#materialise

Hi there!!

I might not be able to tell you which notes they are singing or whether they are doing head voice, vibrato, falsetto or whatever BUT I am pretty good at discerning the voices of Wakana, Keiko and Hikaru. Having said that, I will admit that this is one of the hardest songs to decipher since both Yuriko and Wakana try to sing in a similar fashion. Anyways, here we go〈(•ˇ‿ˇ•)-→

First of all, HERE is my POST where I provide download links for the “FJ BEST of Yuki Kajiura Live” albums. The audio version of “MATERIALISE” that anon is referring to is featured on DISC 2 of “FictionJunction 2008-2010 The BEST of Yuki Kajiura LIVE“. The performance is from【2010.1.9 Yokohama BLITZ】Yuki Kajiura LIVE vol.#5～Japanese Seal SP LIVE～ which had Yuriko, Keiko, Wakana and Kaori as main vocalists.

I like to divide MATERIALISE into “yo-ho-he” sections since that particular chant is sung multiple times (6x to be precise) throughout the song. The first two “yo-ho-he”s are definitely done by Yuriko who is the main vocalist for about a minute of the song. Her vocals are very crisp and clear, she sings her lines effortlessly.

Around 1:13 Wakana takes the lead and sings the next two “yo-ho-he”s throughout the midsection. Personally I think she does a very good job but you can tell she is not doing her parts as effortlessly as Yuriko. During the other high parts of the middle chunk and the ending there is a lot of harmonising taking place between Wakana and Yuriko so it’s not really possible to make out a single lead (Kaori is also providing some high and low range harmonies and Keiko is in charge of the lower registers as always.)

The 5th “yo-ho-he” which starts at around 3:48 is what I am struggling with most because it doesn’t sound quite like Yuriko at the beginning but also not necessarily like Wakana in the middle. I am leaning more towards it being Wakana though but I could be wrong. If it IS Wakana then she improved her technique compared to her first two “yo-ho-he”s. If it is Yuriko then I guess she changed her singing style a bit. Anyways, from that point onwards we are back to Yuriko as lead vocalist till the end of the song. The final “yo-ho-he” can be ascribed to Yuriko again although for some reason I feel like Yuriko and Wakana might be singing it in unison (it’s hard to tell but for me it doesn’t sound like it’s just one voice singing it except for the very last line).