Frequently Asked Questions-
English lyrics for Japanese anime
songs... why, God, why?
It's been a long time since anime
fans were subjected to anime songs performed in English, often
resulting in convulsions and mass riots (see the next question).
For those of you who were introduced to anime in the last couple
years may not even be aware that such a feat has been attempted
before. Granted that there has been little success to produce a
produce a quality dub of a song, why does this site try?
The answer is that songs are
translated from language to language all around the world, and
are often very successful works at that. The musical Les
Misérables was originally French and has since been
translated into several languages, including Japanese (Chairman
Kaga from Iron Chef played Jean Valjean!). The difference with
anime is a question of effort- most failed attempts treat
English lyrics as a translation for business purposes instead of
the poetry any song needs to be to thrive. Furthermore,
re-recording a song into English is expensive, and generally
goes against the marketing strategy of most North American anime
distributors. While I would like to see more dubbed lyrics
incorporated into dubbed anime (and anime OSTs), there is a low
demand for them in the anime community (as opposed to dubs
themselves).
The potential for these English
lyrics, however, lies with fans who want to sing their beloved
songs in English. All of the lyrics on the site pass the
"karaoke" test and correspond easily with the original song.
They are designed for performance, and visitors have recorded
songs, used them in music videos, and received offers to perform
them in concert. Distributors such as Geneon have shown interest
in the lyrics, and many can have mainstream appeal. Whether you
perform them at a convention's karaoke room or prove to your
parents that it's good music with a sound message, they are
yours to bring to the world.
These are pretty good, but I've
heard professionally dubbed anime songs before and all of them suck.
WTF?
Back in the day, many North American
distributors (Viz and Pioneer in particular) thought that their
dubbed productions would appeal to a greater audience if the
music was also in English. So they wrote English lyrics (just
like I do now) and recorded an English version over the original
music. Unfortunately, the vast majority of these songs suffered
from a combination of three problems. 1) The lyrics were written
using a very strict translation that failed to consider the
poetic elements that makes us enjoy music to begin with. 2) The
translation itself was the problem, and either didn't capture
the overall meaning of the song or completely abandoned it. 3)
The actual recording process was flawed, and/or had a singer
that either wasn't appropriate to the song or (in more cases
that you'd think) simply had no talent to begin with. Some
dubbed products, like Tenchi Muyo's "Pioneer" and El Hazard's
"Back in Love" (which abandoned the premise of the song, but
still sounded good) sounded pretty good, but unfortunately those
were in the minority.
Since then, anime distributors have
taken the A.D.Vision approach of abandoning the mass market in
favor of targeting genuine anime fans, who certainly can
tolerate music in Japanese (and often would have it no other
way). Companies that do try to appeal to a larger audience (like
4Kids Entertainment) typically will produce their own music
written to attract whomever it is they're trying to attract,
although Pokémon occasionally will have a dubbed song from the
original Japanese show... usually to the same success as the
stuff ten years ago.
Same as the above question, only
remove "These are pretty good" and add "English lyrics are stupid
and are a disservice to the original Japanese lyricists."
You watch subs, don't you? The
argument over the faithfulness of English lyrics falls into same
realm as the dub vs. sub debate. I'm not going to get involved
in this battle, as this site doesn't attempt to cater itself to
subtitle-only "purists." The case for English lyrics is the same
case for dubs- in listening to something in your native
language, even with a translation in front of you, you're likely
to miss something in the way it was said. Like dubbed anime,
these lyrics try to provide an English approximation while
keeping the original melody (just like a dub's need to "fit the
flap"), at the risk of straying from the original message.
Furthermore, just as there are people who can't read subtitles
and still follow the action, there's a lot of people can't sing
in Japanese.
How long have you been doing
these, and what are your credentials?
I have been writing these lyrics for
about four years now, although many of my earlier works were not
very good and are not available (although "Be All Right," often
considered one of the best lyrics on the site, was one of the
first songs attempted). As for my credentials, I have a minor in
English, performed for four years in my high school chorus, and
have mastered most of the 9-foot songs on Dance Dance
Revolution.
I'm assuming you don't speak
Japanese, ne?
I took a semester of Japanese in
college, but that isn't qualification enough to do the strict lyric
translations. With the exception of "Fire" (the one song I
translated myself), all direct translations are found online
through various sources. My limited knowledge of Japanese, and a
handy dictionary, help me sort through the grammar of some
verses and verify the accuracy of some translations.
Interestingly enough, while I don't
*speak* Japanese, I'm perfectly capable of *singing* Japanese,
which is more crucial to writing English lyrics than you'd
think.
How may I use these lyrics?
The lyrics are designed for you to
sing. So sing them, dang it! You don't need my permission for
that. However, if you plan on performing them in public (other
than karaoke), arranging your own cover of the song, or
recording the song for any kind of distribution, please contact
me ahead of time. If there's no money involved, I will always
give my permission; I just want to know about it, and will try
to publicize it on the site. In fact, I may even start uploading
some of the better recordings I get.
If money's involved, you may not use
these lyrics without contacting me first. Lyric translations
like these fall in a very gray area of copyright law, and I
haven't seen a court case calling these guys fair use (and I
have seen cases calling them copyright violations, but there are
other circumstances involved). Point is, I'm not letting my
babies get into trouble behind my back.
I love {insert song
here}! Can you do English lyrics for {insert song
here}??!!
It doesn't hurt to send in the
request, but after running the site for two years I find that I
have little time to devote to lyrics. It's a very delicate
process and given the negative reputation "dubbed" anime songs
have, I refuse to post anything less than a quality product.
Other factors such as the availability of the song and a direct
English translation, as well as the fact that some songs just
don't work in English, may not get the song done. But I
definitely want to know what songs you'd like to see, so send
any requests to
arpulver@yahoo.com and I'll see what I can do.
At the moment, these songs are pretty
high on my to-do list, so if you really want to see one of these,
let me know and I'll make it a priority.
- "Raspberry
Heaven" from Azumanga Daioh
- "Wakatte
Itahazu" from Fushigi Yuugi
- "Yakusoku"
from Love Hina
- "Hesitation"
from Saber Marionette J
- "Little
Wing" from Scrapped Princess
- "Ano Hi
Ni" from Video Girl Ai
Will you put one of my songs up?
See the
Submissions page. Go
here for a guide to writing English lyrics.
What's up with all the Digimon and
Cardcaptor Sakura?
Much of my anime music collection started
with Digimon, and it was the first series I started writing English
lyrics for. Say what you want about the series itself, but it has an
excellent selection of very diverse music. Furthermore, a few of
the songs are works commissioned by a group called the Digimon Music
Fan-Dubbing Group, now known as Anime Music
Dubbing, that also records the English songs. There are as many as a
dozen songs I've written that are not on the site (feel free to ask
about them if you're a Digimon music fan and want to see them).
As for Cardcaptor Sakura, much of the music
originates from a character album- one of the first import CDs I
purchased. I had made a goal to write songs for the entire album,
but that seems to have stalled at five.
What kind of anime are you into?
Here's my top ten favorite
series, just to give you an idea of my broad interest
range:
- Martian Successor Nadesico
- Kodomo no Omocha
- R.O.D. the TV
- Love Hina
- Serial Experiments Lain
- Fushigi Yuugi
- Princess Nine
- Slayers
- Digimon (Tamers is my favorite series)
- Azumanga Daioh
The list actually goes up to twenty,
but I don't need to throw in Eyeshield 21, Haibane Renmei, or Jungle
wa Itsumo Hare Nochi Guu. For those, check out my page devoted to my
Top 20 series.
Will you answer my
infrequently asked question if I e-mailed it to you?
After much
soul-searching... yes. Go to arpulver@yahoo.com for your portal to the answer.
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