リヴィド ~ 'Livid'

"Livid"... "Rivido"
same word, different pronunciation and language.

Why review an album in which you understand absolutely NONE of the lyrics?

Due to my limited exposure to Japanese, yes, I cannot truly comment on the lyrical style Nightmare uses throughout Livid. Yet I can still say the music is pretty darn catchy and lively. The lyrics seem to flow nicely and the vocals are quite nice. No complaints.

The two or so anime fans who read my blog may recognize Nightmare as the band that provided "The World" and "Alumina" as opening/ending themes for the first half of the Death Note series. Despite the songs' reputations for being deemed "emo J-pop" and my barely lasting to episode 20, I found Nightmare far more interesting than Maximum the Hormone. That or iTunes had their music and I liked what I heard from the samples.

Either way, the Japanese come up with really bizarre band names. @_@

'Fullmetal Alchemist'... in General

 I can hear it already: "Fangirl, do mean the 2003 series or Brotherhood?" Fans get into arguments about which one is better. Others just want a clarification since the two versions go in polar opposite directions by the end. Because of this I didn't want to cover Fullmetal Alchemist right away. As of this post I still have not finished watching either show (at about 30 episodes in the first series and 32 in the second.) So consider this a premature, "superficial" review/analysis of the two shows.

"Superficial" in the sense that I will not nitpick every nook and cranny of both versions. Furthermore, several aspects of each will be glossed over.

However, Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood has the advantage since it closely follows the manga, which I read in its entirety. Maybe about halfway through this, you might already know which adaptation I like the most. Regardless, I will try to mention what aspects of each show were well executed.