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bmsgTranslated from SKY-HI's interview series with Nikkei, "Be myself, for ourselves"
Original interview, 95th installment from August 31, 2023.
The tie-up with “Baki Hanma: Strongest Father and Child Quarrel Saga” happened in between BE:FIRST’s release of “Shining One” and “Gifted.”. Akida Bookstore asked, “How about SKY-HI sings the opening song and BE:FIRST sings the ending song?” The series focuses on the relationship between a parent and child; master and disciple, which seems like it would be a good fit for us.
Anime delivers at a fast pace, right? There needs to be visuals for the opening / ending songs along with the music, and some countries are not included in the global distribution, so it pushes the pace even more. This time, the music was delivered last summer.
I was already a fan of the Baki series… but there are times when it’s difficult to say that. I know how harcore and passionate Baki fans are. It’s one of the greatest franchises in manga and pretty inspiring. “Baki Hanma” has an extraordinary level of fun. I'm honored to be involved in this series.
About “Sarracenia”, it’s supposed to be like a character song for Hanma Yujiro (Baki’s father). I wanted to create a song that Yujiro fans would think “sounds like Yujiro” when they hear it and not be disrespectful to them. I tried not to be conscious of the fact that it was an anime song. I instead focused on Yujiro as a person and at the same time as one of my own songs that I could include in my festival or tour setlist. With that, BE:FIRST’s “Salvia” is made from Hanma Baki’s tension. As text, “Sarracenia” and “Salvia” look similar right? That’s important isn’t it? Stylistically, it’s beautiful, right? I was conscious of the relationship between the two songs; be that of a parent and child, and that of a teacher and disciple. When creating the songs, I was conscious of using the same samples.
Like YOASOBI’s “Idol” and LiSA’s “Gurenge”, there’s probably a huge expectation that “if your anime tie-up song becomes a big hit, you go global”, I think that’s a short-term vision. While there is indeed a certain number of anime fans internationally, it’s pointless if you’re simply recognized as “that person with that song”. Rather, I think we need to create something that we can present as our own story and our own music.
We had a lot of discussions with CJ ENM prior [to this project]. Artists under HYBE JAPAN and LAPONE Entertainment appear on Korean music shows sometimes, so we were wondering if there's a way for us to do something similar to that. HYBE is, of course, Korean-affiliated, and LAPONE is a company heavily funded by CJ. For an independent Japanese agency like ours without such a relationship, no matter how much CJ may be interested, it would not be easy for us to appear or perform [on Korean music shows]. [With the docu-film], I feel like I was finally able to work with CJ.
We started talking [about this project] in July last year. The performance scenes in “Message - Acoustic ver. -” were shot in Korea. I was impressed by the amount of money that went into getting numerous, different takes, and the crew / hands on set to shoot good footage. Not saying that they did anything particularly elaborate, simply that the quality of the footage was of a very high level.
Nevertheless, CJ is a huge conglomerate, so whether working with CJ 4DPLEX will mean it will be easier to appear on MNet’s “M COUNTDOWN” in Korea is another matter. To put it another way, it’s not like you can start doing business with Mitsubishi Heavy Industries simply because you have a bank account at Mistubishi UFJ, something like that.
Please note I translate these for free, so they may not be super perfect.
Retranslations or sharing of the summaries is fine! For retranslations, please notify me beforehand and credit once posted!
Original interview, 95th installment from August 31, 2023.
The tie-up with “Baki Hanma: Strongest Father and Child Quarrel Saga” happened in between BE:FIRST’s release of “Shining One” and “Gifted.”. Akida Bookstore asked, “How about SKY-HI sings the opening song and BE:FIRST sings the ending song?” The series focuses on the relationship between a parent and child; master and disciple, which seems like it would be a good fit for us.
Anime delivers at a fast pace, right? There needs to be visuals for the opening / ending songs along with the music, and some countries are not included in the global distribution, so it pushes the pace even more. This time, the music was delivered last summer.
I was already a fan of the Baki series… but there are times when it’s difficult to say that. I know how harcore and passionate Baki fans are. It’s one of the greatest franchises in manga and pretty inspiring. “Baki Hanma” has an extraordinary level of fun. I'm honored to be involved in this series.
About “Sarracenia”, it’s supposed to be like a character song for Hanma Yujiro (Baki’s father). I wanted to create a song that Yujiro fans would think “sounds like Yujiro” when they hear it and not be disrespectful to them. I tried not to be conscious of the fact that it was an anime song. I instead focused on Yujiro as a person and at the same time as one of my own songs that I could include in my festival or tour setlist. With that, BE:FIRST’s “Salvia” is made from Hanma Baki’s tension. As text, “Sarracenia” and “Salvia” look similar right? That’s important isn’t it? Stylistically, it’s beautiful, right? I was conscious of the relationship between the two songs; be that of a parent and child, and that of a teacher and disciple. When creating the songs, I was conscious of using the same samples.
Like YOASOBI’s “Idol” and LiSA’s “Gurenge”, there’s probably a huge expectation that “if your anime tie-up song becomes a big hit, you go global”, I think that’s a short-term vision. While there is indeed a certain number of anime fans internationally, it’s pointless if you’re simply recognized as “that person with that song”. Rather, I think we need to create something that we can present as our own story and our own music.
Working with CJ ENM on “BE:the ONE”
We had a lot of discussions with CJ ENM prior [to this project]. Artists under HYBE JAPAN and LAPONE Entertainment appear on Korean music shows sometimes, so we were wondering if there's a way for us to do something similar to that. HYBE is, of course, Korean-affiliated, and LAPONE is a company heavily funded by CJ. For an independent Japanese agency like ours without such a relationship, no matter how much CJ may be interested, it would not be easy for us to appear or perform [on Korean music shows]. [With the docu-film], I feel like I was finally able to work with CJ.
We started talking [about this project] in July last year. The performance scenes in “Message - Acoustic ver. -” were shot in Korea. I was impressed by the amount of money that went into getting numerous, different takes, and the crew / hands on set to shoot good footage. Not saying that they did anything particularly elaborate, simply that the quality of the footage was of a very high level.
Nevertheless, CJ is a huge conglomerate, so whether working with CJ 4DPLEX will mean it will be easier to appear on MNet’s “M COUNTDOWN” in Korea is another matter. To put it another way, it’s not like you can start doing business with Mitsubishi Heavy Industries simply because you have a bank account at Mistubishi UFJ, something like that.
Please note I translate these for free, so they may not be super perfect.
Retranslations or sharing of the summaries is fine! For retranslations, please notify me beforehand and credit once posted!
