The latest video uploads feature TEEDA and KENJI03 giving us a quick commentary of Hello World in Japanese, English (TEEDA) and Mandarin Chinese (KENJI03)! I have to say that they are all brilliant! I don’t want to spoil his message, as it’s better to hear the man out himself, but this is what TEEDA said – and I quote:

Hello World, this is TEEDA and KENJI03 and you’re watching BACK-ON channel!
On February 16th we’re going to release the new album “Hello World”! It’s going to be the best J-Rock sound you’ve ever heard – no doubt! The first and second track  ’”Beginning” and “ROCKSTAR ANTHEM” is crazy because I rap so sexxxy, you know what I’m saying?  And this year we’re going to go more worldwide, so hope to see you at your country. Anywayz, please check out our homepage, blog, Myspace, Facebook, Twitter, blah blah blah for more information. Thanks… See ya!

Once you’ve heard him say that, I swear you’ll <3 him forever! (I know I do… and so does Sesshy!)

KENJI03‘s spoken Chinese has improved leaps and bounds, so for any BACK-ON fans that understand Mandarin, this video is a real treat ~~ He says:

你好,我們是BACK-ON! 我是主唱KENJI還有TEEDA! 在2月16號,我們BACK-ON要發行我們的第二張的全新專輯: Hello World! 請台灣大家一定要聽喔! OK?! 然後-在台灣只要上日本Amazon網站就可以聽到我們的新專輯 Hello World. 請多多指教!

which roughly translates as:

Hello, we are BACK-ON! I am the lead vocalist KENJI03 and this is TEEDA! We will be releasing our 2nd brand new album: “Hello World” on February 16th and hope everyone in Taiwan will listen to it! OK?!
If you’re in Taiwan, you can visit Amazon Japan and listen to our new album “Hello World”. Please look after us!

In addition to these 3 videos, BACK-ON have uploaded 5 other videos, which we’ll try and post about separately, including:

• A mini documentary about their T-shirt project (6:35) – TEEDA and KENJI03 design and spray-paint t-shirts by hand for fans to buy at their forthcoming PUBLIC THEATER live
• BACK-ON group commentary on Hello World (5:18)
• BACK to the Future 1 [爆 to the Future 1] (4:53) – Documentary video of BACK-ON’s trip to Canada in 2007 – surely the title is a homage to the film Back to the Future?
• BACK to the SP [爆つべ SP] (2:11)
• BACK to the vol.4 [爆つべ vol 4] (4:28)

The official Youtube channel was registered on January 23rd 2011, but as this BACKONNETCHANNEL account was registered on the much earlier date of January 5th 2011, it shows that this project has been at least a month in the making!

There is a short (and primarily audio) video called album CM 18 26 25 2 which might be some sort of promo for Hello World? We’re not sure really so would welcome any comments or thoughts.

But going back to the main topic: the official Youtube channel is definitely a feather in BACK-ON‘s cap when it comes to their recent international social media campaign, which already includes Twitter and Facebook, as pictures speak a thousand words and videos can offer so much more, and all this means that we can interact with BACK-ON the band directly via mediums we fans are already comfortable with.

Out of the uploads so far, the most exciting video me is really the recent video commentaries by TEEDA and KENJI03, as they reiterate the band’s plans for going more ‘worldwide’ in 2011 – Japan and (we believe) America are already on their list, so I’m hoping that they’ll visit Europe again, as well as the rest of Asia and even the South Americas, as there are brigades of fans in Taiwan, SE Asia, China and Brazil etc.

If you are a fan, give us a shout here! We’ll try and feature some of the international fan brigades over the course of the next few weeks, and hope this will give BACK-ON more reasons to go to even more countries!

It is yet another significant achievement for BACK-ON, as their previous Tales of the World: Radiant Mythology tie-in single flyaway also reached the top #10. We’re hoping with you feat.Me can go all the way to the top 3!

In other news, unfortunately BACK-ON didn’t quite clinch the top spot for the Best of January poll run by our lovely affiliate Love[asia]Music with TELL ME (there were a ‘questionable’ number of Dir En Grey fans loitering around the polling station if you ask me off-record :p)  but with the release of with you feat.Me, the band will again feature in the Best of February votes: we will be promoting this as well and hope more BACK-ON fans will set up camp vote every day for them when the polls re-open!

p/s: Watch out for our forthcoming news post about the launch of BACK-ON’s Official Youtube Channel!

Love[asia]Music is a website by Jae and Jean and is all about the best music from – you guessed it – Asia!  I personally love the design and the logo (doesn’t it just make you happy?)  and have discovered many new songs that I like on their website.  It helps, of course, that they are also BACK-ON fans!

A special thanks must go to Sesshy who suggested that we contact each other in the first place.  :D

And before I forget, Jae mentioned that they are running a Vote for the Best of January 2011 (Japan and Korea) between Feb 1st and 10th (the list includes BACK-ON‘s TELL ME!) so please remember to pay them a visit and cast your vote – ideally for our favourite band!

This is definitely the first time that BACK-ON has ever reached the Top 10 of any Oricon charts as themselves (they did reach #1 with Ashiato – their collaboration with GReeeeN – as part of BAReeeeeeeeeeN) and it seems that Oricon is finally recognising the achievements of BACK-ON, and have featured them in this week’ s RANKING パラダイス (RANKING Paradise)!

This news comes courtesy of Sesshy, who posted all the details on our fan forums right here, and even included an annotated screenshot of BACK-ON on the frontpage (yes, frontpage) of Oricon.co.jp. The programme, RANKING Paradise, which is hosted by Yui Kanno and Brother TOM also features a group of 5 girls known as Ranpara Girls. You can watch the full video (there are quite a few Pocky ads and random mini-clips) by visiting:

http://tv.oricon.co.jp/ranpara/

Unfortunately we don’t really understand (fully) what is being asked during the Q&A between the hosts and BACK-ON, but there were certainly plenty of laughs and every single member of BACK-ON made a contribution.

Some of the things that did happen:

• Icchan was asked to describe what GReeeeN were like, to which he replied ‘GReeeeN are like kind older brothers’;
• The band were also asked what GReeeeN actually looked like – a very normal question given that they’re still ‘anonymous’ – and in the end, Teeda was asked to draw a picture of their face!
• Gori had to talk about what ‘type’ he liked (a lot of laughter here)

Oh and as Sesshy said… if you are wondering what everyone is holding in the photo above, they are inflatable Pocky. :) Hopefully we can find out what they actually said at some point, but in the meantime, do click on the link above and watch the video!

To give new readers a little background: several weeks ago, some Forum members kindly volunteered to share their thoughts about the album with us, and we featured our first fan review by Edward at the end of November, which has been read over 200 times since!

However, we did have more than one volunteer, and I am delighted to present our second ever fan review of YES!!! courtesy of Sesshy! She has picked several songs from the album to write about in her rather detailed review, and I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I did!

About our volunteer reviewer

Nickname: Sesshy Location: California, USA Favourite BACK-ON song(s): NEW WORLD, Chain, Sono Mama De (NEW ver.) Other favourite artists: UVERworld How did you find out about BACK-ON? By my boyfriend Mini Introduction: I’m a graphic designer for many things, even for BACK-ON’s Official street team. I’m a HUGE J-music fan. I believe Japanese makes very unique music, which makes me want to listen to over and over. I has have a big inspiration with Art and Music. Website: Evanescent Studios

The Review:

:::Back-ON YES!!! Review:::

Hate Naiki Michi E [LA Mix]: I really love this song. Especially the beginning when it sounds all hard rock like. The Chorus where Kenji sings is really good. It shows Kenji is getting much better at singing like always. I also notice that Kenji sing some parts in English and I actually understood it. TEEDA’s rapping is also awesome (what’s new?). Around 2:43, He does like some strong rapping voice, which I like! This might be my most favorite song in Back-On’s album.

flower [LA]: I’m a bit annoyed and a bit into it. I love flower, but however I notice they only changed the tone and sound to it, adding more beat to the song. Where Kenji raps in the song around 1:29, I like the “electronic” voice. I also hear more of Icchan’s drumming. However, I still prefer the original song over this. Also, I think Kenji sounds so different in this song. Also, I’ve notice the girl singing is different. But again, prefer the original song.

NEW WORLD: I really thought they were going to remix this song. I wanted to a nice remix, but then again, the song is awesome as it is. NEW WORLD is my most favorite song out of BACK-ON. Kenji’s singing, TEEDA’s rapping, Shu’s guitar, MACCHAN (or ICCHAN), Gori’s bass is all great. Nothing should be change in this song. So pretty much glad this one wasn’t remixed!

Sands of Time: I will always love the electronic voice of Kenji’s in the beginning. When I first heard this song, I was pretty much shaken up at the beginning. What is also good about this song, when I have the bass louder, makes great sounds out of my earphones or stereos. Around 2:00, Teeda was amazing there; sounds all robotic. I guess you can say I like that kind of effects in music. Excellent song.

Butterfly: There could be some changes on this song, even though this one was not remixed like most are. I did love the beat, reminded me some kind of action scene that would be played as a background song. There might be a bit “too” much noise that it kind of hurts your ears a bit unless it’s lowered. I do know all the lyrics to this song since I play BACK-ON a lot. I really like when Kenji says: “You’re my butterfly.” Chorus is well put, but I believe they can did a bit more work to it. Beat is excellent.

BLAZE LINE: I believe this song was defiantly made for the anime Eyeshield 21, which was played as the opening theme song. I did honestly laugh at the part when Teeda said something…a bit over PG-13 rated, haha. The rhythm with the guitars are really well done. Where Teeda starts rapping including the bass playing was like for people to come along and cheer. It can really be played for a football game; that’s I see this song for. Not my favorite song, but I really like it. BOOM, BOOM clap, BACK-ON!

DRIVE: I think I prefer the DRIVE(Shutoko REMIX) since it’s more jumpy. The beat and rhythm is well done, but I think they could make more rock-ish type. To me, it’s calm, something that would be just a chill song, so probably wouldn’t be something to jump with. I didn’t really like how Kenji sang, I guess it kind of annoyed me.

a day dreaming: I believe this song is to be the most calmest song out of their discography. I wasn’t feeling much too this song. I guess it’s…too calm, I guess I can put it that way. I did like the guitar rhythm. Kenji did well singing the chorus, but Teeda could do better with his as well. I know he can sing.

Sono Mama De [NEW ver.]: Indeed I love the new version than the original song. Has more beat, more addings to it. If you compare the old one to the new one, it is such a big improvement and shows how much they HAVE indeed improved. The old version was like some random singing along they made, but this new one is much better to listen and sing along than being just: “random.” Part when they say: “La la laaa” was AWESOME. It gave me chills, but in a good way. Perfect way to end the song, leave you chills.

Hikari Sasuhou [NEW WORLD ver.]: I actually thought they were going to add that one version since it’s not in any official release, but guess not. I believe I prefer the survive version, since it’s more rock-ish, but that’s my taste. I did love how the guitar was played throughout the song. Kenji’s long pause singing was pretty good while Teeda goes out on his rapping. Good song, but the other version is much preferred to me.

Chain [LA mix]: This was a bit unexpected to me because it didn’t sound much like the, what I called, the best Chain live ever. I can tell the different drum beat, which was nice. You can also tell this has more beat and the guitar is more “quiet.” I guess you can call it the pop-side of Chain. Yeah, I see it more pop-ish. Do like that sound that goes: “pash. pash. pash-pash-pash, pash.”

FLYDOM: Pretty much an old, but good punkish song. I can say this song was their beginning and obivously can tell comparing to their newer songs. I can’t imagine a mix of this song, and maybe they have. Though, it’s a fun song, even though they have the “Engrish” parts in it. Fwedom,

color [LA mix]: I love this song, but I don’t really see any much difference like the original. I love the parts when you hear them all techno-y when they go: “I’m going down down down” (I think or “Don’t let me down down down” Haven’t read the lyrics). The guitar delay is really cool. I believe to love this song more than Ashiato.

Ashiato [LA mix]: Again, don’t see a lot of difference than the original song. Ashiato, is a amazing song that goes right between GReeeeN and BACK-ON. Has the mix of both, which is awesome. I hope to see more band combination such as this. The chorus is amazing. I love the part when Teeda spells: “BAReeeeeeeeeeN.” One of my favorite songs.

I would like to say a big thank you to Sesshy for her review and for taking the time to evaluate the album and write a review for us. As we have said before, our aim is to encourage as many people as possible to listen to BACK-ON‘s music, and again, we hope that featuring different styles of reviews is one of the right steps forward to promote their work to others! Please let us know what you think in the comments or on our Forums. :)

Featured are 42 second clips of:

• flyaway (Tales of the World: Radiant Mythology 2 OP)
• where is the future? (Tales of the World: Radiant Mythology 2 ED)
• flyaway 『テイルズ オブ』Remix (Special remix of the title track available as an extra in the special [Tales of] edition of the single)

To summarise, flyaway is just as good as we expected from the original 30 second preview of the song; where is the future? seems reminiscent of one of BACK-ON’s previous title songs flower, but the biggest (and best) surprise imho is probably flyaway 『テイルズ オブ』Remix or flyaway [Tales of] Remix!

For fans of dance or game background music, this is a must listen, but the preview is alas so very short! Teeda‘s voice is electronically altered, and with thanks to BOO forum member Sok for this information, apparently the singer of the main chorus (at least in this preview clip) is the female seiyuu of Kanonno, the main character in the Tales of the World: Radiant Mythology 2 series!

In addition to clips of the 3 songs (sadly missing Re:Start) BACK-ON have also posted a much longer video clip of the flyaway PV on their official Myspace as well! :) I think it is pretty safe to say that everyone on the Forums who has seen the PV preview so far likes it.

You can watch it after the cut (as usual) at the end of this post, or you can:

watch the PV preview on BACK-ON’s Myspace by clicking here!

Last but not least, for fans and visitors who do not have access to Myspace, you can also listen to the clips of all 3 songs after the cut as well! Either way, please enjoy and let us know what you think! :)

BACK-ON – flyaway (Myspace audio)

1. flyaway
2. where is the future?
3. flyaway[Tales of]Remix
   

BACK-ON – flyway PV preview (Myspace video)

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Brand new BACK-ON.com – flyaway version

It appears to be a TV ‘spot’ ad that is currently playing to people across Japan (we hope!) to promote the new single, but the video was quite small, although we were all very excited to hear a clip of the chorus. However, in the meantime, it turns out that AbyssalChronicles has actually uploaded this clip for everyone to watch on Youtube!

Click on the link below to ‘watch it in high quality’ directly on Youtube!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RRHvCLCaOzs

Alternatively you can still watch the ‘normal’ version at the end of this post. For the sake of better graphics in particular, I would really recommend watching it on Youtube directly!

And on a quick side note, JUICE magazine did a quick preview for the new BACK-ON single, and the author seems to say that the theme of this single was:

Friendship & Courage (友情や勇気)

Hope you all enjoy watching the preview! :) Like some others, I am very excited by how good the songs sounds from the clip, and aside from the surprise that the lyrics for the single might already be available online, I can’t wait till we hear the song in full!

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The images we have all been waiting since the news hint of the new single, flyaway, were the CD covers for both the standard or normal flyaway single cover (shown first) AND the limited edition ‘Tales‘ version:

As the news update from Sound Ex put it:

“Even though it’s not “Back-On’s style, I REALLY love the covers.“

I would have to agree wholeheartedly with the latter statement, especially as I also love the covers too (why are the images so tantalisingly small!?) and I am sure you feel the same too (especially fans of the PSP series: Tales of the World – if you weren’t already aware of the news, BACK-ON is writing the OP and ED theme music for the brand new game Tales of the World: Radiant Mythology 2) although if I were to really ‘look’ for any similarities to BACK-ON‘s previous CD cover designs, I would say that the cursive writing reminds me of Chain, one of BACK-ON‘s earliest singles, which features that nice italic-cursive-style as well.

Anyway, before I digress further, let us move on to the tracklisting. The question we were all (at least several of us?) dying to know was whether the limited/Tales edition of the CD would include anything extra – Chain, for instance, did not – but as the official BACK-ON website confirmed (screenshot), there is an additional track called: flyaway 『テイルズ オブ』Remix or flyaway (Tales of) Remix!

So the official tracklisting is as follows (with the Remix version only available with the limited/Tales edition):

1. flyaway
2. where is the future?
3. Re:Start
4. (flyaway 『テイルズ オブ』Remix)

And if it wasn’t clear before,

flyaway is the OP and
where is the future? is the ED

for the game, although it’s a little beyond me at the moment why the remix version is called flyaway (Tales of) Remix rather than just flyaway (Tales) Remix , but according to the info on BACK-ON.com, the remix is a:

スペシャルヴァージョン (Special version) as it involves the voice cast behind the main characters of the game and also some of the background music (BGM) that features during the battles!

You can watch some of the trailer videos at the official Tales of the World: Radiant Mythology 2 website but seeing as the musical styles of the BGM and BACK-ON‘s usual musical style is really quite different, it will be VERY interesting to hear this remix imho! Of course, one mustn’t lose sight of the fact there are 3 brand new songs by BACK-ON on this single, where the titles of all the songs seem to have connotations of creating a new beginning… I think. What are your thoughts?

I am really liking this potential ‘return’ to what appears to be themes of light and hope, as they were, I believe, something that the band were aiming for with several of their songs (more noticeable in some than others) and am very much looking forward to hearing previews of the new songs!

Before I forget… the brand new official profile photos for 2009 and to promote flyaway!
Here’s the official group photo:

And ones of each band member:

I love Gori‘s new look in particular this time round, although he looks awfully serious; Kenji03, sadly, is missing the glasses from the promotional photos of YES!!!, although Teeda is still sporting some very nice sunglasses this time round!

We might even see a new official BACK-ON website redesign – the team behind BACK-ON have a pretty good track record so far when it comes to new single releases – and with the single (both editions) out on January 28th 2009, just a day before the launch of Tales of the World: Radiant Mythology 2, we will hopefully have more news and song previews early into the new year, although there is time for one more message:

HAPPY NEW YEAR FOR 2009 AND ENJOY THE CELEBRATIONS!

Thank you to everyone who has been so helpful and supportive to our site this year. It has been a great 12 months for BACK-ON and ourselves, even if the updates on our site have been a little sporadic, but the band have really gone from strength-to-strength, especially with the release of their first full album, YES!!!

We would also like to say a very special thank you to the fans who have contributed their talent, time and their energy both on our main site and on the Forums. We will see you next year with lots of BACK-ON related updates and very much hope you will all continue to support both BACK-ON and ourselves in 2009!

The redesign and coding has been the brainchild and work of Sesshy, and is inspired by the cover of Back-on‘s latest single Sands of time. I really like this new design, as it looks very sleek and clean, and is extremely easy to navigate, so kudos to Sesshy for doing such a great job! I am very glad she decided to retain the grungy font from the original site as well :)

In addition to this makeover, a new intro flash to the website has also been released, featuring photos of Back-on from their latest photo shoot and Sands of time playing in the background. Unfortunately (as before) we haven’t been able to include screenshots of the flash animation on their front page, and so it is best enjoyed by visiting the Sound EX website yourself!

If you like the relaunch of Sound EX, why not write a comment on their guestbook and let Nao and Sesshy know? :)

Meji, who provided us with the initial review of the new songs from the single – message for kidz and fifty/50, has setup a Myspace profile where you can listen to all the songs. The url is below:

http://www.myspace.com/backonsandsoftime (UPDATE 20/06/2008: Sadly this account is now off-line. With thanks to EJ for the news. You can still listen via the Radio on the Music page!)

So if you haven’t heard the new songs yet, head over to one or both places and listen in! For more opinions of the new single, you can read the reviews posted by Aoi and Sesshy on the BOO forums. At least one of the reviews, and other random ‘Back-on‘ keywords can all be found on the dedicated Back-on dictionary created by ichi!

Let us know what you think of Back-on‘s latest musical experiment! :)

p/s: I received my copy of the new CD in the post a few days ago! :) Do I think it was worth the wait? Definitely!