Kagrra - Vicious Magazine June 2001 Interview
Nostalgia - winter is full of emotions like that.
Kagrra is releasing maxi-singles 4 months consecutively! The first release is "Genwaku no Joukei" on April 27th. It's a song that expresses the plan of "We wanted to display the cold feelings of winter". And special attention to Isshi's poems!
Kagrra is releasing maxi-singles 4 months consecutively! The first release is "Genwaku no Joukei" on April 27th. It's a song that expresses the plan of "We wanted to display the cold feelings of winter". And special attention to Isshi's poems!
―The first of your 4 months consecutive releases, "Genwaku no Joukei", is related to the word ~Winter~ right? It seems like you're backtracking through the seasons with Winter/Autumn/Summer/Spring, so why did you start from Winter?
Isshi: We've already had a release about Spring in this timeframe (the maxi single "Sakura"), so we thought wouldn't it be cool to start from Winter? More than anything, the imagery of this song is winter first and foremost, so decisively, it's winter. Shin-kun was in charge of the recording.
Shin: We've been recording already this year, but it was still cold winter, so our feelings from that time come out here. The feeling that comes to mind... for things like winter, it feels like an image of snow comes to mind.
Akiya: Recording started in spring, but snow was still falling, right?
Isshi: Snow has been falling whenever we've recorded this year, was it because of this song? (laughs) Snow falling in the season of blooming sakura is pretty, but cold and troublesome. We were recording while I was suffering from pollen allergies in the snow. It was the worst...
―The whimsical phrases and sound effects surely makes it feel like a winter scene.
Izumi: As it's a new experiment we used a lot of sound effects. We included various sounds with a synthesizer. Recording? It went smoothly for me.
Nao: Eh, really?!
Izumi: What? No? But when we had the time, things like the imagery went smoothly. (laughs)
Nao: This time while I was thinking about winter imagery, I recorded the bass simply all at once. It was simple for me to be thorough but I was modest.
Shin: I played acoustic guitar like jara~n♪, and I was truly modest. (laughs) So, Akiya played electric and the two don't perfectly intertwine.
Akiya: We wanted to intertwine but they don't intertwine. (laughs) Because even in the solo there's just one note like bi~n. We wanted to evoke a cold feeling of winter, and after we finally thought about various things we took the most simple method, but I think the end result has a lot of interesting sounds.
Isshi: This song is something that depicts "nostalgia". Recalling the past,wanting to go back to the past... I'm full of those thoughts in winter. For me whose hometown is in a snowy region, a winter scene seemed like a good starting point. Without depicting love and the subtleties of the heart, it's a song with a deeper, wide stance.
―It's a limited release to venues and mail order with 1000 copies. Could you elaborate on the jacket design?
Isshi: For the jacket... as usual, 'simple is best'. There was no particular inspiration for it, just a Kagrra-like, beautiful design without writing? (laughs) The tracks are the same, but as there are two types, venue and mail order, each of them have different details, in particular a new poem by me inside. They're poems that show surface Isshi and hidden Isshi are the same and yet different. They're poems following the theme of homesickness and nostalgia from "Genwaku no Joukei". Since there are 4 each, the total is 8. I wrote and rewrote them many times, so in a way it was even more difficult than recording.
Nao, Shin, Akiya: I still haven't read them!
Isshi: Aren't they cruel? Guys like these. But Izumi-kun read it diligently. As you'd expect we're just like a married couple. (laughs)
Izumi: Haven't I been raised to the status of a loving patron? (laughs)(*1)
―On May 5th, there's also a member-restricted oneman live commemoration of the fanclub launch, right?
Isshi: It's called 'The Second Festival'. We're grateful to our fans. We'll be showing a different part of us than usual~ Please enjoy it!
Isshi: We've already had a release about Spring in this timeframe (the maxi single "Sakura"), so we thought wouldn't it be cool to start from Winter? More than anything, the imagery of this song is winter first and foremost, so decisively, it's winter. Shin-kun was in charge of the recording.
Shin: We've been recording already this year, but it was still cold winter, so our feelings from that time come out here. The feeling that comes to mind... for things like winter, it feels like an image of snow comes to mind.
Akiya: Recording started in spring, but snow was still falling, right?
Isshi: Snow has been falling whenever we've recorded this year, was it because of this song? (laughs) Snow falling in the season of blooming sakura is pretty, but cold and troublesome. We were recording while I was suffering from pollen allergies in the snow. It was the worst...
―The whimsical phrases and sound effects surely makes it feel like a winter scene.
Izumi: As it's a new experiment we used a lot of sound effects. We included various sounds with a synthesizer. Recording? It went smoothly for me.
Nao: Eh, really?!
Izumi: What? No? But when we had the time, things like the imagery went smoothly. (laughs)
Nao: This time while I was thinking about winter imagery, I recorded the bass simply all at once. It was simple for me to be thorough but I was modest.
Shin: I played acoustic guitar like jara~n♪, and I was truly modest. (laughs) So, Akiya played electric and the two don't perfectly intertwine.
Akiya: We wanted to intertwine but they don't intertwine. (laughs) Because even in the solo there's just one note like bi~n. We wanted to evoke a cold feeling of winter, and after we finally thought about various things we took the most simple method, but I think the end result has a lot of interesting sounds.
Isshi: This song is something that depicts "nostalgia". Recalling the past,wanting to go back to the past... I'm full of those thoughts in winter. For me whose hometown is in a snowy region, a winter scene seemed like a good starting point. Without depicting love and the subtleties of the heart, it's a song with a deeper, wide stance.
―It's a limited release to venues and mail order with 1000 copies. Could you elaborate on the jacket design?
Isshi: For the jacket... as usual, 'simple is best'. There was no particular inspiration for it, just a Kagrra-like, beautiful design without writing? (laughs) The tracks are the same, but as there are two types, venue and mail order, each of them have different details, in particular a new poem by me inside. They're poems that show surface Isshi and hidden Isshi are the same and yet different. They're poems following the theme of homesickness and nostalgia from "Genwaku no Joukei". Since there are 4 each, the total is 8. I wrote and rewrote them many times, so in a way it was even more difficult than recording.
Nao, Shin, Akiya: I still haven't read them!
Isshi: Aren't they cruel? Guys like these. But Izumi-kun read it diligently. As you'd expect we're just like a married couple. (laughs)
Izumi: Haven't I been raised to the status of a loving patron? (laughs)(*1)
―On May 5th, there's also a member-restricted oneman live commemoration of the fanclub launch, right?
Isshi: It's called 'The Second Festival'. We're grateful to our fans. We'll be showing a different part of us than usual~ Please enjoy it!
Notes:
*1 - He specifically said danna, a term used for a man who takes on the great expense of being a geisha's sponsor, often due to some kind of sexual/romantic interest. They're being silly lol
*1 - He specifically said danna, a term used for a man who takes on the great expense of being a geisha's sponsor, often due to some kind of sexual/romantic interest. They're being silly lol