Museru kurai no Ai wo Ageru
Choking on Love

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contemporary romance done so well ⭐️

a love story between two college students, with ml in a music band and fl into editing. they both cross path on uncertain happenstance but it doesn't take long before both of realises the spark they feel between them and take action to cool the fire. they navigate through their romantic affair, growing closer, making memories, etc. the side characters are so charming !!

the only complaint i have is that it gets "too cheesy" at times so if you love that !! please go ahead.

the art is beautiful, the plot is simple and plain and the characters are ... cute and lovable. the pace is really good, you don't have to pine for them to figure things out because they are quick in their actions.

enjoy because i sure am :)

This is a fast-paced college romance. If you're an older otaku transitioning into the adult life, this should be your pick. It incites this thrill of more mature and healthy romances. They move on pretty quickly to the dating phase and yet it doesn't particularly feel rushed or lacking in depth. The manga highlights how they are very openly interested in each other from the beginning and are still getting to know each other. And boiiii, the male MC (Gaku) has no chill lol, dude is so smitten.
Pick this up if you like:
- Fast-burn romances
- Characters pursuing music or art of any kind
- Healthy communication ... in romances

I love shojo and this one caters to my taste for out-of-this-world gorgeous men kind of like In the Clear Moonlit Dusk also does. The main love interest, Gaku, is everything I look for in a manga boy, the quick pacing of Gaku and main girl Hibari getting together is very satisfying and fast enough so that the reader won't lose interest. The art style is clear, coherent and funny when needed. The plot is kinda gengeric but personally I enjoy predictable stories for comfort reading, which this manga deafinitely is. Hibari's and Airi's friendship is cute and there are plenty of fluffy cuteness between ... the main couple you can gush over while screaming alone in your room.

However, I'm not convinced of the artist side of this manga. Music coulture and bands are hard to write and there are more manga that fail at this than those that succeed. The writing for Gaku's band has its own problems but they are so minor they don't affect the believability of the main plot. My biggest issue with Gaku is that he uses Hibari as their bands personal designer. Hibari is not a great designer for what I understand to be an alternative rock band. Her style is very generic and dare I say even boring. It caters to very modern, minimalistic design preferences but it just doesn't fit with their band, Pantera Negra. It's understandable that Gaku wants Hibari to design everything for them because he's in looooove but the choice to make Gaku fawn over Hibari's "talent" annoys me to no end. It seems like a cheap wish fulfillment for the reader who wishes for their own love interest to find them special.

The story could very well do without Hibari designing for the band and it would make even more sense for her to be frustrated with her own artistic development if the manga would agnowledge Hibari's designs for what they are: bland. The choice to make Hibari's art simple and cutesy might fit in with the average reader, but it doesn't cater to people interested in art or design. Of course the manga doesn't have to be about art but it centres art in it's plot quite heavily from the beginning so it doesn't make sense that the art style of Hibari lacks any visual interest. It would make sense if her art was even somewhat bad but now all it is is plain.

A perfect example of my confusion about the relationship between Hibari, her art and Gaku is when Hibari sells her T-shirts at their university's art festival. The T-shirts look like something from H&M. They are white and each features one little graphic in the centre front of the shirt. Gaku sets his eyes on a design of a simple heart that has sort of distorted outlines. The design looks like it was drawn in under two minutes. I cannot for the life of me fathom why the oil painting prodigy Gaku, who's own work in the manga looks quite interesting, is over the moon for wearing this joke of a graphic desing.

The manga is great at being a shojo about university students if you don't care that much about music or art. If you have any experience in those fields yourself, be prepared that you might be very annoyed at the portrayal of them. I know that in the story Hibari starts off as insecure about her art and even the teachers comment on her lack of personality but the lack of personality in her designs doesn't improve between the first chapters and the art festival where we see the atrocious T-shirts, so it baffles me that everyone is so ga-ga about the shirts. The plot is about Hibari improving on her art but one does wonder how did she get into art school in the first place. Of course design in manga is simplified for the sole reason of manga being a hand drawn piece of media. Still, with Museru Kurai No Ai Wo Ageru's art style being so clean it would be well possible to make more detailed and inetersting graphic designs. Take Gaku's art for example. The details aren't being spared on them, quite the opposite. Overall, it feels like the author got lazy when deciding on Hibari's art style, which is a great shame if you want your visual media people to be immersed in your story. The laziness with the T-shirt designs is all the more confusing when Hibari's first poster made with Gaku's painting for Pantera Negra is actually quite good. It feels like the author is saying that Hibari can't be interesting without Gaku's influence or help which is sad because it makes it seem like Hibari needs a man's help to make her shine.

Despite all of the complaints this is a great read for when you want a light, no bs, quick to the point shojo story. Only avoid if you are looking for a great manga about being an artist. For that I'd say Blue Period is a good one, although that one is not meant for the fluff-craving romantics. Maybe one day a manga emerges where both fluff and great art-school representation are seamlessly combined.