Over the past month I've been listening to a lot of music; this isn't anything new for me but I've been marathoning bands entire library in order to build up a playlist due to new phone plans in the works. Since I do need to write more I decided that hey what if I just talk about these bands that I'm listening to their entire discography. So first up is SEIKIMA-II!
Favorite Album (by way of most saved songs): BLOODIEST (2022)
Favorite Song: El Dorado
Despite being a metal fan, I've really only listened to EU and NA metal and my knowledge of JP metal acts is a huge bottomless chasm. I did not hear about SEIKIMA-II until it was brought up a few times in a discord server and I listened to songs posted (Fire after Fire and The End of the Century). I was impressed and immediately hooked in. I honestly do have a hard time describing what about music makes me love it outside of me saying "I like the sound" so bear with me here, but SEIKIMA II just has that quintessential 80s-90s metal sound thst makes them highly enjoyable. Their songs flow parts heavy to parts slow and then into parts high energy in between and something something variety spices. Because of me deriving my enjoyment of the band from their sound, the language barrier meant nothing to me and it was just a great experience listening to all of their music.
I'm honestly shocked that my favorite album ended up being their newest one, BLOODIEST, which was the first original album they put out in quite some time since their intential disbanding at the turn of the century (they had a whole storyline to their band and it rules) but the entire album was just top shelf quality all the way down. There was one other album that by my metrics of best album stated above that won out, but that entire album was re-recordings of prior songs with what sounds like new instruments, and His Excellency Demon Kakka singing in English. Therefore it didn't count per se since it was re-recordings and not new music but damn those are some sick sounding versions, but also don't replace the originals because the sound is quite different between the two versions.
Overall I'm extremely happy others have informed me of SEIKIMA-II and for the lack of any better terms, they rock hard.