Unleash is at least partially responsible for an interesting dynamic in my household. My daughters are huge fans of the Sunday morning anime ‘Precure’ (Pretty Cure), in which seemingly ordinary girls gain super powers and fight evil through various means (which change annually along with the cast, creating an evergreen suite of merch for parents to acquire). In Unleash, the Band Maid girls go through a similar transformation into kick-arse anime super heroines. Because my daughters also love Band Maid, they are now convinced that:
1. Precure heroines are a real thing
2. The Band Maid girls are real Precure superheroines
and therefore
3. My daughters are also able to become real precure superheroines.
I’m disinclined to disabuse them of the notion, though I expect it will mean at some point I need to get to grips with a heat gun and EVA foam to create the right costumes. I discovered Band Maid because I was looking for strong female role models for my girls. This wasn’t how I was expecting it would go, but I’m going with it.
Unleash is fan service from end to end, in the best way possible. I’ll leave it to Wave Potter to break down the various easter-eggs and callbacks in the music video. He also has an awesome breakdown of the music. I’m 100% on board with the idea this song is an autobiographical tale of the band’s battle against the challenges thrown at them by COVID, their struggles to overcome hardship and ultimately their triumphant return as they unleash themselves upon the world.
To the lyrics:
How many times?
繰り返す眩暈 咳き込んだ
絡みついたリボンでもう動けない
I’m losing my mind.
繰り返す — kurikaesu — repeat(edly)
眩暈 — memai — dizzy, dizziness
咳き込んだ — seki konda — coughing fit, violent coughing
絡みついたリ — karamitsuitari — karamitsuku is ‘entwine’ or coil around. ‘tari’ is ‘and such like’, doing things like
リボン — ribon — ribbon(s)
もう — mou — has a few meanings depending on context. In this case it’s ‘anymore’
動けない — ugokenai — cannot move
How many times have I done this? Dizzy and coughing
Bound up in ribbons, unable to move.
I’m losing my mind
If you were unfamiliar with the band and the chronology of this release, the theme and the lyrics might not make a whole lot of sense up-front, but with timeline in mind, this seems a pretty clear throw to COVID fun.
Which is the best？善も 悪も 極端だ
ブレずに 選べ遊べ追い込んで
善 — zen — good
悪 — aku — evil
も — mo — as well as
極端 — kyokutan — extreme
ブレずに — burezu ni — without wavering.
選べ — erabe — choose. (imperative — a command)
遊べ — asobe — play. (also imperative)
追い込んで — oikonde — chase
Which is the best? Good and Evil are both extremes.
Without wavering, choose! Play! Get after it
Glowing Glowing Glow up！！
I’m curious, given that there isn’t a real distinction in Japanese between ‘r’ and ‘l’ whether ‘grow up’ might have been the intent here. There’s no real distinction between ‘u’ and ‘a’ either, which is occasionally awkward, if not amusing.
そんな尺度は必要ないから
待ってるよ ずっと My mind is made up.
そんな — sonna — that sort of, to that extent
尺度 — shakudo — measure, gauge
必要ない — hitsuyou nai — unnecessary
から — because
待ってるよ — matteru yo — I’m waiting (for you)
ずっと — zutto — always, continuously, all the way
You don’t need that sort of measure
I’m waiting for you. My mind is made up.
激情的Emotion
Showtime
この瞬間が動き出すんだ
Unleash！！！！！
もっと
Dan！ Dan！ Di, di, dan！ Dan！
激情的 — gekijouteki — passion, raw emotion. Adding ‘teki’ at the end creates an adjective whose English language equivalent would probably end in ‘~istic’ or ‘~ical’.
この — kono — this
瞬間 — shunkan — instant, moment
動き出すんだ — ugoki dasu nda — start to move
もっと — motto — more
Passionate emotion. Showtime.
This is the moment that sets things in motion.
Unleash! More
How many times？
変わる事を恐れない
そのまま 全て進め理想郷
Glowing Glowing Glow up！！
変わる事 — kawaru koto — thing that changes
恐れない — osorenai — to not be afraid
そのまま — sono mama — as-is
全て — subete — all, everything
進め — susume — advance, go forward (an imperative)
理想郷 — risoukyou — paradise, utopia
How many times? Don’t be afraid of change.
Go forward to paradise, just as you are.
Glowing Glowing Glow up!!
いつも何度も迷いながら
決心をちゃんと
Fake it till you make it.
いつも — always, all the time
何度も — nando mo — any number of times, repeatedly
迷い — mayoi — lost, confused, bewildered
ながら — nagara — whilst doing/being
決心 — kesshin — determination
ちゃんと — chanto — diligently, earnestly
Always in the midst of confusion
Take your determination and fake it ‘til you make it.
My translation here is a bit different from the subtitles in BM’s own video. They go with ‘Always repeating, searching for the way. Don’t lose your faith, Fake it till you make it’. My translation is a bit more literal. They’ve taken a bit of poetic license, probably for readability and style.
Some folks seem to take a negative connotation from ‘fake it til you make it’, but in the context of the song (having been swallowed by the evil covid cloud monster and in the midst of some sort of aimless despondency), I think its more of a ‘grind it out and do the thing that you don’t really want to do, and the urge to do the thing will return’.
Back to the chorus, with a slight variation.
激情的Emotion
Showtime
この瞬間を待っていたんだ
Unleash！！！！！
もっと
Dan！ Dan！ Di, di, dan！ Dan！
この — kono — this
瞬間 — shunkan — moment
待っていたんだ — matte ita nda — was waiting (for)
Passionate emotion. Showtime.
This is the moment I was waiting for.
Unleash! More
I’m still chasing my dreams.
何処にもないただ掴むだけ
何処にもない — doko ni mo nai — nowhere
ただ — however
掴む — ukamu — seize, grasp
だけ — dake — only, just
I’m still chasing my dreams.
They’re nowhere (to be found), but just grab them.
We hit a sort of bridge which has a cool syncopated rhythm to work with their rhyming lyrics:
一か八か伸るか反るか
雨に晴れに風にたまに曇りのAnytime
巡り巡りたどり着いた光
ichi ka hachi ka noru ka soru ka
ame ni hare ni kaze ni tama ni kumori anytime
meguri meguri tadori tsuita hikari
一か八か — ichi ka bachi ka — literally ‘one or eight’ — win or lose, make or break
伸るか反るか — noru ka soru ka — make or break, all or nothing
雨に — ame ni — in rain
晴れに — hare ni — in fine weather
風に — kaze ni — in wind
たまに — tama ni — sometimes, now and then
曇り — kumori — cloudy
巡り — meguri — circulation, circumference. Twice in succession can be taken to mean ‘round and round’.
たどり着いた — tadori tsuita — finally arrived. ‘tadoru’ means to follow or trace a path. ‘tsuita’ is the past tense of ‘tsuku’ — to arrive, so this is a compound verb that means to have arrived after a journey.
光 — hikari — light, illumination
Win or lose, make or break
Rain or shine, wind or clouds
Anytime
Round and round, we’ve arrived at the light (at last).
When I first began learning Japanese, it surprised me how little Japanese music uses rhyming lyrics, given the language naturally lends itself to rhyme.
踏み出す一歩は In for a dime, in for a dollar.
期待を超えた未来が待ってる
Now we go！！
踏み出す — fumidasu — to step forward, to embark
一歩 — ippo — one step
In for a dime, in for a dollar.
Stride forward. In for a dime, in for a dollar.
Doesn’t sound quite as clever in English without the rhyme of 一歩は (ippo wa) with ‘for a dollar’.
期待を超えた未来が待ってる
Now we go！！
期待 — kitai — expectation
超えた — koeta — surpassed
未来 — mirai — future
待ってる — matteru — is waiting (contraction of ‘matte iru’)
kitai wo koeta mirai ga matteru
A future beyond your expectations is waiting.
Now we go!
Dan！ Dan！ Di, di, dan！ Dan！(x2)
Chorus (same as first) and a bit of kazari eigo to round us out.
We’re the next number.
So, we are holding up the flag.
約束するから
Welcome, next new world.
Dan！ Dan！ Di, di, dan！ Dan！
約束 — yakusoku — promise
する — suru — to do
から — kara — because
We’re the next number.
So we’re holding up the flag
Because I promise,
Welcome next new world.
This song is great fun. The lyrics are upbeat and inspirational; matching the autobiographical nature of the MV. There are a bunch of callbacks to earlier works and band members’ own unique characteristics; Pigeons, bananas, whiskey, Mincho’s complete infatuation with Saiki, a killer set of fangs.
As a complete aside, I read somewhere that Saiki used to be self-conscious about her teeth. She seems to have gotten past that now, which is awesome. They’re part of her character, and very likely part of her sound. I remember an interview with the late, great Chrissy Amphlett of the Divinyls who also had a distinctive set of chompers. Their US representation told her she’d neet to get her teeth fixed if they wanted to make it big in the States. She had braces put in, but took them out again when she noticed it changed how she sounded. Whether or not you liked their music they were a group with some real integrity. Something Band Maid has in spades.
If the maids ended up with their own cartoon, I’m 100% certain my girls would watch the hell out of it. Of course I would be forced to grit my teeth and endure such a hardship alongside them. Sometimes this sort of Herculean sacrifice is required of a dad. In the meantime, they’ll have to make do with this song on heavy rotation.
As I write this, I’ve just come back from the band’s 10 year anniversary tour finale at Yokohama arena. As triumphant returns go, it would have been difficult to ask for more. A 30+ song setlist to crowd eight thousand strong is a pretty solid way to proclaim victory. Watching the show, I found myself unreasonably happy for them. They earned it. From here — onwards and upwards. 期待を超えた未来が待ってる。Now we go.