ANN’s protection of Anime NYC 2024 sponsored by Yen Press and Ize Press!
Hip hop duo Creepy notes carried out earlier this yr at Anime NYCwith an lively present stuffed with hits from a number of genres. Consists of DJ Matsunaga and rapper R-Shiteithe set checklist featured a lot of their prime hits, together with anime-related fan favorites like “Bling-Bang-Bang-Born” by Mashle: magic and muscle tissue“Courting” and “Yofukashi no Uta” from Name of the Night time. We had the privilege of sitting down with them for a fast chat to speak about their writing course of and sources of inspiration.
Your music spans many various kinds and genres, from ska to hip hop to music that individuals would in all probability describe as pop or rock. What influences every new track you write?
DJ Matsunaga: I at all times wish to make songs that I’ve by no means made earlier than. I need the music to be recent and new each time; I deal with that loads.
R-Shitei: I take pleasure in taking a recent, new strategy to the various beats and music that Matsunaga-san creates. I get my supply of creativity from attempting to always evolve, from striving to be a greater model of myself. Once we work collectively, we create music that does not exist by mixing and getting the very best out of one another.
When producing a brand new track, do you already know what you need the brand new sound to appear like? Or are you guys simply always bouncing off one another and letting the track evolve via that inventive course of?
DJ Matsunaga: I’d say the latter. Each time you make music, you are ready for a cheerful accident.
R-Shitei: It is uncommon to see the completed picture as you begin working. Even in case you can, it is a battle to surpass one another’s creativeness. I wish to reply to Matsunaga-san’s beats and tracks with raps and melodies past his creativeness. Matsunaga-san additionally provides preparations to what I put collectively which might be past my creativeness. We exceed one another’s expectations in a great way. And the result’s the ultimate product.
It is cool that along with your particular person music background you come from subcultures that worth this concept of ’combating’, like rap battles or B2Bs. How a lot do you get out of those sorts of particular person experiences once you make music individually, and the way do they work collectively once you make music collectively?
DJ Matsunaga: Sure. I believe that was a giant issue… however I’m wondering.
R: There are inventive battles once we make songs. The issues we’ve developed via DJ battles, MC battles and rap battles will be demonstrated in shocking methods throughout stay performances.
DJ Matsunaga: Our songwriting is totally completely different.
R: If one thing sudden occurs or issues come up throughout stay performances, we will change elements of the lyrics on location or throughout the MC, or document occasions from that day. It may be a legacy of what we have cultivated in rap battles, conversations, and battles with the viewers. When Matsunaga-san responds to sudden conditions, he brings to the fore what he has developed there, and once we carry out stay, we frequently draw on our expertise with one another.
DJ Matsunaga: That is true, that is true.
Throughout stay performances you get a lot vitality from the viewers. How a lot do you assume that impacts you? Not solely as artists, but additionally as performers.
R-Shitei: Once we write songs, in some circumstances we’ve songs that sing about introspective, private issues. So most of the tales are very private. Because of the nature of writing lyrics in rap, particularly within the hip-hop style, that does not change a lot as an artist. Outdoors influences additionally play a job, however after I carry out stay I can inform my private tales to folks I’ve by no means met or to folks out of the country (as on Anime NYC). Even when they do not perceive each phrase, I really feel very blissful after I assume that the melody, move and varied different components have just about conveyed the gist of the music. It has a superb affect on me. Even when they do not perceive my private lyrics, if I can inform from the viewers’s expressions and reactions that it appears to have reached them indirectly, my temper rises too. The me who creates and the me who performs change into one on stage. I really feel a powerful reference to the viewers’s reactions.
Talking of your writing course of, are you able to inform us about your strategy to creating “Otonoke,” the brand new opening theme for AND DA AND?
R-Shitei: Often Matsunaga-san makes the beat monitor first and offers it to me, after which I add the rap to it and ship it again. This time I had an thought for ‘Otonoke’, so I sang it acappella however with out phrases – simply the refrain in scat. I did a verse, bridge and hook-in acappella scat, despatched it to Matsunaga-san and requested him so as to add the sound. It began differently than common. From then on it was enterprise as common. We organized it, repeated it and created it via an trade of creativity.
