NIGHTMARE – √25 Review: 25 Years of Visual Kei Royalty

Some anniversaries feel like obligations. NIGHTMARE's 25th is not one of them.

√25 — read it as the square root of 25, which equals 5, the number of original members — is the kind of title that tells you immediately this band hasn't lost their flair for the theatrical. Released in July 2025 as a milestone mini-album, it arrives 25 years after a group from Osaka quietly began building one of Visual Kei's most improbable legacies: the band whose song "Alumina" introduced millions of Western fans to the genre through the Death Note anime.

That cultural footprint is something NIGHTMARE have always worn lightly. They never chased the anime pipeline again; they just kept making records. √25 doesn't feel like nostalgia bait — it feels like a band taking honest stock of what they've been and where they still want to go.

Vocalist Yomi remains in exceptional form. The register shifts and emotional control that made "Guren" and "The Desperate Game" landmarks haven't faded — if anything, age has added texture to a voice that was always technically impressive but is now genuinely expressive in ways it wasn't at 25. The band lock together with the kind of intuitive tightness that only comes from two and a half decades of playing together.

The mini-album format suits the anniversary context well — tight, purposeful, no filler. For Western fans who came in through the anime gateway and then lost track of them, this is the perfect reentry point. For the faithful who never left, it's a reminder of exactly why they stayed.

Twenty-five years in and NIGHTMARE are still the benchmark. √25 is a celebration that earns its own merit completely apart from the legacy behind it.

Rating: 9/10

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