Forgotten Friday #53 - 仲田ルボ / Nakata Rubo

Ya know what's a really weird thing to be broken? The search bar in Windows Explorer. I tried searching for these banks and it just said they didn't exist. Instead, I just picked a file I knew I had previously downloaded before these banks and pressed "r" to jump to them after cycling through every other file starting with "r". If these names weren't romaji, that wouldn't have worked nearly as well. 

Forgotten Friday #53 - 仲田ルボ / Nakata Rubo

So, Rubo's gender is glasses. Generally, I take effort to make sure that I don't misgender non-binary UTAUs, but really? Glasses? I'm just going to use she / her. Her genderbend uses "g+15", which means that her genderbend is more masculine than her. I did something rare and actually rendered off a sample before I even got to the "Who is this UTAU?" section to confirm, yeah, this is a feminine voice. 

Thank the good lord for the UTAU Visual Archive. Even if I was able to download the bank with a link to the distribution site, the distribution site is long gone and replaced with something really, really concerning and spammy. I did find an email, though, and I compulsively asked if the voice provider would record my English list. I do have a problem. 

Who is Rubo Nakata?

official icon packaged with bank

Wiki Wednesday #42 - 梨音ナツカ / Nashine Natsuka

All I want to do is download more UTAUs! But, I can't download more until I use the ones I already have. So, okay, I'll write more Wiki Wednesday! Well. No. I had written so many Wiki Wednesday articles between writing Forgotten Friday articles, I had to select the label to even see the articles on the first page of my blog queue. But, I got caught up. And now I can finally write another Wiki Wednesday! Hurrah! It's like it is a Christmas Present!

Wiki Wednesday #42 - 梨音ナツカ / Nashine Natsuka

First, wow! This article was released on Christmas! It's so crazy to me when articles fall on significant dates. Sadly, this article has nothing to do with Christmas and isn't very special when compared to my other articles. I'd say it will be pleasant and average.

Well, except for one thing. This is my first Wiki Wednesday hosting samples on Google Drive! That means that I don't have to worry so much about running out of time. This UTAU has four banks, and I can upload samples from all four banks if I want to!

Another something special is just that every time I see this UTAU, I think, "This has to be a lie. This cannot be correct. How does this UTAU not show up on YouTube with thousands of views?" The only time she shows up at all is if you search her romanized name, and even then it's just a video with under 200 views. This UTAU feels like she should be super popular! Regardless, I just sent a tweet to her voice provider asking if they want to record English for Natsuka. Well, I'm tired and I'm not exactly sure what I wrote. But I tried!

Who is Natsuka Nashine?

Official Icon Packaged with Bank

Forgotten Friday #52 - 鳩音キユ / Hatone Kiyu

Is this problematic? Usually, if you have to ask, it is. The name of the bank makes me think this will be an issue, but at the same time, they listed her age as 2010 years old. At release, that would mean she was either two millennia old or two months old. After searching through her bank, yeah, this is problematic. It's not the problematic you expected, but it's still there.

Forgotten Friday #52 - 鳩音キユ / Hatone Kiyu

So, well, this is a joke UTAU. I tried watching the release video to figure out what was going on, but as you may have read in my "hiatus over" post, I kind of lost the ability to can Japanese. What I have found is that the voice provider is someone named Himeno. It's completely impossible to google such a common collection of kana, so I have no idea who that is. She was credited as "姫乃" in the readme, and I went down a rabbit hole. Himeno is also the voice provider for 白滝イト as far as I can tell. Well, Ito was a special UTAU to be used by a small group of producers. I've tweeted about her twice, so we'll see if anyone knows anything.

I wasted a few hours tracking down leads all because of this UTAU, so you know she's getting an article even if she's just a joke. If the leads end up leading to a nice place, you'll be getting an article on a better, not joke version of this UTAU. 

Who is Kiyu Hatone?

Art from release video

Wiki Wednesday #41 - skuidd's wallows

I utterly and completely dislike Arpabet, but I understand completely why it is how it is. I'm not mad about the intuitive design that allows people who don't understand phonemes to see how it works in a sense. The reason I really dislike it is my dyslexia, and that's a me problem. But it's a good system that I dislike due to my own mental handicaps. I have other issues with Arpasing in general, but using it isn't complete torture like other systems. 

Wiki Wednesday #41 - skuidd's wallows

Why does this UTAU have no YouTube videos?! Why is skuidd's dA completely and utterly wiped?? When someone deletes their account, that's one thing. When they go through and delete every single thing on there? That's a different thing. The answer is that skuiid got a new dA account. She is insanely good at art, so I'm really glad she has an account with all of her awesome deviations on it. That doesn't explain, however, why she hasn't posted a single video of Wallows on her YouTube channel. I do get that her channel is mostly speedpaints, but she does have UTAU videos regardless of that!

Anyway, sometimes life doesn't give you answers.

Who is wallows?

Official Icon Packaged with Bank

Forgotten Friday #51 - ライト音トゥワイ / Tuwai Raitone

I actually was going to write about Onnanoko Hen, but I ran into an issue. I have two banks of hers, but I can only find the download link for one, and you have to go into the Wikia's history tab to find it. The voice provider switched dA profiles without saying what her new one was. She had powerwashed her YouTube profile, but uploaded a video six days ago? I left a comment there to just ask if I should delete the banks or not. I literally have no idea how I found the Act 2 at this point.

Forgotten Friday #51 - ライト音トゥワイ  / Tuwai Raitone

I did a no-no in researching for this article and rehosted a bank. The link was still up, but it went through forumotion and it didn't go through to MediaFire for some reason. So, in the interest of people being able to download the bank, I just made it slightly easier. I imagine Lenexia has no control over forumotion and would have taken the link down if she didn't want people to use it. Lenexia has powerwashed all of her accounts, but left the banks up for download. So, I have a feeling she won't hunt me down and yell at me for reuploading something because forumotion is wonky. 

And I know I figured it out previously, because I had the bank to rehost. It's been a few months and maybe something has changed, because I magically had an Onnanoko Hen bank that also just seems like it doesn't exist now. So, I'm just like, huh.

Who is Raitone Tuwai?

official art packaged with bank

Wiki Wednesday #40 - Mal-Cat's XYZNeko / XYZ猫

Another Mal-Cat article! I don't actually think about the schedule, I just remember and then say "oh yeah, that's something I should tackle next." I realized while writing this that I had been convinced Mal-cat's name was actually Mel-cat and I was confused how "mel" came from "malice". It doesn't. I had to edit all the previous articles because of that weird mistake.

Wiki Wednesday #40 - Mal-Cat's XYZNeko / XYZ猫

We're back with another Mal-Cat UTAU! This time, the UTAU's voice provider is Machine. I don't know who Machine is, as there is no link back. I assume it is ClearlyMachine on deviantArt, but I can't be fully sure. But, finally, this bank comes with an image to use, so that I don't have to use an image from anywhere other than the bank itself!

Who is XYZNeko?

Official Icon Packaged with Bank

Forgotten Friday #50 - 変わった音レック / Rekku Kawattane

It doesn't bother me, and I think it's really cute now, but it's not completely correct to format names in this way. Family names (and also given names, but they are separate and not dependent on each other) can either have kanji or kana. Kawatta comes from the verb "to be different", meaning it has all of the verb stem goodness. I'm not sure exactly what the voice provider would choose if told this, so I won't go on a search to find an alternate name for the funzies.

Forgotten Friday #50 - 変わった音レック / Rekku Kawattane

This is my first article back from my hiatus! But, I also have nearly a month's worth of Wiki Wednesdays scheduled out after this goes live, so it's almost like the hiatus never even happened.

In the spirit of nyoom-nyoom, I will only be focusing on the one bank that was easily accessible through the Wikia page. I'm really out of practice, so let's just jump in.

official icon packaged with bank

Wiki Wednesday #39 - TDRloid's Lovecraft

I cannot describe how deeply I loathe the phoneme system CZ set up for her CVVC / VCCV system. I was converting a UST to use as a tester for English banks and I just felt ill. "o" means "u:" ?? "V" is "u"?? "E" is "i:"?!!?! If you speak more than one language, you probably see the main issue with all of those examples. Vowels pretty consistently follow the same rules across most non-English languages. In Spanish (and almost all romance languages), Japanese Romaji... "i" means "bee". I can't name a language where the symbol "i" doesn't mean the vowel in "bee" (Except for occasionally in Chinese). Except maybe English, but ... I'm sorry. I respect CZ for what she has done, but seriously?!!?

Wiki Wednesday #39 - TDRloid's Lovecraft

This actually was a big question of is this UTAU really Wiki Wednesday material? TDRloid was pretty popular and well known back in the day. Well, I knew he was popular and I can remember his UTAU's design and how all the Southeast Asian girls looked upon him with dreamy eyes. But I can't even remember his UTAU's full name. Takayawa Yoshi? Yawane Yoshi? Yawatane Yoshi?

It took looking it up to remember it was Kazune Yoshi. Kazune Yoshi was a big deal, and his videos involving more popular UTAUs were pretty successful. But, TDRloid has moved on. (Okay, not really. He did update Yoshi after releasing Lovecraft, but his icon is Lovecraft.) I'm shocked he only has around 600 subscribers, because I'd swear he'd have more. 

Regardless, on to the article.

Who is Lovecraft?

Official icon packaged with bank,
which is also TDR's current icon on YT

RSL English Recording List Review

Want your UTAU recording list reviewed? Leave a comment or send me a message on dA or Twitter! (annamaeblythe)

RSL English Recording List Review

Here's a fun new thing I might do monthly if enough people write in with their lists! Recording list reviews. Except for the fact that I will be using UTAUs created by the people who made the recording list to demonstrate the recording lists, these articles will be completely divorced from the UTAUs themselves. No character images or bios, just technical details.

What is the RSL English Recording List?

So, I get manic and download things. That's just part of being me. I have no idea where this bank came from, but I vaguely remember seeing the name on an old Mediafire page.

There is absolutely no information that I can find on this UTAU or on this list. I can read the name of the person who made it in the Readme, but I have no idea who they are because I can't find information. Should I make this article? Probably not without permission... But I don't think I'll find the person to get permission, so this is what we got. I believe the UTAU's name is Lia Skye, but as I said, I don't have any proof for anything at all.

This list hasn't been used much. I believe that there is a sentiment that if you aren't following CZ or Hua, you're wrong. I stan my list hard, and it is tempting to just say "use my list plz". However, doing that makes me as bad as the people who talk down to people for trying their own path. I'd be talking down to myself with that kind of attitude!

Voicebank structure

When I see a single pitch separated into several folders, I hiss. CZ's method involves several folders, so I can't fault anyone for following her lead. That being said, this bank is divided into C, CV_E, CVC, and V. 

An important note is that the easiest way to describe this UTAU is 単独音, or "solo sound". Kidding, it's CV. But tandokuon describes it better, because there is both CV and VC within CVC. Each recording is a single, unstringed syllable. 

C is a bit strange. The vowels are presented in CV format, which means that you can only realistically get "- C" from them, and not "C -". This is made redundant by the CVC folder. Is this because of the "separate sections, separate folders" philosophy? Probably, but I never fully understood the appeal. It allows you to be in separate mindsets for "- C" and "CV", but you are able to replicate that in SetParam as long as you don't edit the OTO in UTAU. Once the base is done, I see no real use for this kind of structure. (I blame this on CZ, not on the person who made this list.)

CV_E is for consonants that cannot realistically have a "V C -" sample. This is the first thing that can pose an issue for someone obsessed with realism and clarity like myself. But I calmed my behind down the moment I realized that I'm totally fine with how Japanese CV banks work in UTAU. This section is lacking "V C" that a stringed list would give you. However, overlap will blend the preceding vowel and the consonant really well. 

CVC is, as the name would suggest, CVC samples (or CV and VC samples, depending on if you go by the recording name or the alias name.) There's a rather esoteric discussion to be had about the merits of stringed and unstringed, but the important thing is that it looks like, at first glance, all required samples exist. 

V is simply standalone recordings of each vowel. This is really useful and a nice addition to have.

What is missing?

I don't believe in triphones (or quadphones) in English banks. Why? Because I'm a control freak who wants to make sure that I have control of every single phoneme. So, my criteria for a full bank is simple:

• Does the bank have "- V", "V", "V -"? (RSL does.)
• Does the bank have "CV", "VC"? (RSL does.)
• Does the bank have "- C" and "C -"? (RSL does.)
• Does the bank have all common consonant clusters? (Sadly, not here.)

Having C - and - C means that I am able to smush together standalone consonants to make Lia sing something like "stoves".

audio

How is the phonetic system?

Let me start by saying that this isn't recorded with an American accent, so anyone who speaks with an American accent will be confused. I can't find any documentation with what is supposed to sound like what, so I'm just guessing. However, I know "er" universally means "@r as in bird". This bank has it sounding closer to "V". 

This isn't a fault of the list itself, and anyone who records it can record it in whatever accent they choose to. However, if you notice that it sounds off, it isn't the list's fault. It's my fault for not understanding British English.

The system is intuitive enough that I don't think I need to remake the OTO with my phonetic system. I'll be annoyed that the symbol for an aspirated "t" is used for "T" and that an umlaut vowel is used for "dZ", but I expected to be way more in the weeds with this than I am. "N" is missing from CVC, and I believe "ir" is pulling double time for "I@" and "e@".

vowel list

How is using the bank?

First, let me complain about a dumb nit-pick. I really dislike when there aren't spaces between the phonemes. For example, I want to input "l e", but to get the bank to recognize it, I have to write "le". That's the silliest little nitpick, and I could fix it in the OTO in no time.

The current OTOs are set so that all VC are actually "V C -". Depending on the exact usage, this may need to be fixed to add "V C". (Note, V C - includes the consonant inside of the pink with silence after it in white, whereas with V C, the consonant (or the space before it with plosives) itself is stretched out in the white.)

An issue with diphthongs is that you need to make sure that CV does not contain any of the second element, and I am needed to fix that a bit. That's why my list lacked them. But, for some accents they're a requirement. 

I feel like one way to improve this bank may be to have separate OTO entries for diphthong pairings that will be used in conjunction with VC and those that will be by themselves. See? I don't have to worry about this with my list!

But, it's actually fun to use a bank that uses this list. There's less worries about having VC transitions for everything, and I do like puzzles.

Who is this for?

... I don't know. CV English sounds pretty tempting. It's an interesting puzzle, but you'll get more bang for less work with a list like mine. 

I don't feel comfortable distributing someone else's list without permission, and I don't think I'll ever get permission from someone who seemingly doesn't exist. That means that for now, no one else can  really try this list out. But, if I could point you to a link, I'd say that it's a fun experiment to see how CV English fits into the larger picture of UTAU. 

Forgotten Friday #49 - 甘い音カリテ / Karite Amaine

Why does this UTAU looks so familar?! I remember seeing that face around, but I honestly have no idea. Maybe it's just that she looks quite a bit like Ankoku Kenmotsu drawn in the style of that one girl who was obsessed with USloids?? Either way. On to the article!

Forgotten Friday - 甘い音カリテ / Karite Amaine

Karite's voice provider now goes by Kuripu on Deviantart, but uses her legal name on her Twitter. I've been having a tendency to just ignore the fact that the voice provider exists recently, but I bring her up because her art is amazing and I love it. In under a decade, her art went from the icon you will see shortly to the masterpieces on her dA account.

Don't feel like you'll never be a good artist, because hard work and dedication can make your art into something you never imagined!

Who is Amaine Karite?

Official Icon Packaged with Bank

Wiki Wednesday #38 - 探歌すぴ / Supi Tanka

Operator! I need to report an emergency! . . . An amazing UTAU is getting slept on! . . . Well, yes, I know this is Pizza Hut. . . . I wasn't going to call 911 for the sake of a joke!

Wiki Wednesday #38 - 探歌すぴ / Supi Tanka

Supi Tanka's VCV is over 500 megabytes zipped. You know my hard drive is going to feel great with that weight off of its shoulders. Or... I'm not sure how to make this analogy work. Regardless, this is a huge bank. Her voice provider states that it is because she accidentally saved the samples in Stereo and not Mono. But, it's a four pitch bank. Switching to mono wouldn't make this tiny, though it would help.

So, here's how this went down. I saw the design and fell in love. I love this design so much. Then I listened to the voicebank.

Spoiler: the OTOs are wonky but I love this UTAU. Anyway, onto the article!

Who is Tanka Supi?

Official Art Packaged with Bank

Forgotten Friday #48 - 白牙マナ / Byakuga Mana

I found a blog that does something similar to me - it's even also on Blogspot. They claim to have archived 631 UTAUs at the time of writing this. I think it would take roughly five years to overtake them as the main source for archiving UTAUs in blog format... But, you know, they don't have a scheduling thing going on and I do. I could technically dump five articles in one week to become the "winner" of a contest that doesn't exist. That's just silly and not something I'd think of doing. But, you know, it's fun to do math. 

Forgotten Friday #48 - 白牙マナ / Byakuga Mana

Here's to another footnote at the bottom of another UTAU's distribution page! And, even sillier, I'm talking about this girl before I talk about the UTAU she's actually overshadowed by! I was poking around the bank and saw that there was a UST that came with the bank. Cool! I opened the UST and saw the flags "g-28n100K50Y0h40a0".

I am not going to make this user happy with my complete aversion to flags.

Who is Mana Byakuga?

Official Art Packaged with Bank

Wiki Wednesday #37 - 柿崎冬哉 / Kakizaki Toya

So, I'm not sure what to write up here. I'm kind of... ouch ouch I need to keep thinking or the headache starts creeping in!!

Wiki Wednesday #37 - 柿崎冬哉 / Kakizaki Toya

So, Toya here shares a website with an UTAU I will cover later named Nashine Natsuka. While she is flashy and has insane outfits, he is plain. Very, very plain.

I think both of those UTAUs are voiced by the same person. To which I say how?!?! This sounds like a boy! Not just a boy, but a man! I'm not Nancy Drewing なつめ, but either way, if they provide the voices for both Natsuka and Toya, they are super duper talented. I'm not sure which is harder, even! A man doing a perfect teen girl voice, or a woman doing a perfect teen boy voice?!

Who is Toya Kakizaki?

Official Art Packaged with Bank

Forgotten Friday #47 - 阿井植男 / Ai Ueo

Remember last week when I said that there is a maximum number of Jiisans that you need in life? This one is different! He has a ReaPeaks file in his voicebank!! Just one, but it's enough to see that this Jiisan uses REAPER! And he called out Grandpa Nakamiya as his inspiration!! Grandpa Nakamiya is the best Jiisan, and this guy was giving him props! How can I not be excited for this bank?!

Forgotten Friday #47 - 阿井植男 / Ai Ueo

Usually I switch up the order of the names when I'm writing the article so that, if Google crawled my blog, there would be instances of "Kasane Teto" and "Teto Kasane" (If I broke all of my rules and wrote about Teto, that is.) But I am not messing with Ai Ueo. Ueo Ai is just wrong. 

I believe that his name is written with Ateji, but I'm not smart enough to know if this is the proper time to use that terminology. Regardless, this UTAU actually has some form of character! So on to that section!

Who is Ai Ueo?

Official Icon Packaged with Bank

Wiki Wednesday #36 - Mal-Cat's Autumn Leaves

Whoops! I wasn't paying attention and wrote a few more articles between the parts of this series than I intended to! Oh well, we're here now!

Wiki Wednesday #36 - Mal-Cat's Autumn Leaves

Good news!! This bank comes with a readme and character file! Bad news... Still no icon. It's time for another Mal-Cat UTAU! This time, however, the voice provider is not Mal-Cat, and is instead SombraShadow.

I'm not exactly sure what to say, so...

Who is Autumn Leaves?

Official Art by Mal-Cat

Forgotten Friday #46 - おさコレPoid / Osakorepoid

I beg of you. Please zip your voicebank's folder and not just the contents. Nothing is as mildly inconvenient as unzipping a voicebank and it flooding the folder it is in.

Forgotten Friday #46 - おさコレPoid / Osakorepoid

I Nancy Drew'd, and I think I found the voice provider of this UTAU. I think this is their Nicovideo page. The release video for Osakorepoid has been taken down, but the description with the download link still remains. 

Other than that, there is no information on this bank. There was a website for this bank, but sadly it has went offline and the Internet Archive never saw it. So... Well..

Who is Osakorepoid?

Official Icon Packaged with Bank

Wiki Wednesday #35 - 芽目めめこ / Memeko Meme

Sadly, her name is not pronounced as "meem", the way it is pronounced in English. It is, in fact, pronounced the way that lame grandparents pronounce meme. (Well, as opposed to their mei-mei, this is just meh-meh.) This is getting away from me.

Wiki Wednesday #35 - 芽目めめこ / Memeko Meme

So, the Twitter given in Memeko Meme's ReadMe has been set to private, but it has KuroNeko's new handle in the bio. That is really awesome and considerate! I don't really have much else to say, other than I can't wait until I can read Japanese so that I can understand what her tumblr bio means.

Who is Meme Memeko?

Illustration under the break. The girl has eyes all over her body and one cyclops eye on her head. I did this before with Maron-chan, because I don't know. I have no problem with a character only having one eye, but cyclops eyes freak me out. (Fun fact, it is believed that the legend of cyclops comes from people who found elephant skulls and confused the nasal cavity for an eye socket.)

Forgotten Friday #45 - Kiwi Fukane / 不可音キウイ

So, I'm not going to Internet Archive the voice provider, credited mononymously as Katie. Most of her stuff has been taken down, and I won't go search for it. The only thing that matters is that we have Kiwi!

Forgotten Friday #45 - Kiwi Fukane / 不可音キウイ

I clicked on one of this UTAU's samples because it was named oddly. I heard the sample and smiled. This bank was recorded on a very bad microphone and that's why I love it. I don't feel bad pointing it out, because her name literally means "bad sound".

Anyway, let's not mince words!

Who is Fukane Kiwi?

Icons from UTAU Wikia and Bank

Hiatus Over!

Hey guys! I have a confession to make. I had no idea how long this hiatus had been going on for. I had been focusing on my YouTube channel so hard, I forgot to work on the blog. It was mostly because I knew I was safe until the end of November. I didn't realize that I literally had let this blog rot since mid-August.

whoops

That being said, my YouTube hiatus started just one month later.

I upped a video I made about tracing after this, but it doesn't really count

In general, I used this time to take a hiatus from life in general. I felt really frustrated in general that things weren't coming together as I had planned. I had a Patreon, I had a ko-fi. Nothing on the money front other than one friend feeling sorry for me. I had my English list and people promising to record it, but I still only had Cynpoids to play with. (And two banks that I recorded, but I'm not the biggest fan of my voice in UTAU.) As a note, one person promised to record, but got sick. I don't hold that against them, and I'm still vibrating over how happy I am that they are going to record tripitch English for me.

Wiki Wednesday #34 - 多紀音ういな / Uina Takine

So, in my last Wiki Wednesday, I ended with saying that maybe my mental disturbance was the warning shots of a migraine. Well, I'm still functional. I should go to bed to prevent it from getting bad, but maybe it will just pass over?? I hope.

Wiki Wednesday #34 - 多紀音ういな / Uina Takine

Uina's voice provider is called Planet. Planet got the Twitter handle of BroadConcept, and I'm over here like, that's really lucky that you could get that handle! That's really cool. So, yeah, let's get to the article.

Who is Takine Uina?

Official Art Packaged with Bank

Forgotten Friday #44 - 骨津アロン / Honedzu Aaron

So, thanks to my switch to Google Drive, I am now able to confidently say that I can run this blog for nine years without issue. According to a nightmare scenario of only ten percent of UTAUs on Ruto dot Yu qualifying for Forgotten Friday, I have enough content for nine years. At that point, any UTAU that has been released or will be released this year will be old enough to qualify if they fall off the map shortly. As far as Wiki Wednesday, it would take a complete 180 in how the fandom views releasing voicebanks for me to run out of content. There has been a lot of change since 2013 that worries me a tiny bit, but I don't think it's enough of a problem to worry about. One year is only 52 articles per series.

Forgotten Friday #44 - 骨津アロン / Honedzu Aaron

This is another article that I wouldn't write before my decision to just give up hopes on investigations. This UTAU is actually the sidekick to another UTAU that I will write about in the future. But, I'm just a mess and playing with seven banks is a little off the table. So, I'm going to write about this one pitch CV footnote!

Who is Aaron Honedzu?

Official Icon Packaged with Bank

Wiki Wednesday #33 - neku's Hughie / ヒューイ

Well, I'm going to feelings dump in the first section. I'd usually do it up here, but I'm really going to go on a little rant. I should just write about the UTAU, but you know, I'm not keeping a high standard here.

Wiki Wednesday #33 - neku's Hughie / ヒューイ

Being bipolar sucks. What just sucks the most is that sometimes it's impossible to read your own moods. Mixed states are a thing, and how do you even treat them? If I up my meds, I turn into a rage monster. If I lower them, I start shaking. Not even mentioning the mental feelings, but literally shaking. Granted, that's not always true. But I felt like my head was going to throw up. I don't know how to describe it other than that. So call me a Karen, but I just thought, maybe doing something that makes me happy will make my brain stop feeling like it will fly out of my skull. So far, it is helping. (Important note, last time I felt this way, it was just a warning for a migraine that kept me in bed for like five hours. Mental illness, guys!)

So, here's another UTAU that I would have saved for an investigation. There's almost no information on him. But, here we go.

Who is Hughie?

Official Art Packaged with Bank, Human Form

Forgotten Friday #43 - Gumbi500's Trem

So, fun fact about my accent. I actually can't hear the difference between "pen" and "pin" unless I really listen really hard. For that reason, I read this name as "Trim". What it really means is a shortening of "tremolo".... I think?

Forgotten Friday #43 - Gumbi500's Trem

I feel kind of bad, because I remember being friends with Trem's voice provider. But, I only knew her as Trem. I couldn't even remember her name. Well, I found out why! She's credited as Trempush Jones in the documentation of Trem's bank. She is Trem!

Now, this is going to be difficult. Trem is an English UTAU from before CVVC was common. Meaning? 単独音. There are a few VC samples spread around, and some CCV... But there's no OTO. It's a mess and any modern user would just turn around and cry if they were told to use this bank. And I almost did! But, Trem deserves respect for breaking ground before CZ. (Also, I like her voice.)

Because this will be such a mess, I am only going to use her most recent bank, found here. 

Who is Trem?

Official Icon Packaged With Bank

Wiki Wednesday #32 - Mal-Cat's Bat

See what I said about scheduling? This isn't too far removed from the first in this series that people would have forgotten, but it isn't close enough to make people bored of these UTAUs. Fun fact, however. I had forgotten to download this UTAU somehow, meaning I had to do exactly what I said I wouldn't do... Download another UTAU. 

Wiki Wednesday #32 - Mal-Cat's Bat

If Mal-Cat wasn't kind enough to organize everything so nicely on their dA, these UTAUs would be a nightmare to write about. They aren't packaged with icons, readmes, or character text files. Just the samples, the OTO, and the FRQ. I really, really dislike using images that aren't packaged with the bank, but I literally have to take images from elsewhere if I want to make this article.

What I feel morally right doing when I don't have an image from the bank itself is using one from the UTAU Visual Archive or the UTAU Wiki. But, those don't exist either! Only their dA. So, I'm sorry Mal-cat, but I gotta get the images from somewhere.

Who is Bat?

Official Art by Mal-Cat

Forgotten Friday #42 - 恋歌ラン / Renga Ran

I'm actually going to start testing something new with this blog post. As opposed to using Clyp, I'll try using Google Drive and relying on IFRAME. The reasoning is rather simple. On Clyp, I have ((322 * 60) / 15) more uploads of 15 second clips. (1,288, if you're like me and need a calculator.) However, on Google Drive, space is determined by the size of the file and not the length. If I lower the quality to 128kbps MP3, then one gigabyte of space (out of 15 free GB that I'm not even using) will get me about 3,333 uploads for the blog. Using Google Drive's preview feature will be more work, so don't be shocked if I give up! (Note, ((3,333 / 3) / 104) is ten years of this blog with an average of 3 clips per article, but if I have nothing better to put in my Drive, I could spend all of the data on this. That's over one hundred years! Without paying money, ((1,288 / 3) / 104) is four years on Clyp and that's it.)

Forgotten Friday #42 - 恋歌ラン / Renga Ran

This UTAU was a handful to get! The CV was easy, it was just on someone's getuploader dedicated to this UTAU. The VCV, though? Everyone linked to the voice provider's OneDrive... Which was deleted. Whoops.

But it was only due to the amazing UTAU Visual Archive that I was able to find the ACT 3 VCV!!!!

If you don't know me well, I love VCV. VCV is one of my favorite things. Now that I'm working more with English UTAUs, I thought I had fallen out of love with the whole VCV thing. But the second I saw the FRQs with seven mora VCV? Squee! I even checked the OTO to make sure it wasn't CVVC. It's VCV!! I'm in love!

Now, I say this before even listening to the bank. So, I may hate it. But finding a VCV that no one probably even knew existed makes me really happy!

Who is Ran Renga?

Official Icon Packaged with Bank

Wiki Wednesday #31 - Ajiata's Psyche / プシューケー

I actually giggled, covered my mouth, and said "oh... cutie..." when I saw the katakana Ajiata had given for Psyche's name. It actually is the accepted pronunciation according to Jisho, but as an American where it is pronounced サイク or サイキ depending on the context, it was just a silly little thing that made me giggle.

Wiki Wednesday #31 - Ajiata's Psyche /  プシューケー

I wouldn't have been able to write about this UTAU if I had kept with the whole "save the collectives for investigations" thing. I've double booked UTAUs for Forgotten Friday and Wiki Wednesday before, but I've just been kind of hesitant to do that. This UTAU only has one other UTAU linked to her, so I just thought... I'm doing it. I'm going to write two separate articles. 

Of course, I won't do them back to back because of a promise I made (mostly to myself, and partially for my five dedicated readers) that I wouldn't just spam one series week after week. I get it is a little silly, but maintaining this blog to begin with is really silly. 

Now, let me say, this bank's voice provider is apparently Milkychan. But that makes no sense! A Polish user with 300 subscribers gets a German singer with over 100,000 subscribers to record a bank? And Ajiata hasn't even posted a video with Psyche?! Psyche has no YouTube videos, no Wiki page... The only place she exists is on her download page on Ajiata's website. 

Is this an illegal UTAU?! (Spoiler, it's totally legal. I should probably stop writing these sections in such a hyperbolic manner.) Well, we're here...

Who is Psyche?

Official Icon Packaged with Bank

Forgotten Friday #41 - 凱歌ニケ / Gaika Nike

I "officially" list the year I quit UTAU as 2013. I did produce a tiny bit of content in 2014, but not enough to genuinely be "an UTAU user" in any serious capacity. Regardless of my weekly UTAU related content on my YouTube channel and this blog, I still don't consider myself an UTAU user. I probably should, but I don't really feel like a part of the fandom anymore. But, all of that was just to determine "when I quit the fandom" and why I still feel like I'm still done quit.

Forgotten Friday #41 - 凱歌ニケ / Gaika Nike

What is better than finding an UTAU you used to like but had forgotten about? Finding out that an UTAU that you had like but had forgotten about had a two pitch VCV released after you quit! 

Nike's creator is named 渦彦. I was not able to Nancy Drew their gender, so they are they. Nike is also they as Nike is non-binary. In this article, I will pretend that Nike just popped into existence without the help of any humans so that they only applies to one subject at this time.

Who is Nike Gaika?

Nike's Previous Design,
Packaged with Banks Released before 2015

Wiki Wednesday #30 - 滝口っぽいど / Takiguchippoido

I didn't want to include this UTAU because I find the design... just not aesthetic. But listening to the demo made me say, gosh darn it, I have to write about this guy!

Wiki Wednesday #30 - 滝口っぽいど / Takiguchippoido

Hi! I can't stand UAR files! I never install voices into UTAU. Literally. Never. Years ago, I would load UTAUs in my UTAU folder (not in Program Files) into the dropdown for easy access, but I didn't put them in Program Files.

Here's a tip, though. They open just fine in 7-Zip. I can't stand 7-Zip either, but I prefer that to taking a voyage to my Program Files. I'm deleting this UTAU after I use it, and even if I wasn't, putting the bank in a place that requires admin privileges to modify means that every change to the OTO gets eaten!! I won't tell you not to make UARs. The icon is really pretty! But if you're like me, just download 7-Zip. Ignore the install file and drag the voicebank into your voicebank folder.

Anyway, on to the article!

Who is Takiguchippoido?

Official Art Packaged with Bank

Forgotten Friday #40 - 和歌ザト / Waka Zato

So, you shouldn't really reprimand children who do stuff like this. It's better to be catfishing with UTAUs than getting into trouble and throwing cherry bombs down toilets. I mean, is it ideal? No. But is it better than some of the alternatives? Yes.

Forgotten Friday #40 - 和歌ザト / Waka Zato

LegendMaker was at it again. I was in such a rush to download everything back when I was first making my spreadsheet that I didn't notice the design. But while I was pulling up the Nicopedia article to get started on this article, I saw the design. And I knew, dang it. Another LegendMaker UTAU. I'm am so confused until I remember that this bank was recorded in March of 2009. The OTO was literally stolen from another bank. (Note: that doesn't work for CV banks, and that's why we don't do that anymore.)

Basically, I won't get into why this entire bank is just kind of screwy from a whole backstory angle. That gets too personal, so let's just move on. 

Who is Waka Zato? 

Official Art Packaged with Bank

Wiki Wednesday #29 - Mal-Cat's Mirage Seeley

This week is the beginning of trying something new. I'm not getting paid for the investigations, and I don't expect anyone to offer to pay me for them. For that reason, it's probably a good idea to just give up that idea entirely and fold the UTAUs that qualified for investigations into Forgotten Friday and Wiki Wednesday, as I am doing here.

Wiki Wednesday #29 - Mal-Cat's Mirage Seeley

For those who hate hearing addiction used in a context other than clinical addiction, I have a compulsion to download UTAUs. I only have 138 GB of space left on my hard drive, and the majority of the things taking up space are actually UTAUs. Over the course of two days, I literally downloaded ten gigabytes of UTAUs. This is a problem.

So, I'm going to be cranking these articles out at a fast pace to clean up my hard drive.

Another thing I'm going to do is fold in everything I was holding onto for Investigations into my regular articles. However, I totally see how it would be extremely annoying for someone who doesn't care about a series to be stuck reading about it for an entire month. I thought of that and thought of a solution - scheduling. I won't just do an entire series for two months straight - that would be boring. Instead, I'll schedule them out with other UTAUs between them.

I hope that is a likable compromise to everyone.

Now, I will start this by saying I have no relation to Mal-Cat. I haven't even listened to their UTAUs yet. Why would I choose their UTAUs as my first series since axing Investigations? Well, because seeing Cream Soda and all their other UTAUs, I just broke and said, "I have no reason to save things for money that will never come in." And I downloaded them all! It really helps, though, that all of the links are nice and tidy with only one bank per UTAU for the most part. Mal-cat made this easy on me without ever knowing I existed. So, thanks Mal-cat!

Who is Mirage Seeley?

Official art by Mal-cat taken from Soundcloud release track

Forgotten Friday #39 - 湾音ゐちこ / Wawon Wichiko

So, 湾 means "gulf" or "bay". That's cool and all, but why did her creator spring for adding a "w" to the official pronunciation to turn Waon into Wawon? I'm getting this directly from the Nico Nico Pedia. Anyway, who knows. 

Forgotten Friday #39 - 湾音ゐちこ / Wawon Wichiko

Good news and bad news. Bad news? Only one of Wichiko's banks is available for download. Her creator, who I can only find identified as 湾/WAN, has posted three of them to the "stickied" post on their blog. (They set the date to 2019 so that it would always be the first post. That messes with my head - 2019 being the distant future, after which you will never post on your blog again.) Two of them are 404'd.

The good news only applies to me. I only have to test one bank!

Regardless of that, I feel like I stanned Wichiko at some point, but part of me isn't sure if that was a different UTAU entirely. I never used her on my YouTube channel, but I have a feeling I didn't use a lot of the UTAUs I stanned on my YouTube channel. The only video I have that shows up when I search "Momo" (as in Momone Momo) is this. (Warning, it's not worth watching.) The name feels familiar, but the design throws me off a bit. Regardless, let's go.

Who is Wichiko Wawon?

Official Art Packaged with Bank

Wiki Wednesday #28 - 闇海風憂灯のリュウガ / Ryuuga

I took a while to decide what the voice provider's name should be in the title. I can't just use the name Ryuuga, though, because there probably several UTAUs with a similar name. I think I did okay.

Wiki Wednesday #28 - 闇海風憂灯のリュウガ / Ryuuga

After breaking my own rules last week, I figured I'd just break the spirit of them this week. While Ryuuga meets all of my criteria, she's still a Japanese bank. I'm not repping the overseas fandom that well, but this design spoke to me. I'll call her voice provider Itsuhoshi_P, as they are named on the UTAU Wiki. But, you know, I wanted the title to look all fancy pants.

Anyway, on to the article!

Who is Ryuuga?

Official Art Packaged with Bank

Forgotten Friday #38 - Bekkie Faito

While "faito" is used in Japanese to mean "fight!" or even "fighting spirit", as her voice provider intended, it makes it impossible to give Bekkie a Japanese family name with kanji. However, you can have a field day if you change it to "Haito" or "Haitou". 輩登 could possibly mean "Climb, comrades!" It's completely normal to just have the given name in katakana, but there actually is a word pronounced as "bekki." "別記". It means postscript. "冪", which is just Beki (the little tsu is removed) means exponent. None of this matters.

Forgotten Friday #38 - Bekkie Faito

As of February of 2015, Rebecca "Chiby" quit UTAU officially. She left all of the songs up and left up Bekkie's Act 2 bank. She obviously wanted to allow people to continue using Bekkie, even if she herself quit. 

If you're interested in seeing the works Chiby posted of Bekkie, check out her UTAU YouTube channel. 

Who is Bekkie Faito?

Official Box Art from UTAU Wikia

Wiki Wednesday #27 - 叶千麟 / Ye Qianlin

This is random, because I kind of set out not to do this. This UTAU is Chinese and her entire website is Chinese. This feature was meant to show off the English speaking fandom primarily, but sometimes you just feel "lol so random penguin!!"

Wiki Wednesday #27 - 叶千麟 / Ye Qianlin

In researching for a future article (風南メル, if you're wondering), I sauntered over to the "links" section of his site. In what kind of world do I not click random buttons? Basically, I just felt like doing something, so I did!

Ye Qianlin was created by Jellymog. Jellymog is an amazing artist and can communicate in Chinese and Japanese. Anyway, on to the article!

Who is Ye Qianlin?

Official Art Packaged With Bank

Forgotten Friday #37 - Hairaku Ihiku / 敗楽イヒク

Regardless of how I feel about Legendmaker in the current era, Legendmaker was a literal child in 2009 and 2010. A child displaying these behaviors is normal and can be encouraged as it is a very positive hobby to draw and play with technology. I may be snarky about it, but I don't view it as some crime for a kid to be a kid.

Forgotten Friday #37 - Hairaku Ihiku / 敗楽イヒク

So, I've mentioned how Legendmaker's UTAUs represent a certain era and are a part of UTAU's history. Nothing shows that better than the fact that this UTAU was the first UTAU of 2010 (as according to Ruto).

This UTAU is a bit of a trip, though. No NicoVideo release, no YouTube video, and a ReadMe that is in one hundred percent English. He's saying he wants to quit because no one uses his UTAUs. Which, to be fair, like... You know... He was a kid, so even a decade later I want to be tactful. If there was another kid in this scenario, I would tell them to focus on one UTAU and to commission a design and some great art for that one UTAU. Because, like, well... 

Who is Ihiku Hairaku?

Official Art Packaged with Bank

Wiki Wednesday #26 - softly deerla

Being an adult means that everyone under seventeen is a tiny little baby. According to some basic math, Deerla's voice provider was only eleven when she made Deerla. That just warms my heart.

Wiki Wednesday #26 - softly deerla

I will not say a single mean thing about this UTAU. Though her voice provider is now sixteen years old (according to her profile on the utaforum), Khristian W. was too young to even be allowed on the internet when she made Deerla! When you make an UTAU, that little piece of you is frozen in time. So, I don't see these banks as something a sixteen year old made years ago - I see them frozen in time as tiny little babies.

Who is softly deerla?

Official Art Packaged with Bank

Forgotten Friday #36 - 貴野アキ / Takano Aki

This technically should be a "recovered" UTAU, but I'm not doing that series anymore due to the whole not having enough time thing. It's not really an interesting story, even. I just checked the internet archive because the domain was for sale.

Forgotten Friday #36 - 貴野アキ / Takano Aki

Sometimes you get into a lucky stride where you can just write about UTAUs that only have one one pitch CV bank for a bit. No VCV. No multiple audio files. You can even hand fix the OTOs and spend as much time as it would take rendering off five different samples from five different banks!

The down side is obviously that half of those times, there's just not much to say. It's an old UTAU that was abandoned after one CV bank.

In addition to the fact that this is technically recovered and not found, apparently Aki has a sibling named Yuki. However, I believe that by some magic, only Aki was able to survive. I've checked up, down, and all around and could only get the link for Aki to work, sadly. Regardless, let's get to this.

Who is Aki Takano?

The only image I could find; From Release Video

Wiki Wednesday #25 - 魔論ちゃん / Maron-chan

This article will probably be pretty short. I'm pretty sure this is a joke UTAU. Some tiny research shows that this UTAU breaks my rules for Wiki Wednesday, as "na" has a ton of UTAUs apparently. However, as I could only find them using a method that rarely works, I didn't even bother looking until just now. Like I said last week, I'm breaking my rules because nyoom. 

Wiki Wednesday #25 - 魔論ちゃん / Maron-chan

I really debated whether I should include this. I have a really weak stomach for horror, but I just reminded myself that I have no problem with Mike Wazowski, so I could stomach this girl.

Her voice provider has been missing from NicoVideo since 2013, but amazingly she is still on Twitter to this day. At least I think? When you search the Twitter handle given on NicoVideo, the account has been suspended. (What the heck did they do to get suspended?!) However, when you search that handle, the only time it comes up is when this account tweeted the name. I sent that user a tweet asking if the Okota in the ReadMe was the Okota using that account. I'll update this when I get a concrete response. (The only one I got so far was "んー？" and that doesn't tell me yes or no.)

Who is Maron-chan?

I usually put the picture above the break, but don't click "read more" if you're freaked about limbless spheres with only one eye.

Forgotten Friday #35 - Ironai Yoti / 色ナイヨチ

Who is this UTAU? When doing research I found out that this UTAU was made by someone really, really cool. But that doesn't fully explain why this UTAU only exists on Nicovideo.

Forgotten Friday #35 - Ironai Yoti / 色ナイヨチ

Okay so, before even listening to this UTAU, I found the creator. Their name is Yotty, and they are amazing at art. Not just that, they have some of the best prices vs value ratio on their commissions I've ever seen. If I ever got money and made an OC, I would be paying them their insanely low prices to get beautiful art. Seriously, I had to close the tab with their blog on it like five times because I just kept going back to look at their art. It hit me in the feels. 

Me giving a shout out is completely pointless. I'm lucky to get five views on an article. But still, I have to fawn when I feel like fawning. Regardless, this has nothing to do with the UTAU in question. Let's get to that!

Who is Yoti Ironai?

Official Art Packaged with Bank

Wiki Wednesday #24 -夜鷹センリ / Senri Yodaka

In a rather deserted area of town, there was a bar. They didn't get much traffic, but they did get a lot of non-paying customers. Due to those non-paying customers, they hung a sign that said "No jokes allowed." One day, a chicken walked in. Of course, chickens don't even have pockets to hold money. The bartender asked, "Are you a joke?" The chicken nervously clucked. The bartender responded, "Go to the bar across the road."

Wiki Wednesday #24 -夜鷹センリ / Senri Yodaka

Let me start by saying that there might be more than a few banks that break the rules that I downloaded in my latest binge. There were one or two I didn't even look up on YouTube when I saw how abysmal the views were on the linked Nicovideo videos.

I'm not really going to double check, because I've binged enough for fifteen articles and I need to get them all out so that I can feel like I accomplished something.

Anyway, I noticed the cutest thing on this UTAU's distribution page. Senri's voice provider spells "download" as "downlord". Which does make sense, in the fact that sometimes a long vowel in Japanese is used to represent a rhotacized vowel in English. Anyway, on to the article.

Who is Yodaka Senri?

Official Art Packaged With Bank

Forgotten Friday #34 - 蘭歌ロサ / Ranka Rosa

Still not functioning 100%, but this isn't too painful and will let me spend more time not being afraid of time catching up to me.

Forgotten Friday #34 - 蘭歌ロサ / Ranka Rosa

Ranka Rosa looks like a legit name, not going to lie. Of course, Rosa probably was a tell it was an overseas name, but I didn't expect what I got.

So, little backstory. Legendmaker was like obsessed with getting girls to make UTAUs for him and then just kind of... letting them die. That sounds awful, but, I don't know. Maybe kind of? I don't know if the girls were expecting their UTAUs to get used more than once and then have their videos deleted. Maybe they didn't even care about UTAU and recorded the recording list in Audacity to shut the guy up? Meh. That's all I'll say on that.

Who is Rosa Ranka?

Official Icon Packaged with Bank

Wiki Wednesday #23 - 菖蒲・ヴィルジニー / Ayame Virginie

Okay, making good headway. I'm feeling better. Maybe the sun went behind the clouds and it stopped being as stupid hot.

Wiki Wednesday #23 - 菖蒲・ヴィルジニー / Ayame Virginie

I won't lie. Seeing the name Ayame Virginie made me think this UTAU was from a former Soviet Bloc country. But, the character file and the readme file make it obvious that her voice provider, Peka_Chi, is in fact Japanese. 

Now, Ayame (as the word I won't even try to spell is her last name) has really big banks for a one pitch CV. Her second bank is over eighty megabytes because her samples are five seconds long. Ouch.

Who is Ayame Virginie?

Official Icon Packaged With Bank

Forgotten Friday #33 - ユウイト / Yuuito

Hi there. My brain is broken. There is no telling when it will get fixed. This article will be lacking, and I apologize.

Forgotten Friday #33 - ユウイト / Yuuito

This is a doozy, and could result in me spending quite some time tracking down leads to figure out why the only time this UTAU was ever used or mentioned was on Nico, but it's romaji encoded with an English character file. Why is "oto.txt" a character file?

Now, the answer to all of this may surprise you.

Yuuito was uploaded to NicoVideo by someone going by Fuku, who used manly pronouns. (Not male - MANLY. ORE.) So, okay, Yuuito is an UTAU by some dude.

Not so fast! There's a reason that there was no trace of Yuuito on YouTube. He had been on YouTube! How did I learn this? Well, Yuuito's bank is packaged with the most dA box art possible. That isn't an insult to dA or the box art - it's just like how you know a Sonic OC is a Sonic OC by taking one look at them. So, I looked it up and found his voice provider. Do you want proof? Check the description of some of his art. Another nail in the proof coffin? Remember Fuku from before? Now her name is Fyukue on her new dA account. (Her art is really good.)

It all became a circle.

Fyukue has obviously distanced herself from Yuuito. That asks the question - should we write about him? Yes. It's not hard to delete files from Mediafire, guys. If you don't want me sneaking into nursing homes and dragging out your geriatric UTAUs... This metaphor is ending badly.

Who is Yuuito?

Official Icon Packaged with Bank