Satsuki’s Voice Articulation of VOCALOID／20th anniversary of VOCALOID（YAMAHA VOCALOID）

Satsuki Interview / 20th Anniversary of VOCALOID

Satsuki profile & comment

【Profile】He debut as Vocalo-P with “Nirvana” in May 2019. He has been getting attention since his total view counts on YouTube has exceeded 100 million times this year.

VOCALOID has given me so many things. In this age of rapidly changing content, it is amazing that VOCALOID has reached its 20th anniversary while still maintaining its momentum, and I think it proves that VOCALOID has grown from a passing fad to a culture. I hope VOCALOID will continue to flourish for the next 30 or 40 years, and I will continue to support it from the inside.

Satsuki’s first positing “Nirvana” xv_flower

ーSo your first posting was 5 years ago.

サツキ　I think it was May 24th, 2019. I just posted the song I produced very first time as it was. My DAW history and VOCALOID history were same, and I had never done a band etc. I started from where I could only play the recorder or keyboard harmonica.

ーWhat was listeners’ response towards your first song?

サツキ　Of course, it didn’t get any views at all. But I wasn’t aiming for super high quality and tried to be a popular Vocalo-P from the very first posting, rather tried to do things steadily.

ーWhy did you get v_flower?

サツキ　I bought Hatsune Miku V4X as well as flower, but I didn’t know how to use them differently. Since flower has a powerful voice, I chose it and let the library’s voice itself help me create the impact and power of the choruses.

ーWhen did you buy it?

サツキ　It was in 2019, when I was in my first year of college. Since I started my part time job and became able to manage some money to spare, so I had been working hard since April with just the music prepared, and I bought VOCALOID5 as soon as my first payment was paid. I think it was mid May-ish.

ーWhy did you decide to debut as Vocalo-P?

サツキ　Since 2010, when I was 10, I‘ve been listening Vocalo songs, and at that time I listened almost anything but Vocalo songs. The more I listened to them, the more I wanted to try them myself.

A Vocalo song that Satsuki got influenced “Babylon” by Toma

ーWhat made you to listen Vocalo Songs?

サツキ　There was a Nintendo DS’s software called “Flipnote Studio”, and I listened “Nazokake” and “Nazotoki” by Hinata Haruhana. I thought it wasn’t a real human singing, so I researched and found out there was this thing called VOCALOID, and I could listen to them at this place called Nico Nico Douga(a Japanese video streaming website). Back then famous songs were Toma’s works and AkunoP’s Seven Deadly Sins series, and I really got into them so I bought novelized version. I also admired kemu and Jin. But these people I mentioned stopped their activities for various reasons and I couldn’t listen to those songs all of sudden.

ーSo you became Vocalo-P to take music you like back?

サツキ　Yeah it might be so. At that time I felt like I had to make my own songs that I like, because the trend of songs in the VOCALOID scene was changing from 2014 to 2016.

ーYou are respecting Toma, aren’t you?

サツキ　Yes, I am. He is the favorite Vocalo-P of mine. At that time music I listened were songs my parents played in the car or random J-pop from TV, so every words or sentences came from Toma’s peculiar sense felt really different from those music around me at that time, and they are really attractive. For example, “Babylon” doesn’t fit in regular pop songs’ style, that has meter changes and tempo alterations everywhere, and it was really interesting to me. I felt like my definition of music had changed.

Why Satski, a beginner of musical instrument could produce VocaRock right away

ーYour first posted song has a guitar part that doesn’t sound like come from a person who can’t play any instruments. How did you achieve that quality?

サツキ　At that time I had no idea what they are called, but I was aware of multiple guitar sound, like strumming sound, heavy muted sound, rhythmical cutting sound, and so on. Although I know how those things sound like, I had no idea what actually those are, so I researched about these sound and technique, and then tried to imitate them using plugins.

ーWhen did you start feeling responses after your first production and posting?

サツキ　With the song “Guuzou Ja Nai”, I had a sense that I grasped something once. The next song, “Kouishou, Bibouroku, Jigen Bakudan” was released last year, and I felt like I found what I wanted to do.

ーWhat kind of finding was it?

サツキ　I decided to try a different tone from the popular songs, and wrote “Kouishou, Bibouroku, Jigen Bakudan” completely freely. It was originally intended to be a song for an EP, but luckily I was able to find an illustrator and decided to post it, and it was well received by some of the listeners. I thought, “If I can do whatever I want and get  accepted, then maybe I’m at the point where I can do it without worrying about “how it will be received?” or “what should I do to get more views?”. I was able to get over. After that, I got a full time job last year, but my motivation was still really high and I posted 13 to 14 songs.

ー“Mesmarizer” made an unprecedented huge hit, right?

サツキ　Yeah right. Last year, a song called “CIRCUS PANIC!” was selected for the Project Sekai’s (a Japanese smart phone game app) open song contest, and two songs I posted for Mushoku Tomeisai II (an online anonymous contest for Vocalo music) were receiving relatively good responses, then I also won a prize at the One Picture Video Posting Festival that was held after that. So I thought my songs has been accepted to a certain extent. However, around the same time, my friends around me started to grow faster than me, and I felt impatient. If there is such impatience, I thought I should calm down the feeling I got for “Kouishou, Bibouroku, Jigen Bakudan”. Then I decided to try my hand at making pop music that would click with the masses in my own way.

At the point of thinking about who to ask for a music video, I happened to talk to channel, whom I had been following on Twitter already. Coincidentally the fan fiction version of “Rabbit Hole” that channel released right after I talked to became a mega hit. channeI already had massive amount of followers, but it increased by 3 to 4 times after this event. I remember making a demo thinking that I couldn’t make a bad one.

ーSo were you aware of channel while you are producing?

サツキ　 I thought a dark and messy song with no sense of story would not suit channel’s style, so I tried to make it as simple and bright as possible.

ーThe arrangement of “Mesmarizer” is packed with all the theories of Vocalo songs, right?

サツキ　I think so, too. I had filled it with what I felt good about Vocalo songs of 10 years ago. I pushed that concept to the end. As a result of wanting to make something I feel good, I had to put away what I wanted to do, and then the parts of the people I admired came out instead.

ーYou mean Toma and kemu?

サツキ　When I write songs like “Mesmarizer”, yes Toma and kemu might come out. I think I was deliberately trying to create catchy melodies and do arrangements with loud  sound in a good sense. I think a melody that you can hum when it comes to your mind is a strong one. The other thing is the mixing tricks. For example, I used some sound  that has high tone but did not cover the vocals while I was making music, and I used an EQ to remove the frequencies that naturally musk the vocals. I also paid attention not to put too much sound in the center. If you ask me if I’ve done all of these successfully after all, I’d say it was …… (laughs).

Satsuki’s Voice Articulation of VOCALOIDs

“Mesmarizer” x Hatsune Miku V4X

ーTell us about voice banks and editors you have.

サツキ　I have Hatsune Miku V4X, Kagamine Rin/Ren, v flower, Xin Hua, Kaai Yuki, Gekiyaku V, and Kazehiki V. For the editor I have VOCALOID5 and 6.

ーDo you have a concept for Vocal Articulation of “Mesmarizer”’s Hatsune Miku?

サツキ　It was to create a tone of voice that I thought was “cute”. I like a slightly childish, bright, and high-pitched voice, but I didn’t think my Miku had much personality. But when someone said to me at the Mushoku Tomeisai, “This voice is Satsuki’s Miku”, I realized that my Miku does have a personality.

ーSo do you mean you often share the same preferred setting among several songs?

サツキ　There may be same tendency. Character parameter for “Mesmarizer” was set to little bit high value, 15, and Brightness was set to 75 which gave her kind of childish feeling. I don’t use velocity, but I changed Portament timing to 90. Lowering this value makes note change slightly rushed, and raising it gives delayed feeling.

ーWas it OK to have that much delay?

サツキ　Humans can’t speak next word that soon. That is same for me. I set the way of singing more like as I do, and avoided flatter and artificial feeling.

ーHow do you give vocals more presence for the songs with lots of sound like “Mesmarizer”?

サツキ　Melodies I make keeps higher tones through verses to prechoruses, so if I make it too high the voice might lack thickness. To deal with this I added an octave lower voice. I usually add harmonies at choruses, and to make more width sometimes I add both 3rd higher and lower melodies.

ーAfter it, what kind of processing do you do on DAW in order to maximize VOCALOID’s charm?

サツキ　Well I always aware of giving voice enough thickness while adding effect or doing Vocal Articulation. On the DAW I use Waves Doubler for the lead vocal.

ーDo you often use Waves plugins?

サツキ　Other than gimmicky ones I normally use Waves. I switched to Ableton Live for compatibility reason of Waves products. As for processing, for example, I used this Waves Linear Phase EQ first, and use Waves Renaissance Compressor, then use Live’s OTT(one of presets of Ableton Multiband Compressor) with 40% amount to give clarity. Plugins after this are mostly for the taste, and I use Waves Scheps 73 or Waves CLA Vocals to add harmonics, Waves Vitamin, which is an exciter, to give more color, and Waves Vocal Rider for fader riding. My mixing is aiming for gorgeous atmosphere.

サツキによるVOCALOID 6レビュー

【Check this out too!】
What is VOCALOID? From explanation of Vocalo culture to how to use VOCALOID. instructor : KagomeP

Let’s learn VOCALOID culture and how to use VOCALOID6 simply by a Vocalo-P Kagame P!

ーYou said you have already started using VOCALOID6. How is it?

サツキ　 I love that I can drive more parameter settings. I switched from VOCALOID5 to 6 after purchasing the Gekiyaku V/Kazehiki V Starter Pack. What I found most helpful was the ability to move the pitch curve easily in the editor. In the past, I had to call up the edit screen to control the pitch bend parameters, but now hovering the mouse cursor over a note immediately enables manipulating it. I like this simplicity.

ーHas it became more intuitive?

サツキ　Yes, it has. Especially for vibrato I can set the starting point, so I can precisely create vibrato as I want it to be. It really worth doing Voice Articulation, and it’s exciting that different voice banks have different reactions.

ーYou mentioned some tips for vocal mixing earlier such as making dubbing as a vital part, and VOCALOID 6’s TAKE function could be used to do a doubling easily.

サツキ　I think so, too. I think AI based synthesis voices tend to be monotonous, but it would be nice to have a wide variety of take selections available. I think the choice of takes may become a part of the Vocalo-P’s personality from now on.

ーAre you interested in Hatsune Miku V6 AI?

サツキ　Definitely! I want to listen and use it as soon as possible.

ーWhat kind of things do you want to challenge with VOCALOID6 from now on?

サツキ　Since I don’t want myself to be too exposed, I want to continue making music with the help of VOCALOID and other synthetic voices, and I would like to continue my works so that more people can listen to my music. I would like to pursue my “likes” with the new voice banks that I am sure will come in the future.

ーFinally, could you give a cheering massage to those who wants to be a Vocalo-P?

サツキ　Even a super amateur like me has become as it is with keep doing it for several years, so I think the best thing is to be able to think, “I love VOCALOID, and writing songs is fun!”. Even now, I don’t really understand what songwriting and DAWs are! Maybe it’s okay to pursue results later on. First of all, let’s have fun and enjoy the activity of VocaloP itself!　I’m still having fun too.

VOCALOID6 for Windows / macOS

■Bundled voice banks：16（VOCALOID6：AKITO、ALLEN、ASAHI、HARUKA、LUCAS、MICHELLE、SAKURA、SHION、ASAHI、TAKU、YUINA、NAOKI）（VOCALOID5：Amy、Chris、 Kaori、Ken）
※You can use VOCALOID3, VOCALOID4, VOCALOID5’s voice banks and project file（VSQX、VPR）
■Operating environment：Windows10, 11 （64bit）,macOS 13（Ventura）,14（Sonoma）,15（Sequoia）
■Specifications：https://www.vocaloid.com/en/vocaloid6/specs/