TOP 3 ALBUMS OF 2010: #3-1

Is your body ready?

Best albums of 2010: #10-4

Continued from last post.

I haven't been updating a lot recently: Top 20 albums of 2010 (current opinion) #20-11

I know this blog's existence is solely for fueling this silly fantasy that someone might give a shit about my poorly written opinion's on music, but I should at least try to make an effort to post something every now and then.

So, today, I'm going to make a general list of my top 20 albums of 2010 at this moment in time. This list is not solely doujin music, as Comiket 79 hasn't even come to an end yet, and, I'll be honest: I have only listened to maybe 50 or so albums from C78 out of disinterest. I have went on a spree back during 77, so I have a better grasp of what I do and do not like, which slashes down the albums I listen to considerably, but even then, I still took chances with many types of music outside of the doujin scene this year, so let's see what it boils down to.

Let's get this show on the road. This is my personal (at the moment) list of best albums of 2010:


20 to 11:

minimum electric design - 少女は電気河童の夢を見る

minimum electric design

少女は電気河童の夢を見る

[minimum electric design; 2010]

3.9

Matsui has released five works (if the catalog numbers on his site are to be assumed accurate). To not muck up after this many albums is pretty impressive, since most circles drop the ball at least once by their third. The way he would fail, however, was impossible to predict. He never once struck me as someone who would work well (or consider) pairing up with a vocalist, but on his latest EP released at Comiket 78, ルミコルミヲ performs vocals in three of the five songs. Although not even grating like many of the female vocal in doujin music (for example, 95% of them), her delivery isn't much better, and taken in as a whole scope, probably even worse than the eight billion so-sugary-moe-you're-choking-on-your-own-glucagon singers that poke their heads out of the woodwork come every mid August and late December.

The first gripe I have with ルミコルミヲ is that she sounds so tired and passionless, almost like she was forced against her own will to participate with matsui's most recent creative output. Her raspy vocal performance in 少女は電気河童の夢を見る sounds like she hasn't slept in four days and just got back from finishing a triple work shift. Her deadpan performance in とある紅茶と非日常 do not blend in with his samba rhythms and acoustics, and no matter what language your song is in, having "loo-la-loo-la"s as part of your lyrics is a fucking unpardonable sin, and there is no detectable effort in her tone and pitch to try to get into a groove with the instrumentals in 四季折々. However, matsui is also at fault. Take for example the song I have formerly mentioned. It feels like he was under the impression that because ルミコルミヲ was singing (or talking depending on how much credit you're willing t give her) on this EP, he felt that he could slack off. Personally, I wouldn't be fazed if the reason he got the aid of a singer was to meet a deadline and to avoid having to complete songs that were probably only half-finished. 胎動する sounds like a cool demo until you realize it is only a minute long song, and 今此処に在る隙間 is missing all the bells and whistles of what made his first LP border-lining on brilliance.

少女は電気河童の夢を見る is a tragedy after 幻想郷 Electronic Shoegazer and sanae telegraph. Granted, the C78 release wasn't a xerox of either of the two, which is worth some credit, but not enough to pardon the poor execution. Maybe if we're lucky, matsui has learned his lesson from this instance and will think twice about getting a vocalist, or perhaps will collaborate with someone who isn't so damn apathetic about it.

My super secret zero readers blog is now in peril

Mushi/Lumpy/Musique Concrète - A Bug, Touhou, and Strawberry Jam

Mushi/Lumpy/Musique Concrète
A Bug, Touhou, and Strawberry Jam

[Mushi/Lumpy/Musique Concrète; 2010]

7.6



No, I ain’t bullshitting. t+pazolite’s Lumpy circle really did making a third release over three years after A Bug, Touhou, and Melon Soda (Hydrocyanic Acid), the ying to Honey Milk’s yang. I’m not sure what brought it on, but according to the broken and inaccurate translations provided by babelfish, I think it had something to do with a get together with various other circles and booze. The first album was breakcore, the second was ambient noise, so one would expect a theme with their first release in the new decade. However, there is no set sound. Sure, we get some breakcore and ambient, but we also get swing, hardstyle, and whatever the fuck one would call Shitty Night (Derpcore comes to mind).

We also have a wider cast of arrangers from various circle’s making their first (and probably only venture) into the wacky world of Lumpy, including REDALiCE (ALiCE’S EMOTION), Tainokobone (Azure&Sands), oiko (N-Tone), and Dobu Usagi (dBu Music). We also have many familiar faces such as circle founders t+pazolite, Yuuna Sasara, and ziki_7, along with LV.4 (CODE-49) who appeared in Melon Soda back in May 2007.

This is Lumpy’s most assessable and friendly to newcomers due to it’s wider variety. Fans of dBu Circle will be appeased with tHe minD aNalyzeR, a jazzy swing arrangement of Satori Maiden ~ 3rd eye that rewards attentive listeners with very subtle ambient soundscapes that could easily be missed in the first five listens. Those that have been yearning for two ZUN tracks in one song will have their thirst quenched by t+pazolite’s Luv the lUNatic??, a spastic drill and bass track that Christian’s the a perfect marriage of Hartmann's Youkai Girl and U.N. Owen was Her?. Fans of Deep Forest back on Honey Milk will find much to celebrate about its spiritual successor Cherry Blossom Underground (Lovely Mound of Cherry Blossoms ~ Flower of Japan), which is also done by ziki_7.

Personal highlights include the two arrangements of Stirring an Autumn Moon ~ Mooned Insect. Yuuna Sasara’s バグレイディオ is a four and a half minute track that sums up everything I loved about Honey Milk with melodic glitch, instrumental rolls, and breakneck breaks, and Tainokobone’s 熱すぎて触れない虫 is the closest attempt I have heard at recreating Board’s of Canada’s sound with a downtempo beat, surreal ambient soundscapes, and a melancholy guitar a la The Campfire Headphase. If it had a hazier sound, you might have been actually able to pass it off as a work by the fame Scottish duo and trick a few diehards.

There are many brilliant arrangements here. However, you (yes, YOU. The only reader who has visited since whenever this highly neglected blog was made) are probably asking “why only a 7.6? If it’s really so awesome, why not give it an undeserved 9.2 with BNM on the sheer basis of it not being trance shit like you always do with “unique” releases”? That’s because what’s really good isn’t quite good enough to forgive A Bug, Touhou, and Strawberry Jam’s sins. The two weakest tracks hit you like a one-two punch by Mike Tyson.

Shitty Night, although humorous and whatisthisidon’teven worthy within the first two or so listens, is a novelty that wears off, mostly considering of samples of men fart, grunting, shitting (hurr get it), and wet stools reaching the bottom of the toilet bowl. Perhaps the worst part about the song is that you THINK they’re sampling infamous noise punk group The Gerogerigegege’s Night EP, but they aren’t. Still, if you need a cheap laugh to shut up the eight year-old boy within you, then hearing Gensokyo Millennium ~ History of the Moon recreated with bodily functions will satisfy your craving. REDALiCE’s state-of-the-art is two-thirds passable, and one-third more obnoxious than Shitty Night. You know that faux-pas ethnic electro sound people use to mock bad techno? Imagine that but it being an arrange of Mystic Oriental Dream ~ Ancient Temple and outside of the realms of parody. The album comes to a close with oiko’s drill-saturated arrangement of Septette for the Dead Princess Degeneration, and seeing as we already got the brilliant micro-sampling dnabgib kaerB back four years ago from the same circle, it already suffers by being in the shadows of the zenith of Doujin music, ultimately making it the weakest and most forgettable track.

Then we have some tracks that are immediate dividers. ziki_7’s London Bridge is droning ambient with noise for the first album that develops into a Schizophrenic collage of sounds and buried beats, all of which make a track that sounds nothing like The Bridge People No Longer Cross. LV.4’s Collapse Day completely flips the mood of Fires of Hokkai upside down, turning it into the quietest song from UFO into an epileptic fit.

A Bug, Touhou, and Strawberry Jam is not an album that will appeal to everyone, but most will find one track they like, so it’s not a complete waste of time looking into it. It’s clocks in at a rather standard 45 minute length, and showcases ten sounds from eight artists placing at least a foot outside of their comfort zones. This is what happens when artists bullshit around. The result is more fascinating than that of their "professional" works. People are quick to embrace or reject it.

MA.S ATTACK - 珍時怪異

MA.S ATTACK
珍時怪異
[MA.S ATTACK; 2009]
9.6









Not all doujin music is UNTZ UNTZ UNTZ. Not all doujin music is guitars and cliché metal riffs and the SSKKKKKRRREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE that is in every Dragonforce song that minami has adopted from time to time. Not all doujin music has the prominent melody delivered by a vocalist (or a semi-realistic computer program). There are some out there that ignore the popular trends in the scene they have anchored themselves into and called their home. Upon listening to the opening track of 珍時怪異, MA.S ATTACK newcomer (or one-shot artist) ユタカナウシロ is already awkwardly out of place once you realize he’s in the same scene as circles such as the hard rock/heavy metal circles like CROW'SCLAW and IRON ATTACK!, the hardcore figureheads such as t+pazolite and REDALiCE, and the unbearably quirky IOSYS.

珍時怪異 is the very rare Touhou arrange album you might get two or three of released at Comiket that averts what everyone else is doing in such a drastic way you would be hesitant to lump together the aforementioned artists, or swear that ユタカナウシロ is from a different continent altogether. Ambient techno is already rare in the doujin scene, but to hear someone take a stab at the genre and make it so thick in texture is like witnessing a miracle of the universe. Take Spring Rain, for example. Ambient drones, the leading melody, glitch, various beats and breaks, and shit tons of other sounds that are along for the ride. It’s in the same realms as 青空の影へ, but contradicts the minimalist beauty of the opening track with the busyness of a well-oiled machine. 雲の閉ざせし路は has three or four different breakbeats at once molding together to create a single entity. 幽霊客船へようこそ has the busiest moments on the album with enough ambiance at once that could be separated to create two or three tracks. It appears so simple while being densely layered.

Even fans of more intense and faster music have something rejoice over. The chaotic dreamy glitch of エソテリア-prototype- proves to be on par in abrasiveness as some of the tracks you would find on PURE EXISTENCE and Speed Ball Z. After the last five tracks, ユタカナウシロ’s final track Rich Umbrella sucker punches you in the gut with harsh distorted bass and noisy synth melodies while still holding on tightly to the ambiance of previous tracks. The last two tracks are both arranges of Interdimensional Voyage of a Ghostly Passenger Ship. モリタ’s helluva fun arrange contrasts with 幽霊客船へようこそ’s dub-inspired ambient with glitchy breaks and a clean piano providing the melody at a hurried pace, and NEET師匠’s resembles a mixture of the Sonic CD GST and the Reading Rainbow opening.

The production and mixing would make 95% of the circles out there embarrassed or envious of ユタカナウシロ. There is so much activity, but every little piece is audible and easy to find with a little focus. The layering of so many sounds waiting to be found is what makes this album so much damn fun to return to. If you treat the last two tracks as bonuses and don’t let it bother you that one song is arranged three times on the same album, this is about as close to a perfect Touhou arrange album can get. 珍時怪異 is a brilliant rarity, mixed and produced with the utmost love and care.

ALiCE'S EMOTION - RED

ALiCE’S EMOTION
RED (Disc C Hand-in-Hand)
[ALiCE’S EMOTION; 2010]
3.8

Photon Wave Orchestra - Echoes Across the Astral Wastelands EP

Photon Wave Orchestra
Echoes Across the Astral Wastelands EP
[Photon Wave Orchestra; 2010]
10.0








I had never even seen a shooting star before. 25 years of rotations, passes through comets' paths, and travel, and to my memory I had never witnessed burning debris scratch across the night sky. Photon Wave Orchestra were hunched over their instruments. Fred Zoidos slowly plays on his masterfully-crafted stradivarius whilst his younger sister, Robyn “Robbie” Smith sings, eyes closed, into her microphone like she was trying to kiss around a big nose. White pearls of arena light swam over their faces. A lazy disco light spilled artificial constellations inside the aluminum cove of the makeshift stage. The metal skeleton of the stage ate one end of Florence's Piazza Santa Croce, on the steps of the Santa Croce Cathedral. Michelangelo's bones and cobblestone laid beneath. I stared entranced, soaking in Photon Wave Orchestra’s first release, chiseling each sound into the best functioning parts of my brain which would be the only sound system for the material for months. Sometimes an album is so good and makes its case so flawlessly that it spawns a mini-genre of its own and becomes shorthand for a prescribed set of values. The Velvet Underground's third and Miles Davis' Bitches Brew are two older records that spring to mind, and I'd toss in Spiderland as well. It's not a long list, but somewhere on it belongs Photon Wave Orchestra's Echoes Across the Astral Wastelands.

35 minutes of lush soundscapes entangle your senses, but not in a tight constriction, but a gentle caress, similar to that of a mother gently rocking her baby back and fourth, singing soft lullabies to calm the upset child until they fall into a state of slumber. An aural nirvana is opened up through seemingly simple drones. However, to output such sounds requires superhuman musicianship. The pitch-holding is unreal and far exceeds that by any person on earth, living or dead. It is an emotional, psychological experience. Echoes Across the Astral Wastelands sounds like a clouded brain trying to recall an alien abduction. It's the sound of a band, and its leader, losing faith in themselves, destroying themselves, and subsequently rebuilding a perfect entity. In other words, Fred and Robyn hated being Falling Rose and Dead Entry, and ended up with the most ideal, natural recording yet in the history of humanity. The track's final moments are a wash of humming synths, echoing moans, and pins-and-needles noise that comes just a little too close to human screaming. By the time the piece ends, the tide is way out.

Echoes Across the Astral Wastelands  still wields an uncanny, affirming power. It's the kind of music that makes you believe there is a Heaven, and that this is what it must sound like. The experience and emotions tied to listening to this extended play are like witnessing the stillborn birth of a child while simultaneously having the opportunity to see her play in the afterlife on Imax. It's an album of sparking paradox. It's cacophonous yet tranquil, experimental yet familiar, foreign yet womb-like, spacious yet visceral, textured yet vaporous, awakening yet dreamlike, infinite yet 35 minutes. It will cleanse your brain of those little crustaceans of worries and inferior albums clinging inside the fold of your gray matter. The harrowing sounds hit from unseen angles and emanate with inhuman genesis. When the headphones peel off, and it occurs that two people created this, it's clear that Photon Wave Orchestra must be the greatest band alive, if not the best since you know who. Breathing people made this record! People who show signs of doing what they condemn the world for not doing: changing, evolving, experimenting with new approaches, growing. And that's why Photon Wave Orchestra-- along with Jeremiah, Blaise Finnegan and every other prophet of doom-- might all turn out to be wrong. Perhaps it does get better before it gets worse. And you can't wait to dive back in and try to prove that wrong over and over. Photon Wave Orchestra tapped into the collective unconscious of those who grew up in the English speaking East and were talented enough to transcribe the soundtrack. No need to get hung up on specifics; however we lived and whoever we were, Echoes Across the Astral Wastelands reflected back the truth for a lot of us. You can't ask more of an album than that, and I don’t think we’ll see something like this ever again, and we will always return for what PWO’s EP debut alone can deliver. I realize that this is not a doujin album, but it needs to be heard. It needs to be recognized. It needs to be spread so as that it doesn’t fade away from our memories. Don’t let this treasure slip out of our hands. Clench it, and never let go.at this is what it must sound like. The experience and emotions tied to listening to this extended play are like witnessing the stillborn birth of a child while simultaneously having the opportunity to see her play in the afterlife on Imax. It's an album of sparking paradox. It's cacophonous yet tranquil, experimental yet familiar, foreign yet womb-like, spacious yet visceral, textured yet vaporous, awakening yet dreamlike, infinite yet 35 minutes. It will cleanse your brain of those little crustaceans of worries and inferior albums clinging inside the fold of your gray matter. The harrowing sounds hit from unseen angles and emanate with inhuman genesis. When the headphones peel off, and it occurs that two people created this, it's clear that Photon Wave Orchestra must be the greatest band alive, if not the best since you know who. Breathing people made this record! People who show signs of doing what they condemn the world for not doing: changing, evolving, experimenting with new approaches, growing. And that's why Photon Wave Orchestra-- along with Jeremiah, Blaise Finnegan and every other prophet of doom-- might all turn out to be wrong. Perhaps it does get better before it gets worse. And you can't wait to dive back in and try to prove that wrong over and over. Photon Wave Orchestra tapped into the collective unconscious of those who grew up in the English speaking East and were talented enough to transcribe the soundtrack. No need to get hung up on specifics; however we lived and whoever we were, Echoes Across the Astral Wastelands reflected back the truth for a lot of us. You can't ask more of an album than that, and I don’t think we’ll see something like this ever again, and we will always return for what PWO’s EP debut alone can deliver. I realize that this is not a doujin album, but it needs to be heard. It needs to be recognized. It needs to be spread so as that it doesn’t fade away from our memories. Don’t let this treasure slip out of our hands. Clench it, and never let go.

TatshMusicCircle - Far East of East III

TatshMusicCircle
Far East of East III
[TatshMusicCircle; 2010]
1.9






I did not get into IIDX music until shortly after RED AC came out. I didn’t give much of a crap for his music. I have never been big on GENOCIDE, and was lukewarm to Sphere. However, I, like many others, have left RED ZONE on repeat on my iTunes player. The two-word mantra SPEED RAVE made me take a liking to the idea of more Tatsh songs with a rock-meets-rave formula. I rode Gekkou off as a misfire, since Twelfth Style and Scripted Connection=> were cool, and even Xepher was decent if you ignore the hype. In DistorteD shit like DEEP ROAR turned its ugly head, and it doesn’t help that Double Loving Heart showed how inept he is (like almost every other Bemani artist or person on the planet) at J-Pop. However, we still had Kachoufusetsu and D.C. Fish so it wasn’t all bad in DD. Then, he vanished to pursue other interests, because apparently, making music for VNs that nobody has heard of and the doujin music market pays better or something.

Recently, he has returned in Resort Anthem. Now, I may not have heard to song, and I cannot find it anywhere, but on the chan's I was told it was more shit in similar vein to his Touhou arrangements, which must mean it’s tripe. I have heard WHITE MUTATION, which if it weren’t for Sampling Masters Mega, would have been a total waste of time bothering with. I have also heard the first Far East of East, which was crap, so I bailed out on the second. Judging from Far East of East III, I missed nothing skipping his arrange album from C77.

It follows the standard formula: Rock-meets-Eurobeat. Unfortunately, Tatsh shines far brighter with  techno, and can’t make good rock to save his life, and Eurobeat is a dead-end genre. That much has already damned FEoE3 to the point of beyond saving. As if the arrangements being the most boring shit on the Goddamn planet wasn’t bad enough, the tracks are mixed VERY VERY VERY poorly. Here’s a game for all of you people who have good headphones: Count how many times you hear static and tinniness at a fourth or fifth of your player’s maximum volume. It could be anywhere as high as a couple hundred times (the vocals of 涙のソリチュード and every other piano note in 蜃気楼) or a few times, with those few times consisting of prolonged periods of droning static (The eternity stay with and 哀、揺れて・・・). It’s generic, uninspired, lazy, one-bit rock and eurotrash arrangements playing over a wall of static. I guess you could say it was dirtied. With loudness.

Even if it wasn’t on the dark side of the Loudness Wars, TatshMusicCircle is still a bad circle. It shakes the senses as to how something can be boring and horrific at the same time. Even awful music isn’t dull because you are set back at the ineptitude of the people surrounding the project. TMC is unsalvageable and Far East of East III puts to rest any arguments saying otherwise.

Corky Voce - Ambient Dreamer

Corky Voce
Ambient Dreamer
[Corky Voce; 2009] 
7.6










Back when I listened to a huge pile of releases back in January 2010 from Comiket 77, Ambient Dreamer left a strong impression on me with some of the strongest tracks from the 600+ songs from the 100+ albums, EPs, singles, etc. I downloaded. The high points in Corky Voce’s debut release, I either forgot or, even worse, ignored the flaws that plague the album from being the best release from December 2009’s Comic Market.

Ambient Dreamer is an album that knows damn well what to do two-thirds the time, but is far too timid to carry it all the way each time or gets so caught up in what it’s doing that it goes overboard the other third. I’m going to hazard a guess that they like vocal manipulation software. Layered recordings (マトリョーシカ), echoes (Inner Heart), fidelity (楽園 -シントニック・コンマ-), a very-light pinch of the robot-voice effect that’s is on every other song in Daft Punk’s Discovery (practically every song), duets with second member Kei Fujiyama (Good Day), the list goes on. While Sayaka Horise does have a good mellow voice, the moment she makes her pitch higher is when everything falls apart.  If you have ever listened to Radiohead, you might have noticed that with each passing release, Thom Yorke sounds whinier and whinier to the point of annoyance. Now imagine that but higher pitched and more irritating.

That’s right. Sayaka Horise is trying to out-Thom Yorke Thom Yorke.

What genre is Ambient Dreamer? Hard to tell because they get around to various sounds, such as the paint-by-the-numbers J-Rock (いざない), post-hardcore (Ambient Dreamer), Hard Rock (マトリョーシカ), etc. This is no surprise to anyone who has known the groups past contributions and their flexibility.

The songs themselves range from great to mediocre, and the reasons behind it being mediocre make you sincerely wish it was crap. However, don’t fret because it's still one of the most solid releases from the 77th Comic Market. 風車 has a childish nostalgic feel to it and a solid musical transition. The piano melody of 楽園 -シントニック・コンマ- would fit perfectly at one of those retro soda shacks and is the one time that Horise’s high pitched squeals work and would blend into the song list of pop’n music perfectly. マトリョーシカ is my personal favorite track with a Barracuda-esque opening rhythm, a post-punk touch, and guitar solos that are just as catchy as the lyrics, and blueNote’s opening could very well be a darling homage to Endroll by Mass of the Fermenting Dregs. Despite the name, title track Ambient Dreamer doesn’t have even a shred of ambience in it, but has guitar work that sounds like a really clean Number Girl. Hell, Inner Heart sports more of a dreamy vibe by simply having a soft guitar with a bit of reverb.

It’s so weird to think that the songs that I’m practically tripping over myself to praise share the same compact disc as those that feel like B-Side material or have such a sudden change at the halfway point it will have you eyeballing your media player in amazement as the track number stays the same when it clearly is an entirely new song altogether. 蝶’s first third says “I’m easy-listening with a traditional Japanese influence”, while the other two-thirds sounds like BeForU if they were more intricate.  いざない displays the nadir of Horise’s vocal talents, and Good Day’s mellow stride is constantly interrupted by angst-stained squawks that should have been its own song.

I want to love everything about this album, but it has many missteps and songs that stick out like a sore thumb that would be suited for a more light-hearted release. It’s difficult to not be tsudere for Corky Voce’s debut. Instead of scrapping the laid-back records, we get these weird bipolar vocoded Frankensteins. Maybe next time Sayaka Hirose and Kei Fujiyama will learn to correct the mistakes made here and polish their strong suits. Looking over the flaws, what makes this album so strong is that it stands out from many other doujin releases by besting most circles in technical skill, production, and being damn catchy. Ambient Dreamer is a collection of songs with radio-appeal, which is surprising because so few circles lack such gusto to be talented and daring while still being accessible.

Sharpnelsound - m1dy - Speedcore Dandy

m1dy
Speedcore Dandy
[Sharpnelsound; 2002]

6.6








Speedcore is not a popular genre whatsoever. Even in the rather small world of hardcore techno, it is looked down upon by many groups. Most of the time, it is written off as a bunch of aspies playing around with drum machines under a “Let’s see how fast this fucker can go” mindset, throwing away rhyme and reason and taking a huge shit on music theory and melody while searching for youtube videos and torrents of B-Grade horror movies and low key electric guitar noodling. The result: One’s ears being blasted with a firehouse of bass beats and sped up samples that most would only find a few notches more bearable than noise music.

This album needs no introduction. Speedcore Dandy comes up very quickly in speedcore discussions. It’s practically one of the hallmarks of doujin music. It embodies everything I have listed in the opening paragraph. m1dy’s widely-considered magnum opus is a pillar proving the nicheness of the genre. Who could blame people for riding off stuff like this as a clusterfuck of breakbeat drills and blasts, bordering between torturous and annoying?

Talking about the songs do very little to describe the songs on the album. The standard tempo for the genre makes it difficult to have much variety because speedcore, as the name implies, IS FUCKING FAST. It doesn’t have time to build its way up or any of that pussy shit. It laughs at the idea of a patient and orderly line and instead bum rushes the senses right off the bat. Take the title track Speedcoredandy for example: Opens right up with a machine gun of distorted deep bass, only taking a breather at the one-third point to kick back up thirty seconds later. Reaf is the first track where I was able to get an idea as to just how fast it was going. Crash is the poster boy for all of the tropes for Speedcore that people jeer at. The lo-fi production of Midi Anarchism obscures the breaks and beats into some unholy drum machine orgy, and Kimoneverybody sounds like an abstract noise session turned into a legit jam. Closer Destruct is arguably the most tame song on Speedcore Dandy and is my personal favorite on the album, almost as if it was a song several minutes longer slashed down to 93 seconds, leaving us with the best parts.

Speedcore Dandy treads between energizing and irritating, giving almost a perfect split of invigorating and Goddamn obnoxious tracks. It’s a pretty good starting place for those interested in exploring the Speedcore genre (the questions “Who?” and “Why?” are anyone's guess). This might change a small audience of peoples minds about the genre being complete trash, but it certainly won’t change the stereotypes that it carries eight years after being released. To call it “better than most speedcore” isn’t much of a compliment, or probably even a true statement.

DDBY - Highway2

Bizen
Highway2
[DDBY; 2010]

6.2









I cannot deny that the circle DDBY can produce some classy-ass shit. If all of the music in the world as opposed to two-thirds of Comiket were just Touhou arranges, Bizen would be listened to by gentlemen in top-hats sitting by the fire in their lavish chairs as tall as thrones sipping pricey brandy and wine while polishing their monocles while pulling out the 78 RPM Touhou Synthesis set (assuming we all don’t hang ourselves from their being only two-hundred fifty-something or so songs ever made and billions of arranges of each first).

In late June, DDBY has released their third album of 2010. Likewise with the original Highway, Highway2’s arranges are based off the spinoff game starring Aya Shameimaru, who has been scorned and loved by many, either as a borderline-Tabloid reporter in canon, or as a cumdumpster by fanon. The original Highway were arranges of Shoot the Bullet, so now we are treated to remixes of Double Spoiler tracks. Based off Modern Youkai Colony, opener City is your standard jazzy liquid funk that we have come to know and love from Bizen. Piano Soon somehow sounds even more eastern than The Mystery in Your Home Town and sedates the original track’s hectic tempos with chilled out cheery flutes. Nemesis’s Stronghold is remixed twice on this album, with both arranges averting the usual formula Bizen has been known for in his past releases. Syncopation implements rough percussion and high-spirited synths reminiscent of Yellow Magic Orchestra and Square Night sounds like primitive instrument mimicking music programs and club music where funk is locked into combat with techno. Based off Bell of Avici ~ Infinite Nightmare and closer Auto Pilot is guitarist Takayan’s moment to shine, but even coupled with the spastic at first glance breaks, it still doesn’t save the arrange from sounding like something I’d hear playing on The Weather Channel.

Highway2 has no actual misfires but suffers from the never-changing drum line which comes off as tragically generic and seldom changing, similar to TS5. The breaks feel like they were made in a short amount of time and pushed out the door. The blandness is hidden by the instrumentals huddling together around it to keep it out of main sight, but every once in a while someone drops their amber-stem pipes and exposes the weakest part of the drum and bass offshoot remixes: The drum and bass itself.

Hardcore Technique - DJ Technorch - Gothic System ~Trancecore meets Gabber~

DJ Technorch
Gothic System ~Trancecore meets Gabber~
[2005; Hardcore Technique]

9.3

No, I am not reviewing the remixes, because they could be their own separate release, and honestly, I don’t feel like analyzing five versions of Gothic System when there are eight tracks made by the man who single-handedly got me interested in doujin music: DJ Technorch. After listening to his free downloads, I went through a Japanese Hardcore Techno faze which took around two or so months to snap out of, only to realize that most of it is generic and all of it doesn’t even deserve to be placed under the same classification as anything DJ Technorch has made, much less have the honor to piss a urinal away from the man.

Gothic System ~Trancecore Meets Gabber~ is the first full-release album by DJ Technorch, featuring eight glorious tracks that still srand unparalleled by not only the hardcore techno scene, but the whole doujin community as a whole, and five remixes you wouldn’t bat an eye at as soon as you separate them from the preceeding tracks so as they don’t get dirt on the real meat of the CD, which I will at times find myself repeating after finishing. What separates Gothic System from your average hardcore techno release is that it’s not just hardcore and no song can be pigeonholed into one genre. The Cosmosmith opens up quietly and slowly unveils itself with fast, intense melodies and breakbeats, all the while losing none of its tranquility. The minimal oddball Machine’s EXtream boarders between ambient techno and psychedelic experimentation.

While many “J-Core” artists will constantly bust out the “HARDCORE NEVA DIES”, you can find Technorch sampling speeches by Malcolm X over breaks accompanied by low-tone piano chords in opening 極楽鳥 (Oldskool Mix). Title track Gothic System keeps repetition fresh through effectors, turning a normal synth melody into something fluid and lucid. Even the drum machine-centric 暗転 leaves a number of producers in the dust. PARANOiA TCN 〜Dirty Mix〜, a definite nod to the KCET mix from 2nd Mix Plus, is the most traditional remix of PARANOiA we have had in years from someone who has been apart of any Bemani project.

No song tries to be a Hardcore anthem or displays passive Tourettes through sampling.  DJ Technorch is a man who goes on producing songs and ignoring the trends, the tired tropes, the clichés that swallow up many of the “artists” today in the hardcore techno scene. Even on an off day, Technorch can still take groups and artists like DJ Sharpnel and P*Light to school and even leave competents like REDALiCE, M-Project, USAO, and kors k a damn good lesson. Gothic System ~Trancecore Meets Gabba~ is one of the very few doujin releases that I can point at saying "this album as got balls", throwing in minimal, ambient, and hardcore onto the same compact disc. If you start out with J-Core with this artist like I did, you will be most likely setting yourself up for heartbreak if you're pinheaded enough to find someone like him.

CPY - CPY～はじめてのサンプルCD～

CPY

CPY～はじめてのサンプルCD～

[CPY; 2010]
0.0

















Regardless of how bad your typical Touhou doujin album is, they are at least trying to resemble the melody of your favorite songs as they savagely beat it with no remorse. You can look back on most bad remix albums and say "Yeah I don't like it, but that's because it didn't appeal to me. I am sure this might be somebody's cup of tea, but just not mine". I hate pre-Strawberry Jam The Ramones, Burzum, and a bunch of other bands and music groups, but I can fathom somebody getting a kick out of them for whatever the reason. There is no album I have come across sans the likes of brokeNCYDE where I would aggressively assert that you would have to be batshit insane or live in a parallel world where trite music is like Brian Eno until now.

CPY～はじめてのサンプルCD～ is guilty of every crime you can commit against music: Terrible mixing, below bedroom production values, boring riffs, tone deafness, the inability to sing, and having the gall to announce this as a teaser for an album which will be released four months from now. This album wouldn't get a trial or wait on death row, but instead would be shot in the head upon sight without hesitation.


Now upon listening to East on Light, you might be like me thinking that the way the painfully synthesized violin sounding like it's being sodomized by a tiger is CPY's attempt to be obnoxiously quirky or avant-garde. The moment that talk-in-a-half-assed-sing-songy voice kicks in, you start to honestly start wishing he was being artsy and pretentious as opposed to sonically butt-fucking A God That Misses People ~ Romantic Fall with a condom lined with razor blades. After those 114 seconds coming to an end after going on for two minutes too long, we are treated with the 70-second ear sodomy dubbed Love Bomb, which takes the already criminally overrated and remixed Flowering Night to the nadir that it has been striving toward since August 2005. I am at a loss as to describe the most unconvincing guitar opening other than an off key carousel burrowing its way to Hell in hopes that it can fall in the fires of the damned and end its miserable life. The vocals are not only off key, but also off tempo. By this point, you would swear that CPY is honestly fucking around with us and holding back his laughter each time someone came up to him at M3-25 purchasing his craft work, which was probably done in a single sitting with no retakes or planning. The final "sample" is 空白回想, where he is now performing a hit job on Tabula rasa ～ 空白少女 from The Phantasmagoria of Dim. Dream, complete with your stereotypical metal kick drum-heavy line. It figures that one of the only times a PC98 songs gets attention, it gets stuck in the biggest troll doujin album of the year so far.

The last track on the album 東○大運○会 実況中継 appears to be CPY talking with his friends for 15 minutes from what sounds like through a 360 headset, most likely chatting about how much the people who bought this are complete suckers for Touhou remix albums and how they'll still probably purchase the full version at Comiket 78 even though it's an unredeemable 4 minutes of hell, making the idea of putting a stethoscope on the amp during a Swans concert sound tempting as permanent deafness is the only guaranteed escape from the full release of CPY～はじめてのサンプルCD～ coming August 2010. It's music like this that I use to propose that there can be no God, and the only consolation is that I see them struggle on how there can be an all-loving creator who would allow this to be exposed to any kind of public.

ALiCE'S EMOTION 2009 - Chaos Flare/COLORS/Lycoris/Sphere Caliber

 

ALiCE'S EMOTION

Chaos Flare/COLORS/Lycoris/Sphere Caliber

[ALiCE'S EMOTION; 2009]

3.5 / 4.7 / 8.3 / 7.5

REDALiCE has always been one to release a lot of albums in a year's time. Back in 2008, he put out seven, and six the year before. This does not mean he's slowing down, as he still makes appearances on other doujin albums left and right, churning out hardcore techno at a miraculous consistent pace. When he wasn't sticking his head into every hole he could find, he and circle co-founder Ayumi Nomiya were making and releasing four Touhou remix albums, each of which was released a few months separate at one another.

There is so little of interest about Chaos Flare that it actually leaves me a tad red-faced that I have nothing to say. I personally blame myself for going backwards from the releases, with Sphere and Lycoris making CF look completely boring to listen to by comparison. I guess color me wrong for saying Mizuhashi Jealoussic Park, which was kidnapped by IOSYS for their 2010 release, was from a better album, because CF is worse than Toho Ageha.

COLORS is a vast improvement on Chaos Flare, but also falls victim to having most of the album easily forgettable. If you have heard one vocal remix of Necrofantasia, you’ve heard them all, and Sleeping Beauty is nothing special. Artificial Flower Garden is the musical equivalent of chronic masturbation, always edging but never climaxing. Don’t let the guitar credits for title track COLORS lead you to believe we are getting something special, as it’s just monotonous chords that don’t really contribute anything to the song. Taken out of the context of being on an ALiCE EMOTION release, the electro-house Elebreaka could be mistaken as something made by Traffic Jammies. Tears Doll uses what I like to call “manipulating vocals to sound as artificial and whiny as fucking possible” technique, which combined with Michiru Kaori’s shrill squekly vocals, makes it the worst track out of the thirteen on here by miles. COLORS is filled with some hits and a lot of misses.

An aggressive sound made pretty with joy-filled vocals in Fallen Flower and un;balance, high-spirit synths in lolite, pretty percussion in Alkaloid and a hint of mischief in Morphine. The outer-worldly drones and synths of Hidden Radiance, Magical Higan Tour 2009’s ambient to breakcore blasts, and Oriental Darkcore’s buildups add a feel of mystery and suspense. Despite the rather dark and grim cover, the sound Lycoris boasts is of that that leans more towards celebration than of an ill omen while still being on the lookout.

Given the reputation that doujin has when it comes to vocal tracks, you have every right to be cautious, especially when they are apart of more than half the track listing much like Chaos Flare. Sphere Caliber is the most mellow out of the four releases, with trance being prominent. If you can pardon a bit of moe-ish voice, Ghostly Parapara Ship (Hardcore Edit) uses vocals as a necessity rather than a tag-on to conjour the energy needed for this fist-pumping speed rave. PsychoSniper and under the black, over the shine have better vocals than the aforementioned track, but are musically weaker. Searching For... has more of a lounge groove, making it kind of like the black sheep. REDALiCE goes back to a more light-hearted sound with Heian Inferno and Law Field resembling tracks on Angel Rings more than Crimson Hardcore. Magnolia is THE JAM OF A LIFETIME a masterpiece of bouncy hardstyle. If all of the tracks were up to par with REDALiCE's material, Sphere Caliber would effortlessly outshine Lycoris, but there is so much baggage and dead weight that it hurts the overall quality of the final release of 2009 (seriously? P*Light? Are you bullshitting me?).

With each passing release, an evolution in sound is apparent. There is an awareness that if they keep going along with the same basic structures, Akai Hito and Ayumi Nomiya would be pigeonholed as dime-a-dozen J-Core hacks. It might be the guest-star artists influencing them, or perhaps a sudden burst of inspiration with the release of UFO, but I can see the boldness developing gradually, hopefully promising a better future for the circle and the artists who hop on board, making remixes together in the not-so-distant future, possibly influencing a new route to follow. I cannot help but feel a tad optimistic.

Phonotaxis - Phonography

Phonotaxis

Phonography

[Phonotaxis; 2008]

4.9

I must admit I found this because of Doujincore, a site that uploads doujin music X times (read: whenever the fuck they feel like it) a week. The only reason I bothered listening to this as because of the main post having the words “This is not the shit I’m looking for.”. Given the heavy bias for J-Core on the site, I decided to download this for shits and giggles, hazarding the guess that it was probably ambient or mellow, and I hit the nail on the head. Still, I wondered why the hate right off the bat, as much worse shit has been shared on their servers for seven days, more deserving of verbal assault, so only why do they feel to call out an album now?

All of the tracks have a bit of ambient influence in them, but utilize it in different ways. flashback utilizes instrumentation and vocals, but feels too uniform to prove of any interest. The polyrhythm drum and bass sections in the second half of bulbous scape overshadow the forgettable first two and a half minutes. harmonoise desperately tries hide the fact that the piano playing is dry, lifeless, and forgettable with crackling static. Despite being the longest song on the album clocking in at over eight and a half minutes, tight light go space has neither buildup or payoff and even less variation. orange is the highlight and the keeper of the release, implementing jazzy rhythms and instrumentation styles with soft synths in background. One of my biggest issues with Phonography are the inconsistent pause times between songs, with some ranging between 5 seconds to a near whole minute.

So nearly 40 minutes of music later, I finally find the answer to the question I asked myself earlier: It’s because it wasn’t lively enough like their precious J-Core. These are the same people who turned their nose up towards the zenith of C77 SUBHUMAN while not batting an eye at an extratone-heavy fecalrocket like PURE EXISTENCE. I can just see them rolling their eyes while groaning when having to upload something that doesn’t average 170 BPM. What rational reason would their be to let a whole load of crappy albums slide without a well-deserved slap upside the head and feel the need to call out something like Phonography that is merely mediocre at worst? Genre-racism.

Blck Onyx - DiGiTiZED FAiRiES

Black Onyx

DiGiTiZED FAiRiES
[Black Onyx; 2010]

5.7

I don't get three-flavor ice cream cases at all. I mean, I can understand the concept behind them, but just how many people buy them because there live with several different people in a house, each of whom don't like certain "basic" flavors, and just how in the name of hell is a third of a case satisfactory? Too much for one bowl, and not nearly enough for a second serving the time after. It leaves you unsatisfied unless you aren't too picky and would eat the other flavors (or perhaps take from the other flavors as well). And so this is exactly my beef with DiGiTiZED FAiRiES, the ultimate example of a Touhou remix album that is basically a three flavor carton of ice cream, being a third Trance, a third hardcore, and a third DURRHURR (or mint strawberry pineapple blueberry all in one).

The first third consists of trance tracks such as the reverb-heavy opener Milky Child. セプテットテープセット throws acid onto the field, with a start abusing various effectors at the start before becoming fairly standard afterwards. Flandre Underground Rave Party!is the highlight of the album, feeling like a track you would hear at a club by not being too direct of a remix with an explosion of energy at the end, and FLANDRE SCALET as our piece of Engrish for the album as a bonus.

The middle is the weakest portion, being entirely hardstyle tracks. saw-soul thundering bass drowns out the more subtle layers. TRAUMA MUThAfUckA and cruel punisher use samples that anyone who has looked into the Japanese Hardcore scene for more than an hour would immediately recognize. cruel punisher is the best song of the three, borrowing breakcore and trance elements, but it's not saying a whole lot. もふもふ, frankly, baffles me as to what to label it as, with quiet melodies and distorted uplighting drones done in the form of ambient, and a deep bass seen in techno techno but at the tempo of hardcore. ?63HiiraossHuikgoeH53? corporates breakcore, chiptune, many shifts between various instruments, tempo shifts, etc. that makes it stand out the most from the nine, but in the end come off as an abandomed clustefuck that could be passed off as a B-Side track on ABT&HM(P). Code Red Biological 2010 is another remix of U.N. Own was Her? and is significantly weaker than Party Rave, but still has a fantastic buildup with increasing beats, musical layering, and fade-ins.

What we have here is not an album, but three collective extended plays aimed at different audiences. If you like trance, the first half is for you. Hard style nut? Dig into the center. Want a mish-mosh or a surprise? Skip to the seventh track and leave the player on until the end of the album. If you like all of them, you're mostly like going to find something you like out of this.

Subroc Records - SUBHUMAN

Subroc Records

SUBHUMAN

[Subroc Records; 2009]
9.1









One thing to get out of the way: This is NOT a remix album. It may look like one, it has a strong vibe like one, but all 14 tracks are not based directly off of any song from Serial Experiments Lain, but are instead original tracks inspired from the widely-praised cyberpunk masterpiece made in the late 90s. This must mean we are in for some quiet, calming, ambient pieces, right? Wrong again. SUBHUMAN is inspired from SEL from the atmosphere the soundtrack provides, but for the most part takes a sharp turn, trading in eerie drones for industrial breaks with dark ambient soundscapes abound.

Opener Depesonalization completely shatters the average SEL track length of around 80 seconds, clocking in at more than six and a half minutes with curling low-bass drones, static, and lo-fidelity sampling. The darker, more beat-oriented Re:Duvet starts out as a freestyle rap duet growing into an aggressive breakbeat rock ballad. The Accelerator contradicts every song on the original Lain soundtrack while still capturing the feeling of anxiety with it’s fast, loud, panic attack-induced bass trills that would later on swim from one ear to the next in yoshihisa nagao. Memory takes a note from noise rock distorted guitars and vocal implementation while unwavering from its ballad song structure. hello, weaher evolves from a quiet piano track to a trill-heavy marriage between a samisen and a guitar.

On the subject of dance-style tracks, Bolt opens up as a space ambient techno club jam with a glitch-chime middle, finishing up as a drill and bass-meets-breakcore riot. Protocol In Dub brings the vibrating bass of dub into the Dark Ambient world of Subroc Records founder 3x6, proving to be the only song ever made where I can tolerate wobbling bass. The tracks that ground itself deepest into the more wallpaper music feel of the series include subconscious image and Wired_lainのいる世界, both mostly made up of minimal drones and sprouting beats at the two-third point. The album finishes up with a Bonus Track, an accoustic version of a vocal segment of Re:Duvet.

I know that there isn’t a single hint of enthusiasm throughout my painfully dull analysis, and I contribute my poor writing to the fact that I am awful at praising genius when it’s right in front of me. Out of the one-hundred plus albums I have heard from Comiket 77, SUBHUMAN is the one that comes closest to perfection. No blights to point out, nothing to nitpick, not a single worthless track to be found. “Good for a doujin album” would be an insult. “Essential doujin album” doesn’t cut it. These 74 minutes of hard hitting dark ambient mood swings has no need for such crutch-like words.  Even if it remains unacknowledged by most, this will always be the crowning jewel of the most recent Comic Market.

IOSYS - Toho Ageha

IOSYS
Toho Ageha
[IOSYS; 2010]

4.3








Marisa Stole the Precious Thing: The doujin anthem we love and/or hate that introduced many westerners (and possibly Japanese people) to the Touhou series. “Overdrive” (as dubbed by Americans): The birth of EASY MODO, still used when anyone dare mentions they have starting to play the (by typical shmup standards) entry-level bullet hell. Cirno’s Perfect Math Class: The spitting image of what every “primary” fan hates. IOSYS has had a strong impact on the memes, the behaviors of the fanbase, and, arguably, one of the only reasons why there are westerners who ever found themselves giving a flying-fuck about the one-man project series. It’s been quite a while since ARM, miko, and co. have cooked up something worthy of a laugh to some and to stand as the manifestation of the “true fans” hatred. Their solution to following up such infamous videos: Terribly dull parodies, cherry-picking other peoples shit off of other albums, and juvenile humor.

Toho Ageha is 25 minutes of parodies, with the not so subtle, Engrish-laden bitchslap to the ears Letty Whiterock Rock You!, the Tarou homage/failed attempt to create another memetic anthem Captain Murasa's Ass Anchor, which is enjoyable in a way you are always red-faced when listening to kind of way (probably because Murasa’s theme is the bees knees as is), along with an ARM arrange, who should really sing more songs because it gives me a chuckle, kind of like what Akira Yamaoka would sound like if he were a dime-a-dozen J-Rock vocalist who washes his throat with liquid angst. I must admit, I do applaud Convictor Yamaxanadu! for being one of the most creative ways to basically have a flag reading “Pendulum sucks!” even if that was not their intention.

Tenko's Love Domination from Below! Excla-lala& love-me-tion! would have worked better as a short drama track at half the length, seeing as how it’s smack in the dead center of the album, instead changes back and forth better a deluge of puns and singing. Taking up 10 minutes (and being the two longest tracks), Mizuhashi Jealoussic Parkmusic and Hinarin's Relation of Misfortune appear to have been kidnapped from what I assume to be better albums. MJP changing between drum and bass, breakcore, and hardcore with youtube poop-esque vocal pitch shifts and cuts whenever miko isn’t talking like an office worker who has downed a whole pot of coffee and hasn’t slept in three days days or screeching like a banshee. HRoM is better, boasting strange transitions, with the highlight sections having a 4/3 hardcore swing-like groove, which are tragically short-lived.

Toho Ageha is already long forgotten by fans. The best stuff could use some tweaking with musical and vocal direction, and the worst just cannot be saved. Being only 15 minutes of content made for the album (12 if you disregard ARM’s rendition of Ass anchors), every minute counts. Their big song of the album Ass Anchor is still better than their other meme milestones musically, now only survives because of everyone making fun of it’s lazy, slapdashed, and down-right crapass flash quality. It’s rather funny just how well that video managed to sum up the at-the-time forecoming Toho Ageha.

Mushi/Lumpy/Musique Concrète - A Bug, Touhou, and Honey Milk (Poisoned)

 

Mushi/Lumpy/Musique Concrète

A Bug, Touhou, and Honey Milk (Poisoned)

[ Mushi/Lumpy/Musique Concrète; 2006]

9.0

For a fan of DnB, especially of the experimental variety, Comiket, Reitaisai, etc. prove to be a barren wasteland for fans of the genre. However, every now and then, an album like A Bug, Touhou, and Honey Milk (Poisoned) will be unearthed, perhaps several years after the original release date. Drum and bass and ambient is freakishly hard to come by as is in the doujin community, much less an entire Touhou remix album dedicated to the genre(s).

The nature of the album is mostly rooted in breakbeats while being remarkably diverse. The album opens up with Ultimate☆8bitCrash's chiptune breaks. Deep Forest exchanges chiptune for ambient featuring breaks and beats which are reminiscent of µ-Ziq’s Mouse Bums from Bilious Paths, and ぶれいくこあ? sounds like a ragtime performance gone awry. 最モ危険ナ童遊ビ is basically what Kid's Festival ~ Innocent Treasures would have sounded like if Venetian Snares did the music for Perfect Cherry Blossom. misT is a cluster of drill and bass blasts and scratchy distorted melodies, which, quite frankly, becomes dull quickly while 門番の知られざる17年 -E't'B- proves interesting despite being done in a similar style.

This album also has remixes of remixes, such as the high point of this release dnabgub kaerB, which knows not the meaning of the word "calm" and greets you by kicking you in the fucking face with a chaotic splicing job of JAZZ 2005’s 我儘お嬢様の為の Bigband, making it sound so different that one could confuse it as an original track for the first half out of the context of the album. The closing track Cirno foolish! is also a remix of a remix of Scarlet Destiny’s Cirno Stylish, featuring much cleaner sample rips than the former, mixed in with somewhat lo-fi breaks and synths.

The album takes detour from the drum and bass breaks and trades it in for a more ambient feel with wwrriiggggllee, which is tied with dnabgub kaerB for my favorite, but is on the complete opposite end of the music spectrum, being an ambient piece with intensive sampling (one of which being David Bowie's Neuköln of "Heroes" fame) and no beats. The following track tele-phony terror (i wanted to believe it) is on the same page, but develops a beat after scaring the piss out of you. The soft glitch Enter Fire Power begins the transition that leads us out of the atmospheric nature of the previous two tracks.

After three tracks, we are brought back to chiptune breaks with 夜折り折り折り折り折り, only for Unlimited Voyage 1480 to throw us a curve ball by giving us another remix of a remix, this time being of hardcore artist t+pazolite’s Unlimited Spark!, featuring the same editing styling seen from dnabgub kaerB mixed with a Hardcore bass beat. Preceding Cirno foolish!, we have DEMY, the poster boy of the album providing us with various genre elements we have experienced from the past dozen tracks.

Now that we have an idea what you will be getting into when listening to this album, how does it stack up musically? In my opinion: Really damn well. It might be me just getting tired of the dime-a-dozen trance and rock arranges out there, or perhaps it’s because I have a very biased favoritism for experimental drum and bass artists like Squarepusher and Aphex Twin, but this was like an oasis in the middle of a desert for me. With fourteen tracks and a wide variety of genre fields covered, it can withstand multiple listens, which is just as important as simply being a good album, and with a length of nearly an hour, it needs to be varied. Any other album of similar length rooting itself in a single genre would be hurt from replaying. The track order in A Bug, Touhou, and Honey Milk (Poisoned) changes it up enough to remain appealing from start to finish.

The abrasive and bipolar nature of ABT&HM(P) traps your attention in a vice grip and puts you on a wild journey that very few doujin albums can provide. Even if you disregard "doujin standards", it's fucking remarkable. This is just not your typical Touhou remix album, but also a 57 minute-long lecture on what remixing should be: Breaking songs down and rebuilding them from the ground up as you see fit.

WAVE - Morrigan - Monolith "II"

Morrigan

Monolith"II"

[WAVE; 2010]
8.8



Doujin music is not a very profitable business, and while it is hard to make big money off of, it's even harder to become a big name in the community with the "big names" seemingly chosen at complete random. With the release of Monolith "II", we are greeted with a piracy warning on the back of the CD:

It is no surprise that music piracy is a problem in the doujin music community, as the artists are releasing music for a profit, just like everyone else. However, I have never recalled a time when a circle spoke out against music thief, and WAVE is so far one of the only circles to date to put an anti-piracy warning on their releases to date.

The three-track Monolith "II" is so ambitious for a self-release that it would be forgivable to mistake him for being under a label. It opens up with the ethnic-dance jam Reventon, which puts the listener off-guard when the deep pulsating yet relaxing bass of Peak Lounge. The title track Monolith "II" has a heavier bass with breaks and ambient drones and synth melodies, one-upping the likes of The Flashbulb by doing the one thing he could never accomplish: Dedicating enough time to a track for it to actually evolve.

With the amount of effort put into these 19 minutes and 47 seconds of music, it becomes very easy to see why WAVE are so pissed off. We all have heard a number of boring and run-of-the-mill doujin albums that are just so typical, uninventive, and a chore to listen to that we feel no guilt for not throwing so much as a penny into their rattling cup for smearing our car windows with wet newspaper. Morrigan has not only cleaned out windshield, he has also vacuumed the interior, waxed the rims, fixed the dents, and got rid of the Lord knows how many scratches on the side door. When you try this hard and nobody gives you a dime, you have a right to be pissed off, so rain hell down upon me for getting this off of mediafire!

Blasterhead - Blasterhead Works 1995-2003

Blasterhead
Blasterhead Works 1995-2003
[Blasterhead; 2003]
5.0





I remember listening to Blasterhead's first original album back several months ago, gnashing my teeth after every track, criticizing the fuzzy recordings, and the abuse of the hardcore bass beat for track after track after track. I dismissed it as complete and utter garbage and a ghastly selection of songs for one to choose for their first album. Upon a second listen, I have grown fond of several of the tracks. However, enjoying five or six tracks out of sixteen doesn't really bode well, since that still leaves you with the other two-thirds being hard to keep down inside my "J-Core"-jaded stomach.

Much like the chillout/ambient techno Retake and the dnb/breakbeat sora nuxx, BW95-03 takes a different direction with the genres prominently displayed, with hardcore/acid techno being dominating the 67 minutes on the compact disc. Guitar loops play a huge part in BW 95-03, including in the acid techno opener Shadow Under The Shadow. If you hate Alec Empire, don't feel ashamed if you skip Pop Chaser, Hurry Up Pizza Boy, Do It Runrun, and Friendship. Coastal Waters And Wood gives listeners a vague idea of what to expect from sora nuxx. After we take another acid techno detour with Girls On The Palmtop, we return to hardcore. R-99 is strikingly similar to Do It Runrun if slowed down, and the resemblance 4M L.E.D.-G vs GUHROOY's ErAseRmoToR maXimUM is humorous. The jewel of the album Fire's bass drills are delicious, and Close Your Eyes (GB Edit) proves that chiptune can have pretty music as it fades in and out, bringing Blasterhead's first real release to a close.


This isn't anywhere close to as bad as I recalled it being, but it's still a far cry from his future releases like the two albums mentioned early on in the review and Killbots EP if you are a fan of chiptune. To those who were unimpressed with BW, give the other releases a chance. You may be pleasantly surprised.

Sharpnelsound - Mad Breaks

DJ Sharpnel
Mad Breaks
[Sharpnelsound; 2005]
8.0






I have never liked DJ Sharpnel. They're overhyped, mediocre, and ride on a the gimmick non-genre "lolicore". They're are far better J-Core artists out there. DJ Technorch has made great song after great song, and was my gateway to doujin music. REDALiCE isn't all that, but he has Angel Rings and a few decent arranges backing him up. USAO wrote some pretty nice shit for USAO CD vol. 3, I enjoyed Roughsketch's 108 Sketches, along with t+pazolite work on the same album and neetmania. I guess what I'm trying to say is that nearly everyone can have one time they do something right, and for Jea and Lemmy, that release is Mad Breaks, an hour long album of J-Core that actually frightens me with how good it is.

Don't get me wrong. I still hate him and his anime-clip-splicing parlor trick, but this proves to have some craftmanship put into it. It opens up with the surprisingly slow (by Sharpnel terms) Gate Of Dreams, which proves promising with not a single chipmunk-voiced sampled clip. Hot Pepperz kicks up the tempo (along with the quirkiness factor) and uses audio clips from Galaxy Angel. Zettai Remix by Society Suckers rips classical music and evolves into an audio-splicing track in the significantly more interesting second half, and we return to Sharpnel with the hardcore part-hip-hop, part-hardcore techno, and part-chiptune Star Wars homage titled Bounty Wars, followed up with the even more enjoyable hardcore rockabilly rave Complecks Baby.

You Don't Know What is the most honest song title in doujin history, as I have no clue whether it wants to be a speedcore song or a hardcore hip-hop mix. It seems to have thrown its hands in the air shouting "fuck it" and splits it 50/50. Together As One flounders with the same amen break sample we hear throughout half the album and generally has very little to offer. If you cannot tell that SF-C and SF-R are "tradional" Japanese hardcore remix of Chun Li and Ryu's theme respectively from Street Fighter II and have owned/knew someone with an SNES, you've wasted your childhood.

The out-of-place saxophone sampling and vocal rips gives Solitude Sun some personality and sophistication, which the mindless and wild Speed Disco Vol. 2 compliments it by being the exact polar opposite. The piano and synth melodies 20031023 are so out of place on Mad Breaks, you could probably fool a few people into thinking it's a Touhou remix. Although I'm not a fan of Mugenjou Project's Audiovisualism, I can easily imagine it growing on some people. The album ends on a good note with Blue Army, which actually deserves praise people give it.

I will not lie: I originally revisited this album to completely tear the shit out of it as writing a review trashing something is easier than praising it. Instead, I listened to an hour of mostly pretty great music. It balances the silliness that attracted an overseas audience while still keeping the geeky-side of the hardcore techno scene in mind. Not too stupid while not too retardedly abrasive. Instead of riding this off as a freakish fluke, perhaps I should reevaluate my stance on the most famous duo in the doujin community.

IOSYS - ごっすんリミックス アイン and ツバイン

IOSYS
ごっすんリミックス　アイン/ごっすんリミックス ツバイン
[IOSYS; 2008]
4.2/5.6

I am not a hater, nor am I a fan of IOSYS, but this is fucking bullshit. If there was a line separating "asinine but with explanation" and "complete retardation", they have purposely chosen to disregard it and run into the retard zone until they have disappeared over the horizon. I can understand a one disc remix album a year after release, but TWO discs TWO years later? It takes a lot of stones to be riding on one of the songs that put you on the doujin music map.

In 2008, the same group that gave birth to F.O.E. and Overdrive (much to your pleasure or dismay) have released the 2+ hour two disc set spanning 27 songs, all of which are remixes of Marisa Stole the Precious Thing from various groups. I have put myself through the ordeal of listening to the whole thing expecting to be showered with remixes so horrid I'd piss myself laughing, but instead was greeted with a bunch of mediocre recreations.

We kick off with a moderately enjoyable Detroit Metal version by Live House S.S.H.'s 埼玉最終兵器, and then immediately get thrown into a bunch of mediocre electronic remixes such as the rave version by 株式会社スーパースィープ's 細江慎治, taka's glitch house from Junkan Production's, typical Cis-Trance, well, trance from Technetium. dbu music's どぶウサギ brings some joy to an otherwise painful experience due with quirky sampling and general playfulness, while WAVE brought my hopes up for an ambient remix which deteriorates into half-assed drum and bass. The genre-hopping remix by Innocent Key's yohine takes a shit over everyone else on this disc, and half of that fecal matter is later eaten by Masayoshi Minoshima who rekindles my hate affair with Alstroemeria Records. After more forgettable remixes, we finally come to a close with another mediocre rendition with IOSYS superstar ARM slamming the final nail in the first disc's coffin, only to sport a shit-eating grin while purposefully hit it hard enough so that the rest of the wooden frame splits a bit, forcing us to start all over again, which unfortunately gives rise to disc two.

Thankfully, disc two is not nearly as difficult to sit through as the form compact disc, even with the edition of another song. We open up with 電開製作所's 柏木るざりん metal/hard rock cover, complete with hilarious lo-fi vocal recording and barely sounding like a remix, and then we have SOUND HOLIC who is joined by the Swing Holic Band making with their take on the track, and by "take" I really mean "insert singing into the recording in a very unconvincing style", making the listener yearn for a clean version. 999 Recordings breakcore remix DJ Technorch goes the full distance to demonstrate why he's the best J-Core artist out there and fucking floors me with not only being the best remix on here, but one of the best remixes I have ever heard in my life. It takes a so-poppy-your-jaws-starts-to-tire song into a fierce, well-mixed, abrasive, and surprisingly complex track, destroying the song and reconstructing it all the while having its roots familiar to the listener. This is why I love this man. He always goes the extra mile, even for stupid and terrible crap.

Continuing the trend of MStPT remixes that sound like original tracks with vocals inserted into them is 有限会社モナカ's 中矢博元 orchestral "remix" that comes off as stereotypically "epic". I can only imagine how at home hardcore artist/voice-sampling fetishist REDALiCE must have been, and Silly Walker's すぺらんかー must have interpreted it as a sort of challenge to see who can dick around with the vocal track the most. イオシス's D.watt, much like many of the people on disc 2, sounds like he dug through his unreleased lounge creations and layered the vocals on top of it. Much to his credit, it sounds like he spent more than 20 minutes integrating them, which is more than I can say for Shibayan from ShibayanRecords' take. bassy from Barbarian on the groove is the first people in Lord knows how long to have their remix to sound like it was made to be a remix. Innocent Key strikes again with 溝口ゆうま's genre fusions with rock such as hardcore techno bass, synthpop keyboard, turntablism, and occasional vocal distortions. We end again with another ARM "remix" (by which I mean another song with vocals thrown in). You would figure with so much hiphop funkiness, there would be more fucking around with said-vocals, but not really until the second half, which is still highly lacking.


On disc one, most of the remixes were crap ass, and on disc two, many of the tracks of the tracks barely or don't even resemble the original song they were remixing, and would have faired off loads better without miko's less than average singing voice. Get the Technorch (which is the only reason why this is getting a two and a half) and maybe two other remixes and cast off everything else and just pray that one day we'll get vocal cuts for most of the tracks on the latter half. There's probably something in this beast that someone might enjoy, but why bother getting the whole kit and kaboodle for a dumpster full of hit-or-miss mixes you'll never listen to again?