iNJAPAN

Okay, since this is fairly recent major news, I’ll start off with news about X-Japan.

For the first time since 1997, X JAPAN released a new song worldwide, called “I.V.” The song was used for the ending title of the movie SAW IV.

I did watch SAW IV, but I’m not sure if the song was used for the U.S. version too, or if it was only used for the Japan version. I think I was too horrified to have the compusure to pay attention to the soundtrack and think, “hmm.. this is the perfect song to be slicing your own face out to. I love X JAPAN!”

Anyways, X JAPAN coming back is a huge thing for me. They are the first rock band I ever loved and totally changed my life. In Japan and Korea, it’s equivalent to Nirvana or KISS coming back.
Led by visionary genius Yoshiki (piano, drums, producer), X JAPAN sold more than 20 million combined albums and singles before disbanding in 1997. The group was born as a punk metal outfit in 1982, but became known for starting what was called “Visual Kei,” or “Visual Rock.” Their music gravitated more towards a progressive sound as they matured.

Visual kei has influences of Western phenomena, such as Glam rock and Goth. For example, X JAPAN has stated multiple times that their biggest inspiration was from KISS.

Afterwards, Visual kei became a big movement in the Japanese music industry, and bands such as Luna Sea, Dir en Grey, Malice Mizer, and others gained major popularity as visual bands.
Also, it became a social movement, as fans of such bands began to dress like the bands for concerts, meet ups, and other events where they’ll see other people who enjoy Visual kei. Thus they joined in on the group of cosplayers, which are people who dress up like their favorite anime characters or band members. I’ll probably talk about cosplayers in detail in another posting.

It was heartbreaking when X JAPAN announced their disbandment, but it was even more heartbreaking when the guitarist Hide committed suicide in 1998. He was found hanged with a towel tied to a doorknob in his Tokyo apartment. Three fans died in copycat suicides, and of the 50,000 people who attended his funeral, nearly 60 were hospitalized and about 200 received medical treatment.
I was only 13 at that time, and I remember I skipped school for the first time in my life to go to a memorial service held by Korean fans. We all wore black, and burned Marlboro Reds (Hide’s favorite cigarettes) instead of incense, bowed to his picture, and shared an offering of Sake. We even put an offering of curry because that was his favorite food. OMG, it sounds so dumb now, but at that time it was a total tragedy for me, and I cried for days.

Of course, my parents severely disapproved of my taste in music. They thought I was a Satanist and believed that X JAPAN was the Antichrist. Teachers confiscated any Japanese material, and even the government had a ban against Japanese anime and music. At that time I was enraged at the closed-mindedness and conservativeness of the Korean society, but it also opened my eyes to the still-existing hostility between Korea and Japan. I guess it couldn’t be helped since Japan killed our queen in 1895 and occupied Korea until 1945.

Now that I know more about the seriousness of the issue, I understand the concern of my parents’ generation. I have also found out more shocking aspects about the Japanese culture that I was too young to know about at that time. I mean, who knew they would have a cute little bear that advocates sex with 13-year-olds?

X JAPAN’s lyrics are also shocking, but I didn’t know because, well, first, they’re in Japanese so I didn’t understand shit, and second, even when I found translations for them, they made lots of sexual references that I had no idea what they were about. Like, what the hell is an ‘electric cucumber’? Honest to God, I had no idea what they were talking about back then. I just thought, “Aww, they’re cute Japanese guys who think they’re cool when they speak English, but they don’t know they’re not making any sense.”

And I can’t deny that they kind of did have a bad influence on kids. Even in my own example, I was skipping school, and starving myself to save up lunch money to buy their albums, which were very expensive because they were banned by the government, and I had to go through illegal “black market dealings” to get real albums. Also, liking their music was the beginning for me in metal music, and led all the way to falling in love with the Super AntiChrist of the Universe, Marilyn Manson. haha.

However, disregarding the sex and violence, it also shows one of the positive aspects of Japan that I fell in love with. The openness of their culture where creative freedom is valued is very different from Korea. Also, their creativity doesn’t end with just the band. The fans contribute in their own ways by creating “fan-fiction” literature, and designing outfits and costumes. I guess that’s where Japan’s crazy design sense comes from.

Anyways, below is the link to X JAPAN’s music video for I.V., and a link to one of their old songs called “Kurenai.” For I.V., they put one of Hide’s favorite guitars on stage to remember him, and also used previously unreleased guitar samplings of Hide in the song.
Enjoy.

Kurenai