Interviews with Music Producers

To celebrate Oliver’s 10th anniversary, we decided to show a video reel of people who have used Oliver and how they’ve grown as artists - which can be seen here!

We asked each artist a few questions to understand their love, use, and growth with Oliver. These were all displayed in Oliver’s 10th anniversary video, but they will be posted here for reader’s convenience!

All links to each artist’s social media and platforms will be listed and linked at the bottom of this post.

momocashew

Starlight Keeper was literally my first song I ever wrote. My motivation for writing songs initially was simply because I was a huge fan of Vocaloid. I liked many Vocaloids as characters, and I have been tinkering with the software, making Vocaloid covers, ever since the Kagamine twins were released.

I decided my first song was going to feature Oliver because firstly, his voice and design are adorable, but also because back then, there were very few original songs sung by Oliver. I wanted him to be more well-known and more loved. His angelic voice was truly unique in the Vocaloid lineup.

It wasn’t so much that I wanted to compose songs, but rather I wanted to write songs FOR Oliver. I also had a lot of time because I was in high school. So I spent a few days watching YouTube tutorials for FL Studio and began writing what became Starlight Keeper. The song came naturally to me. All I had to do was imagine Oliver singing a gentle song, and the phrases just kind of popped up. I never studied music and don’t play any instruments. It probably took much longer than someone who has musical knowledge, but I enjoyed the process.

Tarantula was maybe my 3rd song ever. I always liked listening to epic classical music, and I loved it when my cousin played the accordion, so I thought, “why not combine them?”. By this point I have noticed that I’m more suitable for dark songs. It was very easy for me to write about negative feelings. I’m probably a naturally negative person. I also thought that Oliver’s innocent childish voice was perfect for the delivery of those negative feelings. The contrast was comforting to me.

I looked for more tutorials online, learned to mix and “master” my own tracks. I thought I really liked every step of making music. My slowly multiplying fanbase was an encouragement. I got to make many new friends through writing songs. One of them was Steampianist, who I’m still good friends with today! We collaborated on a few Oliver songs too.

After Tarantula’s release, I was happy that it seemed like many people got to know about Oliver through my music. It motivated me to write even more songs for Oliver.

Again, I didn’t know music theory so I composed very slowly. I often stayed up until 3am writing songs. My mom would yell at me to go to bed. I’d sleep in class and my grades fell, but I guess it was worth it because I now write music for a living.

I think Oliver changed my life. I would have never written a song if not for my love for Oliver as a character. I would have never noticed my musical talent. I studied engineering so I’m guessing without Oliver, I’d probably become an engineer, live a regular life with a rather common stable job. Instead, I’m now a self employed musician living in Japan, making music for games and anime. It’s not the most reliable career, and can be a huge toll on my health, being put on the pedestal and being somewhat unrelatable. But I have lots of freedom and I’m happy. Oliver was like the first piece of the dominos that led to my current happiness. I look back on my Vocaloid songs very fondly. Oliver will always be special to me.

momocashew has since formed a band called Mili, whose Youtube can be found here.

baggagelizard

I don’t know what exactly drove me to Oliver. Oliver was the first English Vocaloid 3 voicebank, and had a voice style and range I was comfortable writing in. I had bought Big Al months prior, but, not to knock Big Al, I was not really having the best time writing to the range, as well as encountering some bugs with the Vocaloid 2 Editor, and was looking for something new.

Once I heard the demos for Oliver, and the passion from both the creators at Vocatone and the community, I was quite excited for the product. Also, at the time, a popular Vocaloid Community Forum at the time had a 25% discount for Oliver for its members for a limited time. Of course, that was not the only reason, but I think it was a factor in my purchasing Oliver sooner than later, so thank you for that discount at the time.

As for how I write songs, it just depends on what ideas I get first. Most of the time I start with an idea and build up a melody and lyrics, but other times I start with a melody or lyrics. Ice Sculptures started that way, as lyrics, if I recall correctly.

This leads to, of course, so many ideas that have either gone nowhere or are half-complete, waiting for me to find the right thing to complete it, or at least progress the idea. I’m starting to figure that maybe a released yet incomplete idea may be somewhat better than hundreds of unreleased ones.

Steampianist

Well honestly the reason why I used Oliver is because morb insisted that we use him instead and she would only work with me if i get oliver

So we come up with song ideas that would hopefully fit with Oliver and the first song we came up with was Twaddles of a Flue Faker a sad song about chimney sweeps during the industrial revolution in Britain.

There’s nothing really anything dark about oliver it’s just that me and morb likes to write about Dark and Sad songs sometimes juxtaposed with upbeat instrumentals.

corasundae

I started using Oliver because he was the first young Engloid and the only Engloid with a cute design. I had been wanting to get into Vocaloid for a while, but adult vocals didn’t really appeal to me. Nowadays, I like to use him because I still think he’s cute and that makes for an interesting contrast with my lyrics sometimes.

Manmes

The reason why we chose Oliver is because of his clear and high voice.

Compared to other vocaloids, Oliver’s voice is more choir oriented, so it sounds beautiful even with many layers of voices.

GuitarHeroPianoZero

Well part of the reason why I chose Oliver for my songs is because he was one of the first English Vocaloids that I ever purchased. In fact, I recall staying up late at night to purchase him within an hour of his release. As for the song Christmas Spirit specifically, I felt Oliver would fit the sentiment of the song really well. The song is loosely inspired by the Charlie Brown Christmas special, and I felt like Oliver would enjoy a similar holiday experience. Plus his voice just really goes well with the instruments in the song.

R.I.P.

One of the things that really draws me to Oliver’s voice is the fact that his voice provider was under thirteen years old at the time of recording. There simply are no other English singing vocal synthesizers on the market like him. As to why I chose him for The Medical Anomaly specifically, I wanted to give the listener the impression that a sad young child is struggling with the song’s subject matter, rather than the typical “genki-girl” character we tend to see. Oliver’s voice can sound anywhere from playful to on the verge of tears, all encapsulated in the voice of a sweet child. His voice type is integral to the song’s meaning, and I don’t think it would have been nearly as hard-hitting if I had decided to use some other voicebank.

Ashiotone-P

Maybe first I made a lyric for Aki’s vocaloid music. Then I asked her to make music for my song. At that time I though as Ashiotone-P I have to increase Oliver’s song. 10 years after, the result is not so bad.