Comments on: Interview with an ex-Visual Kei record executive

By: Bread

Bread — Fri, 30 Jul 2010 19:32:45 +0000

Hahaha, after having a million people ask me, with totally straight faces, if I eat hamburgers every day (I have not eaten a hamburger in several years, mostly to avoid being stereotypical), seeing a meltdown like that over something that was obviously a joke made my day. Danke, aufgebrachte deutsche Frau

By: sephim

sephim — Thu, 29 Jul 2010 12:00:30 +0000

So, everybody who lives in Japan is Japanese… Interesting theory. Let's apply this theory to my own country of Australia and say everybody who lives here is Australian. Time to get out of my country, Aborigines.

By: Bernadette

Bernadette — Thu, 29 Jul 2010 11:48:55 +0000

Wow, what anti-social scum you are. How old are you? I bet you earn a lot of new readers with that kind of attitude. Are you Japanese? I hope you know that the Japanese were allies of Nazi Germany and we all know what kind of attitude they STILL have towards people of other races and ethnicities, right?! Haven’t learned a fucking thing, just like you!
And don’t worry, you don’t have to post info about your political leader since I already know who that is.

By: admin

admin — Thu, 29 Jul 2010 09:00:31 +0000

@bernadette: thanks for the first funny comment on this thread since May.
Usually I don’t allow VK mails from people who don’t also post about their political leaders and the decisions of those leaders, but since you’re german, i think it’s obvious, so you don’t have to say it. It can be our secret!

By: Bernadette

Bernadette — Wed, 28 Jul 2010 22:07:03 +0000

“Did you know Germans capitalize ALL nouns? Caps are a nazi plot, I tell you.”

At first I was really glad to have found your site since I find the articles I’ve read so far quite interesting, but this comment of yours really takes the cake of all the bullshit that has been written on here.
As a German I find this remark highly offensive and I find it rich that this brainless crap is coming from you since you’re the one claiming that some of the commenters here are behaving rather irrational and idiotic. Isn’t that the pot calling the kettle black?
Oh, the freedom of being the admin and thus being able to censor the bullshit of others and yet not being able to censor your own.

By: Mana

Mana — Sat, 24 Jul 2010 13:57:37 +0000

Thanks alot for this article!
A friend just linked it and it rewarded everything Ive already thought and felt about this scene.

I'm into this scene since 2004 and lived in Japan for work from 05/2008~10/2009
If you've been living over there,even though it might only be for a few months,and are into this scene for quite a long time, you shopuld be able to feel parts of this machinery.

All I wanna say is,as long as youre not a fangirl and go visit lives for members only,it's not as invisible a you think

By: Anti_JRock_Snobbery

Anti_JRock_Snobbery — Sun, 06 Jun 2010 20:32:17 +0000

I enjoy(ed) the music… But the fandom itself is rather shite. You have the normal fans who appreciate one another and are happy as a hog in slop to be able to meet other people who like the same music they do…. and then you have Fans with a capital F. The kind of fans who lay claim to a band and treat them as their own property, obsessing about every little intimate detail of the members and their personal lives, and only doing anything for them with the expectation of a reward or special treatment. These kinds of fans don't really care about the bands themselves and their music, but what kind of status they'll get as a fan. I'm so sick of hearing such types always going on and on about how they did this and they did that, they own this and they own that, they been to see such and such band 50 times over, and how they had some kind of direct link to them and how anyone who is not as fanatical a fan as they are really isn't a fan… So much hate and infighting over music and bands and all the rumor mill competitions, it kinda burns me out and really taints the whole experience and makes me wonder if it's even worth sticking around.

By: squall

squall — Sun, 06 Jun 2010 05:28:30 +0000

this interview was amazing…i´m a male brazilian vk fan, and everything that i had read here made sense…that´s why they cast sooo much singles,maxi singles,all that bullshit…here in brazil the most singers relase full albuns,and it's rare somebody relasing something with 2 songs. but what i found most ignorant is the fact that they don´t like their fans…My favorite band is called "megamasso".Their compositions are so beautiful,with beautiful lyrics and melody…but if all that stuff come out of the members of the band,if they´re free to do what they want,and they like theirs fans…i would love vk muuuch more!(they say that ryohei(the guitarrist) composes everything,but must i trust it?),anyway, that REALLY dessapointed me.
i´m gonna take care and don't support the bands buying anything of them.

By: admin

admin — Sat, 05 Jun 2010 00:38:35 +0000

@annie: I was going to delete your mail, but I’m approving it for one reason: you make your whole community look really bad, which I find amusing.

By: Annie

Annie — Fri, 04 Jun 2010 10:17:26 +0000

@admin This is probably old news, but I'd like to point out, concerning Don't want to…'s comments about the treatment of reporters, that it's pretty much standard procedure. I've been on both the organizing end & the reporter end of things and although not nearly all managements keep their bands on such a tight leash, many observe the interviews. A few do fill in when (despite of themost likely extensive training the band members get in doing interviews and 'right' & 'wrong' answers) the members fail to remember what the official opinion of the band is. It doesn't matter if you're successful or a not-so-successful band, it's more about the management. You can probably guess which companies are the most anal about this.

That's just how the business works. Interviews, for the most part, aren't supposed to be meaningful ventures into the psyche of the members, they're advertisements. Even when there's nobody watching, it's clear that for many bands the answers are for the most part trained. It would be easy to write a believable interview of a mediocre VK band without even meeting the band, as they rarely have anything really interesting to say – most likely because it's forbidden to say anything too contraversial. I'm surprised people don't know this already. I mean come on, compare a few interviews and you'll see it's mostly copy/paste.

But, you shouldn't forget there are many VK bands that actually have a lot of control on what they say & do, too! Those guys deserve much more respect than they are currently getting.

That's how you roll with them. Of course you can hit your head against the wall of Japanese stubbornness over and over again, or adjust yourself to the way they work. The latter, in my experience, is far easier and faster. So what if you die a little more inside every time you need to let go of your own ideals & plain common sense to accommodate the Japanese way of business. That's the price you pay.

Even if you'd still want me to name a politician, I'd rather not, as I'd like to stay anonymous. It's not good to say stuff like this out loud when you're still in the business.