Every new English song for anime hit Your Name previewed in teaser video【Video】

”Zenzenzense” isn’t the only song getting new English vocals from original Japanese singer Yojiro Noda.

While English-dubbed character dialogue has carved out what appears to be a permanent place for itself in the Western anime market, English re-recordings of anime songs have largely met with the opposite fate. After a brief rash of attempts in the 1990s, which were almost summarily dismissed and/or derided by Western consumers, most English-territory anime publishers went back to using the Japanese vocals for both subtitled and dubbed versions of their products.

So it’s kind of surprising that for its North American dubbed screenings, the handlers of hit anime film Your Name are flipping the pages of the playbook back and using new versions of the movie’s songs that have English vocals. But there’s a twist, in that the English versions are written and performed by the same person responsible for the Japanese originals: Japanese rock band Radwimps’ singer Yojiro Noda.

Last month, we got a preview of the English version of “Zenzenzense,” the infectiously upbeat anthem most strongly associated with the film. But that’s just one of the songs in Your Name which feature Noda’s voice, and this new video showcases all four in their English forms.

In addition to “Zenzenzense,” the video shares samples of the powerful “Dream lantern,” emotional “Sparkle,” and simultaneously driving and soothing “Nandemonaiya.”

Theatergoers in Japan who attended special Your Name screenings which replaced the original songs while keeping the Japanese dialogue in place have been enjoying these songs since last month, but the CD release of the new music is coming up on February 22 in Japan. And, of course, they’ll be present in the dubbed North American release of Your Name, which is coming in less than two months, on April 7.

Source, images: YouTube/radwimpsstaff

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