UPDATE:

Cover revealed!

The album will be 13 tracks long.

UPDATE! Album is officially released. Tokuma posted samples to three songs on their official Youtube page. Sounds solid (for what, 3 minutes of teaser clips), but holy FUCK at that riff in the final track. That alone has me super eager to get this thing.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pTFsuvwOQkc
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WYyI6yWN53s
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XwCuLYE34wQ

It's also nice that this thing whups 13 in terms of "modern production values". Dat guitar grit. Mmm.

So yeah, Ningen-Isu have finally announced their 17th full length album. It's due to come out this summer on August 7th, and is titled 萬燈籠 (10,000 Hanging Lanterns in Japanese). They're also going on a small tour including sharing the stage with Black Sabbath at this year's Ozzfest in Japan (not that many of us can probably attend that, unfortunately).

ANYWAY, no tracklistings yet or anything, but I'm super excited! Recently I've seen people on MA really digging Ningen-Isu, so I figured I'd make a thread to let people know and possibly share a little mutual love for the band. They've been remarkably consistent throughout their whole career -- I can honestly say I listen to material from every single full length and enjoy it immensely. They really don't seem to have ever dipped in quality! If you like what they do, they've done it with passion and commitment for 25 god damned years. What other bands can say they're on their 17th bloody album with no stinkers preceding it? Not a whole lot! And it's such a badass sound too, merging all these elements of 70s prog rock and doom and heavy and other good stuff. Here's hoping the new album is on the same level of quality as their last release, which was honestly one of my favorites of 2011 (Some of the tracks are just SO AWESOMELY RIFFY and heavy).

Discuss!

I'm probably the only other person to be excited! All their albums are good, so of course it's gonna be enjoyable.

I'd hope you weren't the only one with how many people asked for handouts of their damned discography.

No he's far from being the only one. Can't wait for this album to be released.

I remember a lot of discussions around this band in the FFA thread a while back so I checked them out and was really impressed. I've had trouble finding physical copies of their music, but hopefully someone will widely distribute this upcoming release. One thing that surprised me was how much I enjoyed the vocals, which were really emotive despite being in a language that I can't understand.

Sadly I doubt they'll be distributed any wider than they currently are. They're on a major Japanese label as is; I don't think they're gonna see copies shipping worldwide any time soon.

Yay another album that I won't be able to buy for under $40. I found out about these guys a while ago when I saw a cover they did of King Crimson's 21st Century Schizoid Man on Youtube.

These guys really need to get some kind of reliable distribution over here in the US and Europe. I love the band but I really don't like MP3s, and I refuse to shell out ridiculous prices for Japanese imports.

lol, if there was a big enough demand overseas a lot of Japanese bands would probably see wider distribution. The problem is that most people outside of Japan simply don't know they exist, and Japan itself sustains most of its big bands quite lovingly already.

I'm sure people would buy enough to justify printing, say, 500 copies of certain albums from the bigger names. People here and in Europe still like Loudness, so I'm sure Ningen-Isu, Anthem, Gargoyle, Volcano, etc. would be popular enough in the underground. After all, Genocide did pretty well, and they're definitely less well-known than most of those bands.

Well, me and my friend are trying to figure something out with Gargoyle to get them a little more international distribution. I dunno about Ningen-Isu though, they're not an independent band, they're on Tokuma. With enough promotion and maybe a well placed music video from the new album they could probably easily gain a following elsewhere though.

Wow. Great news

Track titles and cover have finally been revealed! I transliterated and translated most of them on the MA page for it. Cool cover!

http://www.metal-archives.com/albums/%E ... %A0/381774

Very cool cover!

Huh, going from the title I was expecting something different. You know, a spooky town street from feudal japan with lanterns hanging everywhere, that sort of thing. Still pretty cool though.

I assume the title refers to stars, based on the cover. Yknow, hanging lanterns... In the sky. Also, super pumped that its 13 tracks. More material is good material from this band.

Oh yeah, I get that now I have seen the cover, I just didn't expect it to refer to that when I first heard the title.

Speaking of titles, I actually really dig the final one (Eisei ni natta Otoko, "The Man Who Became A Satellite"). That's a pretty sweet title, gives me a Sabbath vibe for some reason.

I expect another good album. This band is ridiculously consistent. Nice cover too.

I've heard only their first 5 releases. Couldn't get my hands on anything else. Bad ass band, stoked for this

UPDATE! Album is officially released. Tokuma posted samples to three songs on their official Youtube page. Sounds solid (for what, 3 minutes of teaser clips), but holy FUCK at that riff in the final track. That alone has me super eager to get this thing.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pTFsuvwOQkc
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WYyI6yWN53s
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XwCuLYE34wQ

It's also nice that this thing whups 13 in terms of "modern production values". Dat guitar grit. Mmm.

So good.

Hot damn, the teaser tracks sound promising. Cheers for the update!

Wow, I have never heard of this band before, and the teasers sound totally awesome, especially the vocals.
Will be looking forward to this one. I hope they release this on vinyl.

"This video is unavailable."

Ffs. I can't seem to find them elsewhere.