Today’s live! DIAURA x ARLEQUIN: THIS IS MY CULT Day 1 ✌️
More pics and report under the cut 👇⬇️
Day 1 of the 2Days was called 「BEHIND THE CULT[ure]」. The first half was two session bands made from the 2 bands members. 90←→00 (yo-ka and shouya, etc.) went on first and they played some covers of vk songs from those eras. Very nostalgic. I loved hearing yo-ka cover vidoll, I think it suits his voice. At one point yo-ka accidentally started singing early and interrupted nao’s guitar solo and had to apologize lol. The next band was Boy A (Aki kei and tatsuya, etc.) and they played some more well known songs. Hearing them cover pink spider was very cool. Aki was wearing a cute (Lolita inspired?) blouse and skirt and I was shocked how well it suited him 🤔
The second half was sets by each band based on requests made by the fans online. DIAURA went first. Aki came out and joined during an Insanity which featured a big gyaku-dai break 😫 I wish I was closer so I could have participated. THIS IS MY CULT was really fun, which is good because we heard it 2 more times before the night was over 😂
This was my first time seeing ARLEQUIN despite listening to them for probably ~6 years now and wow they lived up to the hype. Aki is so crazy and cool I could watch him for hours, and his screams are so good. Also I’m pretty sure he was staring directly into my soul for like 2 whole songs which was crazy intense 😳 Anyway I can’t remember which song but yo-ka came out and joined arlequin during one of their songs and it was sooooo fun seeing them interact. Aki said that Makkana USO was the number 1 requested song which I found interesting. I really like it too but I didn’t know it was that popular. Anyway Dame Ningen went hard as expected. Their outfits were some red/black old military inspired thing. Funny because the whole dictator concept is DIAURA’s thing 🤣
Show ended and we chanted for encore for what felt like forever (almost 10 mins??) before they finally came back out. They pulled some raffle numbers to give away some signed items and then they played THIS IS MY CULT again. (That song was a collaborative effort when it came out and they both released a version of it so it’s like THE diaura/arlequin song). Anyway when they played it together it was really funny because they didn’t bring out extra instruments so the guitarists from each band literally kept taking the guitars and handing them back and forth so everyone played like half the song 🤣 it was so chaotic and fun. Especially because both bands have slightly different furi for their version of the song so sometimes the crowd didn’t know what movements to do 😂
Earlier in the day I bought 1 combo cheki and I got the most insane luck because out of all the potential combos, I got both vocalists (my faves) 🥹😭
After the show I waited forever in the diaura merch line only for them to run out of cheki like 10 people ahead of me 😅 it worked out well though because I ended up buying a signed cheki of my second fave member off of a random gya for list price. I also pulled one random arlequin cheki hoping to get aki but unfortunately I got one of the band members that’s a scumbag so idk what to do it it 🤣
There’s probably a lot more I’m forgetting but I’m tired. I gotta get up and do this all over again tomorrow 🫡
livejournal is pretty dead and dreamwidth vk has kinda gone on a hiatus so I have one question guys
Do ya'll wanna make a Visual Kei Fanfiction Community here in tumblr? With of course an added discord group if we all would like!
I think it'd be nice to revive the community in some way, it'll be hard since VK is going more and more underground with less content but I think we can make it work! I'm not sure if we're big enough to make side blogs like secret santas and such, but this will be a start!
This whole sketchdump is an elaborate excuse to rec visual kei to innocent passersby xD
I'm a HUGE fan of vkei for its combination of music, fashion and makeup that creates an optical, auditory and ✨aesthetic as fuck✨experience.
Featuring:
✟ Dead Plate's Vincent in an illegally sexy outfit from a fantastic live performance of Lost November by DIAURA, a band whose name sounds like the most fancy perfume capable of making you instantly aura farm. Incidentally, their band name is short for "Dictatorial Aura". 失翼の聖域 (Shitsuyoku no Seiiki) is a required listen.
Like lordy look at this outfit, it's backless. Can you believe how beautiful vocalist Yo-ka is?? I can't either
Manon is real for voicing out my her thoughts and Rody's having a heart attack.
✟ Lucky Dog 1's Giulio biting on his glove lest he bite Gian. Ivan is my honmei but Giulio is just way too fun to draw xD. I based his look on Kaede from R-Shitei in their look for CLIMAX. (I personally am addicted to 病ンデル彼女 (Yanderu Kanojo) though!)
This is Kaede by the way and I have this image saved in my phone gallery for moral support.
This is Giulio who I also have saved for moral support directly ripped from my Lucky Dog artbook and I'd love to share the rest of it with everyone but most of the content is sus I don't own a scanner. :(
In truth, vkei has a lot of glove biting, cloth biting, member biting, glass holding, and all that wonderfully camp posing that would fit right in in JJBA.
✟ Boyfriend to Death's Lawrence and Ren as DIR EN GREY's Toshiya and Kyo.
I'm very fond of silver jewelry, floral patterns, and belts + harnesses. :D
Though it didn't happen in canon, I love the idea of Ren and Lawrence just being normal friends. Ren would be the type to share memes with Law and force him to sit down and watch anime with him. xD
I based the drawing on this post and poor Law doesn't know what "cute octopus video" is going to scar his eyes. xD Lore-accurate because Ren would 100% troll him. xD I also 100% recommend DIFFERENT SENSE but I won't be like Ren and I'll just put a simple song link...promise. If harsh vocals isn't your speed, THE FINAL, despite being a more "accessible" song, still sounds amazing after all these years.
✟ Cold Front's Winnie in a uniform from CLØWD's ANTITHESE music video. He's doing the Life Fiber Synchronization pose from Kill la Kill!
This is vocalist KØU. Ngl the first time I saw this video my eyes were blinded by the phenomenon known as ✨anime boy pretty✨ for a good 10 minutes. 🫣 Not just "pretty"...but °˖✧°˖✧~pretty~✧˖°✧˖°
Auggie on the other hand is dressed as Aoi from the GazettE in his Before I Decay look.
Don't they just look spiffy?! :D
But I do truly wonder how do vkei musicians have their costumes washed, most likely dry cleaning but you never know, industry secret right there lol. xD
✟ Sweet Pool's Zenya as Kei from DIAURA in his Black Sheep Under The Shallow Sleep outfit, which simply looks fantastic but is too intricate to draw accurately. xD Probably really hard to wash too...
Hard to wash-ness aside, the collective crush I have on this band is just getting stronger and I truly dig their music. ･ﾟ･(｡>ω<｡)･ﾟ･
Going to put another photo because I can and because goddamn they ATE with this look!! (╯✧▽✧)╯
I have very sad yet fond memories of Sweet Pool as I covertly played it during my college days, I can't quite remember how I stumbled upon it, only that I really wanted to play it. After finally getting to play and finish all the endings, I thought the absence of any truly "happy" ending made it stand out, and just hammered in how fate can be cruel, but you can still try to fight against it on your own terms. I also found the game a great lesson in empathy, as despite the horrific ends in Makoto and Zenya's routes, I couldn't bring myself to hate them, if anything I just felt sorry for everyone involved.
And that's the end of this post! I got into vkei when I was 13 years old, and it's been a constant companion of mine ever since, like holy shit I'm now 28 and 15 years wow xD. I don't consider myself an expert on it and there are still a lot of bands I have yet to try, but it spoke heavily to my rebellious side as a young teen, and to this day I feel there's nothing really quite like it. Yes, it has its roots in Western Glam Metal and artists like Queen, KISS and David Bowie are heavy influences for sure, but to me it's got such a unique identity that it's honestly its own beautiful thing to me.
TLDR: I love visual novels and men prettier than you who play hardcore music. xD
