{"id":960,"date":"2014-04-28T21:13:29","date_gmt":"2014-04-29T03:13:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.intlwota.com\/happydisco\/?p=960"},"modified":"2014-04-28T21:13:29","modified_gmt":"2014-04-29T03:13:29","slug":"review-monday-rev-from-dvl-love-arigatou","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mescallado.com\/happydisco\/index.php\/2014\/04\/28\/review-monday-rev-from-dvl-love-arigatou\/","title":{"rendered":"Review Monday: Rev. from DVL &#8211; Love Arigatou"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>As I mentioned in my last post, I&#8217;ve been a fan of Rev.from DVL for a while. As such, I&#8217;m really excited about their major debut single. In this single, they do songs they have been doing for a while. Do these live up to the hype?<\/p>\n<p><strong>Love Arigatou<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/TRHsEw4O6TE\" height=\"315\" width=\"560\" allowfullscreen=\"\" frameborder=\"0\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><strong>Song:<\/strong> This has been Rev.from DVL&#8217;s big song for a long time. And honestly, even though the new arrangement is cleaning it up a bit and making it better for an idol fan audience, I prefer the original Rev version. The thing is, this song is a cover of a song that isn&#8217;t that much of an idol song. It&#8217;s upbeat and happy, but the phrasing doesn&#8217;t always sound like a typical idol song. The song involves a lot of sped through lines and has to be sung with a level of jazziness, especially in the section before the third chorus. This new version, while keeping the melody, feels a lot more like a typical idol song than I would have liked. The arrangement is a bit too cutesy for the song, as well. If you read this blog you know that I do not have an aversion to cute idol music, but it feels overdone here.<\/p>\n<p>That said, at its core it&#8217;s still Love Arigatou, and Love Arigatou is a favorite idol song of mine. It&#8217;s not always a typical song, it has a good melody, and it&#8217;s generally well composed. It is the type of song that almost always suits my mood; it has an idol feel to it, but is easy to differentiate from the rest of the idol crowd of music. It&#8217;s pretty easy to tell that it&#8217;s a cover of a song from a non-idol artist, and I suppose that&#8217;s why I like it. It manages to be cute and fun with not sounding completely derivative.<\/p>\n<p><strong>PV:<\/strong> One of the chief complaints I&#8217;ve seen about this PV is that it focuses on Kanna too much. Which is understandable, because Kanna is there. A lot. But really, as a Rev fan, it was more exciting just seeing the girls I know and love. Really, it could be worse, is all I&#8217;m saying. Every time the focus is on Kanna too long I get distracted by a closeup of other girls I like more. The balance is skewed in Kanna&#8217;s favor, by a long shot, but other girls get some spotlight.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.mescallado.com\/happydisco\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/04\/lovearigatou2.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-medium wp-image-962\" alt=\"lovearigatou2\" src=\"http:\/\/www.mescallado.com\/happydisco\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/04\/lovearigatou2-300x134.png\" width=\"300\" height=\"134\" \/><\/a>And by spotlight I mean the lighting of this PV, which is way too heavy on the light. It&#8217;s almost distracting, how bright everything is. I feel like this should be directed by J.J. Abrams.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.mescallado.com\/happydisco\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/04\/lovearigatou3.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-medium wp-image-963\" alt=\"lovearigatou3\" src=\"http:\/\/www.mescallado.com\/happydisco\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/04\/lovearigatou3-300x134.png\" width=\"300\" height=\"134\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>The above image was slightly edited by me. Only slightly. Still, I know what they&#8217;re trying to do; they&#8217;re trying to make it seem heavenly, that Kanna was sent from heaven to give us handshakes or something. Many PVs try to go heavy on the lighting, washing out the girls, to the point where the lighting is overexaggerated or just boring flat lighting. The rest of the PV is lit fairly competently; the dance shot is a pretty standard flat lighting, and some scenes seem like they&#8217;re lit fine but just have unfortunate brightness added in in post.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.mescallado.com\/happydisco\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/04\/lovearigatou4.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-medium wp-image-964\" alt=\"lovearigatou4\" src=\"http:\/\/www.mescallado.com\/happydisco\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/04\/lovearigatou4-300x134.png\" width=\"300\" height=\"134\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Other than the lighting, the PV is fairly basic. It&#8217;s a collection of closeups and dance shots, mostly, except for a couple of shots of them meandering through a forest or some trees. It&#8217;s the tried and true Hello!Project method of PV creation; it&#8217;s not creative, but serviceable. Other than the lighting the elements are all fine; the set looks nice, the scenes are shot well, and the editing, while focusing in on Kanna, works. I&#8217;m glad they chose to eschew green screen (the filters make it look fake, but I&#8217;m fairly certain they&#8217;re actually outside for the outside scenes); it may be simple, but there&#8217;s no laughably bad CGI.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.mescallado.com\/happydisco\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/04\/lovearigatou5.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-medium wp-image-965\" alt=\"lovearigatou5\" src=\"http:\/\/www.mescallado.com\/happydisco\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/04\/lovearigatou5-300x134.png\" width=\"300\" height=\"134\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>As for the PV introducing the group, it introduces Kanna pretty well. If you&#8217;re watching it for Kanna, you will be pleased. If you&#8217;re watching for another girl, you will probably see her, but you may have to look out for her. That said, this PV is personally what got me interested in Hashimoto Yukina as an idol, because you can see her at specific instances in the PV.<\/p>\n<p>All in all, aside from some shoddy lighting work, Love Arigatou is a serviceable PV and introduction to Rev. It&#8217;s not Rev at its best, but for a major debut it could certainly be worse.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Ai ni Kinshai<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/lAupzXO7zh8\" height=\"315\" width=\"560\" allowfullscreen=\"\" frameborder=\"0\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><strong>Song:\u00a0<\/strong>Criticizing Love Arigatou, I found that while I love the original song the new arrangement didn&#8217;t live up to my hype. However, I have the opposite problem with Ai ni Kinshai. I liked the original song, but it didn&#8217;t live up to other Rev songs. However, the new arrangement elevates the original to new heights. The whole song has a lot of energy with a fast paced beat behind it. The vocal mixing has been improved, as well; there&#8217;s something with how the vocals sound in the chorus that gives the song a lot more emphasis.<\/p>\n<p>This song is, frankly, a lot more fun. Love Arigatou feels like it takes itself seriously; Ai ni Kinshai is a goofy song that invites people to Fukuoka. The pacing of the song is pretty perfect, and its arrangement doesn&#8217;t get bogged down with a slow section like Love Arigatou kind of did.<\/p>\n<p>This song isn&#8217;t that unusual of a song, but it&#8217;s fast-paced and fun, and a great start for this group.<\/p>\n<p><strong>PV<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Even though Love Arigatou is the top billed song on this single, I would rather new fans see the PV of Ai ni Kinshai first. It feels like a much better representation of Rev.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.mescallado.com\/happydisco\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/04\/kinshai1.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-medium wp-image-966\" alt=\"kinshai1\" src=\"http:\/\/www.mescallado.com\/happydisco\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/04\/kinshai1-300x165.png\" width=\"300\" height=\"165\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>While Kanna is still the focus, the other girls get a lot of screentime, relatively. There are long, extended sequences where you don&#8217;t see any Kanna at all. I like Kanna, but this PV is a lot better for getting to know the other Rev girls. They&#8217;re all having a blast with this PV, and it&#8217;s fun to see.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.mescallado.com\/happydisco\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/04\/kinshai2.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-medium wp-image-967\" alt=\"kinshai2\" src=\"http:\/\/www.mescallado.com\/happydisco\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/04\/kinshai2-300x165.png\" width=\"300\" height=\"165\" \/><\/a>The lighting and production is a lot better here; everything looks natural. There are still some overlit moments (on the bus, for example), but they&#8217;re few and far between. Honestly, this PV seems better produced. There&#8217;s a lot more interesting things going on, the lighting&#8217;s better, the editing is just as good. It feels like this should be the primary PV for the single.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.mescallado.com\/happydisco\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/04\/kinshai3.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-medium wp-image-968\" alt=\"kinshai3\" src=\"http:\/\/www.mescallado.com\/happydisco\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/04\/kinshai3-300x165.png\" width=\"300\" height=\"165\" \/><\/a>The PV features a lot of different locations and scenes; much more than even big, mainstream groups get. This makes the PV rich and exciting.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.mescallado.com\/happydisco\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/04\/kinshai4.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-medium wp-image-969\" alt=\"kinshai4\" src=\"http:\/\/www.mescallado.com\/happydisco\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/04\/kinshai4-300x165.png\" width=\"300\" height=\"165\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>The PV focuses a lot on Fukuoka; understandably, given that that&#8217;s the subject of the song. Still, I&#8217;m glad they actually got to go places, as well as using some limited green screen technology. It&#8217;s a solid advertisement for the city as well as being a great PV.<\/p>\n<p>Ai ni Kinshai might not have much of a storyline (Kanna running late?) but it does a great job of showing off the members individually and a group. The wide variety of scenes make this a really fun one to watch!<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>As I mentioned in my last post, I&#8217;ve been a fan of Rev.from DVL for a while. As such, I&#8217;m really excited about their major debut single. In this single, they do songs they have been doing for a while. &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/mescallado.com\/happydisco\/index.php\/2014\/04\/28\/review-monday-rev-from-dvl-love-arigatou\/\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[68],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-960","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-rev-from-dvl"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mescallado.com\/happydisco\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/960","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mescallado.com\/happydisco\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mescallado.com\/happydisco\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mescallado.com\/happydisco\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mescallado.com\/happydisco\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=960"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mescallado.com\/happydisco\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/960\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mescallado.com\/happydisco\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=960"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mescallado.com\/happydisco\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=960"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mescallado.com\/happydisco\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=960"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}