John's nerd corner

Are the Songs From Love Live! Actually Good?

I’ve talked about my love for Aqours (pronounced “aqua”) and Love Live! Sunshine!! a couple times here now. I might’ve mentioned this, but Love Live! is not just “an anime with some songs.” It’s a whole multimedia franchise, and it’s released a lot of songs—we’re talking hundreds—with only a fairly small percentage appearing in the anime series. I’ve spent a lot of time listening to many of those songs.

Aesthetically, these songs are quite different from basically everything else I listen to. Heck, there are a couple of these songs where I wish the production sounded better. This has caused me to wonder briefly if I’ve fooled myself into liking these songs and whether I would still like them if I didn’t know the associated fictional characters.

But come on. That’s silly. At the end of the day, I’m always coming back to these songs.

To be honest, despite the title of the post, my real purpose is not to weigh the pros and cons of these songs and come up with an answer—because if I actually thought they were bad, this would be a very different post. What I actually want to do is explore all the reasons they appeal to me.

Before I get into this, let me just say outright that when it comes to specific examples, I’ll mostly be talking about Aqours’ songs. This is not meant to be disrespectful to the other groups. It’s just that Aqours is where my obsession is, and so they’re who I want to talk about. But most of what I say will apply to other Love Live! groups too.

The Art vs. Pop Debate (Which probably doesn’t need to be mentioned at all but oh well)

Now let me get one thing out of the way: Love Live! as a franchise was created because a magazine, a music label, and an animation studio got together and figured out a way to make a bunch of money. It’s obviously more of a product than any single person’s passion project.

In the modern world, it’s hard for art to just exist. You know when you go to a museum and look at paintings, obviously those paintings are art. But when you go to the movie theater and watch a blockbuster, do you think of that movie as art? Is there a difference? It feels like there is, but is that right? This is quite an old debate that I’m not going to dive deep into.

It’s a debate that clearly affected music criticism, too. Pop music was never considered serious—until the past decade or two, that is, when critics started giving it a fair shake. It turns out that even if music is meant to be catchy and appeal to the masses, it can still be creative and interesting.

You may be writing a song because you’re getting paid to write a song, but I don’t think that robs the project of all artistic value. You can still get creative and express yourself to an extent. It’ll be more compromised than if you were just doing it for yourself, sure, but I think you can still really put yourself into it.

And I don’t think my opinion is all that controversial, because let’s face it, everything gets turned into a product these days, and people understand that it’s very hard for artists to survive if they’re trying to be 100% free of commercial motivation.

To a purist, Love Live! music probably would not be considered good. But as someone who’s looking at it from the angle of “Is this well-made and enjoyable to listen to?” then I think it’s great.

A Legendary Song

One big reason I am convinced Love Live! music is, by and large, Good™, is the fact that I was listening to “Snow Halation” fairly often for at least a year before I actually learned a single thing about any of the characters in Love Live!

On the other hand, that could just means my taste in music is bad, but guess what? Music is all subjective anyway, and I can only speak from my own perspective, no one else’s.

But anyway, how did I come to even hear that song? Well the short answer is: memes.

“Snow Halation,” which is performed by µ’s (pronounced “muse”) and released in 2010, is one of the earliest Love Live! songs and easily one of the franchise’s most famous and beloved, too.

“Snow Halation” also achieved some level of “meme fame” in the English-speaking Internet, which helped to spread the good word of Love Live! further (case in point: me). I don’t know the entire history of this, but what I do know is that in 2016, a certain YouTube channel played a big part in exposing the world to “Snow Halation.”

SiIvagunner claims to upload only high-quality video game rips. In reality, if you click on a video from this channel that promises the “Slider” theme from Super Mario 64, you will realize before too long that the melody is not what it is supposed to be, but instead is the theme from The Flintstones—that’s just one example, of course; the joke of a SiIvagunner video could be absolutely anything.

I was totally unaware of SiIvagunner until 2018. But “Snow Halation” was a common element of SiIva’s music in its heyday in 2016. Apparently this annoyed many of the subscribers, and there was a whole incident where SiIva ended up in an alternate dimension or something? Well that’s not important.

The point is, SiIvagunner is how I heard “Snow Halation.” At first I was like, “Ha. Anime girls? Silly SiIva.” But then I was like, “Wait, this instrumental actually is kinda killer.”

Here’s the biggest thing to remember about my musical taste: there is nothing I like more than an interesting, pretty, and/or unique harmony or chord progression. On top of that, maybe then you can even throw in some key changes? That’s that good stuff, man.

“Snow Halation,” from a compositional standpoint, is absolutely gorgeous. That suspenseful chord just before the end of the chorus? OOH that’s good.

The production is lovely. It has an elegant piano intro, which is accompanied by some jingle bells—because this is a Christmasy song. The song overall has that uptempo rock sound that is I guess pretty common in Japanese idol music, accompanied by violins that add a ton of emotion. And as far as high-pitched anime girls singing goes, you might not find that super enjoyable if it’s your first time hearing it. But this song doesn’t have any solos, which might actually make it more palatable to a normie, since some of the character’s voices… have a lot of character, we’ll say.

To me, the song was in this category of “I would feel embarrassed if someone found me listening to it, but it is unironically a very good song.” I felt like people would perceive listening to some anime girl song as cringe. And I still feel like they will. But this is my blog, so who cares?

After realizing how much I liked “Snow Halation,” I proceeded to not think about Love Live! at all beyond it for quite a while until, eventually, stuff happened, and I ended up watching the anime series and checking out more of the music.

But yeah, “Snow Halation” was the beginning for me. And it’s still a song I do not get tired of (but I do tend to save it for the winter months to make it feel more special).

Music and the Personalities Behind It

I definitely think that when I watched the Love Live! anime and got to know the characters, that made me more interested in checking out more of the songs.

This type of reaction applies to regular music, too, doesn’t it? Artists go on TV and do interviews to promote their music. The hope is that if the viewer finds the artist likable or interesting, they’ll go check out the music.

With these idol songs and these fictional characters, once you get invested enough, you’ll probably start taking notice of how song lines are divided between different characters. Is a trio taking a verse? Is there some meaning behind this combo or did the producers just think it sounded good?

Oh, and on rare occasion, there are also brief speaking parts, so you’re gonna want to know who the characters are for that.

Groups in Love Live! don’t have a permanent “center” member, but rather the center will vary between songs. This is most important for group singles whose centers were decided by polling magazine readers. It’s interesting to see how the resulting songs are a good fit for the centers while still representing the group as a whole.

Of course there are also solo songs, which are the most obvious musical representation of a character.

What was really fun was when I found out about subunits—smaller groups within the main groups. Each subunit has its own unique vibe. Guilty Kiss (the best one) does both metal and western-influenced pop. CYaRon does more of the classic, energetic style of idol songs. AZALEA does a lot of electropop. Do these choices of music style link back to the characters’ personalities? Well, kind of?

I can imagine Kanan and Dia coming up with the cool AZALEA sound, but in my mind the funny part would be when they get Hanamrau to go along with it. Guilty Kiss makes sense if you think of it as a combination of Mari’s over-the-top energy (and love of metal, according to the anime), Riko’s sweetness, and Yoshiko’s chuunibyo-induced love of evilness (she didn’t like Mari’s loud music in the anime but I like to think she warmed up to it).

Uhh anyway.

The rare instances where characters outside of these unit combinations get to do songs together are a lot of fun too. I love the summer vacation CD. Kanan and Chika (who are really my two favorite characters) have a song that’s like “Summer is over and it’s raining and we’re mad about it (but actually this is a metaphor for a person leaving).” I think this angle for this pairing makes a lot of sense because both of them had some angsty moments in the anime.

And then the winter vacation CD has songs that really represent some of the relationships in the anime. Ruby and Hanamaru being good friends, Kanan and Mari being estranged friends who make up, and You and Riko fighting over Chika (not exactly fighting, but you know, it’s like in that one episode where You felt jealous). Chika’s not actually in that song, by the way. So the remaining three are kind of just the leftovers, but it’s perfect because these are the three seiyuu who did the radio show! That’s why you hear “GuuRinPa!” as the song begins.

Wait, but if the characters are referencing a nickname that really only applies to the seiyuu, then… how?!

It occurs to me that I must be sounding absolutely nonsensical to a lot of people at this point. Let’s move on.

Franchises like Love Live! are sometimes called 2.5D because while the characters are primarily defined in 2D (manga, anime, etc.), there is also a live-in-person onstage component (3D). Yes, the voice actors for all these characters do concerts as well as a number of other things. They gotta do livestreams. They gotta do fan meetings. They may not be full-time idols themselves… but it kinda feels like they’re sometimes close to being that.

When I started getting into this stuff I did not realize there would be a whole other dimension to it. I guess I found it a bit daunting at first. I mean they’re not streaming the lives on Crunchyroll or anything like that so how is anyone who doesn’t speak Japanese even keeping up with this stuff?

But today I can name all the seiyuu in Aqours and a handful of the others too, and I have several of the lives on Blu-Ray. Which is new for me, because I’d never supported any type of girl group before. Really, I wouldn’t have gotten to this point without the help of all the people who uploaded various clips with subtitles to YouTube.

But this is getting way off-topic from the music. Point is, knowing the voices behind the characters definitely adds an additional layer of enjoyment to the music, I think.

Making You Smile in Different Genres

Now I don’t know much about idol music in general. My main reference point is Yakuza 5. But it seems like the style in general is meant to be energetic and just make you have a good time. Music that’ll make the fans raise those lightpens up with joy, you know?

The first ever Love Live song from way back in 2010 is a perfect example of the style we’re looking for. Prominent electric guitar, prominent synth part, strong, fast beat. Just good vibes.

The B-side to this single, “Yuujou No Change” is stylistically a bit different, as it’s built all on this chunky synth kick that really makes me want to jump around. But the vibes are the same: just pure happiness and energy.

µ’s pretty much followed that same pattern with “Snow Halation,” too—“Snow Halation” was the rock-ish idol song, and its B-side was very synth-y.

One of the greatest and most legendary Love Live! songs is the first opening for the TV anime, and again, this is that energy we’re looking for. Fast tempo, some electric guitar, and a mix of other sounds including strings (which are pretty common in these songs as well).

Aqours kept that vibe going with their first set of songs, too:

And I’m not sure exactly how they did it, but Liella has songs in that same general style, yet to me it sounds more like an actual live band. Maybe it’s all in the mixing?

Anyway, those should get you an idea for the standard feel for a Love Live! song.

However, Love Live! has quite a lot of songs that make you say, “Oh, that’s different!” See, I may not be able to define in words what exactly that typical vibe is, but it’s easy to tell when we’re straying from it.

I mentioned some subunits earlier. Subunits and solo songs tend to veer the most drastically from the typical idol style. In fact, I’ve been surprised a few times by how far away a subunit song sounds from what I expect from Love Live! or J-pop generally. The AZALEA song “PHOENIX DANCE” really stunned me the first time, because it is suuuper influenced by contemporary latin music.

The Nijigasaki unit R3BIRTH has two non-Japanese members, so I guess that’s why their songs are meant to sound more global. More like K-pop, I guess (I don’t really listen to K-pop). Anyway, their song “Vroom Vroom” is an absolute banger and sounds more like a contemporary western song than anything else I’ve heard from Love Live! (probably because the arrangement was done by a British artist, I reckon).

One of the OG subunits from µ’s, BiBi, has some crazy European dance-esque songs among other styles. I always get hyped for “PSYCHIC FIRE.”

And how can you not enjoy the angsty rock energy of Guilty Kiss’ “Kowareyasuki.”

But we can’t just talk about subunit songs forever, right?

Ok one more. Because this CYaRon song sounds a little punk-ish. And it’s kind of funny that Ruby is the one to take the lead in it.

Anyway, I talked about the typical Love Live! style, but what about a song like Aqours’ “MY Mai☆ TONIGHT” that fits into that style but is also pretty different with its traditional Japanese sounds?

Then you got one of my favorite µ’s songs, “Angelic Angel.” This one feels more like an old rock song—the guitar honestly sounds right out of the 70s. I have always been in love with the melody of this song.

Aqours has been around for nine years now, which has given them the chance to explore quite a few different styles. You got the city pop banger “KU-RU-KU-RU Cruller” which has both a keyboard and guitar solo, and they’re impeccable—I mean seriously, just listen to that (starting at 2:35). THEY COOKED

I’ve always liked “Jump Up HIGH!!” which is a pretty normal EDM song. The drop is good and makes me want to go crazy like any EDM drop is supposed to.

“Fantastic Departure” is another nice EDM song (I really love the high notes they sing in this one), and its B-side “Aqours Pirates Desire” is even cooler—except dang it, that synth horn just sounds cheap and I really wish it didn’t, because I love everything else about the song, especially those drums.

Now, you probably already guessed this, but the way that Love Live! is able to create so many songs and go into different genres is, of course, by having a bunch of different composers.

But the lyrics for every µ’s and Aqours song (until Genjitsu no Yohane) were written by one person: Aki Hata. And even though I don’t speak Japanese, based on the translations I read, it seems like she does incredible work. I guess I assumed these songs would be light and fluffy, but actually a lot of these lyrics feel truly passionate.

But anyway, the amount of variety in Love Live! music is definitely a big part of the appeal to me. But through all these different styles, one thing remains consistent: the music is meant to cheer you up and help you just have fun.

Nine Voices Joined Together

It almost goes without saying that one of the greatest appeals of music in general is the uniqueness of every human voice.

I know anime character voices often fall into familiar archetypes. But if you assumed different groups of nine (or more) anime girls would sound identical, think again.

µ’s’ voices, when singing all together, embody warmth and fun. On the other hand, I would describe Aqours’ collective voice as being punchier and sharper than µ’s.

Of course, these different sounds are simply the results of blending many unique character voices together. When casting for Love Live!, the process isn’t simply a matter of picking the best singers in different ranges like you’d do if you were trying to fill a choir. Instead they are going for unique, memorable voices that can bring the characters to life. When it comes to singing, some members are more skilled than others. And that’s perfect, because in the story of Love Live!, these are supposed to just be normal girls. No matter the singing ability, I love all the characters, and when they all sing together, you get something truly distinct.

Sidebar: Ranking the Singing Voices of Aqours

Hey welcome to the segment where I rank the nine singing voices of Aqours for some reason. I’ve thought a lot about this. Jeez, I’m really exposing the depths of my obsession here, huh? Well, that aside, just remember this is my personal taste, and I am not any sort of authority on singing.

(Note: I revised this section on 12/1/2024).

Well that’s the ranking. But really they’re all winners to me. And now back to whatever else we were talking about.

These Songwriters Are Good

As I said earlier, the songs in Love Live! are written by a lot of different people. I guess the idol and anime industries must keep a lot of songwriters in Japan employed, huh? Not that I know much about that. Anyway, these people are crazy good at what they do.

Earlier I praised the composition of “Snow Halation,” and that song certainly was no fluke. Consider a song like “Namioto Refrain.” A soft piano ballad with all these gorgeous chords—the kinda chords where you gotta start throwing numbers in the names…. Look, don’t ask me to explain too many chords beyond major and minor, ok? I don’t know that stuff.

Anyway, this song has a big key change towards the end and it is incredibly effective. Chika has this big high note and I get goosebumps thinking about it. I get even more goosebumps from this change in the harmony at the end—that minor chord right before the final leg of the song? Hoooooooooooo that’s good.

Speaking of key changes, what’s the deal with modern western pop music avoiding key changes? I saw a video about this. The Billboard charts have been mostly devoid of them for years. I know the standard “shift up half a step at the climax of the song” became an overdone cliche decades ago, but there are other times and ways you can change keys, you know. Well, Love Live! composers (and J-pop in general) definitely have not been a part of that trend.

In a previous post, I mentioned the ending song to Nijigasaki’s anime, “NEO SKY, NEO MAP.” This song starts out in a grand way that inspires this adventurous feeling in me. And then I think there are 4 key changes in getting to the chorus. Perhaps all this movement creates a feeling of drama, or progress, or anticipation…or all of the above. Whatever the case, it’s beautiful, and like a lot of Love Live! anime endings, it fills me with emotion.

The same composer, Koutarou Odaka, wrote “Mitaiken HORIZON,” which has to be one of my top three favorite Aqours songs. Not a single moment of the song feels like filler; every musical phrase is memorable and important. It employs that same strategy as “NEO SKY” where you get several key changes leading up to the chorus. Ugh, it works so well. It would sound beautiful in any arrangement—I honestly want to hear a piano cover of the song. Really, so many good choices were made in the arrangement of the song, too. The part when the whole group comes together towards the end of the second verse sounds angelic.

Another one of my favorite Aqours songs is “Thrilling・One Way.” One of the things I love about the composition of this one is that countermelody on the “girigiri” part. Largely because those high notes sound really good. Most Love Live! songs are in the upper ranges but it’s not usually done like that, in that smooth falsetto type of way. Mainly what I love about this song, though, is just the intensity. It’s a fast rock song, and the rhythm just has this overwhelming sense of forward momentum. Towards the end of the song, you get a breather. But after that, it’s like a train rushing towards the station and you wonder if it’s actually going to stop. I honestly didn’t think much of this song when I first heard it, but at some point I was listening to it on my headphones with the volume up loud and it was like something clicked.

So there’s this other song called “HAPPY PARTY TRAIN.” It’s called that and yet it doesn’t sound exactly sound like “happy” or “party.” It actually sounds sort of melancholy. The heart of this song is that lovely string melody before the verses. Gorgeous. Vocal harmonies are added to it the final time, and that makes it even more gorgeous. The perfect icing to the cake. But where this song really catches you off guard is the way it just changes keys without any warning for the chorus.

Another Aqours song with a significant number of key changes this one which I’m not even going to try to write about—but just listen to it on YouTube for yourself to see how fun it is:

On a different note, there is a song by the Nijigasaki unit A・ZU・NA which, yes it has some big key changes, but it also has time signature changes, going from 4/4 to 3/4 a couple times. So that’s pretty cool. Tomori Kusunoki’s singing as Setsuna really carries that song though, to be honest. (She had to retire from performing as Setsuna due to health reasons and I will always miss her).

And a Guilty Kiss song “Phantom Rocket Adventure” does this crazy triplet thing in the middle. I love that crud.

Anyway, I could talk about dozens more songs and we could be here all day, but hopefully this sample of songs I find to be beautiful, fun, exciting, interesting, or all of the above will paint the picture well enough. The composers and arrangers for Love Live! do great work, and of course the seiyuu truly bring these songs to life and make their characters shine through them. (Did somebody say shine?)

So there you go: scientific proof that Love Live! music is good. I’m joking about the scientific part, but the point is, these songs are pretty cool. And that’s it. BYE.