HIGHWAY STAR Covers

I'm with grunty btw "made with a male in mind" doesn't mean that it was meant to be sung by a male. The song is literally about a love-hate relationship so male in mind probably (most likely) is just the song being sung to a male from Kajiura's/the singer's perspective lol
george1234 said:
Listening to it, the lyrics do say "boku wa" which (at least in anime) is mostly used by guy characters..
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tons of Kajiura's lyrics use boku/bokura as first person prononun though, and boku - while mostly used by young boys/male is also used by girls irl albeit somewhat rarely because watashi is more polite and more feminine. The usage of boku watashi anata kimi is a mixed between gender, degree of politeness, and the situations they are being used on.

About the cover: I don't like it but I don't hate it. At the same time i kinda applaud this cover for being the one that sounded the most "raw" so far, like it barely went into post processing edit.

The cover I liked the most is obsession because they sounded good and well it's a polished cover with plenty of added effects and sound processing. Next is Gloria because I always think that Kajiura should've just made Gloria a Hikaru solo with Keiko harmony to balance Lacrimosa being a Wakana solo and idk Gloria is supposed to be a happy song but Wakana made it sound sad lol. Shinkai no Kodoku next, followed by Shoot. Anna ni Issho Datta no ni is borderline atrocious and I have a dream cover is annoying, but this might be because I find the song to be annoying on its own lmao.
 
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LianaIlia36 said:
I'm loving Gloria actually. Especially how she sings "Gloria."
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rito really got to shine in this song. Her low notes are always solid and fairly dense, and she has a nice mix of brightness with melancholy. Her "Gloria" was really interesting because the "l" was more like a soft "r" so it rolled off the "G" faster (less movement/obstruction of the tongue to articulate a pure "l") and on to the rest of the word.

She definitely has more vocally expressive capability (or should I say, variety) it seems than LINO LEIA at the moment. At least from the songs she's been given to sing. She's also a facially expressive singer. I would say LINO LEIA focuses on looking cute most of the time while singing, while rito is more able/leaning to go raw for the sake of the vocal performance. I just hope she gets the guidance to take care of her voice as she progresses in doing Kajiura's complex repertoire.
 
grunty said:
I never looked for the og Kajiura quotes but some other time Nightmare said the song "was made with a male image in mind", which I feel is a little different than stating "it was supposed to be sung by a guy". I guess WE can suppose all we want...

If she wanted a guy, she probably could've used a guy... There's a plenty on HIGHWAY STAR.
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I agree about the distinction.

rito totally made the song hers, and the male singer covering wasn't strong (to my ears) in some parts to give it the same expression that rito did. I'll be sticking with the original, thank you very much. 👍

I also feel that the melody/flow of the song fit a female voice much more, just from listening to the male cover.

Maybe Kajiura wrote the lyrics with a male perspective in mind, but the melody was more female. To my ears. (Reminds me of Wagakki Band's Synchronicity and the gender switching perspectives in that song).
 
george1234 said:
Yea his voice is pretty typical japanese guy voice but i like his guy-ish way of singing if that makes sense lol
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I think I do get your idea. It was more of a less sing-y take of the song. Like he was a real-life guy (civilian) actually singing it at a karaoke from a broken heart. 🤔
 
Kugayama said:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MdHMyKhwM3E from 12 Jan 2024 at 2000 JST.
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A pleasant take on the song.

The singer, Shiho Terada gave a solid vocal performance. Surprisingly her tone at some points reminded me of rito, but a lighter, happier, less nasal, and less angsty rito.

I appreciated the gentle, light vocal and the acoustic version in general. I was waiting for the echo vocal on the "Ichiban, Hayaku" lyric! 😥

It was good to hear someone who has a working head voice choose to take those higher notes more intimately and even stay in head voice a bit towards the end, showing she's fairly comfortable there. I automatically compared those choices with our Kala ladies (OK, Wakana mostly) mentally, but these vocal choices work better in this stripped-down, acoustic setting.

Also, excellent accompaniment by the keyboardist. She got to show off some of her virtuosic playing at the bridge and filled in lots of activity to give life to the limited instrumentals.
 
grunty said:
That's the pianist.
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🤣 🤣 🤣Thanks grunty.

The singer was ChouCho! Haha. Terada was the accompanist then. Not sure why I skipped Choucho to copy Terada's name since I've been watching other covers and familiar with the naming convention. Guess I really should get to sleep (almost 2AM here and I'm beat).

Great collab from the both of them. Went back to listen one more time...
 
The singer has a very typical Japanese female singer voice but I quite like it. She at least knows her range and just went for head voice for the higher notes. She also has a really bright, youthful voice. It's just I'm not too sold on Kimi no Gin no Niwa being sung solo because it's one of those songs that feels quite empty without the harmonies.

Btw this lady works really hard to make her look young and make her age unknown lmao. She knows her angle for sure. Not a single shot taken from the direct front because she aged like 10 years from the front compared to from the sides.
 
ritarudandoo said:
The singer has a very typical Japanese female singer voice but I quite like it. She at least knows her range and just went for head voice for the higher notes. She also has a really bright, youthful voice. It's just I'm not too sold on Kimi no Gin no Niwa being sung solo because it's one of those songs that feels quite empty without the harmonies.

Btw this lady works really hard to make her look young and make her age unknown lmao. She knows her angle for sure. Not a single shot taken from the direct front because she aged like 10 years from the front compared to from the sides.
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You are making me go back to watch it to check out the camera angles!
 
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