GROOVE ARCHIVE
← Japanese Music
Aku no Hana

Japanese Music / Rock bands, punk & visual kei · 1990

Aku no Hana

BUCK-TICK

惡の華 · BUCK-TICK

Why listen

Ten tracks whose dramatic sequence places the title song near the end, then leaves room for a longer goodbye.

Listen and read

Apple MusicSpotifyYouTube MusicTIDAL
Tracks · previews

English editorial edition

Album story

Aku no Hana is not exhausted by its title track. That song arrives ninth, followed by the longer KISS ME GOOD-BYE. Alongside the album’s dark imagery, listen for where its sequence concentrates attention and where it gives a scene more time to unfold.

BUCK-TICK released this ten-track fourth album in February 1990. Its writing credits reveal more combinations than Atsushi Sakurai with Hisashi Imai: Hidehiko Hoshino wrote both words and music for PLEASURE LAND, while Toll Yagami supplied words to Hoshino’s DIZZY MOON. A distinctive singer need not make every song the expression of one writer. The linked edition is the official 2015 mix, which retains the programme while revisiting the original recordings.

Different sizes of scene

The first three songs lead into the approximately five-minute PLEASURE LAND. After LOVE ME, roughly three minutes fifteen seconds here, the fourth track gives the sequence a different scale. Duration does not tell us tempo, but the arrangement of shorter and longer pieces does affect how an album feels to traverse. Remembering these proportions reveals more than placing every song under one atmospheric label. The fourth position is a change of space, not merely another identical slot.

Several writers within one image

NATIONAL MEDIA BOYS begins with words and music by Imai. The Hoshino and Yagami contributions introduce other combinations later on. Distinguishing authorship from the identity of the singer keeps us from reading the whole programme as one uninterrupted confession. The middle passage through MISTY BLUE, DIZZY MOON and SABBAT is not simply a waiting room for the title song. Those pieces occupy their own positions and durations, creating several scenes before the familiar destination.

Beyond the title song

THE WORLD IS YOURS precedes Aku no Hana, but the programme continues after both. At roughly six minutes nineteen seconds in this edition, KISS ME GOOD-BYE is its longest track. Following the title song’s four minutes seventeen seconds, it provides an extended final space. Listen to those two consecutively, then return to the opener. The different proportions at the album’s entrance and exit are part of its dramatic design.

The album through its tracks

Hear the ninth-track title song and the finale consecutively, then compare the shorter LOVE ME with the longer PLEASURE LAND.

  1. Aku no Hana

    The ninth song carries the album’s name, with words by Sakurai and music by Imai. It is neither the opening nor the final track. Remembering its position after eight other songs changes how a familiar single can function within an album. This selection is the approximately four-minute-seventeen-second album version in the official 2015 mix. Producer Junichi Tanaka described bringing its synthesizers forward; that observation concerns this new mix, not an unchanged 1990 sound. Continue into KISS ME GOOD-BYE instead of treating the title song as the endpoint. Leaving a longer scene beyond a strongly recognisable destination is one of the sequence’s most consequential decisions, giving the conclusion its own distinct task.

    Reference · Victor: producer Junichi Tanaka on the 2015 track mixes

  2. KISS ME GOOD-BYE

    At approximately six minutes nineteen seconds, the finale is the longest track in the linked edition. Its remaining space matters if the title song has felt like an expected conclusion. This is again the 2015 mix: Tanaka described changing the repeated title phrase from a round into a delay treatment. Hear it as a newly mixed ending rather than assuming its vocal space is identical to the original release. A single interpretation of every lyric is unnecessary to follow its role after the preceding nine tracks. Paired with Aku no Hana, it separates a powerful arrival from the longer task of closing the album, allowing the listener to reassess the journey.

    Reference · Victor: producer Junichi Tanaka on the 2015 track mixes

Listen next

Continue with X’s BLUE BLOOD and compare how Japanese rock albums of the period place their longest pieces and final songs.

BLUE BLOOD ↗
References & editorial note

Written for English readers. Album facts are referenced below; listening suggestions are editorial interpretations. AI-assisted editorial review; not independently human-reviewed.