I’m currently going through a nihon bunka (Japanese culture) appreciation phase ^^;
No manga with any references to Japanese history/myth/legend/tradition is safe from being devoured within hours. That’s basically everything that is or has been running in Hakusensha’s Melody. I’ve also read Onodera Akira’s Rokutousei Supika for the millionth time. (If any manga is neo-Japanesque, it’s his.) At the moment, I’m reading Itsuki Natsumi’s Yakumotatsu. I can’t even find the right words to express my deep love for this manga (or any manga by Itsuki-sensei) ♥ Status: 7 volumes of 19 have been read, the rest will follow as soon as I get them.

Now, I also dug out my Kagrra CDs because they’re like the musical equivalent to all the manga mentioned above. Even though I haven’t been very fond of any of their CDs as a major band, they’re still one of my favourite bands because of all their indie releases. And in a moment of mental weakness, I decided to take my appreciation for all those earlier releases to a whole new level and translate my favourite Kagrra CDs -_-; I thought I’d start with gozen and ~Kirameki~. I’m absolutely fascinated by Isshi’s use of old words and grammar structures. They don’t make translating the lyrics any easier, but at least it’s interesting from a linguistic point of view. And it’s ultimately satisfying to bring out the beauty of the songs by fully understanding all those mythological references and the stories Isshi wrote.

It’s especially interesting with gozen because the whole album is one long story and it’s really nice to understand what exactly is going on in every song, how the music mirrors the respective events, how the story progresses and what themes, both in the lyrics and the music, are repeated throughout the whole album.