The definitive Kala B-sides/rarities list

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Martin

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This is off the back of my grumble about how the Red and Blue albums don't have any 'new' songs on them apart from prelude and Heavenly Blue (which may appear on their next studio release for all we know...I'm going to wait and see). Because I don't have all the 'other' non-album tracks in one place and have to scroll around my music library to play them, I sat down this afternoon with Winamp and my music folder to make up a playlist made up of the Re/Oblivious EP and the B-sides. Also because I was bored and I'm a bit OCD like that.

It was a bit of hassle to 'tidy up' my playlists and directories, so I won't even try to pretend I'm an expert and give advice on how to do that part. This is the full list of songs (in chronological order of release) if anyone else feels like trying it:
  1. oblivious ～俯瞰風景 mix (Re/Oblivious, 2008)
  2. interlude 01 (Re/Oblivious, 2008)
  3. 君が光に変えて行く ～acoustic ver. (Re/Oblivious, 2008)
  4. interlude 02 (Re/Oblivious, 2008)
  5. 傷跡 ～piano² mix (Re/Oblivious, 2008)
  6. finale (Re/Oblivious, 2008)
  7. Gloria (Lacrimosa B-side, 2009)
  8. lirica (Storia B-side, 2009)
  9. うつくしさ (Progressive B-side, 2009)
  10. sapphire (Hikari no Senritsu B-side, 2010)
  11. adore (Kagayaku Sora no Shijima ni wa B-side, 2010)
  12. Magia [quattro] (Hikari Furu B-side, 2012)
  13. 屋根の向こうに (Moonfesta B-side, 2012)
  14. dolce (Alleluia B-side, 2013)
  15. fairytale ~2012 Chiristmas LIVE ver.~ (Alleluia B-side, 2013)
  16. 君が光に変えて行く ~2012 Christmas LIVE Ver.~ (Alleluia B-side, 2013)
  17. seventh heaven ~2012 Christmas LIVE Ver.~ (Alleluia B-side, 2013)
  18. snow falling ~2012 Christmas LIVE Ver.~ (Alleluia B-side, 2013)
  19. misterioso (Kimi no Gin no Niwa B-side, 2013)
  20. 追憶 (Kimi no Gin no Niwa B-side, 2013)
Some additional notes: I deliberately left out instrumental and TV size versions, but decided to put the Christmas Live versions on, because AFAIK the 5th anniversary compilation is the only 'live' album they've released so far. I'd love to own a copy of the Christmas/with strings recording.

Also: many of the B-sides are AMAZING. As in, "why did none of these make it onto an album?" level of amazing. Anyway. This is why I wish they did a proper album with this stuff on it.

If anyone has suggestions/corrections, go for it!

EDIT #1: adore is added.
EDIT #2: 2012 Christmas Live versions of seventh heaven and snow falling are added.
 
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^ well misterioso is probably the only "non-amazing" :XD:

thanks for this, I will make a setlist too and try it out.

Magia isnt really a b-side, just the original with added strings
 
There are seventh heaven and snow falling in Alleluia RE B-side. fairytale and Kimi ga Hikari are on LE. Or vice versa. Quoting Kajiura, B-sides are actually songs where Kajiura could put anything she likes, thus nothing limiting her creativity so we love a lot of B-sides. When creating songs for album, there are certain themes that Kajiura thinks for the album (that's what I got from reading one of Kalafina book, forgot which one. Kalafina Record, iirc). Red Moon has a lot of new songs because that's their step-up era when they went on tour promoting the album. Kajiura herself said that the B-sides on Red Moon era are songs that 'she never thought would record', 'can't imagine doing live version of the songs' and 'song that I could make whatever I like because it's B-sides' so she, as their producer, didn't have any intention to put them on their album. On After Eden, she thinks about making down-to-earth and humanly songs - that aren't really her style because Kajiura's better songs are often dark-ish, so the album is really weak for some of us. For consolation, she thinks about not getting what you want but settle for something or searching what you want even though it's unreachable. The new songs in consolation are almost all dark in lyrics, (except for Door, not that I say Door isn't lovely) so we love them but they fit the theme so we have it.
 
As ritardando said, there's 4 Christmas Live songs, two per edition of Alleluia. Kimi ga Hikari and Seventh Heaven sound phenomenal though.

I do really, really like almost all of Kalafina's b-sides though, still sad that Heavenly Blue won't have a b-side, although it'd be very hard to top Tsuioku. I wouldn't necessarily include Magia[QUATTRO] either as it's an arrangement rather than a new song, and I suspect Misterioso will end up on a future album just like Mirai and Manten did.
 
Ah, thanks for the heads-up Re: Alleluia. Looks like I'm missing two more songs then! I wouldn't be at all surprised if Misterioso was on their next album either, considering how it's performed live so often so is clearly a 'high-profile' song. The 'quattro' version of Magia's interesting...I often wondered what the difference was between that and the standard version!

The whole concept behind the B-sides fascinates me. The best example I can think of is how some of the best Oasis songs were B-sides...whether you personally rate Noel Gallagher or not, there are certainly some B-sides that were better than a lot of their album tracks! I guess B-sides allow Yuki to experiment a bit, not worry about recreating them live or simply working outside of the constraints she puts on herself when doing each album. It's just a bit of a shame that when these oddball songs *do* work, they often go unnoticed unless you're a hardcore completist who collects singles!

I didn't realise that After Eden was a deliberate change of style, either. It certainly explains the things that made me think of it as their weakest...except I put that down to it being possibly rushed (being so soon after Red Moon and all) or putting too much pressure on everyone involved.

Darn it, I wish I could afford to collect the singles too. It just seems less...cost-effective? than buying full albums. Jumping through hoops to find them, then paying customs and shipping, sort of gets in the way. I want to support the artists, but practical stuff doesn't make it easy!
 
The singles aren't hard to find if you only want the regular editions, pretty much any store that carries the albums also has them. Getting the LE copies however is an issue. They're occasionally on sale too, I got my copy of Moonfesta for £3 or so and bundled it with another order. I'll probably grab a copy of Progressive, Kimi no Gin and Storia at some point because the b-sides are just that good. As much as I want the Christmas Live songs in my actual disc collection I'm not sure it's worth buying Alleluia twice to get them, though, unless it comes up on sale.

The things I really want in the future though is a Christmas Live BD and an acoustic album. After hearing Sprinter from the 5th Live I've always thought such a thing could be incredible.

Something that came up when I was talking to Surgam after the showcase at JE was that After Eden suffers a lot due to many of the songs being too long for their own good. You could probably trim a minute or more from some of them and lose very little in regards to the structure of the song, at least in comparison to most other Kalafina songs. The only ones that sound as if they were written to be the length that they are are Magia, Magnolia, Destination Unknown, Symphonia and Sandpiper in my opinion, and that might be why those are my personal favourites from the album. Mune no Yukue, Eden and In Your Eyes especially seem to drag on a little.
 
Tsuioku is such a masterpiece, I wish they perform it live again soon. Their best B-side ever. I also love "Lirica" and "うつくしさ" a lot :chuu::chuu::chuu:
 
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