Original Japanese text taken from [Anikan R Music] Vol. 2 (Released on 4 August 2007)

Text by: Shimada Nobuko （島田宣子）

Disclaimer: This is a second level translation so there may be some inaccuracies. [Chinese translation can be found on the chinese sound horizon fansite]

[Actually this is only 90% complete. I rather focus on translating sound horizon light novels. I’ll just post what I have for now]

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Sound Horizon will be releasing the Maxi Single [Seisen No Iberia] on 1 Aug. Which each release, the band evolves and moves towards a larger and larger scale, truly a unique artistic group. Their history shall be revealed here! The origins of the leader, Revo and Sound Horizon from its birth till now. From the legendary self made work that cannot be bought to the newest work, will be told to us completely by Revo. This is a 20000 word interview, a treasured special edition for all those who want to know all things [Sound Horizon]

What is the Fantasy Band [Sound Horizon]?

An artistic group headed by sound creator Revo (lyrics and composition). In order to show the fantasy stories imbued within the songs, numerous band members have to gathered according to the needs of the song. In this style, concerts that are composed of singers, narrators, music bands, string and winder instrument players and many others are also a novel attraction. It started out from releasing music on his own site and then releasing a CD made by himself in 2001. Soon it quickly became a hot topic and made its debut in 2004.

The birth of Revo to debut, the special edition of everything till his latest works!

The revolution of bringing stories into music.

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Revo History Interview

“I wanted to create something revolutionary and the name Revo was born”

The origins of Revo as an artist, the first release of 200 CDs which moved people’s hearts, the secret production of his last autonomous work which released 1000 CDs, the information that were only present in snippets of conversation, now Revo will personally talk about the activities of Sound Horizon when he was still an independent artist。

His drawing talent was greater than his music talent? The childhood years where he first encountered the piano

*

–When did Revo-san first become “Revo”?

R: When? I guess it was about 8 years ago. When I first used the internet, there is a need for a user ID right, without realizing it, I started using the name Revo. After which, it became impossible to get away from this name (laugh). I remember it was a turning point when I could make my debut, during that time, I thought about using a much cooler name but once I thought that this name had been used for some time, it didn’t seem nice to keep changing it…once I had this through, basically I just had to use the name Revo and continue moving forward. Now that I think about it, would it be better to have a celebrity name that had both a first and last name? I do want that kind of name as well.

–Nowadays, everyone has a web account but for you, its actually the origin of your celebrity name. Is there any time where Revo-san follows any mainstream music?

R: Mainstream is a little bit…I’m the same as everyone else when it comes to appreciating music. So I usually listen to all kinds of music, like the kind that most people listen to, such as J-pop.

–Everyone usually starts out as part of the audience. So from there, there is usually some kind of opportunity that makes people walk the path of a creator.

R: That’s true. If I had to seriously trace back to this opportunity, it might when I learnt to play the piano at a very young age, but I seemed to have gave up halfway.

–Saying that you “Seemed to have given up”, is it because this happened too long ago that you can’t remember?

R: I guess I still can remember a bit. But rather than saying that I learnt how to play the piano, more accurately, I was forced to learn to play the piano. Even though I was the one who mentioned that I wanted to learn, it was likely due to my interest in music. When it comes to sound, maybe its an unreasonable interest that comes from the instinct of a human being. At that time I was a child who could not keep calm and was not very good at sitting in front of the piano for a long time. Even so, even when I’m playing, I would play and swing my legs around, look outside to see if there’s anything interesting and then run out to play if there is, so I had no attention at all, I guess?

–Also, rather than adults have direct requests “you must do this”, you hoped to have more freedom?

R: It might be like that. Also, I did not have piano at my house so I do not have the environment where I could freely explore. When there was piano class, I would go to class and only then could I play the piano. That time, I might be the kind of child that is so free spirited that I could not even do such a thing. I was very unrestrained for as long as I can remember.

— And then, somehow, you stopped learning.

R: I don’t remember if I did (laugh). After I gave up on the piano, I remember that I went towards drawing. That time, the teacher and others would say praises like “this child has a talent for drawing!”, they even wanted me to go for a more advanced art class, of course I didn’t go in the end (laugh). Now it was the other way, that time, there should be people who feel that I should go for art rather than music, now it’s just music. Now if I said I wanted to go draw, everyone would probably stop me (laugh).

–No matter what, whether it’s drawing or music, they’re both under the creative territory

R: That’s true. There was an incident in the past when we were shown a vase that did not have a very distinct colour. As kids, we only had paints or crayons if we were colouring windows, we would just fill it with blue. We wouldn’t think of showing the window’s transparency and just colour it entirely build. So at that age when there wasn’t a concept of mixing colours, our teacher asked us to draw that vase with indistinct colours. That vase was somewhere in between green and grey. So for those children who felt it was green, they would colour it green and those who felt it was grey would colour it grey. However I, was the only genius child in the classroom who decided to invent a new method of colouring by mixing both colours together (laugh). At that time, the adults said if this child continued on, he would become impressive. Too bad, I did not choose this path in the end.

— If we had to say that you decided to take the path of creation, in a sense, it’s not that inappropriate.

R: Perhaps from young, I was the kind of child who liked to think and create my own things. Or maybe I just didn’t want to follow the crowd.

–So learning how to play the piano can be considered your first music experience, after that, from when did you realise that you have delved deeply into music.

R: Classical music should be one of my earlier experiences with music. After that, there was also the influences from wind instrument orchestras and full orchestras. However, in the beginning, I had more encounters with keyboards. A relative (T/N Revo said an older sister relative, probably an older female distant cousin) gave me an electone and a reed organ, the kind worked by foot pedals. These instruments were piled in my room. I just treated them as toys that could make sound. So that’s why I liked music all along?

— This interest must have continued on till now, right?

R: I also had experience with the recorder but of course, I was horrible at it. Now, in Sound Horizon, there is Sakeue-kun who plays the flute. When I heard him play the flute, I had the feeling of “If only I worked hard on playing the recorder!”. Last time, I definitely looked down on the potential of the recorder. I felt that it was a plain instrument that could only make whistling sounds. But what kind of instruments can a child have? Things like a guitar were far too expensive. And during that time, the only instrument you could bring around was pretty much the recorder. Now that I think about it, if the skills are polished properly, even a recorder can become an amazing instrument. However a child would not be able to refine their skills that well. They are also unable to put their feelings into playing the instrument. They could only put some simple melodies together, and they are happy enough just being able to do so. When I was young, I only thought about enjoying myself and completely did not think about showing feelings of joy or sadness. However, whether it was the recorder or the electone, I encountered music through these paths. However it’s very different from the celebrity life now, I did not want to show anything at that time. It was more of a simple motive of “I’ll be happy to be able to make some sound using instruments.” But now that I think back, I never really thought about singing, singing is the simplest instrument after all. That time, everyone would have their favourite song whether it was something learnt from school or something heard on television. To be able to play it was really enjoyable.

— That would be something we call a transcription right.

R: Correct. There was no ready made music score, if you had to perform using a recorder, you just had to trial and error without thinking about the octave or note. If you followed every part of the song loyally and, your fingers would reach an unbelievable state (laugh). I just deleted all the change in chords. Now that I think about it, the way I compose music is quite terrible, changing the chord every two music bars, I’m just messing around with other people (laugh). Anyway, at that time, I was just naturally transcribing music. I did not have much ability to memorise scores so I was just remembering it with my body?

— It definitely makes one happy to be able to completely hear the melody being played out. That kind of “Eureka” feeling. I feel that that was one of your original motivations to transcribe the songs.

R: Also, that time I like to sing out “Ohayou [good morning]”, this kind of normal greeting, following the music scales like “♪O-hayou~♪. Then try to replicate that tune using the recorder (Laugh). I was really such an idiot brat that time (Laugh). But doing such idiotic things, my life was full of musical moments. I also listened to songs like other people, but I never really involved muself in the so-called western music.

*

Getting hold of a guitar and getting hooked onto MIDIs. The teenage years of immersing in western music.

— Just now were your experiences in middle and elementary school right? After that, how did you gradually enter the celebrity circle?
R: First, I bought a guitar. Or more accurately, my parents bought a guitar for me. A guitar was not cheap after all. And it wasn’t the kind for amateurs that only cost ten or twenty thousand, I think the one I asked them for at once cost around eighty thousand! I spent a long time asking them for it (laugh). They should have set some conditions but I can’t remember that clearly now. It should be from then that I officially stepped onto the path of music. Of course, if you want something or you’re asking someone else for something, what you should have first is the passion. It’s an important factor to have to motivate yourself. Then after getting what you want, then you have to use it as much as possible……ah, that hit too close to home! Oh no (laugh)! A lot of things I buy these days are a result of stress relief (laugh). Even though I don’t wear them, I still buy a lot of clothes and my closet is stuffed full of clothes I never worn before. It must surprise you that I’m this kind of person.

–Yeah, it’s quite unexpected (laugh)

R: But looking at that point now, since I earned that money, I can spend it however I want, besides, it’s good for the economy……(laugh)

— That’s right, just look at it as contributing to the economy (laugh)

R: That’s how it is (laugh). However, that time, I bought something using money earned by others, if I gave up after a short stint of passion then I would just be a person with no willpower. In a sense, that attitude led to how I am today, even though I didn’t become a guitarist. That time I made quite a lot of scores from popular bands. However, there are parts of the songs you can hear and parts you can’t hear at all. It’s not difficult to hear the main melody. But when it comes to the chords, it’s hard to tell what it is if you don’t practice.

–In the beginning, you can’t even hear the diminished chords or other difficult chords right?

R: That’s right. I think I bought a book about chords and forced myself to memorize the finger positions. When it comes to learning the guitar, most people would probably get stuck on the F chord! To play the F chord, you have to stretch your fingers further than you ever did in your life (laugh). So usually, in the beginning, you won’t be able to play this chord. Even if you could, the position is not good enough and you can’t play the sound you want. Basically, I learned to play the guitar while beating battles as such. After learning how to play, I went from passively listening to those popular songs that were being played at that time to actively looking for music to listen to. A kind of drive to search for even better music in the world grew within me as well as looking for some amazing people to mimic in order to play my guitar better. During that time, the magazines would write about the three best guitar players ( Jimmy Page, Jeff Beck, Eric Clapton) and they will even write things like “Jimi Hendrix changed the guitar world!” or “The guitar god Clapton!’. Because of the influence from these sources of media, I thought I would like to slowly experience and understand this kind of music and transcribed quite a few scores for western music.

— It seemed to be the time when the western guitar was at its best shortly after you bought yours, huh?

R: Yes, I completely stayed away from local music and became the annoying mischievous guitar brat (laugh). During that time, I even felt that “Local music has no future!”. I even felt that Japanese guitarists were awful. This was the thought anyone would have in the past (laugh). I always felt that foreign music was amazing; musicians such as Ritchie, Edward or even those like Robert Johnson from way earlier. No matter how carefully I looked into the history of guitar performances, I could not find a Japanese name. The history of guitars had nothing to do with Japanese people at all.

— A few years after that, the names of the likes of Takasaki Akira would appear. But when it comes to the local guitar history, it’s really lacking.

R: If we’re talking about the present, there’s a number of guitarists that I respect however music played by the guitar is not at the core of what is popular in Japan. What’s played on television or radio would not be this kind of music and is likely to just be popular music under Johnny and Associates. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johnny_%26_Associates] Of course, it could be simply be the truth of that era. Anyway, because of these reasons, there was a time when I was immersed in western music. However, without realizing it, I came back to local music.

–The music you are creating now is completely local, even the lyrics are in Kanji.

R: In a way (laugh). It can’t be counted as western music (laugh), that’s for sure. Even though the lyrics were sprinkled with Kanji that even Japanese do not know how to read and phonetics of unknown meaning. I’m also not too sure why I went back to local music. Let me think, perhaps at that time, I was tired of the guitar itself. There was a period of time when I started to have thoughts that haven’t I had enough of playing songs that only consist of the guitar. Of course, music from the guitar has its charm but just indulging in this only instrument, I wouldn’t be able to tell if I liked music or if I liked the guitar, if I liked the musicality of the entire song or if I only fell in love with the guitar skills of one song while disregarding the other parts. If so, it seems like I have entered a kind of unique place while enjoying music.

— You’ll feel that you’re only paying attention to a tiny portion of the music.

R: Exactly, most people would think that lyrics hold a significant part in J-POP music, so wouldn’t “singing” be one of the main factors too? But if you were a guitar brat, you probably wouldn’t listen properly to people singing. You’ll probably mess with the song equalizer in strange ways, such as emphasizing the parts of the guitar accompaniment and not the human voices (laugh). And add on a cool guitar solo. And talking about western rock music, isn’t it normal to swap the singer with someone else? Ah, of course, actually singers are frequently changed in Sound Horizon too (laugh). Normally, once you change the singer, it would make other feel “this song has changed!”, but within western music, sometimes it the guitarist who plays the main role in the band. Like Deep Purple.

–And at that moment, you’ll developed most of your guitar skills and started to notice the musicality of the songs as a whole. Is that how you started to have thoughts of wanting to create your own music.

R: Yep, you can say that this is the turning point. For example, many times, rather than saying music is the main part which everyone notices, most of the times its played as some BGM. When watching movies, there’s the movie’s accompanying songs, when playing games, there’s music accompanying the games. So in this way, music not accompanied with voices still takes up a large portion of music. At that time, it’s quite popular to watch a lot of TV shows and play games. Like Super Mario or Dragon Quest, that kind. If you played games, you’ll slowly like the music from the games right? In the beginning, there were limitations to the technology available and game music were just 6-bit sounds. However, slowly, it reached an era where game music can be made with real instrument sounds. In this way, it’s became harder to make these just by using the guitar so this was also one of the reasons I changed my direction.

*

Purchasing back to back Multi-track recording equipment and sequencers. Learning music synthesis and stepping onto the path of a composer

— I agree. Game music doesn’t feel like it’s related to the guitar.

R: It’s the feeling like, if there was a guitar part, people would just pay attention to the guitar then it would take ages for the audience to pay attention to other parts of the music.

— For media such as games, sometimes it feels boring without music.

R: It would feel like something is missing. Like something feels off, especially the sound effects. If there are no sound effects, the game would few dry and you can’t get excited at all. When you press the keyboard, there has to be a “dok” sound (laugh). When defeating enemies with a beam, the other party has to collapse with a “sheew”, if not, it’s a bit…….right?

–And when you reach the end, there would be music that moves you and the entire person would be embraced with a feeling of accomplishment. That feels nice.

R: That’s right. Perhaps it was during such a process that you start thinking without realizing questions like “What instruments were used in this BGM” or “how did they arrange this melody”. And this time just happened to be the period of time that I started to compose music. I tried to compose songs using the guitar, but once I use the guitar, the product was basically just the guitar and the human voice.

–There wasn’t any point in arranging the music, correct?

R: That’s right. At that point of time, there was no way I could start if I didn’t buy an MTR. Because that time, I could only record music from a single track. Of course there was also the problem of not knowing what to do if I played it wrong. However at that time, if I could only record a single track, that’s a far cry from what a music composer can do. So I used a Multi-track recording equipment, one track would be the guitar, then find a way to put my own singing in then if there are any empty tracks, I can even put in the accordion or something similar. Then I could even add tracks of various sounds such as drugs. Then it’s time to do music synthesizing! Thankfully, there was a technology known as music synthesizing at that time.

–The sequencer when you started doing music synthesis?

R: Correct. I got influenced by one of my seniors or someone like that, the first one I used was a sequencer that came with its own sound source. It was one of those old machines that wasn’t even compatible with General MIDI. Before that, I seem to have bought a rhythm machine⁷. It’s a machine that could only make the percussion sound at eight beats. I seemed to have practiced my guitar for some time according to this beat. After that, the sequencer had a sounds that was closer to that of an actual drum and I used such a device to create such music synthesis. But at that time, such a device did not have very realistic sounds and a fair bit of effort had to be put in during the synthesizing process. So, in the end, the product was similar to game music at that time. I even tried to use what I had on hand to make back ground music for games that existed then, such as Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest. That time I was still playing the guitar, forming a band and trying my hand at music synthesis in hopes that it would become on of my tools in creating music. After that I got a computer and various work flows became easier. After I got a computer, I wrote quite a few pieces through compositing some tracks together.

— Do you still remember what your first composition was like?

R: U~~~mm, I think I’m starting to remember it just a bit, but it’s completely not the kind of good work I can release to the world (laugh). I can only say that it’s not something that’s serious (laugh). In the beginning, the chords were just done however I liked (laugh), now that I mention it, it might even be a ground breaking level of creativity. Who knows, that product might still be on the cassette. But something like cassettes, there aren’t machines that can play it anymore (laugh). Ah, I can’t say they don’t exist anymore, I did buy a radio that can play cassettes after all. I usually don’t listen to radio broadcasts but there was a time where I was a guest for a radio show before! So I thought to “Use a radio to listen to the program where I was guest!” and bought one back. However, it could not receive the radio waves at all (laugh). The programs I participated in were all from Tokai radio station and other regional radio stations, they don’t broadcast in Tokyo (laugh).

— Couldn’t you just ask them to send you to recording?

R: Ah hahaha (Laugh). That’s true, sorry, I went off track (laugh). Let’s just come back to the original topic, basically at that time, I used the sequencer to create various pieces. After learning how to do music composition, the kind and genre of music is sure to expand a lot. For a moment, you might even feel that you can write all kinds of things. Such as adding the sounds from a symphonic orchestra even though there’s no way you can get a real symphonic orchestra to appear in a live performance (laugh). Even though it cannot beat the live performance, if it’s just synthesized sounds, just that guitar alone won’t be able to play that. Once I kept progressing in synthesizing music, I felt that perhaps it was possible to make music just on my own.

— Or rather, you get the feeling of “It’s easier to make this on my own”.

R: In a sense, that is true! I don’t have to interact with others or consider the plans of my band members. Whatever style I want I want to write is controlled by me, I did have that kind of egoistical thoughts.

— It’s tough maintaining the activities of a band.

R: That’s right. That’s what I thought when I left my birthplace when I progressed in my studies. After leaving where I originally was, my previous band members were no longer around and suddenly I was alone. I went to someplace where I didn’t know anyone to study. So band activities stopped just like that. Thinking that I have made quite a lot of progress then, I could just let my life continue as such (i.e Continue working on music alone). However, now that I’m a mature adult, if the present me could say something to the me at that time, I would tell him “Stopping closing yourself off!”. I really want to tell him “Be a bit more open to others!” If I wanted to continue band activities no matter what, I could just find my own members or even join other people’s bands, right? However at that time, I did not push on. My motivation at that time moved away from simple band activities.

 

–During that period of time, it so happened you understood to joys of creating things by yourself too.

R: After using music synthesizing and other technology to create music, I also slowly began to understand the existence of the internet. My friend at that time made his own website so I asked him to teach me and tried to make one myself. The internet at that time was so…very…slow.

— And from there, you came closer to the current Sound Horizon.

R: And therefore it’s time to talk about my web username! Sometime people would ask me why Revo is called Revo, but it seems like everyone could more or less guess its meaning. Actually not that many people asked (laugh). So Revo is the Revo from Revolution. Revolution means to have a dramatic change. That time I didn’t think too much and started using this name. But thinking that this name spawned from the term “revolution”, in a sense, it shouldn’t be an issue? At that time I wanted to create new things so I thought of the name Revo. It was coincidental but it should be something that was meant to be. Creating a kind of revolution and merging stories and music. All in all, it isn’t something bad at all.

*

Releasing tracks online! The first time attending Comiket!

— Your activities later on stemmed from releasing music clips on the web publicly right?

R: Correct. This way, I could make music independently and my audience can come all across the nation and even the world. There’s a way for me to make music and even a way to broadcast music for everyone to hear. That time, I realized, even if I don’t use the way of playing a guitar at a Live House, there was a way for everyone to hear the music I make. At the present time, this seems like a fairly common method. But at that time, it was something rare. And so, I was completely immersed in this at that time. Most importantly, in such a way, the audience don’t have to spend a cent and it doesn’t pose a burden to either me or the audience.

— If it was a Live House, it would be expensive and you still have to balance that with profit.

R: Because I didn’t want anyone to listen to the lousy music written by amateur, there was no way to have serious fans in the beginning. What such bands need in the first place is to have a good foundation and capability as well to see who has many friends. The world is like that (laugh). But inviting friends of friends and finding ways to sell all the tickets that need to be sold (laugh).

— So you thought of using another method to begin your career in music.

R: In this way, I could get all kinds of feedback and started to gradually release my own music. Just at that time, there someone called Yokoyan among my friends, that person who always helped my draw album covers. From that time, Yokoyan was already very good at drawing. It has already been around ten years since we knew each other, the current him has already improved so much in his artwork compared to when we first met. However, to me at that time, his talent was far beyond my imagination. I thought he was really amazing. So around that time, I think he had a booth at Comiket and would sell illustrations and manga he made himself. His webpage was also very beautiful. Around that time when I felt that he was really mazing, I also learnt that Comiket had people selling their own music works. The music being sold at that time was mainly people transcribing songs from games and anime and then synthesizing them, but there are quite a few people who would make their own original music too. I only knew then that such a market existed and there were people who were willing to listen.

— How many CDs did you bring over at that time?

R: I think I only made two hundred or three hundred pieces of the initial [Chronicle]. But now, it seems like the price had become quite impressive.

— Did you get them made at a CD shop at first?

R: If I went to find a vendor that burnt CDs, even though there are times where they would accept orders of around five hundred pieces, usually it had to be over a thousand pieces. An amateur just starting out releasing a thousand CDs? The end result would only be packing them in cardboard boxes and sending them for storage (laugh). It’s amazing to get a thousand people who are willing to listen to your work! At that time, I felt that it was not easy to sell a thousand CDs so I just made two hundred or three hundred of them. This number was already quite risky and it took me quite a few months to sell them all out. Also, the media used at that time was CD-R and I needed to get a professional to replicate them. At that period of time, there are people who spent lots of energy to burn to CDs themselves as they felt that they need a lot of motivation to hand over what they have made and felt that the tough work of burning CDs is one of these parts and so they should take it own themselves. Of course, this kind of thought is pretty extreme and I didn’t feel this way. Because I create music because I want to and burning CDs is not my job! That kind of mindset.

— True, this sort of work should be left to the professionals.

R: It is troublesome in the first place and since there are people who have jobs dedicated to this, isn’t it better to just leave it to them? In the end, the issue is related to the amount spent, isn’t it? You might not be able to earn much money or even make a loss instead. However, at that time, [Chronicle] seemed to be sold at around a thousand yen? With the market rate at that time, it cannot be considered a cheap CD. Now that I think about it carefully, it’s something like that. People who burn the discs themselves sell them at three hundred and five hundred yen, like that, it seems like the price I set was quite high, right?

–But around the year 2000, it’s not that easy to burn CDs compared to now and the discs themselves are not cheap. How many minutes of content did [Chronicle] have?

R: It’s a bit pathetic now that I think about it. This CD only has about twenty minutes of content (laugh). There’s so little and it still can be called an album (laugh). There should be around ten songs. At that time, I felt that “three minutes per song was long enough!” Anyway, what I made at that time was this kind of product. Comiket booths had to be balloted for. However, I never attended such an event before and was completely clueless about the workflow. I heard that the event space had somewhere which distributed the applications for the booths or something like that so I decided to try. Then I hit a culture shock (laugh). There were so many people queuing up at the event space, didn’t they feel hot at all (laugh)? Then, I tried to apply for a booth but I didn’t get it. The booths were pretty limited and the selection rate was not high. Also, at that time it seems like, if a complete newbie went to apply, they pretty much won’t get chosen.

–Even if they said the process was through balloting, there’s still some reviewing involved huh?

R: I’m not too sure myself, but it seems that groups that are more popular have an easier time getting a booth. If these groups did not get choses, the event side might be even more chaotic. When Sound Horizon applied for a booth the first time, we didn’t get it but we got them subsequently. In the beginning when we solely depended on luck, the heavens had given up on me but the one who saved the day was Yokoyan! Yokoyan put my CDs on the booth where he sold his digital art. There was any kind of advertising done but as the cover was illustrated by Yokoyan, it was placed there like it was a natural thing to do. When this started, I had no idea what was happening but there were some sales of the CD. Of course there was plenty I could not sell. After that, I continued with my music activities, while proactively doing my own transactions.

*

The path to business debut is in sight! Packaging thousands of CDs and selling them……

–So you became interested in such a business after getting feedback from others and your products seem to be getting sales?

R: Something like that. Those are all valuable experiences. I have sold things by myself in the past. Such as packaging them properly and sending them by post! In a sense, it’s selling the products I made myself and that’s a good thing. In a sense, it can be said to be the core of having my own sales business, but I felt that the whole process of sales required me to put in a lot of effort to send the goods, actually it’s alright even if I don’t do it, right (laugh). It is troublesome after all. If I’m too serious about this matter and spend too much labour on it then it would be tough to make music.

–You would be getting your priorities wrong if you could not focus on making new songs because you were too busy sending goods.

R: That’s why I requested for stores such as “Toranoana” to help me sell those. But that time I really put in a lot of hard work.

— Which is to say the market expanded to a point where it’s difficult for you to take care of both composing and selling right?

R: Yeah. I can’t juggle them both anymore so I started to ask for sellers to help. But now that I look at it, that time I must have felt that those were things that someone who was purely a musician should not be doing. Rather than putting my effort on such matters, it would be better to spend more energy on music.

–Since that was the beginning of the events to follow, it must have been a valuable experience.

R: It was the process of personally sending out the things I made myself after all, and these items could finally reach the hands of those who were waiting for them.

–Did you feel like that the whole time you were making independent creations?

R: Yes. A few thousand pieces came like that. I even researched which envelope was better for the packing the products to send them out. If possible, I would like to choose better quality envelopes that did not tear easily but when it comes to profit, using a cheaper envelope would be better wouldn’t it? Anyway, I did all kinds of research such as using this sort of envelope if someone bought one disc then using a larger envelope for those who bought at least two discs. That time I found an envelope that could fit four discs. Basically, I did these kinds of tasks thousands of times. You have to consider where to position everything when doing work right? That’s how people say it right? Anyway, I thought of where to put everything so after picking up one item, I would use the same energy to put another item in and then at that spot, stop and package everything properly! It was that kind of workflow (laugh). Even things like how to efficiently paste the recipient’s address label.

–This is a one person production line!

R: I had to repeat the process thousands of times after all (laugh). It would be terrible if I can’t make if efficient. Also, how the item is positioned is important, if I had to flip it over once to get it into the package once I held onto it, then that’s a big nono in terms of efficiency. I must put it at an angle where it can go straight into the packaging! There would be that kind of research (laugh). Basically~ I did many things!

–It’s already amazing that you could do so much. How many years ago was that?

R: How many years ago was it? I started doing my activities in 2001 and sold the products myself all the way to [Chronicle 2nd]. It was really tough. At the beginning, I only had to send a few hundred pieces but when it came to [Chronicle 2nd], I had to start sending out more than a thousand of them…….Oh right, all the way till [Chronicle 2nd], I usually only distributed my products during Comiket. Comiket is the largest market after all and bringing my new works and selling them on the spot was the most efficient method. But during the time of [Chronicle 2nd], it was supposed to be finished in December, but in the end, it could not make it. Even though it wasn’t anything much compared to what is done now, this CD can be considered a big work and I couldn’t meet the deadline in the end, Of course, I could have tried hard to finish it in December and sell it then but at that time I thought that it wasn’t good to create something I won’t acknowledged for the sake of meeting the deadline. I feel that “I will take as much time as I need!” There were definitely people who sent over complaints due to the delay in shipment but handing over something I could not acknowledge was an even larger betrayal in my opinion. In a professional field, it feels weird to say “I’m not satisfied with my work this time”; but at the same time, I can’t lie about the work I’m not satisfied with by spreading propaganda with declarations such as “My work this time is really good!” If I do not hand over a work that I’m happy with, there’s just going to be more betrayal in future. I mean I can’t tell everything something like “Actually I don’t want to distribute this kind of work at all but because of various reasons, I have to so please buy them!” (laugh)

–You’re already so serious about yourself when you had to work independently, I feel that you already have a professional mindset.

R: That time, I could still control everything within the scope of my tasks so I delayed it.

–Bit at that time, was the market big already?

R: Quite a few people have already made pre-orders so I could only apologise to them (Laugh). But I’ll make something everyone would be delighted to have! Words like that.

— Did you handle all these related matters by yourself?

R: Yes.

–That’s amazing!

R: The truth is, at that time, some people have already transferred their money over. The kind where you remit money through post. Before that I did send out a notice telling people not to remit funds over because the sales of the CD will be delayed but there are still people who continue to send funds over because they were not aware. Actually, to these people, shouldn’t they feel something like “stop messing around, give me back my money!” once they know about the delay? But the unexpected happened and such a chaotic situation did not occur. Everyone calmly waited for the delayed release date. And they even told me that they were waiting for the work and encouraged me.

–It’s great everything worked out in the end.

R: It really did. If I could not hand anything out at that time, then it would have been another kind of revolution (laugh). It’s probably because I had a track record that I was serious about making music before that incident so it did not cause any chaos in the end and the wait to the new release date was peaceful.

— And the release date delayed by three months.

R: I completely missed the exhibition period and everything had to be done through direct sales (laugh). In the very beginning, I tried to handle all the sales myself (laugh). But I felt I couldn’t continue on like that so I started to ask other shops for help.

–After which, came the commercialization!

R: I think it was not long after the release of [Chronicle 2nd] when the agency found us. Even though there was some friction in between, and I moved from the agency that started it but after meeting the director and manager of our current agency, I essentially felt that I could still freely do whatever I wanted to do. If I could, from now on, continue to chase after the potential hidden in music and polish my own interpretation of music and I can work hard to let more people acknowledged this kind of music style and let more audience love my music, that would make me feel even more blessed. It’s No Music, No Life after all.

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Complete Discography

From the legendary first album to the nearest works! Revo explains! The complete album index.

From the legendary independent work that cannot be bought and priced at astronomical figures in certain shops to the newest [Seisen no Iberia], Revo explains personally, the complete discography.

Chronicle

The total time for this pieces of work was only twenty minutes and the unique part of this was one of the instrumental tracks. Even though some of the tunes had voices and sound effects, the nature of this is still considered purely instrumental. This work was created using a whole host of synthesizing methods honed before the album was released. Though I could have shown this work by just uploading it on my webpage, I still hoped that this work could have a complete display with the help of being a physical CD so I made it a CD for the first time and sold it. In a sense, this can be considered a very monumental piece of work. The theme of this album is “history”. It paints the story of a world full of fantasy with historical scrolls. This work can be considered my own starting point and is a very important piece, now that I look back, I still think the same.

Thanatos

Starting from [Thanatos], I begun to use songs with lyrics to express the stories and moved the bulk of my creativity to making songs. This album was also about twenty minutes long, it was shorter. The style of [Chronicle] was instrumentals plus poems. When people listen to this album, they can understand that behind these melodies were actually such stories, however I still want to force the music and the words to link up to each other. My ideals are not those vague unclear kinds of connections, rather, using this art form known as music which requires a good control of timing and insert a timeline which is completely in sync with the music. I want to constrain it to such an extent and feel that accomplishment of being able to achieve this. It’s definitely difficult to tell a story using melodies but in this work, I specially went to challenge myself. The theme of this work is the “illusion of death”.

Lost

You can say that this was the result after doing some reflection about [Thanatos]. When I was making this, I thought “I have to write longer songs!” Before this, most of my works did not have a second main melody. There was only one main melody, a side melody then perhaps an ending tune that repeated the side melody. At that time, I felt that in order to weave a tale, the most appropriate was to open it with a dramatic song then to let the viewers know that there’s a turning point, I thought that I had to leave the fixed way of composing music where the main melody is repeated twice. In this way, no matter what, the song would be a short one that lasted two to three minutes. At this time, in [Lost], it was the first time I consciously challenged a longer song. The song called [Mahoutsukai Saraband], it exceeded six minutes just like that. It was probably at this point, I personally experienced what the concept of using songs to portray stories really meant. While guiding the development of the story, the music unfolded by itself and then came into completion in about six minutes. Of course, that does not mean that is all to the idea of using music to tell stories. It was more that after going through this trial, I realized once more that there was such a methodology and possibility. While making this album, I finally reaffirmed the ambition to work hard towards a bigger work. The theme of this album is [Forgetting and losing].

Pico Magic

When this album came out, all the previous works were no longer on the market, and the fans kept saying that they wanted to hear some of the past works. The mindset I had all along was that when something is no longer sold, it would not be sold anymore. To me, every album has its own theme and is part of my music’s evolution. So when it comes to actual albums, I don’t want to sell the previous albums again just like they were. However, even if I said those, people still said they wanted to hear them and so I made a Pleasure CD that could not be counted as a special collection and chose some songs from the past and added in some others that kind of felt like they were more fun. In a sense, this can be counted as a short break. Creativity is not just about creating serious works. This can be counted as a recognition that there was such a methodology.

Pico Magic Reloaded

I first applied to go for Comiket before even coming out with this album (Laugh). However the album I intended to release on that day could not meet the deadline so as a substitute, I came up with another pleasure album. There isn’t any meaning for the this series of album. I guess this would be the creator going to two extremes. This series of albums did not have the basic concept of being as complete as the other CDs. The theme is also more interesting. All in all, it’s good that I can come out with this album. Because of this album, I have the song [Rein no Sekai] which is always part of one of the live performances. If not for this album, [Rein no Sekai] would not exist.

Chronicle 2nd

This album was made thanks to the warm hearted pleas from fans, the remake of the first work [Chronicle. But it has became something completely different (laugh)! Sorry about that! [Chronicle] only had twenty minutes of content, but this has seventy (laugh). There were some instrumentals included that were the same as the originals but on top of that, there were some lyrics added to the themes that were portrayed with only instrumentals that time. With the attitude of “The present Revo can do it to this kind of level”, I expanded the stories and completely gave it a new world view, resulting in this album. There were even long tracks that reached as long as eight minutes. [Seisen to Shinigami] even had four chapters to it which lasted close to twenty minutes. Anyway, I threw away all consideration and just went ahead to do what I can. I finally made it after some delay. Lyrics, composition and arrangements were naturally done by me, I also took on the job of adding sound effects myself. It was pretty tough. But on the other hand, this album also reminded me that even if it’s just one person, it was possible to do this much. When making something, it’s not good to always strive for the easy route.

Elysion – Prelude to Paradise –

If this did not end up being commercialized and I continued to produce independent works, I might continue to make something like [Thanatos 2nd] or Lost 2^nd. That time I definitely had that kind of plan. When I was preparing for commercialization, as there was new audience that did not understand us, there was discussion on coming up with something that was easy to understand, that would let someone know what SH’s style is like before coming up with a concept album. Therefore, some of the works that I produced while working independently was specially selected and compiled together and that became the first album sold after commercialization. Actually, I would have preferred it if the first album that I sold during commercialization was a concept album.

Elysion ~Paradise Fantasy Story Collection~

The theme of this album is “Paradise”. The previous concept album [Chronicle 2nd] is something that had the trait of a musical and a lot of dialogue was inserted into the music. The lines of each character was also quite aplenty and it was like a mix between a music album and a drama CD. Of course, there was a lot of audience who expressed that they liked this style very much, but that time, I felt that it might not be too good if I kept it as such during commercialization. This style was not easy to keep up for most of the audience. So that time, I thought of creating something that had more musicality, a work that used music better to express its story and the result was this album. Also, a lot of thought had been put into the structure of this story. Some little tricks are also added into the order of the songs, the design of the album and other things, you could say I was exploring the potential of using a CD as the medium. I also realized even more that the CD could be used as an art form to show the entire product.

Shounen wa Tsurugi wo…

This album exists because we had a collaboration with two games, also, in this piece, each song had a different singer. This was the first time we had this kind of system. The activities of our second era started from here. In the end, the things we made was a fair bit more in comparison but in the mind, the change was not that great. I did not completely differentiate the relationship with previous works while making this single, for most part, I see them all as my own music and naturally created it. Except that the methodology was different from my previous works and the scale was also larger. As for the reason for making these changes, part of it was because I wanted to show ourselves to new audience who had not encountered us before, the other part was because we were collaborating with other works. However, even so, quite a bit of effort was made to link these songs together to a complete concept. The title of the CD did not follow the title of the songs, instead, the title [Shounen wa Tsurugi wo…] was intentionally used. This was also to make it easy to understand the concept behind this single. That’s the unique part that makes Sound Horizon Sound Horizon.

 

[Sorry, I only translated till here]