Thoughts on Rock Your Soul

[spsn]

There are saying that 40s is when human will start to show signs of aging.. rapidly... well, normal humans... but not V6! 20th Century are going 40, passed 40, but they're getting cooler and the Kamisen boys don't look their age at all (well, except Go, but look at Ken... sigh...). And music wise, their music is actually getting cooler and more thought of before releasing. I'd think since Sexy! Honey! Bunny!, yeah, after so many years and singles, V6 finally finds the core music style that they're good at, the cool party music with 80s disco sounds for the title song. And after that, no matter how you spin it, the 80s sound is there, plus minus auto tune and all the mixing, layering and whatever stuff you do in music arrangement. The results? My ears are happy and satisfied and Rock Your Soul will be played during my commuting hours. 


What I love with the whole package of Rock Your Soul is purely the song list. All 4 songs are good songs, and in totally different genres and we have:

Rock Your Soul ~ As the title song, it has to be catchy and kick ass. Being OST of the game 'Fist of the North Star' *I remember this is one of those never ending shounen manga*, it helps to define the song's direction. From the CD cover to the PV, it reeks of macho flairs, and even the choreography has the boxing moves as well. Not that I'm complaining because I think the song is cool and the choreograph is the high tension energy sucking and for the group with that kind of age range, it makes me think, yeah, V6 still has it. I remember Nagano mentioned before in one of the MC from Sekubani concert that they're dancing more than before, and Inohara also mentioned that as the group age, the choreograph is getting complex because they need to trade off between easy but tiring or complex but not so tiring (and usually complex means cooler too, in a different way, aka no more backflips, wheel etc). So, that means we'll have V6 dance to the song for the more years to come, yeah! Viva V6!

Music Life ~ And after the macho red and black boxing song, we have a song that sounds totally nothing like the first track. I love how they line this 2 tracks together because it shows how wide V6 music range is. I'd imagine I suddenly arrive in the candy land with all the pastel color, something like what Kyari Pamyu Pamyu (did I spell it correctly?) would wear and there's a merry go round waiting for me in the middle of the land. The song itself is so V6 and as the same time it sounds so light and fluffy.

fAKE ~ And after the happy cheery song, we suddenly plunge into a very moody song, with all the angst. Well, this song is my favorite in this single. If I roughly play by ear, the lyrics would sound like the angst of a guy who goes WTF with all the fakeness. He's hurt, devastated, but what I'm not sure of is whether he stays in the relationship or walks off (pardon my limited vocab). There's lots of auto tune usage here but not as excessive and Sakamoto's voice is still clear (I don't mind if they autotune 100% Miyake's LOL, his voice is much better auto-tuned!)...

Bokura no Oto ~ And another roller coaster ride, you end up in the land of heart warming ballad. I'd like to see this song sung at the end of the concert before the goaisatsu. I can even imagine how the stage and lighting will look like and it's a really beautiful scene.

So, there you go, after finish listening the whole tracks in order, you'll feel like you just listen to an express mini concert of V6. And for that, I give a big plus point of this single.