PRETTYMOON commented. April 134月13日
Can't speak for other countries, but they are considered South Korea's first visual band. Very early on in their career they didn't consider themselves as such (Kim Seheon considered them glam rock) but despite this they were WIDELY recognised as vkei by the public and considered "visual rock pioneers" (they were very popular at the time and were often compared to X Japan and nicknamed "X Korea" and "X Joseon", although these are nicknames they've said they dislike because South Korea has it's own identity) and they eventually came to accept the label (I don't have exact dates but I gather it was still pretty early on in their career). They've spoken about it a fair amount in recent interviews and these days they do label themselves as vkei and I got the implication that they now consider themselves to have always been vkei. (8428)/ANGEL HEART/ are also sometimes named as South Korea's first visual band, and I'd say they were the first who debuted with the intention of being a vkei group, but they formed and debuted about a year after EVE (plus as far as I can tell their popularity was never anywhere near that of EVE, which is why they're mentioned less). GIRL is also very occasionally mentioned (this is the band Kim Seheon was in before EVE), but I don't consider them as visual kei and neither did the group.