Moon Phase and Anime Round up

This anime about the relationship between Kouhei Morioka a freelace photgrapher and Hazuki, a teenager who descends from a royal vampire lineage.

We learn at the start of the story that Kouhei travels to a castle in Germany to take photographs of all sorted Paranormal phenomenon for his friend Hiromi, the editor of an occult magazine. At the castle, Kouhei meets Hazuki, who feeds on Kouhei's blood and claims him as her unwilling servant. She is a 14 years old vampire - selfish but adorable - who was separated from her mother and restrained in a castle in Germany.

Although this "blood pact" is supposed to bind Kouhei to Hazuki as her obedient slave, her act has no effect on Kouhei. Following an action packed sorcerers battle, in which Kouhei and his cousin manage to free Hazuki from her captivity in the dreary castle, Hazuki travels to Tokyo, and takes up residence with Kouhei in his grandfather's house in Japan. Hazuki reveals this is what her mother wanted her to do when she disappeared.

Hazuki claims that, because she fed on his blood, Kouhei is now her servant, but Kouhei continually refuses to obey her, especially when he thinks her requests are unreasonable. Despite their fighting, the relationship between the duo progresses over time - even in the face of repeated attacks by opposing vampires - until Kouhei becomes determined to protect Hazuki from the vampire servants of her family, who themselves are determined to retrieve her by whatever means necessary.We learn later on in the anime he possesses great spiritual powers which were sealed by his family in order to allow him to live a normal life, as they were too strong for him to control. In the anime, he once again seals away his Jyougan so that it doesn't affect his relationship with Hazuki.

Other characters include Ryuuhei is Kouhei's grandfather who took in Hazuki and is a powerful spiritualist and exorcist.

A word about Revelation's DVD packaging. It is beautiful with pop up disc holders and a set of guide notes to further explain things as well as points to look for in later viewings.

Below is a picture of it in exploded form:

Glimmers of the past

There is much in here that resonates such as  the playfulness of the child in trying to wake up the man who one assumes is a Minister of religion with no hint of malice or being mean in their whole demeanor and the playing out of doors in a cultivate garden which was a part of my childhood.
The other thing is personal which is that child is outside in a traditional girls school dress being carefree in the presence of a powerful male character although they in terms of physical build look more 'boy' and I suspect was 'assigned' as such even if they may of been transgendered before that term came into vogue.
I so wish that child could of been me at that age as it was all I really wanted.

Sony's Mastersound cds

I've always been interested in music and one by product of this is I like to have good sounding copies of my favourite recordings so I do sometimes buy two or more versions of an album where the the recording is transferred to cd or record differently.
These cds came out during the mid 1990's being made in Japan by Sony Music and I bought several of them as they purported to from the original mastertapes and were a bit cheaper than those issued by so-called 'audiophile' labels such as MFSL and DCC a factor that was important as being very pawley(tm) I didn't have a lot of spare money to spend on such things.

They were a mixed bag - I couldn't get on with the issue of Boston's self titled album being screechy replacing that by a regular US version - and failed to see the sense and trying to make a audiophile issue of Bat Out of Hell, an album that has lots of mixing issues whatever you might think of it musically.

On the other hand the issues of Toto IV, Bridge Over Troubled waters and Billy Joel's 52nd Street in that series were quite something and continue to provide me with much pleasure upon listening to them.

Ouran High School Host Club

Recently following its arrival I've been watching Ouran High School Host Club which has proven very popular over here.

This part- Series 1 Part 1 (Episodes 1 through 13) - came out Late April in the UK with Part two  set to come out early June so I really must remember to pre-order!

It is set in the institution of the same, a place of extravagance and prestige where learning is secondary to luxury. Bookish Haruhi can't afford to slack, being on a scholarship and out of place among the moneyed.

The Host Club is open - a Japanese notion of a place where for a fee people of the opposite gender are entertained and this school has one!Each Host club's job consists of entertaining and accompanying the female guests, whether it be a tea party, a costume dress up or an afternoon tea

A group of handsome boys dedicated to selling their charms to their bored female classmates, Haruhi is suddenly in debt to the club after breaking an expensive vase in their lair.

Naturally Haruhi has to pay for this damage but how?

By become a Host!!!!

Now this would be fine but we'd be forgetting something important -Haruhi is a girl!!!!!!!!!!!!

Between the wildly inflated ego of the expert escorts and the potential calamities of constant cross dressing, Haruhi's freshman year sure looks like it will be one to remember.

This is witty shojuo anime at its funniest with constant near misses for Haruhi like the School Medical with the Special Boy area screened off, a attempt to have enrolled in an All Girls School so she can their club and bathing suit scenes.

The constant themes include as you'd expect in this type of anime friendship and romance although the more observant will notice the mild sexual references (it is rated 15).

The animation in Ouran is simply gorgeous with some nice delicate shoujo style artwork, coupled with lovely bright and vibrant colours, making Ouran a series you wont want to take your eyes off.

I'd strongly recommended it.