Hyde
- 666

Note: 8,5/10, because nothing is never perfect.parce que rien n' est jamais parfait
(/would have probably deserved a 9/10 if I had had the "real" cd, not simple mp3s: never forget the sound of a cd is better than the sound of an mp3, even "well encoded".)

Woh! Hyde remembers his rock/metal roots! I feared a little the release of this album: Roentgen was sooooooo soft... yes there are nice melodies, very nice, but after a while... someone has a pillow for me? But Hello then Horizon gave me some hope... and I was right to hope! As there was nothing but nice ballads in Roentgen, there is nothing but GOOD! + ROCK! in 666, I would even say hard-fm if we were in the 80's.
Yes this album is commercial... and then? L' Arc en Ciel is commercial too, VERY commercial, far more than thhis album can be I think (pop/rock [L' Arc] v. rock/hard-rock [666]), is it a problem for those who like L' Arc? So why would it be a problem here? The only thing I care about is that, when I listen to 666, I have some irresistible need to either move my feet, bang my head (...well ok softly, this is rock, not metal... but still!), "move my hands in the air", or a mix / all of them at once! And it is well composed, no "repetition" -one of the "bad points" of Roentgen up to me, and that makes me bored after a while-,...: only nice rock songs with a sound / an atmosphere for each: sometimes sad, sometimes "funnier",...
To be honnest, L' Arc often makes me bored after a while, mainly because it is too soft for me: I believe I begin to prefer Hyde-solo than L' Arc themselves: Roentgen is quite repetitive once again, and up to me, but there are still some / a lot of VERY good melodies in this album, far more "serached"/"worked"/"that speak to me" than most songs of L' Arc, and now 666, far more rock (then close to my "natural taste"!) than any album L' Arc en Ciel ever released!

To sum up: I LOVE this album (...although it would have deserved to be heavier here or there, but well I'm always looking for "not so good points"...), and to see if you could like it, I can only advise you to look for the singles of the album, Hello and/or Horizon: if you like them, RUN to the album, because you will LOVE it!
(+ Some people don't like so much the fact that Hyde sings so much in English in 666... well, up to me, and on the contrary, it is one of the "positive sides" of the album: for once, I don't have to look for translations (+which aren't so good most of the time...) all over the net + I can easily sing along the songs + hey! Hyde has an excellent accent, not only "for a Japanese" but even "in general": instead of criticizing him, a lot of these persons would rather try to get an accent about as good as his!
+ Don't fear too much about the rumours of "rap-part" you may have heard about: there is one, but very short, 30s max., and there is so much effect over Hyde's voice in this part that it' s quite acceptable, really.)

(P.S.: Don't forget to congratulate Mummy Megumi and Daddy Hyde for the birth of their child on November, 11th! Yippee yeah! And the day before my mother's birthday: I shouldn't forget about this little child's birthday!)

Track-list:

01- Sweet Vanilla
02- Hello (album mix)
03- Words of Love
04- Horizon
05- Prayer
06- Masquerade
07- Midnight Celebration
08- Shining over you
09- Fruits of Chaos
10- Hide away

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