Concept and inspiration
The 2004 anime series Samurai Champloo was created and directed by Shinichirō Watanabe, known at the time for his work on Cowboy Bebop . It was the debut television project of Manglobe, a studio founded in 2002 by former Sunrise staff. [1] [2] Watanabe's goal for the series was to blend a traditional Edo period setting with anachronistic elements including the culture and music of hip hop. [3] When deciding on the music, Shinichirō Watanabe wanted to incorporate hip hop, fitting in with the series' original goals and themes. [4] While several staff members wanted him to bring back Cowboy Bebop composer Yoko Kanno, Watanabe was reluctant as he wanted to use professional hip hop artists. [3] [5] The soundtrack was collaboratively composed by Shinji "Tsutchie" Tsuchida of Shakkazombie; American musician Fat Jon; Nujabes, a DJ known for his sampling and blending of genres in tracks; and the DJ team Force of Nature, consisting of KZA and DJ Kent. [6] [7]
Watanabe was friends with Tsutchie and had worked with him on the final episode of Cowboy Bebop, and Nujabes was the first name which came to mind when he was thinking about the series music. [4] [8] [9] Tsutchie was on board from the beginning, being intrigued by the mixing of hip hop music and samurai culture. As with the rest of production, Watanabe was heavily involved in choosing and using pieces of music. [9] The non-standard sound design and dubbing approach, together with the improvised style of the production as a whole, meant that the composers had a harder time than expected finding suitable samples for their work. [1] The soundtrack included original work and sampling from pre-existing tracks. [9] [10]
Watanabe wanted the music to be on an equal artistic and quality level to the animation, though he later noted his choice of hip hop limited the anime's audience and alienated many Japanese fans. [8] The music was not always used either in intended scenes, or in its entirety. One example was Watanabe only using the opening section of a theme for the opening of the first episode, which was motivated by the track's unsatisfactory sound on large speakers. [9] During production on the later episodes, there was some "chaotic" scheduling to edit and compose tracks. [9] When asked to collaborate, Fat Jon almost cried with joy as he was a fan of Watanabe's other work. [7] It was his first time working on an anime soundtrack. [11] Fat Jon's approach of fading tracks into each other frustrated Watanabe as he wanted the tracks to have abrupt endings and transitions. [9] Force of Nature were brought on board through Tsutchie, who provided samples to Watanabe. [10] They described their contribution to the soundtrack as even more heavily influenced by hip hop than their standard work, with several of their tracks being used for battle scenes. [7] Watanabe hired a professional DJ to perform scratches for the eyecatchs. [12]
Several other guest artists contributed to the soundtrack. Beatboxer Afra both voiced and performed the beatbox pieces for a character in the episode "The Art of Altercation". [13] The second part of "Misguided Miscreants" included a long uninterrupted piece of Okinawan music, "Obokuri/Eeumi", which was in Watanabe's mind before the animation was created. This track was performed by singer Ikue Asazaki. [3] [13] For the two-part story "Lullabies of the Lost", the track "Pekambe Uk" by traditional Ainu musician Umeko Ando was licensed; Ando died shortly before the episodes aired. Yano Yuki scored the episode "Cosmic Collision", recording the music live using a theremin as she watched the completed episode. Yukiko Tsukioka sang the folk song performed by the character Sara in the story "Elegy of Entrapment", creating a new recording of it for the episode. Rapper duo Suiken & Sword provided vocals for "Hi-izuru Style", the closing track for "War of the Words". [13]
Theme songs
The opening theme "Battlecry" was composed by Nujabes and performed by Shing02, who also wrote the lyrics. [14] The lyrics, written in English, made use of word play and referenced the series' themes and period. [15] In addition to the English version, Shing02 created a Japanese translation which was included in a series guidebook. [13] Multiple ending themes were created, two of them performed by Minmi. The main ending theme was "Shiki no Uta" composed by Nujabes, with lyrics and vocals by Minmi. [14] [16] Minmi wrote the song to emphasise a sense of longing, with the person singing the lyrics seeking someone and holding onto hope despite never finding the person. Her image of the song while creating the lyrics was as a dance tune, with a lonely girl in a kimono dancing through a town. [17]
Episode 12 used the song "Who's Theme", again composed by Nujabes, and written and performed by Minmi. [14] [16] For Episode 17, the final episode in the series' original television broadcast, Tsutchie created the original track "You" without consulting the other staff. Performed by the singer Kazami, the track was a mid-tempo ballad contrasting the rapping vocals dominating the series. [9] The lyrics of "You" were written by Lori Fine. [15] Tsutchie had originally been asked for a rap track, but ignored this request. [13] For the episode "Baseball Blues", Tsutchie created the ending theme "Fly", with lyrics and vocals by Azuma Riki. The final episode's ending theme was "San Francisco", licensed from the rapper band Midicronica. [14] [13]
