vocaloid is, first and foremost, an instrument. a computer program, similair to an online composing resource, or an electronic piano. the vocaloid program is a music creation program where one will input notes, pitches, lyrics, and other variable changes, and create a singing voice. of course, when most people think of vocaloid, they don't think of the program. they think of the mascots. hatsune miku, the kagamines, meiko, kaito, luka. the tretchery of images, a painting by rene magritte, represents something similair. though there is a pipe painted on the canvas, it is not a pipe. it is a symbol of a pipe, a suggestion. it's there so that your brain can imagine a pipe.
hatsune miku is the image connected to the vocaloid, the synth. and yet, i find myself having such a deep relationship with her. she helped me out of my worst times, she held my hand, she was there when nobody else could or would be. i don't think, "this song saved me.". i tend to think more of "miku saved me", as it was the idea of her that motivated me.
but behind her, there are millions of songwriters, lyricists, artists, composers, creators, that have managed to bring her to life. today, i wanted to talk about the exististential side of the vocaloid fandom, the songs dirrectly from the producers to miku herself.
it's not vocaloid if we don't bring it up. this song is by cosmo, and about hatusne miku being deleted from existance. it actually stirred up quite the ruckus, as many actually were lead on to beleive that miku had actually died. in the early 2010s, a lot of people closely associated miku to vocaloid, having the idea that, as she was singing songs, she was the one who wrote them. the phrase "music by:hatsune miku" was popular then, in constast to crediting the producer. "I'm born and come to realize/I'm merely an imitation of humans/Even knowing this, I keep singing", only seemed to nail the coffin harder. dirrect sorts of association with miku and the program, really and truly caused many to see her as more than just a mascot. such unbashed display of emotions from "miku" was something people greived.
for cosmo especially, this was probably ear-grating. he eventually released a response song (seperate from the infinity series), named the real disappearance of hatsune miku. this song, opposing the OG, was sung by gumi, who seems to be used as cosmo's stand-in. the song description "I've come here to end your repeated lie of retirement.", seems to be a refference to how people constantly worried about miku disappearing. but, i think, when looking back at it today, it also easily reflects the worries of everyone that vocaloid would one day die out. of course, it hasn't yet, due to new games being released, producers churning out new songs, and new social media platforms like Tiktok. "It's foolish to be so sympathetic/Towards consumer goods" is another dirrect statement, of cosmo's frustration against the fact that more people seemed to love his miku than him. it hurts to listen to, knowing that the song was composed due to the hopelessness and spite of disappearing behind the thing that you once stood beside happily.