ONMYOZA-Inyo Shugyoku (2006)
Guess you may already know them... the most successful female fronted band around here. Yet you don't see much of their stuff around, nor you get to stumble upon their CD at the shop so often - outside Japan, I mean. Almond-eyed female singers sound pretty much all the same, but ONMYOZA is a bit of an exception, since she's the prototype of them all. She's not bad at all and has a nice power. Yet on the long run her limited excursion range may result a bit tedious. This double CD is certainly a good selection of their repertoire. A perfect start for those who still ignore them, as well as a good end! You'll get what I mean!
ANIMETAL-Complete Last Live (1999)
You could take them as a joke, were it not for the awesome musicianship of the players and for the stratospheric voice of virtuoso EIZO SAKAMOTO, singer of world famous Osaka originated Anthem. And I do love his scream, one of the best - if not THE best voice in Japan. Animetal is a parodistic band, covering virtually all the most known anime soundtracks Japan-born. Those of you who got blessed by the first or second invasion of Japanese animation on TV in Europe, will certainly recognize & enjoy their themes (I still got many on 45' vinyl). But those of you who are in metal since those days (a long while ago!) will also recognise a mountain of other references... Helloween, Maiden, Metallica, AC/DC. You lucky bastards won't probably understand a shit of the Japanese singing, so most of the tracks may not sound so booring to you, as they often do with me! But just in case, be carefull to ABSOLUTELY check out track 08 (Mazinga Z), 09 (Guitar solo - I'd like to see more things like this one!) and track 14 (This is Animetal). You'll get hell of a fun!
