Keiko's solo debut (after 2020)

Wanted to see what all the fuss is about.

Keiko's voice is still smooth as butter. Glad she's using her upper range for once, because it's like candy for the ears. I love her enunciation and vocal delivery; her voice would work great for ballads.

If only the ballad was any good. I don't judge the lyrics since my Japanese isn't good enough, but the music is a mega snorefest, even more than Wakana's ballads like Toki wo Koeru. Ballads need to be at least Davichi-tier and be tied to a drama if they want Keiko to have any sort of mainstream relevance. I am glad that she didn't try to artificially raise her tone to be higher. I've forgotten how much I loved her deep, dark tone.

Be Yourself would be okay if it didn't sound like a cheesy 2000s anime theme song. Love her voice in the chorus, tho. Her mixed voice is just sublime (funny that the contralto can hit high notes better than the soprano).

She said in an interview she wanted to level up and work with Kajiura again, so as long as she's got the voice, she has potential. I just wish her debut was stronger and wasn't headed in...this direction. Then again, JPop hasn't held my attention for a long time, not since Mamamoo has taken over my heart and filled the void of a harmony-trio (Moonbyul doesn't count lol).
 
Random post but I’m walking out on a rainy morning here in Detroit listening to Inochi no Hana a couple more times, and I have to say, the song has re-touched me.

Don’t know about anyone else but I’ll gladly give it a bit more credit than what’s been going on for the last few pages. I’d honestly be glad to sing it at a con later in the year! which even surprises me as I’ve been fearful of the results of non-Kajiura songs 😅

(Also, I’m so used to FJ and Kalafina that Be Yourself seems SO SHORT to me 🤣 )
 
Lyrics that talk about rain are pretty common in ballads as rain represents sadness and lonelyness. There are better musics to listen while its raining, Kalafina's songs menthion rain on every third song, and in case of bgms, i talk to the rain, and rain and storm, have them even in the titles 🙂
 
Another day, another essay reminding the world that they are in fact a respectful ray of sunshine, while trashing CPM.
 
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grunty said:
Another day, another essay reminding the world that they are in fact a respectful ray of sunshine, while trashing CPM.
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What's interesting is that we just carry on here with our negativity and trash talk not bothering anyone and "they" just keep coming by to read the negativity and get mad about it and then report it to the Queen who then re-emphasises time after time after time that she doesn't give a crap what we think and that all we do is "toxic trash talk". We seem to make headlines on that Tumblr blog once every few months... I actually consider that great free advertisement!

I think they might be obsessed with our negativity because it is the only way they can see positivity in the three ex-Kalafina girls.


By the way for those of you who are curious about who the anon was that wrote:

So I just made the mistake of going on CPM to see what people think about Keiko's new songs and YIKES... I honestly don't know what exactly I was expecting and I too feel a bit underwhelmed, but she had literally just started her new solo career and there is so much room and potential to improve that all of that negativity and the immediate disinterest in her solo work is just so uncalled for. Thank you for always being so respectful and nice, even when you're criticising things!
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It was me. :glasses:

PS:
Here is my next anon question, let's see if I make headlines!

"Well said, Sarah! I seriously cannot believe those CPM members and their awful comments about Keiko, when she put so much hardwork into her single release! It's just uncalled for and so toxic, like you said. Thank you for always shining the light while still keeping it real with the opportunities on which the girls can improve on! "
 
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I literally lost faith in CPM those minutes ago. I feel Iike a fool. I need to sleep on it.
 
Ok, so now I don't know what's going on...
Atlas Star said:
"Well said, Sarah! I seriously cannot believe those CPM members and their awful comments about Keiko, when she put so much hardwork into her single release! It's just uncalled for and so toxic, like you said. Thank you for always shining the light while still keeping it real with the opportunities on which the girls can improve on! "[/SPOILER]
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Can someone explain me this :XD:
 
But, who is anon?

Nevermind, I've just visited our favorite kala-fan site! My god, that girl is insane (sorry if I'm not allow to talk like this in here :bow:), and she really hates us, in her positive and lovely way to hate us (?).
For a moment I really thought you were that anonymous gut :ohoho:
So, now we are all toxic-trash talkers (?)
 
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now i feel bad for this... blogger ? she(?) is clearly attached to Kalafina in some ways that are obsessive?

what's great about music or people creating music is that :

there are MANY OF THEM. Go explore! You will find many compositions and voices of style and humor that you internalized as an adolescent (as this is the time when we listen to a kind of music, we think/feel it's important!)

or widen your horizons! For example, I can't really stand rap but I find some pieces moving and even enjoyable if directed to!

and yeah we can be as negative as we'd like, go DARK CPM ! LET'S CHANGE OUR THEME TO DARKKK
 
😅 i like dark too as an option but for other reasons, as its not blinding for the eyes.

As for Putch, i think we re different: she is fan of the Kalafina girls as WKH but doesnt care much about Kajiura as she seems to blame her for whatever negative happened to the group 🤔. We re Kajiura fans which means we focus on her music, but we re not fans without critical side as we like to point negatives even in YK's compositions if we find them. For example, i consider her 2001-2007 era her golden era where almost everything she did was original, inspired, and with instrument variation. After KnK she changed point of view, started using mostly her band as musicians, with some kind of obsession on strings an doing lots of SFX as opposed to before where tracks were huge with complete structure and were fit in the show by the studios.

The fact that putch is always possitive about Kalafina girls doesnt make us the bad guys. For example remember how happy we were when OST 3 of Sao Alicisation came out because we found in it the inspiration that was missing. Saying your opinion isnt a bad thing, its part of democracy, but having only one opinion and not accepting critisism of any kind is remniscent of other kinds of ideologies or other kind of age of human (its usually little babies and old people who insist in what they want or know and wont listen to others and then have tandrums).

But even us need to keep the discussion civilised :glasses:
 
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...It looks like this thread took quite a turn again, just as what I have seen certain times before in this forum, lol.

Still, I manage to find it nice as we somehow find ways to keep the conversation going.

I really can’t comprehend though about this fixation that she had for CPM, despite having talked to her back in Taiwan. AND YES. When I visited Taiwan for the YK live she was there, AND she was there primarily for KEIKO.

We did talk about stuff regarding Kalafina back then, and I did find interesting this part where I told her I blame SpaceCraft for the mess that caused all those things on YK and eventually to those 3 and yet what she did was she defend them due to the fact that it is in their culture.

I actually don’t mind her not really that interested in Yuki Kajiura, but I just hoped that she does not go out of her way to nitpick anything she finds with regarding her music since her focus should only be on WKH, especially Wakana.

Back to Keiko, I actually listened only her ‘Be Yourself’ but it did not really stick with me on first try. Still, I look forward to see how Keiko will grow as a solo singer. That signature voice is at least something unique that you can’t hear in mainstream Japanese music.
 
Credits from mora:

命の花
作詞：KEIKO
作曲：XYZ

Be Yourself
作詞：並木瑠璃
作曲：SoichiroK・Nozomu.S

No arrangers listed.

Lyrics also there.
 
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