the “some of my favorite anime themes” post that no one asked for

ACCESS – “Hitomi no Tsubasa”
The opening credits theme for the final two episodes of Code Geass (first season), this song somehow seems to be forgotten by many fans of the series but completely floored me the first time I heard it. Pretty much everything that I love about J-pop in one song. Heroic guitars like these don’t get paired with beats like this one often enough. The song doesn’t really take off until the chorus, though, where male-female (?) vocals take off and push it to ecstatic heights. There’s a HI-NRG trance keyboard solo in the bridge, which I normally find corny and stupid, but every time I hear it here, it seems like nothing else in the world could take its place. All this plays over a bubbling acid baseline that gives the song a depth that’s so often missing from tunes like this. Absolutely massive. None of the Youtube versions really do it justice, so grab a good-quality, full-length mp3 of it if you can.

Kouji Wada – “Butter-Fly”
“Heroic guitars,” huh. Well, this is what I’m talking about. So much positive energy in this song, which never really lets up and sets the stage for this series so much better than the embarrassingly lame English dub theme. Killer riffs, unforgettable melody, this song has got to be a classic by now, right? It’s been almost a decade since I first heard this and I still can’t fade it.

ROUND TABLE feat. Nino – “Let Me Be With You”
I bought a used Chobits DVD many years ago, enjoyed the series, but perhaps not enough to track down any more of it. I was really struck by the opening theme, though. Maybe I’d never heard vocal effects like these before, at least not in a pop song like this one, but it was one of those instances where I was really struck by the sheer “foreign-ness” of the music. No, this was not something that anyone would even think of recording in America. Could we imagine songs like this if we even wanted to? Today, I’m not sure if this really stands out as particularly “weird” or even unique anymore; either our cultural exchange is on the rise or I’ve just heard a lot more music since then. But I still hold a special place in my heart for this song.

Akino Arai – “Kirei na Kanjo”
Ending theme to the 2001 series Noir, a very mellow and chilled out coda to each episode, which helped cast a sweet but dark aura of cool over the show. I love all the space in this song, but the borderline trip-hop feel it takes on at the halfway point of the abridged Noir version is really cool. There’s a feeling in this song that I rarely experience from western pop music, or rather, one that I have to reach back to another era to even find a comparison to. (Um… Sarah McLachlan? Before “Adia” became an overplayed hit for grocery stores, I mean.)

Asian Kung-Fu Generation – Rewrite
Pretty much every song I’ve heard from Asian Kung-Fu Generation has been good or even great. They first caught my attention with their song “Haruka Kanata,” which was used in one of the earliest opening sequences for Naruto, but their appearance in the opening credits of Fullmetal Alchemist could be their finest moment, IMHO.

Supercell – “Utakata Hanabi”
I know this sounds just like Celine Dion singing “The Power of Love” but I still like it. I guess I just enjoy listening to vocals in Japanese (in the same way that I don’t enjoy, say, the sound of Italian), so unlike a lot of sentimental ballads that sound like this one, I’m more willing to give it the benefit of the doubt. Probably doesn’t hurt that its accompanying ending credits animation is so nicely done, either. I don’t have time to revisit every Naruto theme right now, but I can say that this is one of the most enjoyable ones for me.

Yoko Takahashi – “Zankoku na Tenshi no Te-ze (Thesis of a Cruel Angel)”
Would I love this song so much if it didn’t soundtrack my favorite series of all time? Or if it was forever paired in my mind with Evangelion‘s fantastic opening credit collage? So inseparable at this point, it’s probably impossible to tell just what it is that I’m responding to when I hear it. Do I like the song, or does it just conjure up my favorite images from the show? I guess this question could be posed to any fan re: their favorite anime themes. Are they good songs, or simply effective in channeling the “spirit” of the series? I’m sure this has extensively been covered elsewhere, though.

Megumi Hayashibara – “Give a Reason”
Wow, this takes me back. The funny thing is, I didn’t hear this song until sometime around 2003 or 2004, and I didn’t see any season of Slayers until about three or four years ago, so there’s no first-hand nostalgia at work here. But there’s something about “Give a Reason” (and a lot of Megumi Hayashibara’s other songs from the same era) that simply “work” on me, reminding me of a simpler and more innocent time — okay, does anyone reading this not want to go back to the 90’s? — that predate both our real-life global problems (terrorism, unemployment, the death of futurism in our post-millennial world) as well as the cynical sense of entitlement that’s set in on anime fandom. In short, when I hear this song, it reminds me of when the future (as represented by music so “new” and exotic-sounding) seemed boundless and full of potential. And hey, I guess that’s a good theme to shoot for when you’re writing a song to help set the mood for a “quest” story like Slayers. In my (still-limited) experience, nothing tops this when I’m looking for HI-NRG j-pop bliss.

Sarasa Ifu – Curriculum
I’ve yet to see Moyashimon — Funimation seems to have licensed the live action version, but not the animated version with this particular opening — but I adore this opening. One of the happiest things I’ve ever watched, and a pretty great song in its own right, too.

open letter to the guy who walked past me at FYE last week

I was taking a break from Christmas shopping and browsing the anime section. You walked past with some girl and commented “Oh, here’s the ‘no taste’ section.” Less than a minute later you started talking to her about video games and Internet memes.

Pretty sure I’ll always have better taste than you (whatever you think that means) and that there’s nothing you’ll ever be able to do about it. But keep acting like a smug dick and dressing like Kevin Smith if it makes you feel better.

Solanin

Solanin
Inio Asano
Weekly Young Sunday 2005-2006
Viz 2008

I’ve found the phrase “slice of life” creeping into my entries here a little more often than I’d like. There’s nothing wrong with it, but I just feel like relying on it so much kind of suggests that stories about everyday people and their everyday lives are somehow a strange kind of niche, one that readers may need to be “warned” about in advance or something. I’ve always enjoyed comics that tell stories about average people and the trials and tribulations they face in figuring out who they are and what to do with their lives. Two of my favorite graphic novels are Craig Thompson’s Blankets and Daniel Clowes’ Ghost World. These books honestly and artfully deal with what it’s like to be young and struggling with real-life issues: coming to peace with yourself and trying to find one’s place in the world. Solanin tackles some of the same themes, which affect young adults just as much as adolescents, and takes its place next to those titles as one of the best illustrated books that I’ve ever read.

Meiko Inoue, the “heroine” of the story, is disillusioned with her dead-end office job, which was hardly the future she envisioned for herself after she graduated college. At 24, she wonders if she’ll ever discover a greater calling for herself than the soul-crushing world of nine-to-five work. Early in the story, she quits her job in the hope that it will force her hand and lead her to a more meaningful calling in her life. I know how she felt because, at almost the same age, I did the exact same thing. I expect that plenty of readers will relate to her situation or perhaps even be reminded of when they finally reached that breaking point themselves.

This, perhaps, isn’t the most responsible decision that Meiko makes in the story, particularly because her longtime boyfriend Taneda is only able to find part-time work as an illustrator. Taneda deals with his own professional dissatisfaction by continually pursuing his dream: to play in a successful band with his friends from college. Throughout the story, we follow not only Meiko and Taneda, but their friends and bandmates Rip and Kato. They weather trials of chronic boredom, self-doubt, indecision and impatience, both in their individual lives and in their relationships. This is the kind of stuff that may have many shonen readers crying “emo!”, but will instantly hook anyone who’s craving a thoughtful story about well-developed and empathic characters.

The art in this book is wonderful. Asano’s characters are drawn with personality and flair, and with lots of attention to their individual sense of style. Set in Tokyo, the backgrounds are richly detailed and boldly flushed out, drawing the reader into the world of the characters. Even the interiors, from Meiko’s apartment and office to the band’s practice space, are meaningfully designed and rendered, often feeling tiny and claustrophobic. This is difficult to achieve in the space of a few panels on a page, but Asano makes the characters’ spaces highly involved in the story.

As the story progresses, we learn more about Taneda and his music, which takes a more prominent role in the second half of the (rather lengthy, at 426 pages) book. Asano captures the raw energy of the band’s performance in a way that I’ve never seen in comics before. In contrast, there’s nothing glamorous about the way he shows the struggles of a young band trying to succeed and simply be heard. There are plenty of opportunities to glorify the rock and roll lifestyle in this story, but Solanin‘s portrayal of playing in a band is much more true to life than most fiction. Just convincing others that it is (or could be) more than a mere “hobby” is a hurdle that many fail to clear. Asano understands this, as well as the conflicts that young artists face in slowly growing up and facing the eternal question: how long should one continue to push on with your dreams? When is it time to give them up?

Solanin is a handsomely-bound book that you wouldn’t feel ashamed to leave on your coffee table, even in sight of your non-otaku friends. I hope that fans of thoughtful graphic novels like Blankets or Ghost World will give it a chance, as it’s not only a wonderful story, but stands to bridge the gap between manga and those kind of books, so much more commonly accepted as worthy reading for adults than ever, even here in America. And like so many graphic novels of that caliber, Solanin carries with it an air of “cool” that’s impossible to deny. It not only makes the case for manga as vital modern literature, but as a genuinely hip cultural item to possess. Heh, if only.

So it’s funny how, in the afterward of the story, Asano blatantly states that, “there’s nothing cool about these characters,” perhaps understanding the temptation of readers to ascribe such a tempting quality to them. (And the fact that we may see ourselves mirrored in them? What a coincidence!) “They’re just average 20-somethings who blend into the backdrop of the city. But the most important messages in our lives don’t come from musicians on stage or stars on television. They come from the average people all around you, the ones who are just feet from where you stand.” In its thoughtful focus on the pervasive aimlessness and quiet desperation that’s so common in our world today, Solanin might make you take a second look at the people around you. Maybe their stories are worth telling, too.