Angela's
story gives you new respect for street musicians. That's because the
duo of guitarist Katsu and singer Atsuko started as street musicians in
Japan, playing songs and selling CD's to make ends meet while they
worked at odd jobs. "We were making a small living," Katsu said. "One
day we got 50 dollars, another days we got 100 dollars. We didn't spend
everything but when we had good sales, we went to eat Korean barbecue."
Katsu, known as a guitarist with Angela, began as a drummer who
idolized rocker Tommy Lee. But the difficulty of finding practice space
and the need to accompany Atsuko led Katsu to take up the guitar and
several other instruments. Atsuko joked that she forced him to take up
the guitar. The duo got their break when they were discovered by a
Japanese record producer who enjoyed their music. That set Angela on
the brilliant road to success - and their theme songs for Stellvia and
Fafner. "I take sketches and logos from the series and put that on the
wall," said Katsu. "That starts my imagination and I start making
songs. I try to imagine if there's a battle and where the music fits."
Stellvia's main theme, of a girl from the countryside who seeks success
at an advanced academy in outer space, is mirrored in Angela's
experiences of coming from street corners to commercial success.
Stellvia
has one opening theme and three ending themes, all performed by Angela.
"The producers are involved a lot to create the songs," said Atsuko,
and the themes reflect the moods of the characters and the direction of
the story. The first closing scene, uptempo and optimistic, is replaced
in the middle episodes by a serious-sounding song. "In the last
episode, he (Tatsuo Sato, the series director) wanted to have a
`friends get together' song, so we created that kind of song," said
Katsu. All four Stellvia themes were performed at the Sakura concert,
along with the theme for the Fafner series, which Geneon plans to
release in the U.S. in the months after the April convention. As with
Stellvia, the Fafner themes are written to match the story. "Fafner
isn't a space story, it's based on the earth," said Katsu. "There's a
festival theme and I tried to translate that to several types of
scenes." The Sakura Con concert followed an Otakon convention less than
one year earlier. "When we debuted in Japan, we never dreamed we'd go
overseas, but Japanese animation is more global, and we can introduce
Japanese culture with Japanese animation," Atsuko said.
Angela's
story gives you new respect for street musicians. That's because the
duo of guitarist Katsu and singer Atsuko started as street musicians in
Japan, playing songs and selling CD's to make ends meet while they
worked at odd jobs. "We were making a small living," Katsu said. "One
day we got 50 dollars, another days we got 100 dollars. We didn't spend
everything but when we had good sales, we went to eat Korean barbecue."
Katsu, known as a guitarist with Angela, began as a drummer who
idolized rocker Tommy Lee. But the difficulty of finding practice space
and the need to accompany Atsuko led Katsu to take up the guitar and
several other instruments. Atsuko joked that she forced him to take up
the guitar. The duo got their break when they were discovered by a
Japanese record producer who enjoyed their music. That set Angela on
the brilliant road to success - and their theme songs for Stellvia and
Fafner. "I take sketches and logos from the series and put that on the
wall," said Katsu. "That starts my imagination and I start making
songs. I try to imagine if there's a battle and where the music fits."
Stellvia's main theme, of a girl from the countryside who seeks success
at an advanced academy in outer space, is mirrored in Angela's
experiences of coming from street corners to commercial success.
Stellvia
has one opening theme and three ending themes, all performed by Angela.
"The producers are involved a lot to create the songs," said Atsuko,
and the themes reflect the moods of the characters and the direction of
the story. The first closing scene, uptempo and optimistic, is replaced
in the middle episodes by a serious-sounding song. "In the last
episode, he (Tatsuo Sato, the series director) wanted to have a
`friends get together' song, so we created that kind of song," said
Katsu. All four Stellvia themes were performed at the Sakura concert,
along with the theme for the Fafner series, which Geneon plans to
release in the U.S. in the months after the April convention. As with
Stellvia, the Fafner themes are written to match the story. "Fafner
isn't a space story, it's based on the earth," said Katsu. "There's a
festival theme and I tried to translate that to several types of
scenes." The Sakura Con concert followed an Otakon convention less than
one year earlier. "When we debuted in Japan, we never dreamed we'd go
overseas, but Japanese animation is more global, and we can introduce
Japanese culture with Japanese animation," Atsuko said.
