Songs of Self Abuse

Songs of Self Abuse

By Renaissance Yoshida

Overall: Just Wow
Smex Factor: Sexy Sexy
Art: Different
Status: One volume; Complete

Note: I would also recommend reading this on Nakama’s lovely in-browser reader.

Review: I was so excited when I first saw the art, I forgot how to breathe. Literally. I gasped, and then I was completely unsure of what to do with the air. It was a very uncomfortable and slightly panicky few seconds.

The art is beautiful. More than lovely; utterly gorgeous. The first couple of pages are in color, and the grainy stressed texture used over the earth tone pallet sets the tone of the story beautifully. The translation is done by Nakama, so of course, it’s quality as well. The font is more decorative than standard, but not obtrusive; conversely, it fits the vein of the story.

Huh. Actually, I think I have that font. Love ya like a sister? Oh, no. It’s a little different, but it’s close.

The inks for the rest of the pages are scratchy and detailed. Every single line has its purpose, not one is out of place. Small features like the knuckles on a hand or the creases in a glove that’s slightly too big are drawn with love. The blacks are pure black. I love it. The artist doesn’t spare the texture, but doesn’t overuse it either. And the backgrounds? To. Fucken. Die for.

The sex scene with the woman is graphic. While the artist has interesting ideas about what womens’ nipples look like, the genitals are, again, lined in loving detail. If vaginas really freak you the fuck out, then I recommend with caution. (I wouldn’t say I’m fond of them myself, but sometimes you just gotta muscle through this stuff to the gold at the end of the rainbow. I’m mixing metaphors again, aren’t I.)

All this happens while the first main character ponders the connection between sex and death (an old contemplation, to be sure), even thinking about ‘le petit mort.’ (If your English teacher was obsessed with sex like mine was, you’d learn from Romeo and Juliet that “death” can be a euphemism for climaxing during sex. I think my teacher got bored of teaching anything about that play besides the sex metaphors, because that’s all I remember about R+J. She was a bit of a nut. Love that lady.) Birth, death, and sex are all themes in this book, by the way. Sometimes their significance can be metaphorical, other times, literal. And they can mix too... Birth is mostly significant in the first and last parts of the story, with the shop manager and his mother.

For a while, I was a little worried that this wasn’t a BL manga (despite being on Nakama). Not because it would make it less enjoyable, but because then I wouldn’t be able to post this review, heavily recommending it.

But past that: this is a complex, disturbing manga. The art style fits it so well. Soooo weeeeell. I’m sorry: I’m an art nerd. But the point at hand. With a title with the term “Self Abuse” in it, it’s obviously not gonna be rainbows and sunshine, but man. Contemplative misery is just my style I guess? Misery may be the wrong word. Calmly assessing their problems and examining the misery as though it’s being experienced by a person separate from themselves. Maybe I like it because I can identify with it, but the idea of that kind of mental process is fascinating.

The narrative of the flower prostitute boy is captivating. He speaks, detached from his situation, calmly. His “self abuse” is evident in the portrayal of his body, but he speaks of those he let ruin him as though they are the self-abusers. He’s a pathetic character when viewed through the perspectives of other characters, but inside his mind, he never cares. His tragic descriptions of his own loneliness neglect the plaintive overtones of other manga about downward-spiraling lives. He never pities himself, but he pities others. Never have I read a manga with such strong characterization through narrative. I mean, obviously it’d be weird to see a literary style prevalent in a graphic presentation, but it works here. The illustrations serve as a complement to the inner monologue. Like icing on cake…

Again, about the sex scenes (because in a manga about a whore house, sex scenes are always going to be important), they’re not sexy. They exist to make you think. The sex scenes are never about the sex, but what's happening around the sex scenes, what led to characters having sex, etc.

This is a thinking manga.

It’s the kind of thing that I won’t understand if I don’t read it more than once. Sure, it’s about love, and sex, and death, and the death of love, and hope, and abuse, and overexertion, and living, and being a bad person, and being a good person… It’s confusing and it doesn’t make sense unless I put my mind to it. And then I start thinking all these things and…It’s about a lot of things. That’s why it’s good. The narratives are all delusional, and the situations can be absurd, but the words! The idea! All of it fits together seamlessly.

It’s a wordy manga. But the art’s so nice, I’d at least recommend a flip through, even if text walls (no matter how engaging the contents) psyche you out.

The after stories are a bit…less serious in tone. I’m honestly not sure what to make of them.

Also it mentions Excel Saga at one point, which is bizarre, yet fills me with affection.