An interview with Yoshimasa Hosoya (voice of Yamato) on the Digimon Adventure tri. website, surrounding his participation in the series, and the Part 3 (Confession) ending theme song “To Me” (僕にとって).
The series’s band, “KNIFE OF DAY”, makes their major label debut!
We’ve posted an extended interview with the actor playing the vocalist and bassist, Yamato Ishida!
Yoshimasa Hosoya talks about his feelings and how he approached the recording!
Please tell us about your honest feelings about singing the ED theme as a representative of “KNIFE OF DAY”.
This is a series that has been going on for a long time, and the announcement of the screening for Part 1 was a huge hot topic, and the voice cast had changed so much, and I felt that, especially when it came to the fact I’d be playing Yamato, there were a lot more negative than positive opinions. So when I was doing the post-recording for Part 1, I really tried to tread with caution. However, after that, there was an event called DigiFes that I participated in, and they read out a letter from Kouji Wada-san, and there were people of all sorts of different ages, but so many of them were crying. I remembered what it was like when I was a kid and cried because an anime I liked was about to end, and so I thought, if these kinds of pure-hearted people will be watching this, now the pressure’s really on for Part 2 (laughs). In regards to the song I sang for this, “To Me”, I really, really enjoyed hearing the demo version of it, and I thought, I put my all into singing for this, trying to convey the emotions in it, and I really hope it’ll resonate with everyone.
There have been a lot of ending songs sung for this series, by vocalists such as AiM-san and Kouji Wada-san. Did that add any pressure?
I hadn’t even sung yet, and I was still embarrassed at the thought of the song playing over the ending visuals (laughs). Nowadays, there are a lot of voice actors who have entirely separate careers as singers, and when I listen to their music, it sounds so professional…I can’t do that, so I was really worried if it’d turn out all right.
What kind of song is the ending song, “To Me”?
When I first listened to it, my first thought was that it was Yamato’s feelings for Gabumon. A certain thing happened in the story that separated them from their Digimon, and we’d recorded this after the post-recording for that scene, so I couldn’t stop thinking about that. That said, I’ve been involved in a lot of character songs before now, and many of them directly used lines from the script or referred to direct story beats, but “To Me” wasn’t like that, and I felt that the lyrics were based on the story on a larger scale, and I think the fact the song isn’t too narrowly specific makes it the kind of song that all kinds of people can empathize with.
Is there anything about it you’re looking forward to?
Hearing it in the theater is going to put it on a completely different level. It’s technically a character song, but it’s going to have theater-level sound quality, so I’m really looking forward to that.
How about the B-side song, “WHICH”?
I really love the lyrics! The lyrics are about someone trying to find himself. If we’re going to relate this to Digimon, Taichi and his friends are growing into adults, and they’re fighting alongside their Digimon, but that fighting might destroy their city. Up until now, it might have been normal for them to fight against enemies with their Digimon, but for the average person, it’d be hard to deal with buildings collapsing, and while everyone’s worrying about that, Yamato wants to fight as passionately as he used to. He’s that kind of person who doesn’t change much, and that’s exactly why he comes off as cold to everyone, and I thought that the story (lyrics) might be about that kind of struggle.
In closing, please leave a message for the fans.
I feel that singing an ending theme song for a series like Digimon Adventure, with such a long history, is a very big deal for someone in the anime industry. Being chosen to take the role of Yamato Ishida involved a lot of people making that decision, like the production team and the staff, and I think they picked me with the expectation that I was going to be doing this ending theme, and I’m very grateful, I really am.
But in the end, it is a piece of entertainment media, and you’ll all be listening to it, and there’s still a long way to go. So, as the first step into all of this, the fact I was picked for this role means that they want me to make all of the people watching Digimon Adventure tri. — Part 3: Confession happy when they hear the ending theme song, so I hope everyone will enjoy the ending song as a part of the whole series, especially with the theater-level sound quality. I think that’s where it’s really going to hit your heart, so please come see the movie at the theater!