I was playing Rock Band 2 the other day and happened to see X Japan on the list of artists. I only remembered to Google it tonight while procrastinating from studying and lo and behold, it turns out that X Japan not only re-united in mid-2007 but also did the main theme song for the movie Saw IV. I suppose I may have known this earlier had I actually watched Saw IV but seeing as I have no backbone for horror movies... yeah.
Anyhoo, I watched the PV for their song, "I.V." and I was really touched to see how much they integrated hide's memory into it. They placed his guitar in front of a mic to symbolise where he would have been playing had he been there with them, and showed clips of his performances on the huge building-screen-monitor-thing. Also, I read on Wikipedia that his unreleased guitar tracks were used in this song.
R.I.P., hide.
I was surprised to read that SUGIZO (I assume it's stylised in all caps) joined X Japan, mainly because I didn't know that he had performed with them as a stand-in for hide. I recognise his name from LUNA SEA but to be honest, I never really had much of a thing for LUNA SEA so I have no idea how awesome he is aside from what Wikipedia and fansites tell me. According to Wikipedia though he said he joined as their sixth member, meaning that hide is most definitely still there in spirit (X Japan has 5 living members, including SUGIZO).
Btw, Yoshiki looks totally badass on his drums.
Listening to right now: X Japan - I.V.
I noticed that hide had actually discovered Luna Sea, according to Wiki... fitting that a member of theirs would honour his legacy after his death. :)
ReplyDeleteIncidentally, IV is such a departure from their typical "speed metal" sound! It's ironic though, because IV's style is a bit like hide's happy-grungy-weird solo stuff, compared to X Japan's hits. In my opinion, anyway. LOL