Interview with fhána, an artist in the spotlight! What are the members' thoughts on their first album "Outside of Melancholy"?

The four-member unit "fhána" consists of three sound producers, Junichi Sato, yuxuki waga, and kevin mitsunaga, and a female vocalist, towana. fhána's major debut was in August 2013, and since then they have released five anime tie-in songs as singles. Since their major label debut in August 2013, they have released five anime tie-up songs as singles, and have now completed their long-awaited first album.

It is the 14-track "Outside of Melancholy. The album is based on the theme of the place they have reached in a possible novel-game-like world that branches out through a number of choices, and all of the songs, whether singles written for different anime productions or new songs newly written, are connected by the larger story of fhána.

This is the world they are in now. We asked the members to share their thoughts and feelings about the album.

A year and a half has passed since their debut. I feel as if to say, "Thank you for your patience! that's how I feel.

─ Your first album "Outside of Melancholy" is finally completed.

Sato: At long last, I guess.

kevin We had been talking about making an album for quite some time, but thankfully we received one anime tie-up after another, so the time to start production was delayed. We ourselves were eager to release the album as soon as possible, and many of our fans were asking, "Is the album ready yet? I felt that we had to wait a long time. I feel like I've been waiting a long time for this album.

Sato: The album contains all five singles we released during the year and a half since our major debut, so it is a compilation of the past year and a half. In addition to that, the five new songs produced for the album open the door to the next development.

towana The past year and a half seems to have flown by, but songs like "Kesera-sera," our debut single, feel like a long time ago, and I already feel nostalgic. Listening back to it now, the way you sing and the feel of your voice is quite different. As a vocalist, I think this album shows the transition, or rather the growth, of a vocalist over the past year and a half.

─ How do you feel now about your vocals at the time of "Kesera-sera"?

towana I think I should have relaxed my shoulders a little more when I sang (laughs). Kesera Sera" was the first song I sang in a vocal booth in a recording studio, so it still has a stiffness to it. But I felt that I was able to capture a singing voice that could only remain in that moment.

─ ─ With a year and a half of accumulated experience, and having sung theme songs for various anime, the songs on the album are very varied, aren't they?

kevin For those who got to know us through our recent anime tie-ins, you may discover that fhána has written such a wide variety of songs. To go even further, some of the songs on the album were demos that we had been working on since before our debut. But when I listened to them all together, I could feel that there was one core to all the songs.

When the lyrics of the first song "Outside of Melancholy" were written, Mr. Sato sent me an e-mail about the theme, and after reading it, we all agreed on the direction of the album. We all had an idea of the direction we wanted to take with the album.