Today on our spotlight are a couple of licensed picks that I'd like to classify as 'Song Series False Friends', with titles hinting to well-established Namco Original song series that are instead J-Pop tracks that have no relation with the actual Taiko no Tatsujin song series tropes and its composers.
LOVE 2000 hitomi| Version |  |  |  |  |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| All | x3 (139) | x4 (205) | x5 (355) | x6 (500) |
Taiko 13, 14, Taiko +
170
none
love2kStarting with what the average Taiko fan might see as a clickbait-y song title, we have one prominent track from the 2nd arcade generation's end. It's safe to say that Linda AI-CUE has had nothing to do with LOVE 2000's creation, as said song's debut actually predates the beginning of the iconic '2000' Namco Original family of songs!
Composed by Masato Kamata (鎌田匡人) and arranged by Zentaro Watanabe (渡辺善太郎), LOVE 2000 came out on June 28th, 2000 as part of the namesake maxi album by Japanese singer/songwriter hitomi. Born Hitomi Furuya (古谷仁美) in the Japanese city of Toshigi, she started her career as a teen model before being picked up by producer Tetsuya Komuro for the production of pop music. After a few years under the guidance of the experienced composer, hitomi's will of musical and themes experimentation let to an amicable split from Komuro in 1998, leading to different collaboration projects and a more independent production direction for her style in general.
One of hitomi's first hits after the split was LOVE 2000, which has been picked up as the image song of professional runner Naoko Takahashi (高橋尚子) due to its energetic vibes. With Naoko Takahashi winning a gold medal in the 2000 Summer Olympics, hitomi's LOVE 2000 got a wider exposure in Japan, with the mega single peaking 5th in the weekly Oricon charts (and ranked as No.78 track in 2000) as well as being one of the more recurrent themes for Nippon TV's professional baseball broadcast since the third millennium's inception. Later on, LOVE 2000 was featured again in hitomi's 5th studio album: Love Life, released on December 13th of the same year.
The Oni notechart is quite the standard affair for upbeat songs with a mid-high predominant BPM value, consisting in a full 1/16 notechart with some special notes along the way.
Apollo (アポロ) Porno Graffiti| Version | | | | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| All | x2 (69) | x4 (130) | x4 (211) | x2 (227) |
Taiko PS4 170-190 none ???For a more recent pick, here's a song that despite being named after the Greek/Roman god of a-thousand-and-one talents is not related to Taiko gaming's recent God Collection trend! It's also the 5th song from a Japanese unit that has quite the peculiar track record in this music game series...
The rock band from from the Hiroshima prefecture known as Porno Graffiti (ポルノグラフィティ) was founded in 1994, as a result to the earliest musical experiences of the act founder and lead guitarist Haruichi Shindo (新藤晴一, often referred to with the stage naming 'ハルイチ') and his cousin. During their high school years, the two have founded the original band under the name "No Score", as a reference to its members being unable to read musical scores during their early years. Shortly after his cousin's detachment from the act, Haruichi asked two more people to join: bassist/background singer Masami "Tama" Shiratama (who left in 2004) and lead singer Akihito 'ak-homma' Okano (本間昭光), finalizing Porno Graffiti's first lineup. The band's name was chose after one of Boston rock band Extreme's studio album releases: 1990's Extreme II: Pornograffitti.
Porno Graffiti's first single was Apollo, whose lyrics and theme were inspired by the USA's third spaceflight program, known as the Apollo Program/Project Apollo. This kind of association was also heavily attached to the band's earliest recognition, with the general public tending to refer to the act as 'Apollo Graffiti' instead. The single premiered on September 8th, 1999, peaking at the No.5 spot in the weekly Oricon charts as well as being ranked No.63 in the Best Song category of its release year. Later in the years, Apollo was featured in 2004's PORNO GRAFFITI BEST BLUE'S studio album and in 2016 it was re-released as the "Recurrent Edition" maxi single.
Porno Graffiti songs in Taiko gaming is usually quite the niche subject to talk about, as each of the currently-available tracks tend to only have a single Taiko game appearance overall, a trend that hasn't applied to the very-recent Anime license Oh! Rival but that has come back full force with Apollo, currently being a PS4-exclusive song. Despite the low star rating and the absence of note clusters, it's crucial to properly weight in the song's speedy pace while playing, as having an accuracy drop under these circumstances is an easy affair for this Oni mode...
Apollo (アポロ) Porno Graffiti| Version | | | | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| All | - | - | - | x8 (513) |
Taiko PS4 170-190 none ???Drawing a parallel with the recently-released Dragon Ball Super OP theme Gekkai Toppa x Survivor, here's a huge star difficulty bump between the regular Oni and its Ura Oni counterpart! Session de Dodon ga Don's only Ura Oni newcomer doesn't shy away from exploiting the base track's speed with lots of 1/16 clusters to boot!
