Overview
“Re:package” is the debut album released by Japanese music group livetune under the name of “livetune feat. Hatsune Miku”.
Background of the Production
Livetune launched their activities as a music group of two members, kz and kajyuki-P in 2007. They were Senzoku Gakuen College of Music students at that time.
The livetune name is derived from “Ableton Live” (a digital audio workstation software developed by Ableton, Germany) and “Auto-Tune” (a pitch correction software developed by Antares Audio Technologies, the US).
“Hatsune Miku” is a virtual singer software developed in 2007 by Crypton Future Media and powered by Yamaha’s voice synthesizer software “Vocaloid”. The voice data of Hatsune Miku was created by sampling the voice of Japanese voice actress Saki Fujita.
In 2007, livetune released their songs featuring Hatsune Miku on vocals on Dwango’s video sharing service Nico Nico Douga and Avex Digital’s music distribution service muzie, and they got attention on the Internet.
At that time, their song “Packaged” got a total of over 700 thousand views on Nico Nico Douga.
Commentary
“Re:package” was released as a doujin (self-published) music CD of 12 tracks in 2007.
Most of the songs on the album were previously released on the Internet. All the tracks featured Hatsune Miku on vocals.
The doujin edition of the album was sold in Comic Market (a doujin convention) and doujin shop Comic Toranoana, and it sold out.
After that, the commercial distribution edition of the album was released by major label Victor Entertainment in 2008 with three additional tracks. The jacket illustration of the album was drawn by illustrator redjuice.
The commercial distribution edition reached number 5 on the Oricon Weekly Chart.
The commercial distribution edition of “Re:package” is the first major-label Vocaloid album featuring Hatsune Miku’s character and name.
The album is characterized by its soothing electropop songs with glittering sounds and catchy melodies, four-on-the-floor rhythm in the house/techno styles, and Hatsune Miku’s striking vocals.
In this album, livetune processed Hatsune Miku’s voices by the use of Auto-Tune as an effector and made a unique vocal sound.
In 2009, livetune released “Re:MIKUS”, an album that contains remixes of the songs included in “Re:package”.
“Re:package” and “Re:MIKUS” were reissued on SHM-CD in 2010.
In 2017, subscription music services started distributing “Re:package” and “Re:MIKUS”.
Track Listing (The Commercial Distribution Edition)
- “Anthem” (written and composed by kz) – 4:12
- “Packaged” (written and composed by kz) – 4:53
- “over16bit! (Full ver.)” (written and composed by kajyuki) – 5:30
- “Shooting Star” (written by yae, composed by kajyuki) – 3:00
- “Nijiiro” (written and composed by kz) – 5:54
- “Momiji” (written by yae, composed by kajyuki) – 3:57
- “Light Song” (written and composed by kz) – 5:05
- “Lilachorn” (written by Elina, yae, composed by kajyuki) – 5:03
- “Hibi no Yume-omoi” (written by Elina, composed by kajyuki) – 6:07
- “Finder” (written and composed by kz) – 5:11
- “Doki Doki HeartTune” (written by yae, composed by kajyuki) – 4:38
- “Strobe Nights” (written by yae, composed by kz) – 5:44
- “Last Night, Good Night” (written and composed by kz) – 6:20
- “Packaged (piano ver.)” – 6:05
- “our music” (written and composed by kz) – 7:15