A S P E C I A L J ! - E N T F E AT U R E I N T E R V I E W

J!-ENT Celebrating our 15th Year Anniversary

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In 2003, HALCA and YUCALI, the duo that make up HALCALI stormed onto the Japanese hip-hop scene with their first CD single “Tandem”. Five years later, having since released 11 CD singles and four albums, HALCALI has brought their hip-hop act to the United States with a live performance in Chicago and New York City.

J!-ENT recently had the opportunity to interview HALCALI regarding their US performance, about their music and to show fans another side of the hip hop duo.

ハルカリJust Doing It the HALCALI Way!

J!-ENT

J!-ENT Celebrating our 15th Year Anniversary

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Copyright © 2008 by J!-ENT. www.j-entonline.com. All Rights Reserved.All HALCALI images and photography is ©2007-2008 Epic Records Japan, Inc.

INTERVIEW WITH HALCALI

J!-ENT’s Dennis A. Amith interviews HALCA and YUCALI aka HALCALI.4

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t was an exciting two nights as Japanese hip-hop duo HAL-CALI had finished performing for thousands of attendees and

their many fans at Anime Central in Chicago. The performance marked their de-but in the US and the duo would make another return to the US weeks later for a live performance at Japan Day @ Central Park: Japan Day Festival in New York City. Who is HALCALI? The name is derived from the duo’s real names: HALCA and YUCALI. The two are friends from Meguro, Tokyo that participated in a female hip-hop audition held by the popular

Japanese hip hop group RIP SLYME back in 2002. The two came first place at the au-dition and a year later, the duo released their first CD single “Tandem” in Jan. 2003 which debuted at #19 on the Ori-con Charts. Their debut album “HALCALI Ba-con” debuted at #5 on the Oricon Charts and it was a major accomplishment for the duo as they had the first album by a female hip-hop artist in the top ten. With the release of several CD Singles, their second album “Ongaku no Susume” and a remix album titled “HALCALI Mix”, the group has managed to attract many listeners around the world. HALCALI has also performed sev-

eral theme songs for anime such as their track “Tip Taps Tip” (which was used as an ending theme for “Eureka Seven” which aired in the US on the Cartoon Network) and also the ending theme “Look” for “Demashita! Powerpuff Girls Z” to name a few. The group signed with Epic Records and released their first major album re-lease in July 2007 with “Cyborg Ore-tachi” which featured many musical col-laborations with Natalie Wise, Fantastic Plastic Machine, Utamaru (of Rhyme-ster), RAMRIDER, POLYSICS and many more. And in 2008, there has been an ac-tive campaign by their label to promote the hip-hop duo in America and it was evident by the turnout at their Chicago live concert performances that many fans were definitely supportive of the duo coming to the US. J!-ENT recently had the opportu-nity to interview HALCALI’s HALCA and YUCALI after their performance in Chicago.

J!-ENT: Before we get into the music questions, let’s first start and get to know a little about the both of you. What kind of students were you in high school? A party person? A per-son who studied a lot? An athlete?HALCA: We were already HALCALI, so I was really just the same as I am now. I hung out with friends after school and we had shows too. I had a lot of fun.YUCALI: I played volleyball in middle school. What we did as HALCALI was kind of like an extension of what we did for fun anyway, although we went to school every day. I sang while I studied.

J!-ENT: I read that you became HAL-CALI and took part in the auditions held by RIP SLYME but I was curious what hip hop artists or groups were you influenced by?YUCALI: Missy Elliott!HALCA: I used to dance to Missy when I was young. I also liked Eve and the Spice Girls, although they’re not hip hop. I lis-tened to danceable songs.

J!-ENT: As a child, what did you imag-ine yourself being, as an adult? Was it your dream to be a performer or some other type of job like a doctor, teacher, etc? HALCA: I didn’t necessarily want to be a musician, but I liked to dance, so I

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thought I might be a back up dancer. And then I became a rapper. (laughter) YUCALI: It was unexpected. Until the au-dition, I’d never really paid much atten-tion to rap. It was just what I put on to dance to. And then we did rap in the au-dition, and kind of ended up sticking with that. And now I love it best.

J!-ENT: How was the audition?YUCALI: We just went to the audition be-cause the flier was cute. (laughing)HALCA: I know it wasn’t easy to pass (the audition), so I wasn’t really crazy about it. YUCALI: We didn’t even wear any make up to the audition. All the other girls, even the middle schoolers had a ton of make up on. We were like, “No way we’ll pass this” and pigged out on the catering snacks. Later we were told, “You two were the only people eating then!” (laughter)

J!-ENT: You recently made your Ameri-can debut in Chicago at Anime Central. Were you aware of your fandom all over the world and how do you feel about having International fans that love your music?

YUCALI: I’m sure they found out about us over the web, but like, we don’t even have a CD out (in other countries) so we were kind of shocked, like, “How do they know us?”. But we were also really happy. HALCA: I never imagined we’d come to the US. I couldn’t imagine what kind of people would come to the show, or how many songs they’d know. But at the show, people were singing along, even though our songs are in Japanese, and they brought our old CDs to the meet and greet for us to sign. That made me really happy, just knowing how many people are really listening to our music.

J!-ENT: Being here in the US, especially in Chicago, was there any place that you wanted to visit or anything Ameri-can that you wanted to eat?YUCALI: When I was looking up stuff about Chicago, everyone was talking about deep dish pizza or ‘Chicago Pizza’, so I wondered what it was. I was just imagining normal pizza. I’d never seen deep dish before and I couldn’t even imagine what it would look like, so when

I saw it... It was really impressive. But it was delicious.HALCA: I like the crust. Everyone got too full to eat the crust. It was really thick, like bread. I like the crust, so I was the opposite of everyone else. YUCALI: Also, I want to go to Lake Michigan.

J!-ENT: Your first CD single was “Tan-dem” back in 2003, In the five years since HALCALI first debuted, what has been the biggest lesson that you have learned as music artists? HALCA: We’ve learned so many things... Recording, shows... Everything. YUCALI: But I think the show we did in France last year was big. We realized how ambivalent our feelings about shows had been. I can’t say exactly what changed in Paris, but something really changed, and we learned about how we feel about shows and how to become one with the audience. We were really scared to come to the US, because it’s the birthplace of hip-hop. And what we do, we may call it hip-hop, but they call it ”sugarcoated hip-hop”. Since it was an anime conven-

PHOTO: HALCALI performing at Anime Central in Chicago. ©2008 Epic Records Japan, Inc.

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tion, so I knew that super hip hop people weren’t going to come see our show, but we were worried that they might boo us or want us to free-style or something. But the audience was great. That’s what we did in our simula-tion. (laughter)HALCA: At the show in Paris, I realized how hyped up I could get for a show. I don’t even remember what I said on stage. I think that getting to have that experience was really big. YUCALI: Because we couldn’t com-municate with words, we learned how to use our feelings. We’re really good at getting by things on the nuances. (laughter) I thought we did great over-seas. HALCA: I’m scared to go home to Ja-pan, because people understand what we’re saying. YUCALI: Yeah, we actually got nervous about that instead.

J!-ENT: Let’s talk about your album “Cyborg Oretachi”. The album was quite interesting because of the vari-ous collaborations for nearly each track. RHYMESTER, RAM RIDER, Na-thalie Wise, Tanaka Tomoyuki, VER-BAL, etc. How was the experience to work with all these talented artists? YUCALI: HALCALI’s style takes on the color of all those different artists. When we made our first two albums, OTF (Oshare Track Factory) did all the production, and OTF decided which artists we’d work with. But for the third album, we chose the songs and the

people we wanted to work with ourselves. Everyone had a different production style and there was a lot of things we could take from them, so we learned a lot. HALCA: It was fun because we got to do all different kinds of songs.

J!-ENT: Let’s talk about certain tracks on the album. “Halcali Michi~19 no Yoru” which you collaborated with RAM RID-ER. RAM RIDER is a talented artist that is a mix bag when it comes to music. You never know what to expect. So, it was very cool to hear this track because the song was very energetic, fun and it was a very smooth flow of rap and incorpo-rate some of his style. How was it like to collaborate with him and was it challeng-ing to create this track?YUCALI: It was our first time meeting him, but we felt like he was a friend already. A lot of producers are older men, so he was closest to our age. When we worked with him, it was like we were working with a friend. He has a lot of ideas, and he always gave us a reason we could understand when he suggested we changed the lyrics, which we learned a lot from. These are the last lyrics I wrote at 19, so they’re really meaningful to me.

J!-ENT: The track that surprised me the most was “Tougenkyo” which you col-laborated with AIGON (of HONESTY). Your music is typically seen as hip hop and pop but the song incorporated a rock-style (even though there was a little rap). How was the experience of creat-ing this track and do you enjoy experi-

menting in different in musical genres such as rock music? HALCA: We’d just been talking in an in-terview about how we wanted to do rock next. And then the song that AIGON made for us was very rock-like, so we thought it must be destiny. YUCALI: The tempo changes really quickly and stuff, so we thought, ‘What’s AIGON thinking?’ HALCA: In a good way, the song’s all over the place.YUCALI: Only he could make a song like it.

J!-ENT: For the track “Cyborg Ore-tachi”, that was quite an interesting collaboration with POLYSICS but at the same time, it was what I expected mu-sically and it turned out wonderfully. It also had that old school 80’s hip hop style with the POLYSICS musical style. How was the experience collaborating with them? HALCA: I love POLYSICS, but I’d always imagined Hayashi-san as more of a crazy, funky guy. I mean, he is funky, but not in the way I imagined. He’s very calm and focused on his work. He wasn’t like he is on stage, which surprised me. But we had a lot of fun doing the recording.YUCALI: We played the guitar for this track. HALCA: Yeah. We can’t play guitar, but he was like, ‘Just strum a little.’ He said it’d be interesting because we can’t play, so he recording some of our crappy gui-tar playing. YUCALI: Everyone was like, ‘Someone who actually play guitar could never play that phrase, that’s cool!’, but we didn’t really get it. We were like, ‘No way can this be cool!’ HALCA: Hayashi is crazy over music.

J!-ENT: My favorite collaboration was the first track on the album “Doo THE HAMMER!”, the collaboration with Dr. kyOn and several musicians from TO-KYO SKA PARADISE ORCHESTRA was very surprising and I really found the musical arrangement and overall track as very cool! How was it like to col-laborate with them?YUCALI: Interesting. He’s a weird guy, in a good way. And very intelligent. He’s an adult but sometimes he says weird things. Kenkoba (a Japanese comedian) was his idea too. He was like, “I love comedians.. Comedians are awesome.” And we were like, “What’s he talking about?” (laughter) As for the horn player from TOKYO SKA PARADISE ORCHES-TRA...

HALCALI THE INTERVIEW

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YUCALI: He’s friends with Kyon. HALCA: He’s amazing.

J!-ENT: Of course, there are so many awesome collaborations on this album but for the both of you, which was your favorite collaboration and track and can you tell us why? YUCALI: VERBAL (note: from the music duo m-flo). We didn’t ask to work with him, he came to us and said, ‘I’ve got a song I want HALCALI to sing.’ The song was really something that only HALCALI could sing. I don’t think it would have worked with m-flo or with any other art-ist. We really felt his love for HALCALI in that song. We were really happy that he’d just written a song for HALCALI on his own, not because anyone had asked him to. The way he does recording is very hip-hop, and I learned a lot about what makes rap sound cool. HALCA: Since working with RAM RIDER, I think a lot more about my poetry when I write. Some times when I write lyrics I just go with the flow, or use word play, but when I write poetry, I remember things he said. It’s hard to explain things in words

when you’re writing songs, but he al-ways understood, and it was really easy to communicate with him. I’d like to work with him again.

J!-ENT: You performed at Anime Cen-tral, how was the experience for the both of you performing in front of an American audience?YUCALI: I think it was completely differ-ent. Japanese audiences tend to be shy. But looking at their faces, I could tell the American audience was having fun. They just seemed to be rocking out and enjoy-ing themselves in their own way. In Japan, people usually do the same thing all to-gether, like waving their hands in the air. But in other countries, people don’t just copy us, they move in a way that’s fun for them. I could see that from the stage, and it made me happy. HALCA: We want our audience to just have fun so it was great.

J!-ENT: You have so many fans in Ameri-ca and also around the world but in Chi-cago, how was the experience of get-ting to meet them? Are you surprised

that there are many of them? YUCALI: Maybe it was because we were at an anime convention, but we got all these really great drawings. And we were happy to get letters too. In Japan, we don’t have much chance to get letters. People looked up the Japanese and tried their hardest to write their feelings for us, which surprised me. It really communicat-ed how passionate they felt and it made me really happy. HALCA: People had old merchandise I’d forgotten existed and even some t-shirts they had made themselves. We were re-ally surprised, like, “Wow, why do you have this!?” Everyone wanted to be our number one fan. (laughter) YUCALI: We don’t get to meet fans very much in Japan, but people said, “It was my dream to meet HALCALI”, and we were like “Oh no, thank you!” (laughter)HALCA: Everyone thanked us for com-ing to Chicago, but it made us happy to be thanked like that. I thought, “Thanks for lining up to meet us”, but they were saying, “Thanks for coming”, which made me really happy.

PHOTO: HALCALI performing at Anime Central in Chicago. ©2008 Epic Records Japan, Inc.

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HALCALI THE INTERVIEW

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J!-ENT: I know it may be a little strange for Japanese to know that a lot of Japa-nese music performances by artists or bands outside of Japan and Asia are held at anime conventions. How was the experience of performing at this kind of venue and looking at the various cosplayers at the anime con. What was your first reaction when you saw that?YUCALI: It’s not really the same. Like, there were some people wearing charac-ter suits or people where we were like, “That’s not cosplay”. (laughter) or people that looked nothing like the character they were supposed to be. (laughter) But everyone seemed so confident which was cool. A Japanese person would be more likely to say, “Well, I don’t look like this character, so I should just go in my normal clothes” but no one seemed to think like that at all, which was awesome. (laugh-ter) HALCA: It’s great to be so confident. It really comes out in people’s expressions. When they took pictures, they really got into posing as the character. It made me want to do cosplay too. (laughter)YUCALI: The cosplay in France was more precise. The costumes were hand-made,

all very finely done, while the American’s costumes were rougher. (laughter) It was interesting to see the national character that way.

J!-ENT: Of course, many people would like to see more HALCALI in the United States especially live performances in New York or Los Angeles but because you have fans all around the world, what other countries would you love visit and perform at? YUCALI: Anywhere (laughter). I’d love to play in other cities in the U.S. as well as other parts of the world. So please invite us!HALCA: In fact, we will return to the U.S. soon. We’re playing in NYC’s Central Park on June 1st at an event called Japan Day. We’re so excited about it. Please come see us there if you have a chance!

J!-ENT: If I was to look at your MP3 or CD player right now, which artist or song would be listening to right now?YUCALI: I listen to a lot of Kevin Michael. But I put some Common in my iPod, be-cause we’re in Chicago. HALCA: I like Kevin Michael too. I also

like listening to instrumental music.

J!-ENT: I read that the both of you are from Meguro, Tokyo. So, If there was an imaginary “spend a day with HAL-CALI” type of day. If we were to spend a day with HALCALI, where in Meguro would you take us (restaurant, shop-ping area, cultural area, dance club or anything…)?YUCALI: I’d love to do that! HALCA: I’d show them the cherry blos-soms at Meguro River. YUCALI: They’re really beautiful. Also, Meguro has a lot of hills, so I’d take them on a tour of the hills. (laughter) There are a lot of interesting places in Meguro, but I think Meguro is most famous for sanma fish (Pacific Saury*). The tables at one of the libraries there are fish shaped. * NOTE: There’s a famous work of Rakugo (Japanese traditional comic monologue) entitled “Meguro no sanma”

HALCA: There are a lot of little details like that.YUCALI: I know a lot of interesting plac-es. We used to do a TV show called ‘HAL-CALI TV’ on SpaceShower TV (Japanese

HALCALI THE INTERVIEW

premium channel) and we had an episode where we went around all the interesting places in Meguro. It has a lot of weird or interesting places.

J!-ENT: If the both of you had to de-scribe yourself in one word, what would that word be and why?YUCALI: “Blood Type B”. I don’t pay much attention to detail and I’m selfish. (laugh-ter) People tell me that all the time. HALCA: Stubborn. (laughter) People tell me that all the time, lately. YUCALI: She is stubborn. She never changes her opinion, so I’m always the one who ends up bending. (laughter) HALCA: Also, I can get through most things with my face/expressions. I tend to use my facial expressions more than words.

J!-ENT: In every J!-ENT interview, we like to do a little world play where we give you five words and you give us your definitions of those words:

1. LOVE2. SUCCESS3. FAMILY

4. Meguro, Tokyo5. HALCALIYUCALI: It’s so hard!

LOVEYUCALI: I think of my own ‘love’, like sin-cerity. HALCA: Most things are love. By nuance anyway. (laughter)

SUCCESSYUCALI: That’s hard. Ask someone who’s a success. (laughter). People in a country we’ve never heard of listening to HALCA-LI. People all over the world listening to HALCALI. That would be a success.HALCA: When a show was just really fun. If I think today was fun even if there were some small slip-ups, that’s a success.

FAMILYYUCALI: My biggest fans. They always keep track of what HALCALI’s doing. HALCA: Like that. They always listen to our music. I think they like HALCALI. YUCALI: They like their daughters. (laughter)

MEGUROHALCA: It feels like home. Somewhere I feel safe. I’ve always lived in Meguro.

YUCALI: It’s home, after all.

HALCALIYUCALI: You can connect to it without words. HALCA: All people are friends. When we go to other countries, I feel like everyone is a friend. I may be meeting someone for the first time, but they’ve been watching our videos and listening to our CDs, so they feel like a friend to me. If I see them at a show, I feel like, ‘Aw, they came!’

J!-ENT: What final words would you like to leave with your fans worldwide?HALCA: A message for our fans world-wide? Cool! (laughter). We want to go to other countries and have people listen to HALCALI there. YUCALI: We’re going to keep on mak-ing music you can enjoy even if you don’t understand the words and I want to do shows in smaller places where we can re-ally connect, so please come and see us next when we do!

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PHOTO: HALCALI performing at Japan Day in Central Park, New York City. ©2008 Epic Records Japan, Inc.

grooveworldJ!-ENT

cyborg oretachiHALCALIEpic RecordsESCL-2986DURATION: 51:06RELEASE DATE: June 18, 2007Website: http://www.halcali.com/

1. Doo THE HAMMER! 2. I t ’s PARTY TIME! 3. Koi no Bububun 4. Twinkle Star 5. endless lover ’s rain 6. LOOK [Special Edi t ion] 7. Cyborg Oretachi 8. Dr ivers License 9. Fessu de Ouissu!” 10. Tougenkyo 11. Tip Taps Tip 12. Halcal i Michi~19 no Yoru

A J!-ENT MUSIC REVIEW

HALCALI returns with their first major label album “cyborg oretachi” featuring their hit CD singles fro 2005-2007. HALCALI which features teen pop duo HALCA and YUCALI from Tokyo features a promising young music act that are noted for their unique fusion of infectious styles from hip-hop, dance, techno to new wave. The first track “Doo THE HAMMER!” features a pretty cool piano driven arrangement from Dr.kyOn and also brass horns by NARGO, Kitahara Masahiko and GAMO from TOKYO SKA PARADISE ORCHESTRA. For me the collaboration for this track is pretty cool and I actually dig the arrangement and the girls vocals/rap on this track. The second track “It’s PARTY TIME!” is a collaboration with Tanaka Tomoyuki of Fantastic Plastic Machine. Interesting to see how they integrated the sampling of THE HIGH-LOWS “Nichiyoubi Yori no Shisha” shalalala’s on this track. The song is very happy in the essence of “Fantastic Plastic Machine”. The third track “Koi no Bububun” is another collaboration track and this time its produced by VERBAL of m-flo (lyrics/music) and Deckstream (arrangement). I know, the thought of m-flo involvement would probably get many people salivating but it’s an ok track, very non-m-flo like to be truthful. Definitely, an old school groove that reminds me a bit mid-80’s J.J. Fad style of hip-hop. The fourth track “Twinkle Star” is another collaboration with RIP SLYME members RYO-Z and DJ FUMIYA of O.T.F (Oshare Track Factory). The lyrics are by RYO-Z of O.T.F. and instruments by DJ FUMIYA of O.T.F. The duo have been involved with HALCALI in their first album but it’s really cool to see the groups infuse elements from the film “The Magnificent Seven” into the track. A very cool track! The fifth track “endless lover’s rain” is a

< GIVING US A NEW PERSPECTIVEJapanese hip-hop duo HALCALI returns with their first major label release

collaboration with the group Nathalie Wise. For those who are familiar with music from Tokyo No. 1 Soul Set will probably be familiar with the band which Takano Hiroshi utilizes a combination of guitar, glockenspiel and Saito Tetsuya with the Piano giving an interesting musical direction for this track. I actually like it a lot! The seven track “Cyborg Oretachi” features a collaboration with POLYSICS. There’s not much too say but if you dig the blips and bleeps and digital music of the POLYSICS, then you will probably dig this song. One thing this album showcases is the duo embracing various musical styles through their collaborations and this collaboration with the POLYSICS is something definitely fresh and unique for the group. The eight track “Driver’s License” features a collaboration between HALCALI and Japanese hip-hop’s RHYMESTER. This track is the more hip-hop sounding track with the bass drum, smooth flow of lyrics and some “Boom Boom Shaka Boom Boom”. The tenth track “Tougenkyo” is a collaboration with HONESTY and features a rock track. Actually, when I was listening to this track, it was actually more reminiscent to music from another duo, PUFFY (Puffy

AmiYumi). Very surprised to hear HALCALI do this type of song but then again, this album is about the duo embracing various musical styles and in this track, bringing together rock and hip-hop. And track twelve features “Halcali Michi~19 no Yoru” which features a collaboration with RAM RIDER. When RAM RIDER is producing or arranging music, I expect to hear a lot of vocalizer or some use of chiptune or something different. You do get the vocalizer with the ladies but all in all, a fun track. HALCALI’s “Cyborg Oretachi” is an album that is sort of a mix bag because it includes various collaborations with different artists known for their style of music for their respected genre. The tracks infuses that music along with the groups vocals and rap music and all in all, you get a smörgåsbord of music that those who enjoy something fresh and new from the duo, might appreciate it but those expecting music comparable to their older hits may feel differently. Although a much different style compared to their older albums, I found the collaborations with the various artists infused with the HALCALI style to be fresh, different and overall enjoyable.— DENNIS A. AMITH [KNDY]

Dennis A. Amith, is also known to Japanese and Asian pop culture fans as “KNDY”. Dennis is the owner of the multi-disciplinary communications and design business, nt2099 media and entertainment and founder of Japanese and Asian entertain-ment and pop culture website, J!-ENT. Graduating from Cali-fornia State University, Fresno with an educational background in mass communications and

journalism, Dennis A. Amith has interviewed and featured many talents and industry professionals in the United States, Europe and Asia and is recognized for promoting the entertainment and pop culture of different countries to an International audience. He is currently residing in California.

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