Moving away from itself in Rijin, DIMLIM's new Single

This is an analysis focused on DIMLIM's new release, Rijin (離人, lit. Depersonalization). The purpose of this text is to draw technical explanations about the terms used, as well analyze the music as a whole, from its arrangements, melody, vocalization, lyrics and music video. The interpretation of some parts is based on the Psychology and personal understandings of the author of this text. It is clear that the great fun of the musical world is the multiple interpretation of the same songs, don't take as absolute truth the one exposed here.

The translation used is here in the blog, so it will be used only the English parts in this analysis.

The music video begins with the presentation of the band's name followed by a blank frame that suddenly becomes lamps in a hospital room. The patient gets up and has the memory of a white landscape, then a dark one, and returns to the hospital room where he finds more whiteness, books, medicine, and a closed door with a window. This all happens before the first verse of the song. But why am I paying so much attention to this? Because it's the starting point for understanding the whole song:

This "big white spaces" are a way of symbolizing something that can change, a blank paper that we can color at our will. It also means something untouched. The transition from this white and existential void to a hospital bed reveals the psyche of the lyrical-self; a life that knows almost nothing about itself and is now in a hospital, waking up confused, as if trying to disappear. But it also represents the central idea of ​​the theme of the lyrics: the things people feel in Depersonalization.

Who am I? Why should I runaway from the doubts that is inside this body?

The first verse is sung by a person dressed in white inside an isolated room before beginning a heavier transition in the rhythm, where scenes of the patient contemplating an empty room pass with the band and the patient itself in confusion (crisis) sitting before continuing the lyrics - which starts after showing someone's heartbeat. The way it is sung exposes fragility in the singing voice.

It's weird that I am myself, and it's weird that this is weird...

The verse is sung in a sample of a "Patient in White" where images of heartbeat, body contemplation, and mental confusion are elucidated in the video. The song title gives us a clue as to what is going on.

Depersonalization is a kind of dissociative disorder, where someone may not feel within oneself, just as this person may not have the notion that its own members belong to oneself. The event can be due to high stress, trauma and other psychological disorders. The individual may feel like a viewer of its own life, as well not having the assimilation of its own self. It's like living in a blank world where you have no activity, you just watch your body living. Many claim to be like undead because they don't have the feeling of being actually living, although they consider that yes, the one they are observing is living. They often feel unreal, as if they were mere pieces of dreams. It is interesting how some patients might characterize the world as colorless - an allusion to the "big white space" described in the video. Other things that can happen, due to the derealization is to see things distorted, to feel seeing everything through a large glass, among other things pointed out in the video.

I can only feel my pulse when I embrace till the limits of the sense of discomfort
Who am I? Why should I runaway from the doubts that is inside this body?
am I alive? I am here...

In another transition in the rhythms, the song receives a new stanza that repeats the opening. Patients know that the feeling of unreality is not actually real, that is, they can get a sense of the disorder and their suffering is something adjacent. The first verse increase the idea that, however, to reach this understanding the persona must reach extreme levels of depersonalization (which can lead to damage to one's own body, depending on the intensity and other factors). The vocalization is expressed in two vocals, one full of low-pitched vibrato and the other more high-pitched, the vibrato applied in this section shakes the music as if the persona is trembling and suffering, while the high-pitched second voice tears the last verse as a cry for help, it is as if the observer and the living one are singing together. In the second verse the lyricist doesn't recognize itself and tries to understand the reason for moving away from itself, trying to find an answer to its disorder. Then in the third verse, this persona can't understand if itself is really alive (reinforcing the idea that it maybe tried something against its own life), but it understands that its self is somewhere there.

I hear from afar ...
In my ambiguous consciouness, this horrible feeling is just my heartbeating

In this part, the song uses the lots of possible effects thanks to music production softwares. The first verse is sung with distortion to give the impression of distancing, reinforcing the idea of feeling disconnected from oneself, hearing itself away from oneself. The video features the "Patient in White" watching a "Patient in Black" rise up of a bed with its distorted face. And at the end of the second verse is added the sample of a heartbeat. The representation of this part and the video shows us a personification of the disorder; the viewer seeing the one that lives, exactly when it wakes up (at the beginning of the music video) then, the video is following the point of view of the spectator (the person with the disorder).

The reality is painted white, and disappears moment by moment…

or maybe

The now is painted white, and disappears moment by moment…

The next verse is sung in a darker, lower pitch, with the video showing the Patient in White watching someone and the Patient in Black on their bed, with the sound of a heartbeat before finishing the verse on vibrato and starting the solo. Both translations (of the text and the sung verse) fit the situation perfectly; the "reality being painted white" is a way of depicting the effects of Depersonalization by taking over the person, making him or her move away from what is real and feeling unreal. At the same time, everyone around Patient in White is disappearing, such as many report to feel their surroundings disappearing, until they're leave all alone in intense suffering.

Who is this me that remains alive? I don't know if my self still alive
I couldn't give an answer…

The next part is sung after the solo and the transition to a heavier beat. The first part of the first verse “Who is this me that remains alive?” Is sung in a calm falsetto, like a doubt filled with melancholy. The lyrical-self do not recognize itself. It don't understand why it remained alive. The next part, “I don't know if my self still alive” is sung more brutally, a firmer, slightly torn voice, as if the observer felt a blast of anger about its suffering, unable to understand if its true self is it actually alive or if there's only that lifeless body at all. Then the next part is returned to a lower tone, serious tho, as if giving up on saying "I could not give an answer" because the disorder blocks the person to feeling reality and the self can understand that.

Hey? Where is this place? Who am I? Who are you?
There's no pain nor sadness...

The verse is still sung with the expression of anger in the voice, almost shouting, because the Persona can't feel actually in real things, can't settle in its place, feeling in a misty world, not understanding who is who, and sometimes being unable even to comprehend emotions as sadness and feelings as the pain from being the viewer. However, this inability to connect to reality doesn't free the person of an absurd suffering, and can reach extremes like those mentioned in the next verse that is not sung or shouting, much less in low tones, but calm and calculated when speaking:

Ah, if I fall asleep, please, let me keep like this
[because] is not like I'm going to open my eyes

Rationally, the lyricist asks nobody to try to wake it up. Then there is a return to the beginning of the video where someone wakes up after seeing a big white space in a room in a hospital, included in a ward for critically ill patients (in old asylums); At this point, we can believe that the Persona has attempted suicide or is thinking about trying, asking to people don't try to save it, because even if he/she comes back to life, it will not feel like opening its eyes, just watching the world from outside, just watching your body relive. Suffering is so big that he prefers to sleep forever. Finally, the song calms down ending with a slow guitar solo until it goes out.

What can we understand from the song?

This is a song about a mental disorder. Vocalist (Sho) said in a interview that he suffers from Depersonalization [Source: ToppaMedia.com (japanese)]. This song is a way for him to expose the effects and feelings of a person in this suffering. It is very sincere and connects to many sources of research on the subject (scholarly articles and even diagnostic manuals). The song is a mix of ballad and progressive metal, provoking an interesting duality to the theme; just as if they were two beings evoked into our ears. One more passive, another more active. It's amazing how Sho can bring us so many vivid feelings in a single song, the exact use of vocal techniques in certain parts makes the song a unique piece in its genre.

This is a GOGUN's review.

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