MGazette vol. ??, Le Ciel Gackt "Le Ciel"

 

First I would like to ask why you chose Le Ciel as a standalone song from Merveilles.

G: There no sensation of singling it out from the album. In terms of order, if the album comes first then it’s a “single cut”, and then if the album comes after it’s said to be a “singles collection”, but we have no intention of that. If you think of the album as a big map taking an extensive view of all of Merveilles, the singles are that magnified chart. By focusing on one block and one point it becomes a very thickly crowded map. So even though releasing Le Ciel was necessary, the feelings differ from person to person, and I don’t want to force it by saying, “Let's do this!”

Is it possible to imagine Le Ciel as something that brings Merveilles to an end? Until now it’s not an answer, but a “?” that has been raised, and I think that it is too polite.

G: There may be a part that hits upon an ending, but that doesn’t mean that Merveilles itself is ended… It’s that Merveilles is one book. But Malice Mizer also does not end when you’ve read to the last page. That page that closed at the very end is the story of “Le Ciel”, but you haven’t read the conclusion…and those are the conditions under which we’re releasing Le Ciel. The resulting answer to will change as time passes…I’d like you to feel it this way.

The time before it felt like you were pouring out your feelings, but this time is very soft, that is to say I have the impression that the feelings were released in a state where they have been swayed and were moving.

G: I didn’t have any feeling of having to change the form. The Le Ciel from before is something I wrote feeling the instant that it floated down into me when I was in France (reference to vol. 18), this time I moved from that first impression to the tour and am releasing the heightened thoughts I had towards Le Ciel. Therefore even thought there are things that changed in terms of the sound…it is natural. Of course, to come to this point took a lot of time, but I think that was a necessary process.

So it was created from very deep thinking?

G: Rather than deep thinking…the thing that was on my mind most during production, in my head there is another world existing, but everyone has the images from the album, so I had to focus on the arrangement. But if I could genuinely release an image drawn from the thoughts born from inside me and make them 100% into sound, it would be nice for it to turn out exactly the same as before in the end. But expressing that in words is difficult…there’s no sense of time, is there?

Ah, you’re right!

G: Right? I didn’t want to give a sense of passing time, and besides I wanted statelessness. Because I cannot show the scenery from the Le Ciel in my head to other people…it would be quick if you could just put some ear plugs in and an image would come flying at you from the TV screen.

Huh…(lol). People have different ways of thinking, so normally it’s difficult to convey it that clearly.

G: Exactly. We’re trying to reproduce that with sound. This time, after the end of the 6/30 tour I went home, and like that ended up in the studio all night and talked to the arranger for a looong time. He had to understand before we could start after all. Eventually, it took 2 weeks.

What? Isn’t that a long time?

G: Isn’t it amazing? For one song! But we worked on it for 4 days and then thought, “We’re done!”, but we’d made an overly clear image into sound after all. Normally he would not know what would fit, how I live, how my way of thinking changed so greatly, what kind of viewpoint I have, how I feel towards life, the kind of meaning there is in expressing what I write…he could come to see that after being around me for a long time.

So he grew accustomed to the vision.

G: Right. We go back longer than I do with the members, so he understands easily, it’s easy to express myself, and that’s his strong point. Bu the words when you express something to someone are not 100% exact, and depending on the person there are times when it becomes 0 or minus. Even so, we are starting from a place of trying to get close to 100. Still, as expected, making something from 0, from that first sound, takes a lot of power, and I think it might have taken the most time. In the back there’s that low noise growling “do, do” right? We made it from the sound all the way down to there. That is all different types of sounds piled upon one another making that “do, do” sound. It took 5 or 6 hours, but having done it, it felt like we’d almost finished. I wonder if you understand it, this feeling. Rather than a sense of accomplishment, it felt like we’d been able to see relatively 90% of that which we couldn’t see at all.

And the cloudy sky was…?

G: It’s like Paaaa!, like Moses’s ten commandments. (lol) Really it’s that kind of feeling. Whether the song will arrive at the end, or fall short, whether you can see what’s coming or not, is the thing decided from the very beginning. Because of that it was quick from that point forward. After I tested with the members saying what kind of image I wanted to use. If that was a good way to turn to, then it was ok. That’s something Malice Mizer has always done up to now, but the members were also anguished about it too, greatly.

It sounds like you’re saying, “I imbued this with my way of living, so understand it!” to people who were raised in a different environment.

G: I see. But the interesting thing is that Malice Mizer is putting forth very difficult thoughts, aren’t we? But there are no private connections at all. (lol) Even so we still manage, and I think that’s amazing! We’re a group of individuals with a certain kind of warped air to us after all. Personally I’ve never taken a band so seriously before, but I don’t expect us all to get used to working together. All 5 of us have our separate choices, and so we’re coming together with the confidence of being able to do something good. From long before there was a point of light, and the 5 of us turned towards it walking our own paths. Like that.

For me the previous Le Ciel was painful, but for some reason this time I felt comforted. But the sadness still remained…it conveys a strange emotion.

G: That is because the things I have now experiences and the emotions remaining in my heart have been dragged into Le Ciel. Those conditions and experiences are different from person to person, so if it’s a question of other people feeling the same thing then that’s not the way it works. But what is felt is definitely not mistaken, and in fact it’s what each person personally is hoping for.

Ah, for me, the environment has completely changed from before.

G: Right. When it comes to what people are looking for, I think there are both subconscious things and unconscious things. And music brings forth the subconscious ones, but more than that it also has the power to drag up the world that people are looking for unconsciously. Especially the power and emotions that thing holds became larger…I don’t know what it is, but has it perhaps made you cry?

I have. When I saw Bjôrk.

G: I think that is cause by the development that happened the instant something pulled forth the thing that you are naturally looking for. That instant, you’re being lightly pushed on your back. And the thing that pushed me was Le Ciel. Right? Often listen to Le Ciel in a running car, when I’ll notice that I’m crying. It’s not because it’s sad, or harsh, but for some reason I’m crying. Therefore the song’s story in fact exists, but as with the name Le Ciel, everyone has those feelings. For all people there is something that resembles a single notion which is the same until a conclusion is reached. Because the stories that they are each holding differ. Separately, I think in what everyone feels there is a unified Le Ciel. I cannot express those common feelings in words, so I’m putting them in the general term of Le Ciel.

So you mean that you put into song a feeling of “why” that was awakened in yourself at the point when you were searching for it?

G: Yes, exactly. It’s not just the literal translation, but also the meaning above that…

G: Tenkuu doesn’t just mean sora (天空VS空). When I stood in the center of the ground and looked around me, far off the ground and sky stuck together. I put the two together and that was Le Ciel.

Including yourself, it was a set.

G: I was in the center and there was a 360 degree world around me.

But it doesn’t mean you’ll always be there?

G: I don’t know why, but I’m always looking for a place to return to.

Is that why your style of singing is soft?

G: That’s on my own terms. I’m singing according to my own feelings. When I start to sing on stage too, I sing what comes to me as it is. But if you ask why I can’t act it out too, I can. However if that were also to go into the movie world, at that time there would be no, “Should we perform?”, but rather the common point of, “We have no intention of performing.”

In the live everyone was in the feathered costumes, but the white ones for this time’s Le Ciel interest me too.

G: That’s because there was a different story in this time’s Le Ciel. That’s the only difference. Mana, Yuki, Kozi, and Kami each have their own Le Ciel story, but doing that all on stage is impossible, so mine got picked up.

And there is a meaning in the blood, right?

G: There is. What do you think it is?

The pain of an angel fallen from the sky, the pain that heretics feel, hopelessness of having nothing to do in an unknown place, the pain of taking in and feeling all of the harshness of others…?

G: Oh. That is what you’re looking for. For me…there is one common point – “What kindness is.” Kindness is different depending on the person, right? If kindness is too great, then I do not think it is understood well…it will be understood at some point though, I suppose this is the feeling?

Doesn’t this kind of thing come in the mail too?

G: Actually recently…there are many kinds of weekly publications, and there were things about being very annoyed with humans, times that they were hated. But at that time there were about 400 mails sent in a day. It wasn’t for consolation, but everyone was saying what they thought. When I saw that, I thought of how much humans are moving. I felt people’s “life.” People who weren’t fans sent things too.

Can’t you feel that kind of thing at lives?

G: The thing I feel most is chaos. I can feel the question of what it is like with my whole body after all. I take it in to myself, and if I were ever unable to I think it would be the end. I want to have something that I can take just that in. If it weren’t like that I’d leave.

Actually, now, aren’t you starting to go out of the tolerance level?

G: Well, I don’t know how you can see it, but I have no intent to flatter, nor for masturbation.

Because there is everyone, and there is yourself, and there is Malice, right?

G: Really yes, that is it. It’s not something that can be done by one person. I exist, and the awareness that I am doing it…of course perhaps the thing that is becoming the core is myself, but by ourselves we can’t do anything.

Ah, you have been in Malice for 3 years, haven’t you?

G: Yeah…it’s been a long time. And gone by quickly. Extremely. But long. It took a bit of time to arrive at the question that we envisioned.

In that area did you make efforts in your own way?

G: Rather, I’m doing ordinary things. It’s been that way till now, and will be that way for hereon. I do the things I have to do. That’s all.

And to support you, is there anything that is indispensible?

G: Hm. Dating? Lol