Baku - Kono Akumu Kurai Tama e-
06. Nameless alice
07. HATE HATE HATE
08. guilt trip
09. 17sai no Kodoku
10. lust[er]
11. reminiscence
12. in the shadow of the rain cloud

Hold a Funeral	Once again, it’s another SE opening. It starts out slow and ominous but its long runtime turns it dull. There’s moaning, static drums and some words muttered by Jin here and there. The ambient effects, which give it a nice feel, also make it repetitive. Had it been shortened, this would be a more diverse and transient piece.	3/10
the Grave	I just can’t get into the Grave too much. It starts out with a bang and there seems to be so much going on but twenty seconds in it loses steam and goes downhill from there. It’s heavy, psychotic parts aren’t convincing enough and the background chants don’t add much. It sounds like they’re trying to be hard and aren’t playing hard. Jin’s harsh vocals in this track could use some work as well but I know how much worse they can be, but compared with the lighter vocals in the chorus they’re atrocious. His vocal work in the chorus is listenable and actually pretty good, and said chorus comes in and out seamlessly. At the end of the day, the Grave remains faceless.	6/10
Soul cry	Tighter handling, a better balance between the classical and the heavy instruments, a more expressive solo, and a louder roaring aria around 3:17 makes this version of Soul cry superior to the one on the Rebirth Under the Chaos mini, although both are very good. Otherwise, everything from this review remains the same.	9/10
muddy cult	The opening passage is smoother than the makeshift version I ripped off YouTube and compared to my version this song is shortened by roughly one and a half minutes. The song is also re-recorded from the music video, although the difference is negligible at first glance. This however, is offset by the abrupt transition at 2:54 where the speaking portion from the music video was. It would have been better to just jump into a scream a la Obscure (Dir en grey) or to keep it like the portion from Hydra (Dir en grey), because that portion spaced the choruses out. The way it is though just doesn’t seem right (although I understand that’s how they do it in lives and they want to be consistent). Due to the loss of that part there, the two choruses seem too close together and that takes away from the song. It’s still brilliant with a sick music video I recommend you watch. You can read the original review of muddy cult here.	8/10
Baku -Kono Akumu Kurai Tama e-	Is this Nega’s version of Macabre? Let’s see: long title followed by one word name (Macabre vs. Baku anyone?), similar passages (admitted this one is within a listenable frame), and sections where the vocalist goes insane in the background over muttered vocals. Nevertheless, it isn’t as brilliant as Macabre but it’s still a good effort on its own. Much like its predecessor muddy cult, it’s got a disturbing air of elegance amidst horror-centric lyrics and bone-crushing instruments. There are parts of this song where everything feels like it lifts off into something purely epic and despite every twist and turn this song goes through it still remains in a listenable time frame of about four minutes. One of the best tracks they’ve put out in a while and I’d venture one of the best on this album.	10/10
Nameless alice	As a stand-alone single I could stomach Nameless alice. In the review here I said it was pretty decent for what it tried to do and gave it an 8/10. Admittedly, that was very generous of me. If you scroll down, you’ll see that I had the doubt of whether or not Nega could make this fit on the album. It doesn’t. As a jazzy piece coming from a horror-centric band, it feels alien for Nega to even attempt to record, much less sandwich somewhere on this album. I understand soft songs usually come after dark pieces to alleviate the mood but it doesn’t work here. Nameless Alice should have been left as a single. The score here drops because of the placement of this track and the fact that it was free to download before and so I couldn’t complain whether or not it sucked (but now that I have to pay for it, I can’t gloss over its mediocrity JaME style). And does anyone have the lyrics for this, because I swear the first words he says are “IN MY BATHROOM”.	6/10
HATE HATE HATE	Sounds like a terrible B-side and has some traces of the jazziness of the last track in the left ear. If it didn’t work in the jazzy soundscape of that song, it won’t work here when Nega’s attempting to be hardcore. The bridge is horrible and the chorus is repetitive (a cookie to whoever can figure out what the three repeated words are) and reminiscent of some patterns found in older tracks made by the GazettE. The abrupt ending puts the nail in the coffin of this song. I would skip this underwhelming pile of trash.	3/10
guilt trip	I was hoping guilt trip would make an appearance without the last minute or so. My wish didn’t exactly come true. Jin re-recorded the last minute of assrape vocals and they fit in better since they don’t fade out. With the vocals themselves, they actually send shivers down my spine this time. This just about sums up everything I have to say about the end so now let’s move to the beginning. It starts out better than the single version, with some simulated wind supporting the beginning strums. After it disappears, I don’t detect any radical changes up until the end but I don’t doubt I missed something. This song DOES border on nine minutes long, and perhaps that is the major drawback of the song. It has beautiful guitar passages, decent vocals at worst (minus the last bit of course) abrupt stops in the right places, soft acoustic strums, perfect drum patterns, but it’s all too long to enjoy.	8/10
17-sai no Kodoku	Objectively speaking, this song is actually done pretty well, except Jin can’t really handle this song in the vocal department and it doesn’t fit either with the album or the song name. The guitar passages are nice and the song is consistently driven and really only held back by Jin’s shaky vocals in parts. Subjectively speaking, this is not what I want to hear from Nega and it has no place in Nega’s discography. Any other band could have pulled this off but not Nega. I have no more words for this song. Skip it. (Score on the side stems from a mix of what it is and what I feel, which is why it’s uncharacteristically low for a song I acknowledged as good)	4/10
lust[er]	Other than a better balance between vocals and instruments, lust[er] doesn’t offer anything new than from back when I reviewed it on ill. As a straightforward headbanger it’s pretty decent but other than that it fails to do much for me.	7/10
reminiscence	I guess it hit Nega somewhere along the line that having this ten minute ballad somewhere after an eight minute ballad on an album that’s supposed to be deep and heavy isn’t a very bright idea. As a result, Nega decided to cut this track down by a whopping four minutes. It works in any case since all the superfluous but pretty instrumental parts are excluded and the ending was reworked to keep the perspective of an album in mind. Reminiscence sounds like a whole new song and even though it doesn’t quite fit here, the despair and want conveyed in the vocals combined with its long runtime mitigates that to an extent. Reminiscence is a “love it or leave it” piece of work, and I’m of the former opinion.	9/10
In the shadow of the rain cloud	A piano-dominated piece that ends the album on a light note. It flows with reminiscence quite well but on it’s own it’s rather average at best. Yes, it does tug on your heart strings. Yes, it does feature no annoying grunts. Yes, it is pretty. That’s why it gets a seven.	7/10

Can I say that I'm disappointed? Yes. The best tracks are the ones that were previously released (sans Baku) and overall the tone of the album is too light for Nega. I want to hear the hard, screamy Nega with crushing guitar riffs among the melodies but it feels like the last bit of the album had lust[er] sandwiched in so it didn't seem like everything past HATE HATE HATE was a ballad. With a title for an album like Grave of the Sacrifice, most of what Nega has given us is pretty damn deceptive and perhaps that is why I came away from this album unsatisfied.

So, do I recommend this album to anyone?

I'm pretty damn ambivalent on this one. Older fans of Nega are going to despise parts of this album heavily and lament at the lack of hard, heavy pieces while newer fans of Nega aren't going to get the right picture of what this band is. However, this album contains re-recordings of some of Nega's best songs and they've been done rather well. Personally, tracks three to five is the highlight of this album and I can go without everything else. If I based these reviews on how I feel and not on the objective portion of the album, Grave of the Sacrifice wouldn't reach 4/10 tops. But since I keep my bias out of it, it rises all the way up to a 7/10.

Recommended:

Soul cry
muddy cult
Baku -Kono Akumu Kurai Tama e-

Rating: 67%

Review: Nega - Reminiscence

If I recall correctly, this single came out almost immediately after the last review I did, ReBirth Under the Chaos. In the span of a few months, Nega found some new source of inspiration that gave birth to this single. Either that, or they figured that Reminiscence and the following B-sides didn't fit in with the sound scape of the EP and decided to save it for another release. I'm going to go with the idea of the latter. Regardless, Reminiscence is an interesting single that might come as a surprise to those that didn't expect Nega to have a softer side to them.

1. Reminiscence
2. Another Eyes of Reminiscence
03. Dokusoukyoku Dainana Ban "hi ai"



1. Reminiscence
2. Another Eyes of Reminiscence
3. Dokusoukyoku Dainana Ban "hi ai"
4. Shinkaigyo

Reminiscence	I’m a fan of longer tracks, but not this time. Reminiscence is entirely too long, but it's still enjoyable if you don't mind it being so damn dragged out. It’s also a ballad, and coming just mere months after Rebirth Under the Chaos it’s definitely a new side of Nega. It’s most reminiscent of the fourth track of Rebirth Under the Chaos as it’s a slower and lighter tempo that doesn’t switch gears at any point in the runtime. Yuu’s piano lines signal the start of the song are beautiful and consistent throughout and lend a sense of timelessness. They also are a perfect compliment to Jin’s voice and the both of them end off the song peacefully. The guitars are tuned to just the right level so that they’re tangible but not overbearing and Jin’s vocals are solid throughout. San’s guitar playing is top notch as always but it’s his solo that creeps up and leaves an almost ethereal sense of pleasantry. It doesn’t disrupt the feeling of the track as it runs its course and ends up being a very memorable part of the package. If you need a ballad that takes forever to convey its message, this is for you.	6/10
Another Eyes of Reminiscence	The slightly distorted drum introduction is jarring coming off the ending of the last track. Compared to the last song it’s not as delicate but it’s still softer than the typical Nega fair we are used to hearing. The song starts off promising but it becomes apparent as it goes along that it has no direction and ends up fizzling out before it’s done. It was a good attempt at another side of experimentation but pales in comparison to the two tracks it’s sandwiched between.	6/10
Dokusoukyoku Dainana Ban "hi ai"	A piano dominated instrumental that manages to be even more heart-wrenching than the title track. It’s backed by a nice string section that helps to fill out the spaces where the band members aren’t at. Its simple but effective nature and short length also prevent it from feeling dragged out.	9/10
Shinkaigyo	After three relatively soft songs this feels out of place. In order to flow with the lamenting, depressive last number, it starts out with soft but determined drums that are joined by a whiny guitar, deep bass and a lamentful Jin. It doesn’t explode for a minute and when it does it feels restrained and unsatisfying. The verses and chorus don’t fit in with the sudden outbursts, and said outbursts feel forced and get repetitive before the song ends. The song would have worked better without them because Nega compromised and it didn’t work out well. Other than that, Jin soars in the chorus and the dark nature of the verses fits in well with the overall feel of the single.	6/10

So Reminiscence as a single is a little hit and miss. That's to be expected with an experimental single with a nature such as this. However, it comes with a solid A-side, and three not-so-suckish B-sides. Reminiscence as a title track is enough to warrant thinking about purchase, but it's appearance on Grave of the Sacrifice would warrant me to advise you picking that up instead.

Type A: 70%
Type B: 68%

Review: Nega - ЯeBirtH Under the Chaos

Grave of the Sacrifice is coming out in a few days and there a crapton of tracks that are included on other Nega releases that made it onto the album. Since they're all being re-recorded, it would be wise to try and get to as many as I can before the album hits shelves. Prepare to see a ton of Nega in the next few days folks.

01. Under the Chaos
02. Dirty Faith
03. Soul Cry
04. Tamashii Namida wa Akai Chi ni
05. DIS.
06. Shutora (Type B only)

WARNING: This album is extremely loud, heavy, amelodic, and full of piercing screams you may not be used to. Unless you are a frequenter of Nega or a fan of harsh and unusual vocalists I advise you to turn the volume down. Now, on to the review...

Under the Chaos	I don’t know what to think of this song. It’s got lyrics which means I can’t throw it aside as a shitty S.E. but as a song it’s dull, repetitive and boring. Under either category Under the Chaos fails. Its uninspired two minute runtime drags on longer than it needs to and fails at establishing a mood for the album.	3/10
Dirty Faith	Straight from out of the gate there’s Jin’s unique yells, heavy guitars and pounding drums, which definitely wakes you up after Under the Chaos. In true Nega style, there’s a slowdown where Jin’s vocals take center stage backed by some strong bass courtesy of Ray. After the chorus, there’s a section where everything slows down and a haunting melody is played by a piano. Just when all appears lost and that the fury at the beginning was just a lure the song breaks out into hell spawn once again. Sadly, those harder parts don’t mix with the softer majority of the song well and Dirty Faith comes off a confused beast.	6/10
Soul Cry	Jin’s vocals start this song out strong. The heavy riff at the beginning does a good job at catching your attention before it slows down into a piano based verse. Soul Cry juxtaposes portions rather than sections and the transitions are coherent. Softer verses are punctuated by wild guitar sections, and Jin’s voice is the glue that holds everything together. There’s mumbling and whispering along with singing and crooning (although sometimes it feels overwhelming), and the section where hard and soft mix together beautifully make Soul Cry a standout, right up to the soft ending. Looking forward to the re-recording on Grave of the Sacrifice.	8/10
Tamashii Namida wa Akai Chi ni	Long name in Japanese plus long runtime equals a ballad. To be quite honest there’s an obvious motif of piano running throughout these tracks but it’s most noticeable here where it takes front and center. The first part of the track is Jin and piano for the most part. Three minutes in it changes pace and explodes into a flurry of dueling guitars while a haunting piano weaves between the guitars underneath. A dark but fitting solo follows before the chorus returns (and the addition of a bad electronic effect) and ends off with just the piano and some twinkling in the background fading away. About as epic of a ballad as we’re getting.	9/10
DIS.	They switch out the piano for the organ this time. The first few notes of the band sound ominous before it completely switches direction into rock that’s loud, amelodic, fast paced, and full of riffs and unusual sounds. Those guitars are distorted to the max all over the place and the bass is thick underneath it all. The quick rhythmic drum patterns injected with blast beats every so often add to the sense of urgency all over the place. Jin’s vocals are also quite spastic and range from his piercing scream at the end to distorted chanting just about everywhere to the whispered grunts and squeals in the vocals. It runs a little too long but the dynamically changing face of this song saves it some points.	8/10
Shutora	It starts out with some rising guitar followed by some disturbing, distorted voice. It’s got an arrhythmic, galloping pace until it moves back into a softer, more haunting piece. This entire piece is eccentric but with that touch of Nega that makes everything seem purposeful. Jin’s vocals do just about everything here, and add to the overall weirdness of the track. Shutora ends with that disturbing voice deepening thicker and thicker into distortion and ends what could possibly be one of the more successful bonus tracks I’ve heard. I also think it’s placement at track 13 was intentional o_o.	8/10

Unlike a lot of their newer work, ЯeBirtH Under the Chaos is Nega at it's core - experimental. It's loud, heavy, distorted and full of screams with the melodies inserted underneath all the noise. This is definitely an album you can't pick up and "get" on the first listen because it experiments with so many polarizing sounds you may just throw it aside as garbage and go to listen to something more melodic. It takes multiple listens to find the beauty in the songs, because each of them were constructed with such complexity you can't possibly hear everything at once. Ironically, the one thing that sets Nega apart and puts them on the map is the one thing that also holds them back. Jin's voice is pretty rough on this release in parts and I personally feel that if Nega wants to extend their fanbase he's going to have to work on his vocals and variate his screams. Fans of Nega may be fond of this release but newcomers need to start at their recent stuff and work their way back.

Recommended:

Soul Cry
Tamashii Namida wa Akai Chi ni

Rating: 84% (A-TYPE)
Rating: 69% (B-TYPE)

Review: Nega - Nameless alice

I just realized that if I don't do this by the 22nd this would become redundant.

1. Nameless alice

It's definitely a different sound from Nega, and with everything considered they didn't do this too badly. Compared to dig and ill it's way better. Even as I go back and listen over parts of it I discover new things, like the little part with the guitar in my right ear during the second verse. Nameless alice feels like a mix between jazz, rock, and country and the three styles work rather well together in this song. The verses are bass heavy with Jin's vocals alternating between ears and relying on effects. Jin's unusual voice suits the atmosphere of the song well and his annoying yells aren't present, although there is a portion where he goes apeshit in the background while he sings. The solo is one half-rockerish, one half jazz inspired and it remains complex while not abandoning the core sound of this song. My only doubts at this point are whether or not it will fit on the album, but as a standalone song it's pretty good to listen to. 80%.

I should also mention this single is free to download on their website. Normally I would link to a file itself but their home page could use more visits so click here and rummage around a bit to find it.

Review: Nega - dig

I managed to stop lol'ing enough to review it.

01. death warrant
02. idle
03. guilt trip

So we have the other half of Nega's double release campaign and I have to say after a few listens this CD is the better of the pair. It comes with death warrant, which is still an opener but it doesn't fail. It just sucks. The haunting piano melody that it starts out with was a nice touch to the album but it doesn't go anywhere. It repeats until it tires itself out and the novelty wears off. Now if Nega had made a decent song out of it then this single would be infinitely superior to ill, but as of now it's just better.

idle to me is the only good song that Nega released out of the six they recorded, and it's the main reason why dig is better than ill. It has a beginning, a middle, and an end for one. It's transitions from hard to soft, while still suckish and in need of improvement, work and fare better than in labia, and Jin's singing isn't utterly atrocious and the lyrics aren't laughable. This is the only song I recommend you listen to.

guilt trip is a wreck. It starts out soft and it's obviously a ballad about, iono, GUILT, and it does well for seven minutes. Had it ended right there I would have called it a nice ballad that lacked a little bit of energy but overall is worth a listen. In the last minute, Jin manages to singlehandedly steal the show and shit all over the hard work with his UNGAAH-ing. I can understand what he was attempting to do and I give him props for his musical "genius" but he should realize that he only knows how to scream one way and that's his simulation of upchucking on the microphone. And in some songs (like muddy cult) he does it well and in other songs, like this, it fails. He should have just shut up.

If you want some lulz play it. Otherwise, I guarantee you embarassment if you listen to it on stereo.

dig is a better single than ill, but that's because the former has one decent song while the latter has none that can compare. Here's hoping to Grave of the Sacrifice that the song guilt trip has a re-recording that does it justice. 2.5 out of 5

Review: Nega - muddy cult

I'm unsure as to where muddy cult fits in the realms of albums and singles. As a physical CD it was only released as a music video yet Nega's placed it on their first ever album Grave of the Sacrifice. As if that weren't enough, the CD Visual Negativism sold out extremely fast due to the muddy cult PV. That video in itself did more for this band than both dig and ill combined, which means that it's going to be a surprising review.

IMPORTANT NOTE: This video is very disgusting and foul so if you are under 18 I'd advise you not watch it. Then again, this part right here probably made you want to click it even more...>.>

01. muddy cult

The reason why this video is so infamous in the indies Visual Kei scene and also amongst Nega fans is because it's the most disgusting video this side of Obscure. It's vile, it's disgusting, it's got an air of disturbing elegance to it, and also because the song itself is the best thing Nega has put out in quite a while.

Since I've given you the link to it I don't need to explain the way the music sounds. What I like in this music video starts with the slow-down somewhere in the middle. The beautiful part about this is that it shows that Nega knows how to contrast loud and soft, unlike ill showcases. In a weird way, it also reminds me of the interlude from the Obscure video and how the most pivotal part of the entire video happens when they "cut the lights", so to speak.

I haven't even heard many of the songs on Grave of the Sacrifice and I can already say that this song is going to me one of the major highlights on that album. The music portion of the video gets a 4 out of 5, because I'm not exactly sure when the song is supposed to "begin" but the video gets a 4.5 because in some parts I have absolutely no idea what's going on and it's a flash of blood, gore, and maggots.

Review: Nega - ill

I'll do dig when I finish listening to the entire single and I can stop laughing at guilt trip.

01. idiot beauty
02. labia
03. lust[er]

Before I begin, I would like to bring your attention to the text on the side.

[What is love? What is sex?]

I'll give someone a cookie if they can figure out what this single is about.

The inclusion of an instrumental track on albums is already a questionable affair that not many bands pull off well, but an instrumental track on a 3 track single is mind boggling. idiot beauty attempts to channel some GazettE and fails miserably, and The GazettE failed miserably when they created Art Drawn by Vomit so figure how bad that track is. Not worth a listen so just skip it.

labia is about....labias. The first part of the song is in English and the entire song is about sex...as if that was a shock. The soft and the hard parts are put together and don't flow very well and Jin channels some serious Dir en grey screams at parts. It's nothing more than a wanna-be Marrow of a Bone track and it provides nothing special other than lulz and entertainment value as he mumbles some Engrish thinking it's cool when it's laughable at best. I actually feel quite bad for him. Also skip this one.

lust[er] is mostly in Japanese and is the best track off this single, and that's not saying much simply because I'll recommend you listen and see, which is one step up from a complete skip. It's also going to be the track from this single featured on their full length album coming up in a couple of weeks and other than being a solid rock track it sounds way too similar not only to the track that preceded it but to other tracks in the same genre. It's decent, but that's it, and one decent song can't save this single.

For the most part I recommend you skip this single completely because it's not that good. ill makes me ill just listening to it, and when a fan knows of what Nega is capable of this is a disappointment. I'll give it a 2 out of 5.

Here's hoping Grave of the Sacrifice will be a lot better.