https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1t1G_rXHW_DSUWu_NYgi7nZkPY3XTlCWX?usp=drive_link
As someone who enjoys playing video games, one of the most important factors to my experience is my enjoyment of the soundtrack. What music plays and when is incredibly important to me as a creative; I was even more fascinated by the knowledge that video games sometimes even make the effort to have up to three composers, while a movie might have one. Persona, a series created by Atlus, with its music mostly composed by Shoji Meguro, is memorable to fans like myself partly due to its beautiful soundtrack, both vocal and instrumental. Some of the vocalized music plays during battles, but many of them play while the played character is exploring their surroundings outside of fights, which make up the songs in this collection.
Persona is a series dedicated to self-exploration and the willingness to see past flaws to discover who one truly is, and is primarily based in Japan. While Black people are a relative rarity in Japan, Black culture and influence in Japanese music and fashion is apparent, especially in Persona’s music. The songs in this collection have roots in R&B and acid jazz, with the former originating from African-American culture, which is one of the reasons I was drawn to Persona to begin with. The dilemma that Black anime and video game lovers face constantly is the pushback against our inclusion in the aforementioned media due to claims of “forced diversity”, despite other cultures claiming our music and fashion for themselves, which is something I cannot ignore. Persona does not yet feature Black characters, and it’s unclear if it ever will. Therein lies the goal of my remix and my critique: to incorporate a Black voice in the music even if Persona may not put us in the spotlight.
Persona’s music in and of itself is a remix of different cultures, especially Azumi Takahashi, who was the main singer of Persona 3: Reload, the most recent installment in the Persona series, a remake of the original Persona 3. In her singer biography, she is known to sing R&B, gospel, soul and jazz, all of which are genres created by African-Americans, and her voice reflects this. To find her own voice, she had to remix and take inspiration from Black singers to be able to sing in her “own” style. It might even give the impression that Atlus is trying to recruit singers who are able to copy Black voices, without even attempting to recruit singers from which the sound came from. However, there is the dilemma with the idea of remixing. Even my mind was initially under the impression that Black voices were simply being copied. Something even more interesting was the fact that because the game was a remake, she had to remix the previous singer, Yumi Kawamura’s songs. Takahashi’s “Mass Destruction”, a song in Persona 3 that is beloved by fans, was thoroughly criticized because it didn’t sound like Kawamura’s version, showing how Takahashi’s remix and originality, her very singing identity and ability was criticized because she put her own soulful spin on Persona 3’s vocal soundtrack, moving away from Kawamura’s brand of vocals.
My initial idea was to create a cover of these songs, since I’m already experienced with singing them. However, I made the decision to tighten up the lyrics and change them a bit to make them a true remix. If the soundtrack was going to be inspired by R&B love songs and culture, I wanted to put more of that feeling in there. Because the song lyrics repeated in the second verse, there didn’t seem to be much room for creativity for the singers, and part of my critique lie in that it didn’t feel like 2000s rhythm and blues. This would also come in the form of ad-libs and riffs, which I did my best to incorporate in every song of this collection, because R&B and improv have a sense of predictable unpredictability in how the songs will be sung. For example, in “Heaven”, a song played for a little girl who’d lost her mother, I decided to switch up the rhythm of the lyrics to leave more space for original riffing and different lyrics. This was an experiment for me as well, as I’d never changed the lyrics of these songs before. In that moment while I was recording, I had to put what I truly felt into my vocal chords and diaphragm. I had to believe what I was singing if I was going to make this a remix instead of a cover, and put myself into the words and rhythm.
My collection of remixes(which now could be seen as a remix of a remix) that includes a song from Persona 3 Reload, could be seen by others as a simple copy of Azumi Takahashi, which might in fact be true. I used the voices of singers in Persona, as well as R&B singers that I grew up with to frame my own, not just for the purposes of this project, but for my future as a vocalist. This collection of remixes wasn’t just a reclamation, it was also an absorption to add to my own original “vocal pattern” and my identity as a singer. All of those things are connected for any creative, and they’re needed, even if the uninformed will call it “fake” or a “copy” of someone else’s. This collection of Persona remixes is still my own rendition, just as Takahashi’s is Takahashi’s, and Kawamura’s is Kawamura’s, even if the songs themselves are owned by Atlus.
Remix is a form of critique because it’s a reminder for the original to stay open-minded. There’s always another way to look at something, always another way for something to be imagined. I would also call this collection a form of intervention because as I mentioned before, I love the Persona series. I don’t think anything will stop me from singing the songs for years to come. But I learned from this class that if you really do love something that you grew up, try your hand at reimagining it. It doesn’t have to become truth for everyone, but as long as you continue to reimagine, recreate and remix, you can even gain more experience as a creative yourself.
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