Some songs and American Miku

By now anyone who's interested has undoubtedly already heard about the whole Toyota Corolla promotion featuring Miku, but I felt like adding my two cents anyway.

moe~

Like others have said, I don't see it having any value for Toyota. Most (dare I say all?) Miku fans can't afford to buy a new car, and anyone who doesn't already know her is going to be confused if not well and truly put off by the commercial. Well, the long one at least. I think the short one is a lot better for a number of reasons: the narrator isn't wanking on about dreams and works of art, we don't hear Miku's banshee wail, and we don't hear the "ima sugu ni yo" which I think seems a bit out of place - foregrounding the Japanese vocals would just serve to further distance people. If I saw the short commercial and didn't know about Miku I think I'd almost be tempted to look her up.

But it's not really about selling cars. Miku's English debut is coming up, and Crypton are trying to drum up some excitement. Surely that's not so bad? Well, no, but I still think it's a bad approach since there's still the problem of it doing very little to expand the potential market. In fact it could well end up reducing it, restricting the scope of English Miku to the 'otaku' community.

What I think they should have done is something more along the lines of Yamaha's VY1, which sounds fairly similar to Miku but was released without a character image and was advertised as having a unisex voice (although it sounds quite feminine). Obviously Miku already has a well-established character and this is the leading cause of her success, but given the Western market's general distaste for overtly anime-looking goods, I think playing down her character a bit in advertising would have been a better choice. This would give Miku more of a future in professional music (as a backup vocalist or whatever) rather than being shunned as a piece of chinese girl software. 

I could be wrong. Miku could catalyse the 'otaku' (I don't like using that word but it conveys meaning well) community into a state of unprecedented creativity and we'll actually get some good works made using her voice. I'd very much like that, but I remain pessimistic.

That's enough negativity for one blog post so I'm going to post some music. None of it's new or anything, just some tracks that I've been listening to recently.

I picked up this CD (Puzzle) on a whim when I was in Japan last Christmas, and this song's been stuck in my head on and off since. The circle is 恋竹林 (koichikurin) and the song is SA/BA/O/RI. Miku's voice is pushed a bit high but it's still pretty catchy. Another song off the album that I particularly like is Puzzle, which has a fairly similar sort of sound.

This one's Orbital, a fairly old song sung by Teto. It's got a fairly muddy sound but I really like the voice. The same guy did a second version of the same song called, not surprisingly, Orbital 2nd. It's got a cleaner sound and uses Rin as well as Teto. It's a good song too, though I think I still prefer the first.

This one isn't Vocaloid related at all - it's リラの街から (From the town of Lyre) by ORIGA, who is probably best known for her vocals on the Ghost in the Shell soundtracks. It's in Russian, I think it was released over a decade ago, but I think it's a beautiful song.

I played some Minecraft earlier with HHH and NEET. It was fun, and they've got some impressive structures going. I was going to hop back on and play some more after dinner but Cella (a Korean Zerg player from team SlayerS) is streaming Starcraft 2 and he's damn entertaining to watch. His English is pretty good too. I'll have to get back on tomorrow and work on my little house some more.

Ye olde medieval shitpost

I haven't posted anything in almost a week, mainly because I'd been up visiting my parents and their internet connection is flaky enough that even checking emails is an arduous task that can take up to 15 minutes. The highlight of the visit for me tends to be the two hour trip each way. I quite like driving, sure, but the good part is being able to blast my shitty animu/vocaloid/j-pop music for an extended period while isolated from everyone else. This trip I went with a Gumi playlist on my way there and the Panty and Stocking soundtrack on the way home, with some SZS songs after the P&S CD finished.

Soutaisei Riron

There's nothing better than waking up to a knock on the door and seeing the postman holding a package with moonrunes all over it. Today's delivery was three albums by Soutaisei Riron, a Japanese band I'm quite fond of. The first time I heard them I was some 12000m above ground level idly flicking through the various CDs on Qantas' in-flight entertainment system. I liked what I heard over the roar of the plane's engines, jotted down the name of the band, and promptly forgot about them. Some weeks later I was hooked on the Tatami Galaxy ED and, in between replaying it over and over, found out that the singer (Yakushimaru Etsuko) was also the lead singer of Soutaisei Riron, that band I faintly remembered from the flight. The rest is history.

If you're going to listen to any of their albums, make it this one.

The band itself has a fairly minimal sort of sound with the focus being on Yakushimaru's vocals, which are described on wikipedia as "moe", and are very flighty and acrobatic. If you've heard the Tatami Galaxy ED or the Arakawa OP then you've got a pretty good idea of her unique sound. If not, then I'd highly recommend you watch The Tatami Galaxy (seriously, it's a great anime) then get back to me.




Tracks to try:
Shinagawa Number - halfway through Hi-fi Anatomia, this track is my pick of the album - though not by much. Yakushimaru's vocal dexterity complements the fairly simple guitar riff perfectly, resulting in a great sounding track. But yeah, I really could have said the same about half the album.
LOVE Zukkyun - this track is from their first album and has much more of a lo-fi sound to it, with the guitar being noticeably more prominent than on the later albums. This doesn't stop it from being damn catchy. The video on the youtube link is either the actual PV or a weather report.
Peperoncini Candy  - This is from their latest album Synchroniciteen, and is extremely cute. I don't really think much more needs to be said here.

I wonder if I could safely assume anyone reading this is going to be able to read at least some Japanese? I'd feel more comfortable posting track names etc. in Japanese rather than having to hit up Wikipedia and other sites to find the standard translation. Anyway, sorry for starting this off on a decidedly non-anime-related note, but it was fresh on my mind.

Back to watching Nico Nico Live then.