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Saturday, November 10, 2012

Song of the Week! 10 November 2012


Today is a mix of licensed songs, one new fast favorite and one classic! Both of them are also user requests with the first of those coming from KyasarinTsu.

Kill Me no Baby! (キルミーのベイベー!)
Version
Allx4 (138)x5 (220)x8 (491)x9 (596)
 Taiko 0.5 to Mu, Taiko PSP DX, Taiko 3DS2, Taiko PS Vita
200
none
 kmbaby


One of Codename Katsu-Don's new Anime songs, Kill Me no Baby comes from the 2012 anime Kill Me Baby (キルミーベイベー), which is based on the 2008 manga series by the same name and still going on as we speak. The manga is illustrated by Kaduho and follows the Yonkoma format, 4-panel comics used for simple jokes and gags like the early Naruto comic strips.

Kill Me Baby follows high school life for a trio of girls: Sonya, a blonde assassin, her dimwitted friend Yasuna and a kunoichi (Ninja) named Agiri. In the anime, Yasuna and Sonya are dubbed respectively by Chinatsu Akasaki (赤崎千夏) and Mutsumi Tamura (田村睦心), who also sing both OP and the ED of the anime. The music for the entire anime (OP/ED themes included) is composed by EXPO, the name for the composing couple Matsumae Kimitaka (松前公高) and Suguru Yamaguchi (山口優). Both of them are well-known in Japan for the music they compose for NHK's children shows (for the record, the latter also made the Oshiri Kajiri Mushi songs).

The version of Kill Me no Baby used on Taiko is the original OP and not a cover. Like most anime notecharts higher than 8*, Kill Me no Baby has a big name behind its chart: Masubuchi Yuuji. Because of the song's intense BPM, it was possible for him to make a really relentless chart with tons of 1/16 note stacking, made even harder by occasional 1/24 clusters, interspersed big notes, and several long Kat clusters, resembling the ones already seen on other songs like the game music Bambini. Just faster. At 596 max combo, Kill Me no Baby also has the most notes ever in the Anime genre, barring Ura modes.

Often with licensed songs is its eventual bid to leave the arcade scene, which came in the early days of Murasaki ver., and announced on the same day as it was set out to appear on 3DS2 DLC! More peculiarly, the Asian version of AC0 only received the long-missed song at their upgrade to Murasaki, which totaled no more than three months and making for one of the shortest inclusion periods in Taiko arcade history! Not that it was too devastating, as Kill Me no Baby go on to be included as DLC for two more handheld release after that.

Zenryaku, Michi no Ue Yori (前略、道の上より)
Version /
Taiko 7 to 11,
all console
x3 (174)x4 (242)x6 (518)x9 (650)
Taiko 12 to 0, Taiko iOsx3 (174)x4 (242)x6 (518)x8 (650)
Taiko 0.5 to K, Taiko Wii U2x3 (174)x4 (242)x7 (518)x8 (650)
All (2P)x3 (181/181)x4 (237/237)

 Taiko 7 to 14, Taiko 0 to K, Taiko PS2 6, Taiko PSP 2, Taiko Wii U2, Taiko +
 151
none
 soiya


After last week's trip into the Japanese music of the 80s with Kimi ni, Romantic and C-C-B, deanhankanasai!blog makes another request for a song from that era, with the very first song of the street band Isseifuubi Sepia (一世風靡セピア).

Formed in 1984, Isseifuubi Sepia comprises of seven members whose vocal leader was Ogi Shigemitsu (小木茂光). The other members were Aikawa Shō (哀川翔), Yanagibato Shirō (柳葉敏郎), Nishimura Kakei (西村香景), Harumi Shikata (春海四方), Matsumura Fuyukaze (松村冬風), and Takeno Isao (武野功雄), who left the band before its definitive disbanding in 1989. During their five years of activity the band has 11 singles, six original albums and various other compilation albums, though data on their popularity is scant. Both the leader and the other members share a common fate: after the disbanding and their graduation from high school/college, each of them is now a professional actor for Japanese dramas and TV shows.

In 2004, fifteen years after the end of Isseifuubi Sepia, the Fuji TV program HEY! HEY! HEY! MUSIC CHAMP reunited all the 7 members of the band to perform some of their greatest hits together one last time. One of these was Zenryaku, Michi no Ue Yori, their first single ever released, on June 25th 1984. That makes the song one of the oldest songs to be in Taiko no Tatsujin, and the oldest one currently in the arcade songlist.

The song was not in the early Taiko games, so it seems like that last highlighting of the band in 2004 had a direct impact, as just on the following year, Zenryaku, Michi no Ue Yori began to be a staple on the Taiko arcade, being on Taiko 7 first and was never taken down even until now. The Oni chart was 9* with lots of clusters to test stamina and little room for rest. There was even some 1/12 streams! The song was cut down to 8* after Taiko 12, but Zenryaku, Michi no Ue Yori still remains one of the 'Greatest Hits' of Taiko no Tatsujin.

After a very long presence (9+ years) on the arcades, Zenryaku, Michi no Ue Yori finally has to face the removal axe, and leave the title of the oldest song ever to Linda Linda (1987). Later it is included as one of the final DLC songs for Wii U2, marking a different kind of ending.