Shuensha's latest [by Kappa]

Takahashi Ai: AzNxRawRx
Niigaki Risa: MomoxMochi
Kamei Eri: BanryuSaint
Michishige Sayumi: AnimefreakXDD
Tanaka Reina: Marianahime
Kusumi Koharu: NicNac4Eva
Mitsui Aika: Aznfiregirl
JunJun: Yuns217
LinLin: BreeCuppycake

Onna ni Sachi Are by Shuensha (from HoshiDubs) / Well, I have to admit that this is one of my least favorite MM singles. I think maybe I’ve just seen one too many dubs of it and that’s made me resent it a little… but nonetheless, I am taking a good long listen to this newest from Shuensha!

I am only familiar with the voices of less than half of the cast members, so this is a view from fresh ears you’re getting here. I’ve noticed that sometimes if I’ve heard someone a lot, I get numbed to their voice and my perception of how good (or not as good, even) they are goes haywire. So hopefully my ramblings here might actually be a bit useful :P

The mixing struck me as loud right off the bat, but I think that wasn’t helped by the fact that the mic quality is suffering here amongst singers. There’s a wide array of mics, from AzNxRawRx’s, which is maxed out throughout, to BreeCuppycake’s and NicNac4Eva’s, which are pretty badly muffled. Good mics (as well as mixers having the know-how to fix bad ones) are so crucial to dubs, that what I’d love to see from this group is a dub where everything’s a lot more even. I find that it makes the experience of listening to a dub a lot more enjoyable and easy to the listener when they don’t have to focus as much on drastic differences between the mics of singers.

I can hear though where this group has a lot of potential. Going through the girls one by one, AzNxRawRx certainly has a lot of energy, as was noted in the dropdown bar. She has a nice tone, but again the mic is killing it a bit for me. She seems like she’s maybe trying to have a bit more energy than she actually needs and is getting a bit yelly in her lines. This in turn is maxing out her mic, which makes her hard to listen to. I can hear where I’d probably like her a lot more, but the mic’s limiting her, so I’d suggest just a little more control. It’s a difficult thing to get that sound of dormant power, but she sounds like she’s almost there! Mic aside, I did like a lot of her solos in this.

I like MomoxMochi’s emotion here! She’s got some pitch stuff to work out, but her solo was nice to listen to nonetheless. BanryuSaint’s Eri solo at 3:16 was really one of my favorites! I’ve heard her in stuff before and she surprised me here, which is awesome. The same goes for Marianahime, whose solo in the first chorus came out of nowhere to surprise me—I loved it!

Aznfiregirl covered as Aika, and did a nice job for having done lines quickly and still making them sound nice. I would have liked a bit more energy on her second solo, if anything, but props for covering on short notice. Although she only had one small solo, Yuns127 sounded good in this too—she’s got a sweet voice and I would have loved to hear more of her. I wish we would have gotten to hear a solo out of AnimefreakXDD, but she sounds good in her duet lines from what I can hear. Sorry I can’t comment more on her!

I noticed in the info bar the critiques for NicNac4Eva, BreeCuppycake, and AzNxRawRx respectively. I already talked about the last, but for the other two my mixer’s heart says that I have to pipe in to disagree just a bit. I’ve had to work with tons and tons of muffled mics before, and so I’ve gotten pretty good at hearing what’s underneath the bad quality—and I hear a lot with NicNac4Eva and BreeCuppycake. I actually thought that Eva had the best emotion and feeling in her lines of all of the singers in the dub! It sounds like both of them had fine energy, but it’s hard to hear because the mics are holding them back.

Seriously, bad mics should be crushed and burned because it’s such a sin how many fabulous singers I’ve heard totally covered up by their mics. Without going into huge detail and making this long entry even longer than it already is, I’ll just quickly suggest that whoever is mixing them looks into the high pass filter to use on their lines. Seriously, it will change your life the first time you use it. Change your life.

Like I said, this is as long as can be and I don’t want to bore you any longer, so here’s my quick note on the mixing: definitely work on bringing the mic qualities closer together, whether that be through your members or your mixing program. I won’t go too heavily into other stuff because it seems like your program is malfunctioning a bit, but one thing you can change easily is the vocal rip I hear in the background.

Make sure you’re silencing out the echos from the melody lines after you’ve taken out the harmony. I heard it echoing in the background and it can be a bit distracting—obviously this is a talented cast, so we want to hear them as best as we can! :] I’m interested though to hear what you can do with a fully functional program to mix with, so I look forward to the next single!