Halcali in What's In? (2)

Here's the next part from the Halcali pull out magazine from What's In? #242. It's commentary from Haruka and Yukari on their For Life releases. The commentary doesn't extend to anything they've done on Sony, perhaps because those single releases were already covered in Halcali's track by track commentary on their new album which was also featured in the magazine (and which I'll get to next).

It's described as 'commentary', but as you might expect each entry is quite brief. Although it's a shame that they aren't given the space to go into a bit more depth about these early releases, there is still the odd anecdote or two that you might find interesting.

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1st single Tandem 2003/01/08

Back then some people said that the problem with this song was that we sounded lazy, like we weren’t trying, but how could anyone think that? We sang our hearts out on it. I mean, we were only in Junior High School at the time! On the day it was released, a friend of ours played the song over the speakers during lunch time. I was embarrassed, but grateful. (Haruka)

2nd single Electric Sensei 2003/04/09

It’s kind of about having a good relationship between student and teacher. It’s set in school, so it’s a bit hard for us to relate to it now. This is the time when we were always playing games and wearing our voices out before we went into the studio. That’s what we were like back then! (Yukari)

3rd single Giri Giri Surf Rider 2003/07/09

This song gave us out first TV appearance. (Haruka)
It was for a programme broadcast on the BBC in England (Adam and Joe Go Tokyo). I love the video, it’s the first time we made a ‘story’ to go with the music. (Yukari)

1st album Halcali Bacon 2003/09/03

I love the song Hello Hello Alone. I still cry listening to it now! (Yukari).
For me it’s Ah Halcali Sensation. “Okachan, Troussier, Zico, Zico” The lyrics are really tied into that era. It’s like, “we’ve got Osim now!”*1 (Haruka)

4th single Strawberry Chips 2003/11/26

The limited edition release had 2 extra tracks, and they’re such good songs. They haven’t been released anywhere else! (Yukari)
I really want people to listen to Slalom ’03. It’s a great tag team up between Halfby and Kohei Japan! (Haruka)

5th single Marching March 2004/06/09

This song is really popular with the fans. DJ Non’s acting is great in the video! (Yukari)
The lyrics grapple with some bigger ideas in this song then what we were used to. I like the way it kind of looks down from above, and gives you another perspective [on idol culture]. (Haruka)

Compilation Makogoro Covers 2004/09/01

I love this song, and for about a year we always closed our set with it, even though it’s not even one of our own!(Yukari)

6th single Baby Blue 2004/10/20

This is the first song we made with Verbal (the second being Cyborg’s Koi No Bububun). It has a sample from Boowy’s B-Blue. It’s magnificent! (Yukari)
The raps that Verbal wrote were really fast. So fast in fact that I was tripping over myself repeatedly trying to get it right. I got used to his style eventually, but it was difficult. (Haruka)

2nd album Ongaku No Susume 2004/11/24

This album featured our first guest singers in Utamaru (Wakakusa Dance) and Tanigawa Shuntaro (Shibafu). History features my grandfather and Haruka’s grandmother too! (Yukari)
My favourite song is probably Densetsu No Futari. It’s got such a cute, gentle feel to it. (Haruka)

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I don't want to go back over my list of usual Sony complaints, but just glancing down that discography it's obvious that For Life took a lot better care of Halcali than their currant label. Their first three singles released about three months apart then their first album right after- it's not hard to see how a label should go about trying to maintain their bands' popularity and exposure.

In case you forgot, there was about a one year gap between Baby Blue! and Tip Taps Tip, then another 11 month gap between Twinkle Star and LOOK.

Anyway, I really liked that anecdote about their friend playing Tandem over the school speakers. Reading the comments on Electric Sensei though makes me wonder if they'll ever perform it live again.

*1 As I'm sure you know, the Okachan, Troussier, Zico, Zico line in Ah, Halcali Sensation is a reference to the last three managers of the Japanese national football team (Okachan is Takeshi Okada). Their currant manager is Ivica Osim.