These two albums arrived while I was away to celebrate my graduation.

ONE OK ROCK - Kanjou Effect (Limited Edition)
Stereopony - Hydrangea ga Saiteru (Limited Edition)
- I’ll make an entry about Stereopony’s album later.
ONE OK ROCK - My favourite J-rock group.
ONE OK ROCK is a rock group there’s been around for about 3 years now. I discovered this group a few months ago and now I can finally add one of their albums to my collection. This is their newest album, but it’s not my favourite album from them, but decided to buy it, since Yesasia still had the limited edition in stock (shortly after I had pushed the order button, it went out of stock - so guess I got the last copy) I think this album is their only album to be released in a Limited Edition, which makes it easier to complete my collection later on. Since I’ll buy their two other albums when I’m in Japan next week. The limited edition bonus is a DVD with footage from their Live Tour 2008 “Beam of Light”.
I discovered ONE OK ROCK a day I felt like getting to know new artists. So I looked through Japanese artist names and looked them up on Youtube. ONE OK ROCK was one of the groups I decided to look up, for no particular reason - except for the reason that I had heard their group name before.
I had no idea of what to expect when I clicked on their “Keep it real” PV. (Their first single/mini album)
The song’s first few seconds give a peaceful feel, then it gets louder and more rock-like. Then one of the members suddenly started to rap, which didn’t really fit my taste and I almost clicked away, then the front singer started singing. I was instantly captivated by his unique voice.
I can’t remember the last time I was so intrigued with a voice, which made me continue to listen to the song. After the first chorus, the rapping returned, but I didn’t think of closing the window, because I was already in love, with not only the front singer’s voice, but with the song itself.
I listened to Keep it real over and over again and it still remains my favourite song of theirs - even thought a lot of their other songs has come close. Keep it real is even my ring tone on my mobile phone.
The mini album Keep it real, has 4 tracks - which are all amazing. The second track is 辛い+一=幸せ (Tsurai + Ichi = Shiawase.) The romanji title of this song doesn’t make much sense. Looking at the Japanese title makes a lot more sense. This song is almost as amazing as Keep it real. The verses are just as captivating as the chorus and I never get tired of this song.
The 3rd track on the mini album is P.P.S.H, which has a less serious sound, compared to the other 3 songs on this album. The last track is “And I know” which is the slow song if the album, I love the chorus of this song. I always feel like singing along with the chorus - especially the “naiteru yo” part.
They’ve seemed to drop the rapping influence, since rapping hasn’t really appeared since their first mini album. I’m happy about that, since I didn’t really felt like the rapping belonged there.
What I also like about ONE OK ROCK, is that they’re a rock group, without being too “noisy”. I really like their kind of rock music. Not too sweet and pop influenced, and not too noisy and heavy.
A fun fact is that the front singer of the rock is a former member of the Johnny’s group, NEWS.
He only participated in their single NEWS NIPPON, though - back when NEWS had as many members as current Morning Musume.
I remember watching NEWS on Hey!x3 as the 9 member group and when I saw Taka (The ONE OK ROCK front singer) I for some reason, felt that he didn’t really fit in. Of course he was already out of the group when I saw the show, since I’ve only been a NEWS fan around since Weeeek. But don’t really think that this is the reason why I felt he was the odd person out - since I felt that Kusano and Uchi fit, even though they’re out now as well. Anyway, with Taka out of NEWS I can enjoy his music with ONE OK ROCK.
My favourite ONE OK ROCK album of is: Zeitakubyou, which contains amazing songs such as: Yokubou ni Michi ta Seinendan, Etcetera, Naihi Shinsho and Yume Yume. I can’t recommend the album Zeitakubyou enough.
On their 2nd album Beam of Light, my favourite song is 100%(hundred percent).
ONE OK ROCK’s 3rd album, Kanjou Effect.
01. Koi no Aibou Kokoro no Cupido. This is my favourite track on the album. They over act a bit in the PV, but that doesn’t change the fact that this song is awesome and catchy.
The song is a little short though, I’m used to songs being at least 3 minutes. But I really love this song - it’s the kind of song I really want to listen to with the volume turned up high.
02. Doppelgänger, which is a very upbeat song. It is a good song, but compared to the group’s other songs it’s a bit average.
03. Kaimu. Another upbeat song - in kinda the same pace as the previous two songs. Seems like this is one of the popular songs at their concerts - which I can imagine, since the song probably has a lot of energy on stage. It of course also have energy in this studio version - no doubt about that. It’s just missing something.
04. 20 years old. What I like the most about this song is the chorus, because the verses are a bit average, where it becomes more interesting once it reaches the chorus.
05. Living dolls. This song has a bit more slow paced verses and chorus. It’s far from a slow paced song - it’s more compared to the previous tracks. I like this song, because it seems like there’s put a lot of emotion into the chorus. There’s also full English sentences in this song (compared to just random isolated words): Ex. “If I can touch your heart, I can tell you what you feel” “They’re all the same looking like dolls”. Overall I find this song interesting.
06. Break my strings. A louder song than the previous ones. This song is also a little average.
07. Sonzai Shoumei. Another loud song. The verses are forgettable - at least the chorus isn’t.
08. CONVINCING. This is a nice song. What I like the most is actually the verses. What I also like are the little pop-like parts of the song, just before the chorus. Where they change from rock, to a more soft sound and back to rock again.
09. My Sweet baby. A slow paced song, which is a nice change after the fast paced and loud songs. It’s a cute and sweet song.
10. Reflection. And after the slow song, we’re back to the rock tunes. This has a loud and interesting chorus. It catches my attention.
11. Viva Violent Fellow ~Utsukushiki Moshpit~. Long instrumental into and upbeat. I like this song. Intriguing verses and a powerful and very interesting chorus. This is a nice song to listen to with a high volume, like the 1st track.
12. JUST. This song is a little average. Not bad, but not that memorable either. The little annoying thing with this track is that they’ve added a hidden track to it, making it 11:14 minutes long. I actually like the short hidden track - which is a short acoustic performance. I like the song and Taka’s vocals, even though they tend to get very high in this song - I still like it a lot. What I don’t like is that it takes 5 minutes from the ending of JUST to the beginning of the hidden track. It’s too long. And the 5 minutes silence is a waste of megabyte.
Rating: 7/10
(Yes, I dropped the star, since I felt like my rating options were limited)
This is a good J-rock album, what drags it down a bit is because I can’t help, but comparing to their other material and this album can’t live fully up to their 1st album.
RANKING and The END.
ONE OK ROCK, is like stated earlier in this entry, my favourite J-rock group. They have amazing songs and a great uniqueness. Which makes me listen to their songs over and over again.
My top 10 of their songs.
01. Keep it real
02. Tsurai + ichi = Shiawase
03. Yokubou ni Michi ta Seinendan
04. Et cetera
05. Koi no Aibou Kokoro no Cupido
06. 100%(hundred percent)
07. Naihi Shinsho
08. And I Know
09. Yume Yume
10. Viva Violent Fellow ~Utsukushiki Moshpit~
I’m happy I’ve discovered this group and I’ll surely keep supporting them from now on. Now I just need to buy their two previous full length albums and then I want the Keep it real mini album.
There’s not a single bad ONE OK ROCK song, there’s good and amazing.
Of course what I still like most about this group is Taka’s voice. This group wouldn’t have been the same without it. So liking his kind of voice is a great importance when it comes to liking this group.
Since one of the members, Alex has left the group now, because he groped a young girl in a train in an alcoholic state, it will be interesting to see if this change will be evident when it comes to their sound.

























