"Saku" | ||||
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Single by Dir En Grey | ||||
from the album Withering to Death. | ||||
Released | July 14, 2004 | |||
Recorded | On Air Azabu Studio Fine Studio Greenbird Club Citta' Kawasaki (3) |
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Length | 13:56 | |||
Label |
Firewall Div. SMEJ |
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Producer(s) | Dir En Grey | |||
Dir En Grey singles chronology | ||||
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"Saku" (朔-saku-?) is a single released by Dir en grey on July 14, 2004. Uncommon for a single, the title track is placed second, not first. The first track is "Machiavellism" and it can be briefly heard in the "Saku" music video before the main song begins. The third track is composed of a studio recording of "G.D.S" (the long-time opening music for the band's concerts) and a live recording of the song "Shokubeni" from the album VULGAR. The music video for "Saku" was voted the #1 video of the year 2006 on the MTV2 show Headbanger's Ball.
The video beginning with a teenage boy turning on the radio, with the song "Machiavellism" playing. The boy arrives home from school, finding his dead family within the home. Once "朔-saku-" starts, Dir en grey is seen in dark, gothic clothing in a room surrounded by televisions. Despite the mounds of filth around the apartment and cockroaches crawling over his dead parents, the boy lives comfortably and casually, barely acknowledging their presence as he tears up photographs of the three of them. As the boy tries to remember what happened to his father, flashbacks throughout the video show that he beat his father to death with a golf club and strangled his mother. Another flashback features all three family members alive, watching the band perform on TV. The final image is the door to the apartment covered in caution tape. The band's portrayal on the TV in the household throughout the video references the cursed tape seen in the movie Ring.
The video's sequel, "Kodou" (鼓動?), features the same boy strangling his girlfriend and leaving her to hang on public display. Both videos were included on the AVERAGE PSYCHO DVD. Unlike "朔-saku-", "Kodou" was released in censored and uncensored versions; the censored version employs wide-margin windowboxing for the graphic portions, similar to the video for "OBSCURE".