I'm really not being hyperbolic. Despite BM being the first act I can call myself a fan of in the truest sense of the word, I've always tried to approach them as objectively as possibly when writing these. That's going to be very hard this time but I'll try my best. The idea that this album is just the same thing again but way better holds pretty well with the first third or so. I can easily see Karate as this album's version of Megitsune (soya!) Awadama Fever as this album's Gimme Chocolate, YAVA, the successor to Iine and Amore would pass as the new Akatsuki. But the only song that doesn't blow it's début counterpart out of the water completely is Karate, and that's only because Megitsune was that album's strongest track (in my humble opinion). For the other three it's absolutely no competition.
But then Meta Taro happens and the album goes completely of the rails into wacky town. I now kind of understand what people who were into metal sung by big hairy men felt when they listened to the first album. I might not have had much expectations about what metal is supposed to sound like in those day, but I know big strong Vikings and little Japanese girls are polar opposites. After that the album touches the ground with its feet from time to time, only to float of again. The BBM tracks sound somewhat reminiscent of 4 no Uta and Onedari Daisakusen, but I don't think that's a great comparison. Apart from being much better, they have a much rougher, punky edge to them. Moa and Yui's vocal parts sound forceful and almost a bit shouty compared to their gentle handling of 4 no Uta, while still being quite cute. It's nice to see the dichotomy seep into the vocals as well. The second to last track meanwhile, called Tales of the Destinies in the best of Engrish traditions, gave me flashbacks to being fourteen again and fighting the final boss of Golden Sun 2. It's the most frantic and jarring thing they ever recorded, easily outdoing Iine. Brilliant.
In fact, compared to this the entire first album now seems tame in every aspect, even in weirdness. The shock from two years ago mainly had to do with what BM itself was, not the music. Because the album wasn't that much stranger than, say, Ariel Pink's Pom Pom or Swans' The Seer. No this, this sounds weird! It also sounds heavier, more engaging, more mature, more refined and all round superior to the first album. Another thing about that: when I heard Koba say that he wanted to make a real studio album, not the glorified compilation cd that the last one was, I thought something along the lines of: "Sure Koba, I haven't forgotten that you work for a talent agency with marketability as their number one concern. This album is going to be full of self contained, compact, singlable (not a word, but I don't care) ditties than can each on their own be representative of the image BM is supposed to project, like the last one was." Well, I hereby officially give Koba permission to slap me across the face with his dick, because once again I was wrong. The song most indicative of this is From Dusk Till Dawn, an otherworldly electronic mood piece that hardly has any lyrics. This would never have been on the début. I haven't heard Syncopation yet, but I already feel sorry for the Japanese fans that they didn't get this track. I'm so glad it got included here.
It must be fun writing music for BM, because more and more you get the sense that the sky is the limit. I can't stop listening to Metal Resistance. Never In my wildest dream did I think it would shock me even more than the first album, but it did. I fucking love it.
Music listened to while writing:
- Take a wild guess...
