Top 50 Progressive Idol Songs

So, I'm back once again with another of my stupidly long lists. This time, I'm choosing to list the most progressive idol songs.

Now, granted, progressiveness is a hard trait to define at the best of times. I am in the interesting situation that my three cobloggers are also big prog nerds, therefore I anticipate (and expect, don't let me down guys) some criticism regarding my choices. So, before we begin, just what is prog anyway? I had a go at explaining some of the stuff I class as prog metal here, but of course, prog metal is but a drop in the ocean. Prog is a massive sprawling genre, with nearly as many subgenres as metal. So I'll just leave you to make up your own minds on what is prog and what isn't, and get on with explaining some more of the system I've been using to determine my newest list.

This time, I started out with, once again, shitloads of idol songs. Probably approaching 1500 songs now, and I listened to all of them. I also asked Henkka for some recommendations, as he's better versed on early H!P that isn't Momusu than I am.

After that, I narrowed it down to about 140 songs which I deemed had some progressive qualities. I once again attempted using the * system to narrow it down further, but my prog-mind decided to be strict as fuck that day and wouldn't let me pick any more than 11. Not great when you're aiming for a list of 50, eh.

So, I went into my trusty Calc and stuck all the songs in. I deleted a few here and there along the way as I decided I'd been too easy on them, so my final count was 126 songs to get the 700 treatment.

Yes, the Seven Arbitrary Rankings have returned. This time, they are:

• Length


• Structure


• Timbre Spectrum


• Virtuosity


• Musical Curiosities


• Insanity


• Awesomeness

Put them together and we get 700.

Headbangeeeeerrrrr!!!!!

Babymetal's new single is out on July 4th, and today the music video was released.

My reaction?

HOLY FUCK.



Dat organ. Those choirs. THE HARPSICHORD!

Plus the metal, of course.

FAKSM #18 - It All Works Out All Right

So, my head has been slain by all the recent weird comings and goings of idol singles. All of them are seemingly summer themed, except for the Ebichuu single I spoke about not long ago. Now, when I got the single, and was highly impressed with it, one track in particular stood out to me. It was a C-side that was better than the pop/waltz/silliness A-side and the lolwtfmetal B-side.

[audio:http://www.intlwota.com/metalhead/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/Kekka-Alright.mp3|titles=Kekka Alright]

It's called Kekka Alright. It begins with an electric guitar quoting Bach's Toccata and Fugue, then flows full throttle into multilayered guitars weaving interesting patterns and delicate themes. The vocals aren't so much sung as they are spoken. The bassline takes the randomness and pulls it together into some semblance of form, and the drums are fun. The vocals become layered too at points, and the middle eight choral section is truly mesmorising. The syncopation in the chorus makes everything sound cool. The addition of brass instruments add a bit of a ska feel, and in general it's all just moderately controlled chaos. The end quotes Fur Elise (I think, though can't be sure) and then just has a girl saying "all right" with a beep. Proggy much?

This just concludes to me that the Stardust groups are, by far, getting the best songwriters at the moment. This song was written by a girl called Tamurapan (real name: Tamura Ayumi), who writes some really weird but cool songs. In addition to her, they have the madcap genius of Hyadain (aka: Maedayama Ken'ichi), the "I use everything in every genre" awesomeness of Coalter of the Deeper's NARASAKI, the occasional talents of AKIRASTAR (usually known from Buono!) and the one time epic collaboration of
godOotsuki Kenji from Kinniku Shoujotai and Ian Parton from The Go! Team. If any other idols have had such a talent lineup behind them as Momoclo and Ebichuu, I've not found them yet.

Honestly, I wish more Jpop were so epic instead of being like Momusu at the moment.

Plus AKB's recent singles mostly all sound the same (except when they play them themselves and make lots of amusing mistakes)...

Momusu's new single, mass hysteria and why I hate humanity.

So, Gaki has crawled into a retirement home, Aika has wheeled herself off to something which I'm not even sure how to sum up, and Sayu is Momusu's leader. With the average age of the group now about 15 and Sayu's randomness in charge, I was hoping for some improvement.

Now, I'll admit. I like the 9th and 10th gens. They all seem pretty fun, some are talented, and some are just insane. I was content to wait for Gaki to be dead and buried before I passed judgement on the new era.

So she's now in a coffin, and I'm passing judgement.

The new single is shit.



I go on forums, I find everyone saying how wonderful it is. I despair. It sounds like Tsunku's just found more buttons to press and given up all thought of melody or timbre, or dynamics. Let's look at the vocal melody line. It barely fucking moves. Stays on the same note for ages, and then moves maybe a semitone in accordance with the chord progression. Not that the chord progression is good, you understand.

The song is a mess. The vocoders are useless, having a voice cut to shreds and buzzing incessantly pisses me off.

This isn't so much a song as much as it is an aural nightmare. It's like partenza, just not quite as bad.

The dance seems to be the thing people are interested by, which brings me to the conclusion that it's not so much that idol music is bad, per se, it's just that the majority of people listening to it are deaf.

Idol Body Parts Top Ten Series: Part 4 - Hips Ahoy! (plus waists, bellies and navels)

So, despite me posting like a spammer on Beat Laments The World at the moment, I've not really posted much on here of late. I was planning to sort of scale back and do maybe a post per month for the near future, but that now seems pretty lackadaisical of me thus I figure I'd provide you, my few readers and many searchbots, some more fap material eye candy.

As I said last time, the fact that the feet post was leading the leg post was confusing to me. Now it's beating both legs and ass by some margin. Currently:

Feet - 2432 views.
Legs - 436 views.
Ass - 161 views.

So I guess modern tastes and acceptable fetishes might need some reconfiguring.

Anyway, recap.

• Breasts (ie. actual ones)
• DFC (delicious flatchest. Tits that ain't)
• Ass
• Legs
• Feet
• Clavicle
• Lips
• Belly/Waist/Hips/Pelvis (that general area)
• Back
• Armpits

So yes, this time it's time for the Belly/Waist/Hips/Pelvic area. Of course, some girls impress me in one aspect particularly, some evenly in several, and possibly some in all. Just to explain here, my tastes in this area are capricious at best. You will see pokable bellies and hard abs, hips that aren't and hips that could carry quindecaplets, innies and outies... Who knows. In any case, let us depart for the promised land (with no clover).

On AKB's senbatsu elections, sales figures, graduation of Maeda and all that jazz...

So, unless you've been living under a rock you'll know that AKB just released number two out of their now habitual five singles of the year. As with the past 4 years, this CD contains a voting ticket to determine the ranks and suchlike for their next single. Now, with the most popular member from last year not taking part, one wonders where her vote is going. It's obviously going somewhere, as this is probably going to be the last single she's a part of (she's graduating the day after the Tokyo Dome concerts which take place on the 24th, 25th and 26th of August, which means she'll still be a member as of the next single, but as she's not in the election she won't be in the single. Make sense?), it's got some ridiculous sales figures. 1.17million for the first day alone. Up to 1.3million by the second day.

Anyway, back to my point. The elections.

Once again, AKB fans are getting all the press for all the wrong reasons. Granted, it's not something I can really say I disagree with, I'll personally never understand the method of buying multiple copies unless they all have something different on them; buying for handshake tickets means nothing as I haven't been to Japan in four years; and the election honestly does nothing for me as I know the ones I support the most will maybe make the bottom end of the rankings if they're lucky, and my meagre salary and the slow speed of delivery between Japan and the UK renders any contribution I could make rather moot. Still, AKB have achieved quite a remarkable level of market saturation for a niche product.

When Passpo met the bassist from Jane's Addiction and a guitarist from the band of Shakira.

Or something.

So, Passpo's new single is called Next Flight, continuing the theme of flying and rock. What is slightly new is that they went to LA to film the PV, in order to achieve a feeling of "LA Metal" in the song.

They said that a famous LA Metal Musician would be in the video, which I guess is supposed to be Chris Chaney even though I wouldn't really class Jane's Addiction as metal. Josh Freese and Robin Fink were apparently also involved in the song in some way, but who knows.

The next few singles they're doing are going to be themed on locations and their music scenes, so personally I'm hoping for either some grim as fuck Norwegian Black Metal, some Brazilian Thrash, Italian Prog/Power or some Gothenburg DM. Still, the preview of the "LA Metal" song doesn't sound half bad.

So, without further ado, the short video...



Desert theme is quite cool, but for that would prefer it sound a bit more Kyuss-ish though.

Honestly, it's not metal, but it does sound like pretty anthemic rock. I think I like.

Japan's Insanely Talented Youth

So, for a while now I've been listening to a certain Japanese drummer girl on youtube. Her name is Kawaguchi Senri, she's 15, and she's probably one of the best drummers in Japan. She's apprenticed to a guy called Suganuma Kozo, who's probably one of the best drummers I've ever heard. But it reminded me of some of the outstanding talent I've seen over the years, most of it from Asia, quite a lot from Japan. So here's a bit of a breakdown for all of you interested in the next generation of musicians, all of you who have an inferiority complex about your own playing and can now be awestruck by the sight of little Japanese girls putting your 10+ years of experience to shame, and those who just want to see Japanese girls in general.

So, let's start with the first one I saw. Her name is Sara, she'd probably be 15 by now. Unfortunately she's stopped uploading videos to youtube, so I guess she discovered makeup and designer goods, but still, she had some talent when she started.

So, have some of her playing Rush to make you feel really inadequate about yourself.



So, a while goes by, then I find out about this really cool and weird type of keyboard that's only available in Japan, called the Electone. It's got 2 keyboards and footpedals, just to be really annoying, but it lets you play just about everything yourself.

So this girl does:


Yes, it's Kansas. But dude. She's also got a vid of her doing YYZ, which is awesome. Dunno why Japanese girls like 70s rock so much. Guess it's just because it's FUCKING AWESOME.

Yea, I said it.

THE Possible - ② Shiawase no Akashi review

I've decided from now on to only review one album at a time as then I get to write more posts with less content rather than the opposite. This will make me slightly more capable of writing more posts. Or so I hope. Maybe it'll just end up with me writing the same amount of posts but with a lot fewer words.

So, The Possible released a new album, a whole five years after the old one (and nearly 4 years since their last best-of slice of weirdness which I've never understood about the Japanese music industry. How in the hell can you have a best album after one album? You need at least 10 albums for that shit to work), which goes down as probably the longest wait between albums in idol music history (if it isn't, let me know.) To compare, it's about the same length of time between AC/DC and Metallica albums, but as AC/DC and Metallica are a bunch of old men with nothing new to offer, I don't understand why Tsunku hasn't got his ass into gear and given The Possible a new album (and more songs in general) much earlier. Especially considering he didn't even write half the songs on this album.

Just hope it isn't as bad as Lulu...

Shiritsu Ebisu Chuugaku

Welcome to the slightly madcap and insane world of Momoclo's little sister group...

Like Momoclo, they're all on the Stardust agency, an agency best known for throwing away talent like a 5* restaurant throws away perfectly good food. Also like Momoclo, they have the skills of Maeyamada Ken'ichi writing most of their songs for them. What follows is perhaps an experiment in minor insanity. While Momoclo seem to be naturally a bunch of spanners, probably caused by the nature of roadtripping to perform tiny concerts in a dingy little van, Ebichuu seem a bit more sane, probably due to the fact that they're all members of Stardust's 3B Junior and actually have a normal manager. As a result, their songs seem to be even more insane than Momoclo's, just to make up for it.

I don't really know much more about them that that, but this brings me to the reason I actually made this post. They're having a major label debut (DefStar, so I wonder if they'll do what they did to AKB...), and the Bside is this complete mess of a song which is fucking awesome:


私立恵比寿中学 『放課後ゲタ箱ロッケンロールMX』

Damn that's pretty metal.

The A-side, if you care, is here:


私立恵比寿中学 - 仮契約のシンデレラ [HD]

Not quite as insane, but still a bit weird, having a waltz in the middle.

Anyway, I shall be keeping an eye on these girls with great interest. Especially if they get nearly as awesome as Momoclo.

Speaking of Momoclo, I came across this heavy and grim as fuck remix of Mouretsu. Make of that what you will.