音時雨 ～Regentropfen～

It rained a lot recently. I even wonder if there is the so-called "rainy season" in Canada! So the weather was also getting colder than a few days ago. But, this is rain, my favorite weather!

June-15, a beautiful blue-gray sky
When I was on my way home, I looked at the sky. It rained in the morning. The air was a bit chilling, yet extremely fresh. Instead of a red sunset, I saw the serene after-rain sky. So transparent and clear, made me taking that tiny yet unique moment. I love the gradient from a pure colour to the clouds. Except the nature itself, who else can made such a beauty?

June 16, a peaceful morning song
And it continued to rain in the next day, which gave me a super delightful mood. The morning was dark, covered by thick rain clouds. Still, it was cold, yet I was kind of satisfied. I have my own enjoyment of dark, cold, and rainy days. Not too excited, such moment can just make me calm down. It's a kind of feeling that I can't describe well in words.

At the bus stop, I looked at the sky, and took this snap. It was morning, a dark and rainy morning. Rain drops falling down, showed the world a peaceful morning song.

This afternoon rained again, but since I didn't go out, I had no photos. Today is also cold, but is still sweet. Rainy days make me happy and comfortable, and thus I could write such random text. xD

All right, this time, I'm gonna continue my talk about new music~ :3

eufonius – bezel

eufo finally got a new album after years! They seem to be a bit normal recently. I was hoping they could do better – I mean, make me more impressed – in their new works. Yet, this album is not that impressive, though I still love riya's voice. xD

Akiko Shikata – 白夢の繭～Ricordando il passato～

Mwahahaha, Akiko's new songs are so excellent! They're all in her regular yet pretty style. The cover is also so Akiko-ish! (I just wished she could do a cosplay of the girl on the cover, but... ^^;)
Anyway, about the songs. As usual, she used lots of chorus and rich arrangement in each of them. Still beautiful, still ethnic. I especially love track4, "誰ガ為ノ世界". You know, when I first time listened to this song, I was soloing Dragon Nest's dungeon in abyss mode (they're released lv50 eventually)! This song's ambience made me super excited~ (and the monsters in lv49 abyss are so hard to fight with~ xDD) (I know, my description is so pain... but I'm not gonna write a review for them :P)
And these five songs can make you looping time after time.

Noriko Mitose – Cotton 2

Kyaa, it's Noriko~
Cover album vol. 2. Her first volume of Cotton was released in 2007 (I believe so!). She was also excited about this vol.2, and in her blog, she has begun to write liner notes for every song (I suppose so, since I haven't read her blog in detail...).
So... to be honest, I only know few from the tracklist... yet I still enjoy these "covers" (they're almost new songs to me!). Track 3 is very cute, track 5 is very yorlga-like (because the arranger is Hirota :3), track 8 is my love, and track 11 is also my love, and it's very cute too~ (nyaa~~)
Noriko's crystal glass voice, my favorite~
I really love Noriko singing Japanese traditional songs! :P

Bonus:
Yanagi nagi – freirinite

I found this album when I organized my folder, almost forgot it... -_-
Unlike binaria, Yanagi nagi sounds sweeter in her own works – here I'm NOT saying that her works are NOT mysterious like binaria anymore! Her own works are in a kind of sweet and fantastic mystery. They're soft, gentle and just pretty.

Tuneyoshi Saitou – FAFNER in the azure HEAVEN and EARTH

I saw someone posted this album on a forum. I didn't pay any attention to the anime itself since the first 26-ep TV series. But I do love the music. Yet, in this album, to me, most tracks are just rearranged repeats as shown in the original anime OST (and it's also what shown on its amazon page)... so, I have no more to talk here. =3=
Btw, angela's theme song "soukyuu (azure)" is very good!

what's more?
I received my ordered KOKIA's DVD "moment NO moment", as well as her book on this Monday! But I didn't watch it, or I would not be in working mood in the rest of the week (actually, I was not in working mood this week because of this... →_→).
But till now, I HAVEN'T WATCHED, STILL!
Why? I was enjoying the new music a lot. xDD
I will watch it tomorrow (just hope so, since I have lots of things to do tomorrow)~

Like I mentioned above, Dragon Nest has released lv50 and 2nd subclass in this week. I've tried most new dungeons (4/5). For me, trying them for the first time was more like sight viewing! The new dungeons are so well-designed. I love the scenes very much!!! I think I will post some screen caps later as well! Gosh, the size of my screen cap folder increased suddenly since this week! xDD

@pixiv

Another drawing was done this afternoon~
Inspired by Hanako Oku's song "Yuudachi (which means 'evening shower')".

I loved this song long time ago. Yet I suddenly got inspired by it a few days ago.
And until now, I don't know why... xD

Based on that song, the main element of what I was going to draw should contain the sea and sunset. Although the song title is "evening shower", I still prefer sunset. Because in the lyrics, most things are related to sunset not the rain. In my opinion, this song is depicting the scene after the evening shower~

At the same time, I was going to choose some songs for my characters from my (pending) story. I've done a few, but it's not easy to choose, especially when you want to do it on purpose. In most of times, I just follow my sense. This time, my sense told me, this song is good for one of them.
Yuka. A half-heroine. No any reason, I wanted to use this song as her image song... ^^; maybe I will talk about more in future, but right now, I have nothing to say...

Then I began to draw. Really, I'm not good at drawing in this aspect (downward). The right arm looks weird, but I don't know how to change it – I wish I had some large mirrors around my room so I could see myself as the model. xD
Anyway, I will improve myself, but this time, the drawing doesn't look that good. ^^; The rest of the working was not hard – coloring, shadowing, and merging. While looking for a good background, I've tried at least 6 candidate pictures. Each one looked good but none of them was superb until I tried the last one. Then, I tilted it, ohhh, the tilted version looks so nice! Better than normal horizontal version, I think~

For the part of lyrics – it's my habit to insert the lyrics of the song that at first inspired me. I typed it first, but there was no good Japanese font on my computer. Eventually, I decided to write it by hand – I did want a handwriting-like font but I didn't have one. Then that's the one you see now. The text was written by me. :P
Moreover, this was my first time to try shadowing my work by using a way larger character (make sense? xD). Though it looks fine for me, does it look strange for you? :3

My next drawing should be targeting on "Hontou no Oto / The Real Sound" the song by KOKIA. I've got my vague idea two weeks ago since the album's release, but I haven't decided how to draw it. Hope I can figure it out soon~

I was going to write this post two weeks ago, but, in last week, I was bus making my new blog template, and in this week, I was busy making a powerpoint presentation for lab meeting... :down: However, now I'm back and wanna talk about all new music since my last post.

This album is very excellent, though I'm not a big fan of her non-doujin songs. I didn't like her "best collections", but those songs, in this album, sound so good! The most important difference between this recording and the original versions, may be the using of acoustic instruments. I'm bored with most of electronic instruments in current music; songs in this album can give you a different feeling. I do think Haruka's voice matches better with this kind of instruments.

I finally found this album in last week! :excited: It has two discs; the first one is a collection of Ancient Colours Infinity series, and the second one is a collection of other songs by bermei.inazawa. About the first one, I've talked a lot before; however, here, songs are made by another arrangement. They sound similar but they do have another fresh feeling to the listeners. About the second one, I only know the ones from Higurashi. So most of them are very new to me. I especially like the song by Annabel, btw~~ xD

Wow, KOKIA never mentioned this single in her blog (as far as I know)! And I was very surprised to see KOKIA's name being together with Saiyuuki. It's so hard to link these two names, no? :P
About the music, they're a bit different to KOKIA's typical style (in the first song). To be honest, I didn't see anything impressing in this single... (plus it has my "favorite" erhu... →_→) but I love Ura Kiyohide's arrangement (especially in the second song). It's a good relax to listen to this single.

I JUST RECEIVED MY COPY OF THIS ALBUM YESTERDAY!!! I'M SO HAPPY NOW~~~ :happy3:
I've already looped this album since for not less than 15 times within a few days. This album is just EXCELLENT! Not only that all songs are new, KOKIA also did a wonder job. Like what she said before, this album is like the sky, linking everyone together via the music.
Open the booklet, I smiled. Every page has a photo of the sky. Different sky, in red, in blue, with clouds, with sunlight, serene, or vivid. Her songs are the same, with emotion, power, warmth, gentleness, or love. Ohhh, I must write something for this album later. My favorite of this album should be "本当の音 (the real sound)". It touched me again~ T T/~~
I also ordered the DVD "moment no moment" and a book about her stage life (secrets[?]). Gosh, and thus I had to pay for the middleman's fee as well. Probably I won't buy any other CDs in the rest of this year, but... who knows what happens if KOKIA releases something again? XDD

New season is good. Now, the new waiting albums/singles are from Akiko Shikata, Noriko Mitose, and eufonius. Also, in the end of June, GARNET CROW is going to release a single.
It was raining in last week. Looking at the outside rainy view, listening to either the gentle KOKIA or the mysterious bermei.inazawa, I was very satisfied. :full:
Being surrounded by my favorite music, is such a piece of huge happiness~

I was planning to write this post yesterday, but I was too lazy tired to write anything. Too many things are to be written, but here in this post, I'll only write about the daily life of this week.

My boss said in last week's lab meeting: "and that will be a busy day, hope we can survive."
Actually, there was a lab from neighbour city would visit us on Monday, and in the afternoon, from my and their labs, two members would give a talk on a semi-remotely connected seminar. We were also going to have lunch together before the seminar, which was at 2. Yet, they may arrive at noon because that day was also a day to vote. Moreover, on Monday, one post-doc and two summer students were coming to my lab (my boss emailed me and wanted me to go to lab at 9, orz). So, new comers' arriving, a lab's visiting, seminar... who can't say that's not a busy day?

When the day came, everything was just like usual. It was not too bad, because I was not that late when I arrived at my lab (20 past 9 -_-). Nothing trouble happened on introducing the lab to our new people. My boss first had a long talk to the post-doc, then near noon, he wanted to talk to the new summer students. But how come he also wanted me to be there?! Though my current project is sorta involved in their project, is it necessary to let me listen to my boss's "basic biology lecture" that was begin from "what DNA is"? OTL

Anyway, just 10 minutes after his talk, the neighbour city lab came. So we were heading to the restaurant. Then, it was near 12 already. On the way, one of my lab members mentioned about the two summer students. "The two computer kids are really look like computer kids."
"Why look like?" I asked curiously.
"Well, as I know, all summer computer students were quiet. Like..." then he listed all summers he knew, and said how quiet they were.
At that point, he was right. The two summers were really quiet. That quietness while staying with them was not the same as staying in the room alone; you know someone else is here, but it's even quieter than only you being there. xDD

The seminar... like the presenter said, was cursed. In fact, she was supposed to talk in March, but the talk was delayed to this Monday, and was delayed again. Since this is a semi-remotely connected seminar, speakers from remote sites may not present due to this or that technical issues. Before the talk, our speaker tested the connection and it was fine. But when it was her turn to talk, everything was not working, and even the technician didn't know why. Firstly, we just wanted to fix this problem and let other speakers to talk ahead. Yet until the last one finished his talk, the problem was still here.
"Are you frustrated for being coming with us?" they asked the other speaker, who was coming from the neighbour city and was going to present on that seminar as well.
"Well, a little bit, but I did enjoy the lunch."
"However, we can present to each other."
Their boss' suggestion was the beginning of another nightmare... xDD;;

After our talking-to-each-other, it was 15 past 5... gosh, I was so sleepy (because I was trying to come to lab at 9 this morning... :P). According to my boss' plan, we wanted to go with everyone to a bar. Oh, no, I don't want that! You guys' busy day ended, but not mine! I was supposed to give a lab meeting to talk about a scientific paper, and I haven't looked at that! Go home, go home. Before I thought up a good excuse, another one in my lab already said he was going home. Good, at least I'm not the only one who don't want to go. xD

I don't know how everything went later. The busy Monday ended, yet it's not that terrible as what I thought. Hope in this month, everything can go well too.

Since last Thursday, there was a terrible odor lingering in biological science building. At first, I didn't know what that was and thought someone broken a bottle with some terribly smelt chemical. But at noon, I heard from others, that they found a dead rabbit in a vent of this building and this was the resource of the bad smell. Oh, how come a rabbit can go into the vent? Stupid rabbit, which was the comment from my lab. My boss, who is not a humor person, also said "horrible rabbit" during that day's lab meeting.

Although my boss isn't that humor, his thought was sometimes very funny. "At first, I even thought that was ... cheese." he said. ￢_￢
If so, how expensive cheese that would be! xDD

Like what I said in last post, new music season has come... and it's so surprising that I could get 3 of them in the very first day of M3-25 (thanks those people who liked to share)! Together with the IS OST that I just got, I'd like to talk about these new stuff in this post.

This OST, however, is just a regular work for anime, and it has no special points that I want to talk. I'm really a bit disappointed by it, yet as usual, I DID hear a lot excellent strings! xD

Annabel's voice is still that clear, I love it~ The first song, "ignis", is very powerful, "pulse" is very mysterious, and "innocent flame" is both powerful and mysterious, to me... XD
I like the strong drums, rhythm, they all have a good match to Annabel's deep voice, but seems the melody is not my favorite type. I think I will like this work because of her voice, and the entire ambience of the songs, but I may not loop it for too many times. :X

First, for those who don't know who CorLeonis is... CorLeonis is yanaginagi. :P
In my opinion, nagi's personal works are not as impressive as Annabel's personal works, and I do think Annabel + nagi's binaria is the best.
Well, about the album itself. It's calm, as the title says, and it will be a good choice to play it while staying alone during late nights. Some songs are even a bit "weird"... I mean they're so different from either jpop or other doujin music. They're just different, and thus the listeners are engulfed by their strong and special environment. By the way, I like the piano in track3 "Inori no Tou" very much!

Kyaaaaa~~ binaria is finally back!!! This maxi single is so beautiful~~~
XDDD;;
At first, before it's officially released, I was wondering, if they were going to sing in German. But now I know, I was wrong – only the title is in German! xD
I can feel that binaria is still binaria. Nothing changed in their music. I can feel their unique ambience. Their songs will have the best effect if being played during nights, cloudy/snowy/rainy days. Listeners' mind is in an endless fantastic world with their music, and never want to go out of the special space (like me).

I was attracted in the very beginning as soon as I played the first song "Nachtflug". Another new song in this maxi single is good, and the last song is a remixed version of an old work.
I like all these three songs, but I do love "Nachtflug" the most. The melody, the lyrics and the arrangement match perfectly, plus nagi and Annabel's superb duet, this song is making a quiet flowing world of sound. I myself have looped it without stop for 85 times (according to my last.fm record). So, here, my only suggestion is, to loop "Nachtflug" for not less than 50 times, and you'll be very happy and satisfied~ :3

In the end, hope I can get other new music in this season ASAP!

Good news was coming since a few days ago; seems a completely new season will come soon~
I mean,
Lots of new releases in the next a few months!!!

No.1 Infinite Stratos OST
Artist: Hikaru Nanase / 七瀬光

I have no idea about the anime itself, but I believe this will be a good work. I hope Hikaru uses lots of excellent strings there~

No.2 Chords＼bermei.inazawa collection
Artist: bermei.inazawa

You will be happy if you like Ancient Colors Infinity series. This album will include remix versions of ACI songs, as well as other works that bermei.inazawa was in. For me, my favorite is the first one, where Haruka Shimotsuki is in. She sounded so special than all her other doujin works, and very attractive melody of course! :3

↑ promotion video clip~

No.3 Annabel etc.
Artist: Annabel (probably with yanagi nagi...)
No more information about this entry, but I do know she will work on songs for Key's new game, and a few animes. Also, on M3-27, she's going to release something. BUT I REALLY KNOW NOTHING MORE BEYOND THIS!!! OTL

No.4 E.P.S -Eiko PRIMARY SELECTION-
Artist: Eiko Shimamiya / 島みやえい子
Waah~ Finally Eiko-sensei is back!!!!!!!!!!
I'm really looking forward her new songs included in this album~ -_,-

No.5 moment
Artist: KOKIA

Another good work. I've mentioned a few times ago. All songs are new works, and the more important thing is, this one is a real on-stage recording!
How it would be? Is that like another kind of live? I don't know, but fortunately, the special edition has a DVD, I hope it records every moment during the recording~<3
From her blog, I've known that the jacket was a photo she took on the day when she decided the tracklist. A clear blue sky, like the album itself; an album which you can feel like the sky, she described.

↑ video clip for "moment～今を生きる～"
Please note: this video is only available until June 30th, 2011!

No.6 two delayed releases
The first, Noriko's "cotton 2"
The second, Akiko's "白夢の繭 (shirayume no mayu)～Ricordando il passato～"
Both will be delayed, and will be released on June 8th.
P.S. still no exact release date for Akiko's "Istoria～Kalliope～" >_<
These are all news I know so far about new music releases. Hope I can get all of them ASAP (I believe I will enjoy them very much), so then I may talk more here.
Hmm, I did list all new works I'm waiting for, didn't I? xDD