Commemorating the release of the 1st single "Nijiyume Road" & 3rd album "Yumegen ∞ Time Travel!　Long interview with Ikasan (Part 1)

The story behind the birth of Ikasan

─ ─ Since this is your first appearance on Akiba Research Institute, I would like to ask you to introduce yourself. ...... should I call you "ika-san"?

Ika-san: As for myself, I would be happy if you call me "ika-san" in a friendly way (laughs). To begin with, the reason why my name is "ika-san" is that I originally played music games under the name of "Yuika. That was when I was in the second year of junior high school, and a good friend of mine at the time invited me to do a live broadcast (on the Internet) together and practice my female voice there. ......

─ ─ Wahahaha (laughs). So, you already had a good-looking voice back then?

ikasan: Around the 5th or 6th grade of elementary school, my voice changed from husky to low. The friend who invited me to join him was active under the name "XX-san," and as a set, I was also active under the name "Yuika-san" at first. Later, when I wanted to use an eye-catching name for posting my videos on Nico Nico Douga, the name "Ika-san," which is derived from the "Yu" in "Yuika-san," had a strange impact on me, and I began to use the name "Ika-san" in a casual way.

─ So you were not a singer from the beginning?

ikasan Yes. However, I was always interested in the Nico Nico Douga culture of "I tried singing. However, I actually wasn't very good at Vocaloid songs at first. I felt uncomfortable with the synthesized sound, and I couldn't accept it. But when I listened to the songs sung by the vocaloid singers, I began to think that they were really good songs, and gradually I started to like vocaloid songs. Now I rather like the original songs (sung by Vocaloids). So, I tried to post a video of myself "singing it" as a one-shot recording. That was on August 31, the last day of summer vacation in my second year of junior high school. I will never forget that day.

─ How was the reaction of the listeners?

ikasan: As I expected, people didn't pay attention to my video just by posting it out of the blue. At the time, I had only about 10 My Lists. However, I wanted to have many people listen to my song, so I decided to start with a fixed number of listeners. Then, I thought about what attracted me to the site, and I decided that my voice was the key. Then I thought that I didn't have to limit myself to singing, so I decided to increase my listeners by doing live broadcasts. I like horror games, so I started out doing live game broadcasts. However, I also wanted to have some connection with singing, so I would crash into live broadcasts of "Karaoke Waiting".

─ ─ What is "karaoke dekkobeki"?

ikasan: It is when a distributor who has a slot on Nico Nico Douga recruits singers via Skype and waits for them to come and sing a song for him or her. At the time, such live broadcasts were very popular on Nico Nico Douga. I sang in various major communities, and those who were interested were invited to come to my community as well.

─ ─ It was like a dojo-warrior (laughs).

Ikasan Yes, that's right (laughs). (laughs) I was convinced from that time on that I would have the greatest impact. I have always had a strange overconfidence. After I started that activity, the number of my listings increased about 10 times. After that, when I had an engineer come in, the number of MyList registrations quickly exceeded 2,000. I realized how much it can change when you have the sound done by a proper person. After I was able to get so many people to listen to my songs, I was invited to participate in the Exit Tunes compilation album, which led me to my current musical activities.