Originally posted by: Harakiri
An example of Dir En Grey not sounding like 'heavy metal' to me is Cage, or Yokan. Those tracks in particular are flat out pop music. Although some bands can move through being heavy and being softer - example, Alice in Chains, who mix depressed ballads with aggressive metal - Dir En Grey can't cover the two poles of extremity, those being Heavy metal and idol pop.
Cage is ace, mainly cos I like playing it on bass [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-tongue.gif[/img].

As for heavier songs (while hardly being death metal they are still pretty agressive) try:

Obscure (a screenshot of which is in my avatar) - pretty simple but cool song and a well good video
Hydra (I only discovered this recently but it fucking rules - especially the new live DVD version)
Zan
Pink Killer (cool screaming)
Saku - the video for this is amazing and its got a cool epic chorus
Child Prey - kinda punky but it also has a cool pretty heavy roaring bit
The III D Empire
Ugly
I'll leave it there...

etc

They're not really heavy metal but IMO they can definitely dish out heavier stuff on occasion...for me the wide ranges in their music was one of the biggest draw factors for me...plus Kyo's got a cool scream [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-tongue.gif[/img].

Can't wait till the DVD finishes downloading...

Got tickets to see the Mad Capsule Markets live (in Sheffield cos they're not playing Manchester [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-sad.gif[/img]) which is gonna be fucking well good...