MOSAIC.WAV to perform (new Pachinko Theme) at Comiket 76

NET CORPORATION JAPAN is huge, no two ways about that. They've been rolling out popular slot machines all over 日本 for the past 15 years, raking in hundreds of millions of yen in the process. You might remember last summer's story about mi~ko singing her first pachinko theme song, that was a NET product too. Surely that went over very well with fans all over the country, so they're repeating the experiment this year with a new game called ビキニパイ. Yup, "Bikini Boobs". Straight to the point, with extreme prejudice. Kill'em with the obvious.

So the song itself (and the presumed moneybags provided by NET) are good news enough for us fans, but NET decided to up the ante this year by promoting a MOSAIC.WAV concert on the third day of Comiket 76 (August 16 2009). I believe they've played the event in the past, but those were possibly impromptu "rogue lives" or certainly not as fully promoted as this one is turning out to be. SHAM STUDIO sent an email confirming that this will be a "full band performance", so their cool-cat drummer GanChan will be up on stage with them.

Oh while we're at it, you can bet your ass MOSAIC.WAV will release a new single in less than a month. If their track record is anything to go by, we will get news about their 7th single in the second or third week of August (recall that 「こどもざいく・やみもざいく」 was a "concept mini-album"). Of course there's still the slight chance that their recent focus on touring could have taken a toll on their creative juices, so if they sit this one out, well no one can really blame them. LIVE DVD, BITCHES!

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ave;new projecto's 「A LA MODE 3」 out sooner rather than later?

So the second ave;new projecto album finally came out a little less than a month ago and already, it has been a resounding success with the masses. Says who? Says me, motherfucker. But don't just take my word for it, doreCHU (that's doreCHU様 to you) and crew have been dropping a few hints that clearly indicate the third album won't be another 2 and a half years in the making.

First of all, they are holding a whole bunch of auditions for all of their active "branches" if you will, with ave;new projecto clearly positioned on top of the list. The only requirement is to be a female vocalist with one hell of a moe voice, as age and experience (pro or amateur) will not be factors. Basically it's Moe-Denpa Idol, come one come all, as long as your voice makes our ears bleed rainbow-colored bunnies. Interestingly, they will also run auditions for bands, so it looks as though they are ready to form a distribution label as well. By the way, last year's audition winner 白沢理恵 sings 「ずっキュンFEVER☆純愛えんじぇるLOVER!!」 on 「A LA MODE 2」. Yep, that one song that runs at 200CPM (CHUS per minute).

OK, so maybe that wasn't such a big hint, but here's the second clue. They ran a contest where fans could name the lovely POPさん-designed character that appears on the cover of 「A LA MODE 2」. What's in a name? Lots, especially in terms of marketing power when it comes to future editions of their denpa workhorse. Not to mention she just got her first promotional video! Poor girl was nameless until July 1st, so what did the savvy ave;new fanbase come up with? ｢ももえ☆ぱるちゅ｣. Yeah. It kinda sucks, I know. The first part, OK, makes sense, I guess. Second part? Humour me with your guesses, dear beloved-but-fictitious peanut gallery. If we take out the CHU part, that leaves us with PARU and that's not a word as far as my 外人 ass knows.

But I guess it's supposed to be a heart-melting pun on "pulse", because a runner-up came up with a much more clever nickname 「佐藤ぱるす」 and describes it as "sweet denpa thoughts" (佐藤 is the name Satou, which also means sugar!), and as you can see, we have a proper "pulse" here, which does tie-in with the whole denpa waves concept. That would have gotten my vote. Enough over-analyzing for today! Here's your short and sweet 「A LA MODE 2」 review: "HAI HAI CHU CHU KYUN KYUN YAYYYYYY" Suddenly I crave for strawberry milk... huh, wonder why?

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New MOSAIC.WAV self-cover album, early Japan Expo media

Well it was bound to happen someday. Online retailers such as amazon and HMV have begun accepting preorders for 「MOSAIC.WAV×鶴田加茂 feat.初音ミク」, a self-cover album featuring vocals by Hatsune Miku (and presumably mi~ko herself as well) set to come out on October 21st 2009. They actually announced this at their May 30th Tokyo show, playing a few of these covers for the occasion, but somehow this escaped me completely since it did not show up on most of my usual news sources. Although ave;new beat them to the punch when they released new;fable in mid-April 2009, this should still be pretty cool, as long as they give their older songs a new twist (and hopefully sneak in a few new songs on there too).

Did you know that 「最高ψ最強φメロダロイド!」, the only "proper" MOSAIC.WAV song to feature Hatsune Miku was actually composed by 磯村カイ, aka TONAKAI Sound Works, aka the other half of LOVExBULLETS? Of course you did. The "other" Miku song was 「×××にできるかな」, a bonus song which was made available for the lucky folks who preordered the February 2008 「ラストバトル! アキバトラー''μ''」 single in stores. Incidentally, the "miku manipulator" for that song was 鶴田加茂 (nickname: ika), who then went on to compose two more of their songs. As you probably gathered from the (temporary) self-cover album's title, he will be in charge of all Miku programming.

A few interesting pictures and videos featuring MOSAIC.WAV have begun to make their way online, though we don't have a proper live performance segment yet. I'm in contact with a few beret-wearing Frenchmen, but it looks as though cameras weren't allowed for the occasion (they usually aren't). But if anything does show up, you can be sure it'll pop up here. Until then, we have a few high-quality live pictures (merci ChrisCB) as well as a kooky group performance of niconico's classic medley "Kumikyoku", featuring MOSAIC.WAV members + tie-wearing translator (is that you, ino?) on the right side.

Update: No videos still, but I have confirmation that a crew from nolife.tv was on stage with professional video equipment and direct access to the sound console, so they could be churning out something sweet any moment. Also I should have mentioned this earlier but mi~ko kept blogging diligently even as she was in France. She has a ton of pictures up as well as some hilarious little keitai videos that usually end up with her crashing into kayapi's golden locks. By her own admission, their live set was somewhat disorderly and felt strange to her; mostly due to the enormous, empty stage (aniki was not on hand), but she did feel that their new found fans warmed up to them immediately.

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Under the Scope: In-depth KuKuDoDo feat. Gumi profile

Welcome to the second edition of Under The Scope, where we take a closer look at the career of various Japanese denpa artists. This is different from our other features such as interviews and reviews, since the focus here is more on exploring the artist's discography and overall path of progression. You folks are in for a rare treat today: "KuKuDoDo feat. Gumi" is a brand-spanking new sound unit that formed just over a year ago to this day. They have already started to build an impressive discography in these past 12 months, not to mention their biggest release is going to come out at Comiket 76. Without further ado, let's Osaka Denpa Get!!!

KuKuDoDo feat. Gumi is a brand new Osaka-based, denpa-oriented duo whose first activities trace back to early 2008. As the name suggests, KuKuDoDo (male) is the producer and Gumi (female) is the main vocal act. They operate together under the Holic Service doujin circle (think of it as a multi-purpose D.I.Y. label). But to further complicate matters, they are also closely related to the Birdtune doujin circle (to be discussed in a further issue of Under the Scope) who released their first EP, as they are also based in Osaka. KuKuDoDo composes a number of songs for Birdtune, but Gumi herself is mostly exclusive to Holic Service activities. Of course, "Gumi" itself could just be a second pseudonym for any singer from any other circle. Why they decided to make things so complex is anyone's guess, but let's just play along, shall we?

As previously mentioned, KuKuDoDo's music is unequivocally denpa at its barest denominator, a fact that the duo is proud to endorse. Of course, the genre is merely a loose descriptor for a mish-mash of cute/moe JPop, chiptune, high-energy dance tunes and whacked-out compositions, but so far they fit under the umbrella just fine. Furthermore, some of their songs are a bit more "normal", sounding more like I've Sound's earlier gritty trance than cartoony. So it's fair to say that while denpa is at the core of their creativity, they're willing to explore connected avenues. Although they haven't composed any proper eroge or anime theme songs yet, they are offering their services and are looking for staff as we speak.

Gumi with motherfucking MASTER HIGGINS himself

Not unlike their peers in IOSYS (with whom KuKuDoDo collaborated by way of Birdtune), Shanghai Alice's popular Touhou STG series plays a huge part in their musical inspiration and by proxy, their marketing ability. But you shouldn't let that stop you from giving them a chance if you've gotten sick of constant Touhou rehashes, as the influence here is certainly palpable but not overwhelming by any means. The fact remains that ZUN provides amazing blueprints for budding artists to build off from and propel themselves into a solo career, which is the step where KuKuDoDo feat. Gumi are at right now. Additionally, some of their earlier songs also made use of Hatsune Miku's charming voice, but the original musical arrangements far outshined the virtual diva's waning appeal.

But KuKuDoDo's influences extend far from the insular confines of Japan. In fact, this guy is a full-blown fan of England's legendary synthpop years, citing bands such as Depeche Mode, Yazoo, Erasure and KajaGooGoo as primary sources of inspiration. Who knows, maybe his artist name is a direct reference to KajaGooGoo? At any rate, KuKuDoDo wanted music to play a big part in his life a number of years ago, citing that as a child, he wrote "I want to be a roller disco DJ" on a 短冊 (Tanzaku), those long pieces of paper that people use to write down their wishes at a 七夕 (Tanabata) festival. He was "dormant" for a number of years, but took it upon himself to realize his wish from 2000 on, when he began experimenting with Cubase and other DAW tools. Very little is known about Gumi herself, unfortunately. Holic Service also have a PR lady, Ponza, who's in charge of events, marketing and so on.

Let's move into discography territory. So far, KuKuDoDo feat. Gumi have released exactly 22 songs spread across 9 CD releases, including 2 singles and 2 mini-albums. They first made a name for themselves by releasing some online videos of anime theme song remixes, but their first original song didn't even feature Gumi on vocals but rather Hatsune Miku. This was on the 「れいんep.」, their first single which came out in April 2008 and also featured three other original tracks, including the unique 「コイノカイロ」, which was renamed 「恋の回路」 later on. Holic Service wasn't even formed then, so Birdtune handled the distribution of this first single.

The summer of 2008 passed by and presumably the first single did well, as KuKuDoDo and crew didn't waste a single second away. They created their own music circle Holic Service to take control of their upcoming releases. The first self-published effort came out in October 2008, in the form of their second single 「HANABI」. Right off the bat, KuKuDoDo wears his Brit-pop influence on his sleeve with the wild opening track 「stjarna」, an hyperactive denpa remix of an otherwise quiet Depeche Mode instrumental piano tune written by founding member David L. Gore. The title track itself is a pretty dark composition, but 「マジカル☆蛙たん」 grabbed the attention of denpa fans worldwide with its textbook execution and addicting patterns.

But in order to tease their fans, they only put the short version of that song on the second single, paving the way to their first mini-album, which came out... on the same fucking day. This was a bit of a questionable move, but maybe what they really intended is to have 「HANABI」 acting as a sampler to 「ぐみれいんぼっ！」. The seven-track mini-album paints a better picture of the unit as a whole, to be sure. It opens with a remixed version of 「恋の回路」 that clearly indicates both KuKuDoDo and Gumi gained quite a bit of skill in their respective departments. 「Dancing Vanpire」 [sic, bitch] is an enjoyable trance-ish song that, as previously mentioned, recalls this writer of some of KOTOKO's better earliest songs. Then the album closes with 「マジカル☆蛙たん」 and 「大好きバイバイ」, two light-hearted denpa songs that most certainly turned up the heat at their recent concerts.

Comiket 75 saw the limited release of 「エネルギー冷麺」, a Touhou-oriented single that didn't feature any original KuKuDoDo compositions, but rather 3 covers of recent ZUN songs. They also threw on a 10-minute crossfade sampler of their previous compositions but more interestingly, a 4-minute long audio segment of their (presumably first) live appearance. It doesn't sound half-bad, and it's pretty awesome to hear the crowd reacting so well. But much like with the second single, this release mostly served to make way to their second mini-album, which didn't come out on the same day, this time.

Rather, 「エネルギー冷麺　てんこ盛り」 was released in time for the March 2009 例大祭, the wildly popular Touhou festival. This time around it's exclusively a ZUN cover album, but a full-on denpa one for what it's worth. The interesting part about it is that it features quite a few collaborations. They're not going to be listed here, because the official Holic Service page does a great job of listing all of the various performers, arrangers and original compositions from which the covers originate. Oh and short sample versions of all songs. 奥村りお provides a splendid performance on 「カッパイズム≠Nitorism」, especially considering that this is only her second recorded song. But the real star here is still Gumi, especially on the hilarious 「O.T.オタクは彼氏なのか?」 whose lyrics talk about the life of an Otaku, going to Akihabara, becoming an Hikikomori, all to the tune of the ridiculously catchy 「U.N.オーエンは彼女なのか？」.

This brings us to the current writing time of this in-depth article: July 2009. KuKuDoDo feat. Gumi have recently announced a brand new album for Comiket 76, and it already shows a lot of promise. This one will be completely written around 「東方星蓮船 ～ Undefined Fantastic Object」, the 12th Touhou shooting game which incidentally also comes out at Comiket 76. Interesting that they'd already have enough source material to write a cover album, but there is a demo out there after all and presumably plenty of original songs to go with it (as well as ZUN's official description of the songs). Now although the whole thing is orchestrated by KuKuDoDo, there are three arrangers and EIGHT vocalists who are enlisted, including the fantastic 井上みゆ (INOUE Miyu) of LoveBullets and ave;new fame!!! This is quite the prize catch for the duo, but considering their previous releases, all of the 10 tracks should prove quite interesting. This is being heavily promoted as a pure 電波ソング album, so keep an eye out on this one, denpa fans!!!

In conclusion, KuKuDoDo feat. Gumi and Holic Service should definitely be moved to high priority on every denpa fan's radar. While they certainly benefit from denpa's increasingly huge wave of popularity created by MOSAIC.WAV, SHORT CIRCUIT and of course IOSYS, they do stand quite tall on their own, with some memorable arrangements that will require permanent brain storage if you give them enough exposure (aka they'll stick in your head). Of note: the duo is particularly active on niconico, having released some absolutely insane videos recently (you're not supposed to know that's them, 電波の世界 exclusive info!).

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Recent MOSAIC.WAV collaborations: Micheal Jackson and Eminem

Yeah, this is a lazy repost, but you gotta admit it's a pretty timely one. They just love him to death in Japan, tomorrow's probably going to be an off day for the whole country. I figure not everyone saw this MAD, so here it goes again!

Oh, but this isn't the only weird-ass fan-made crossover I've got for you folks today. Eminem and MOSAIC.WAV? Yup, that happened last year. These guys JPz Records made an unofficial two-disc album featuring "Eminem's spits" (their words, not mine) over various anime theme songs, including MOSAIC.WAV's first "Sumomomo mo momo" OP. There's some even weirder shit in there too, such as a track featuring Phil Collins. Just don't tell my dad about this travesty, or he'll have these guys' head on a stick. Sussussudio, bitches!

Credit goes to Sham Studio's Ino for pointing this last one out to me. He probably wants to shut this horrible thing down too!

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LOVE BULLETS Reloaded for Third Offensive

Unbelievable, but true. The dynamic LOVE BULLETS duo (磯村カイ and 井上みゆ) will release yet another mini-album on July 31st 2009, their third in eight months. This was only recently announced by their label GWAVE, but the artwork is already out and their banner campaign is in full swing. Once again, Yuzu Soft artists こぶいち and むりりん reprise their roles in drawing the cute LOVE BULLETS mascots, which are still nameless it seems! And you guessed it, FAMISHIN is also going to contribute a track as a guest producer, to everyone's delight.

The six tracks have more or less been confirmed by GWAVE already, with full details and short versions to follow in the weeks to come. They are, however, tossing all sorts of genres in a blender with this one: Denpa, AgeAge (that's a new one to me, but it basically means Get up! Get up!), Moe R&B and Japan-Techno-Pops. Oh well, they can call it whatever they want, we know it's gonna turn out great either way. One of the confirmed songs is particularly interesting, namely a Special Remix of last year's Sister Magic OP theme. It was already pretty damn good, so it'll be interesting to see how TONAKAI can mix it up. Don't look for the ChiChi Ninja theme song here though, that'll be on GWAVE's 2008 Second Experience, coming out June 26th.

Remember the Angel Magister commercial that popped up about a month ago? Mana just put out the standalone opening demo movie, so check out a 2-minute preview of a song that will most likely be on the fourth LOVE BULLETS album later this year...

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VORC Records Interview (TM NETWORK chiptune tribute)

Chiptune. If you're with it, you'll praise its contemporary composers for their amazing ability to increasingly knock out dazzling originals or faithful recreations with a new twist. But if you don't get it, you'll be quick to dismiss the genre as a bunch of eighties-obsessed geeks freaking out over crude beeps. Honestly this description suits me just fine, as I'll readily admit to being an old-school video game nerd anyday. But unless you're a stinking hypocrite, you just have to applaud the efforts of recently-launched VORC Records, who are working so damn hard to bring chitpune to the next level, with international collaboration albums and a major push for the budding genre to hop onto mainstream distribution channels, certainly to the joy of all artists involved.

Assuredly, this last point holds true in the case of this interview and the many other international articles spawned off from the release of their latest album, "8-BIT PROPHET - TM Network Tribute Generated by Chiptune + Vocaloid". Unlike the majority of Japanese artists and labels, VORC Records are stepping out of their insular boundaries and aggressively reaching out to the whole world, making sure no one misses out on any of their latest chiptune offerings. While you're reading this interview, you might want to head over to VORC Record's myspace page and let the audio player do its thing, as the label generously put up 10 samples for everyone to check out.

Let's begin with a brief overview of VORC Records, for the uninitiated. Actually, what does "VORC" stand for?

VORC Records is a pioneering independent Japanese chiptune label founded in Tokyo in 2006. It was originally started by hally, who is a chiptune artist himself, as well as the website manager of VORC. The acronym stands for "Video game OR Chiptune". But before it was a label, VORC used to be a news site dedicated to oldschool video game music and chiptunes, launched in 2001. Unfortunately, this news site has not been maintained in over 3 years, mainly due to a system problem, but it doesn't help that Hally is very busy with the label and his own artistic activities. You may access the English archives to get a better idea of VORC's long-standing involvement with chiptune and videogame music.

What are some of VORC's long-term objectives?

We really hope that chiptune will occupy a greater part of this music jungle in the near future. We want a lot of people to know about chiptune, to spread this original sound as much as we can. That's why we released various remix compilations in the past and want to put out more original albums in the future if our most recent release turns out to be a success. Saitone's first original album "Overlapping Spiral" and his 3D dome theater live as well as the SILENT LIVE 2008 are also some of our proudest achievements to date.

Can someone really make a living running a chiptune label in this day and age?

I think it's more and more a possibility. In fact, we released the TM NETWORK tribute album through the POSCA personal distribution system. It can be used to distribute a CD or DVD internationally, with very little work required from a label's perspective. Anyone can use this system. Furthermore, we are going to sell our MP3s through HearJapan. Again, anyone can use this service (though it focuses on Japanese artists obviously) and its circumstances are much less restrictive than Apple's iTunes. Thanks to these distribution services, we can concentrate on promoting our releases on the Internet and other media.

Now let's focus on your recently-released album "8-BIT PROPHET". Please explain how this TM Network chiptune tribute concept came to be.

We realized that TM NETWORK represents a major source of influence for this generation of musicians and listeners. One day at a club, my DJ friend played a TM NETWORK song between two techno tracks, it drove the crowd nuts! Hally and I discussed the possibility and we eventually agreed on a course of action. K-> took a leading part on this album because he just swears by TM NETWORK. Specifically, he contributed the album's title, its track list and produced 6 of the 11 tracks.

I imagine you had to obtain permission from TM NETWORK before putting this show on the road?

Yes you are absolutely right, this album would not have been a possibility without TM NETWORK's consent. We are a corporation after all, not just a fun part-time hobby. You can find the names of members, crew and publisher of TM NETWORK on the album credits, as well as Yamaha's Vocaloid copyright information.

Speaking of which, why was Hatsune Miku selected as a vocal engine?

We thought that Hatsune Miku's impersonal voice would be a perfect fit for the 8-bit sonority. Furthermore, K-> and Kyonomoti are what you'd call vocaloid specialists, so it all just fell in place, a no-brainer if you will.

Did you ever consider using real voices on these tribute tracks? Saitone's "Get Wild" cover does not use the Vocaloid.

Well actually, yes, we considered this possibility! However we concluded that it would be too difficult to find the perfect replacement to Takashi Utsunomiya's unique voice, not to mention someone who could complement our 8-bit style. Saitone's "Get Wild" cover is based on the "I LOVE TM NETWORK" cover album, which came out on AsianDynasty Records earlier this year. The vocalist's name is Reco. She is one of those few people whose voice can suit both a TM NETWORK song and 8-Bit style at the same time. It was Saitone's idea to remix this particular track.

Thanks goes out to Tsutomou Outani for this interview.

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Yui Sakakibara's Mad Summer of Compilation Love

The otaku-pleasing-yet-otagei-prohibiting JPop diva may have had an extremely busy first half of 2009, but that doesn't mean she's planning to take any vacation this summer. Of course the biggest concert of her life is approaching rapidly, as she takes the Saitama Super Arena stage on August 23rd along with a host of other elite artists gathered for the Animelo 2009 RE:BRIDGE concert. In terms of releases though, she's got not one, not two but THREE brand new compilation albums coming out in the near future.

The first one is titled 「DreamParty メモリアルアルバム」 and actually already came out on May 5th at the Dream Party (duh) Tokyo event, but will be available to the general public on June 30th. It compiles twelve unreleased and/or re-arranged songs from her 2004-2006 repertoire. It's possible that this re-release might get different jacket artwork, since neither amazon nor ota-suke are showing the album's cover at the moment.

Then we have another compilation which was apparently heavily requested by fans, that is to say her first four singles on the same disc. 「LOVE×singles」 comes out mere days after the Dream Party Memorial album, on July 3rd to be exact. There's no word on whether any of these songs will be remixed/remastered/what-have-you, but it's a safe bet that they'll be the exact same versions that could be found on the 「jewelry days」 (2004, produced by DJ SHIMAMURA!), 「此の花咲ク頃」 (2005), 「Eternal Destiny」 (2005) and 「Imitation」 (2006) singles.

Last but not least... her fifth full-length album is also coming out this summer! It's slated for August 26th, but you can be sure that advance copies will be sold at Animelo. This was just recently announced (June 10th) so the only details we have right now is that the album will contain 15 songs; 11 of her latest eroge compositions and 4 new ones. That's it for now. Oh wait, we have the title too... 「Yeeeeell！」. Yeah, no kidding. I like to end my posts with a bit of a snark, but I don't believe anything else needs to be said right now.

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ave;new project hits hard with nonstop mix

The second ave;new project is just under one week away from coming out, after being hit with a myriad of delays. doreCHU gave the growing website a much sought-after update: a link to a 5 minute long nonstop mix containing a preview from each track off the upcoming album. Recent updates also include a short version (1:15) preview of ｢ふわっFuワッホー☆メイプルまじっく！！」, sung by the lovely (and frequently naked) 柚木涼香 (YUZUKI Ryouka).

There are plenty of surprises on board, such as the return of 井上みゆ (INOUE Miyu) and 榊原ゆい (SAKAKIBARA Yui) to the ave;new fold, if only a temporary one. Huh, one of the questions I had for Miyu in the LoveBullets interview was whether or not she would work with ave;new again. She declined to answer, now I know why! Also, I think I may have heard that Sakakibara song before, but I'm not sure. Maybe a certain fan of hers can fill us all in.

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Putain de bordel: MOSAIC.WAV to perform in Paris

Sacrebleu Didier, mais il est où le foutu pain baguette? Ah, il est tout juste à coté du Roquefort, nom d'une pute! Ralala, quelle poisse! Tu me fous les boules!

French people. Usually associated with stinky cheese, fancy wine and striped mime shirts, they will soon add a positive chapter to their otherwise morose legacy of unparalleled whining and beheaded kings. For you see, mon ami, the organizers of Paris' 10th Japan Expo have wisely decided to invite MOSAIC.WAV to perform on July 2nd, for the dirt cheap ticket price of 12$ USD. Good for them, good for the French, and possibly good for us non-Euros too, because this event sets a precedent that will most likely see our dynamic duo/trio travel to other countries in the future. On the other hand, seeing as how Japan Expo saw 130,000 visitors last year, this will be a very hard event to top.

Wait, what's this? That French bio page looks familiar somehow. Oh right, it's a literal translation of Sham Studio's English section, which yours truly put together earlier this year out of pure generosity and blind adulation. Surely this uncredited work entails a free trip to Paris' Japan Expo, right Sham Studio? Heck, I'll even take my chances and fly Air France, for god's sake.

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