#inpine

[ayara-resara]

KA & STR covers by INPINE

[voca-song-a-day]

Today's featured song is: "GURU" by Jin feat. KAFU! (warning: video contains flashing imagery)

[x0401x]

Jinpine Radio #5

Long time no Jin! Translation of the radio segment from his official YouTube channel. Original video here. Done on commission!

The livestream starts with a whole minute of nothing but clicking. Jin and Inpine’s avatars have some... modifications on them. An indication that this episode will be just a lot of fooling around. It always is, but this time it’s on purpose.

Inpine suddenly starts singing and Jin can’t hold back a laugh. Yes, they’re doing a skit again and they just ruined the surprise.

Inpine: Strolling is so fun! The air’s so good in the countryside! Aah! Such nice weather! Haaah! Oh? There’s a yellow video tape lying around in the middle of nowhere! *high-pitched screaming* Must be some pervert’s tape! Guess I’m gonna watch it using my uncle’s VCR! Now, now, now, video tape goes in! Clank, clank, clank! Press plaaay!

[some weird-ass noise effects]

Inpine: Transformation!! (T/N: the word used for “transformation” here is “henshin”, which is the title of Jin’s latest song at the time of this livestream)

[background music blasts on]

Jin: *clears throat with the most monstrous, alien-sounding voice filter ever* All right! Guess Imma go around doing evil stuff for one more day! *villain laughter*

Inpine: Ah! There you are! Sea monster Jin! Your days of wrongdoing are over!

Jin: Who’re you?!

Inpine: Ora, ora, ora! I’m a hero of justice, Inpine!

Jin: “Inpine”, you say?! Come at me with all you have!!

Inpine: Gimme back my pervy tape! Take this! Inpine puuunch!!

Jin: Stop! That hurts! S-Stop!!

Inpine: Inpine Kick!!

Jin: He got meee!

[music stops]

Inpine: Jin, Hatsune Miku. “Henshin”. You can listen to it on YouTube and NicoNico Douga—

Jin: Pffft!

Inpine: It’s out right now. Please support us.

As the skit ends, Jin does the usual greeting and introduces himself, then passes the baton to Inpine and does a little bit of promo for his song and its MV. Inpine feigns ignorance to the fact that the MV was also out, even though he was literally the one who made it along with Sayuki. Jin then announces the guests of this episode: the bassist Natsume Yuuki and the drummer Janku (Junk), who played as support musicians for “Henshin”. Jin adds that he’d also wanted to invite Saiyuki for this one, but admits that he and Inpine wouldn’t have been able to handle more than two guests at once. The figurines on Jin and Inpine’s avatars represent Natsume and Janku.

They’ll be discussing music this time around. Jin starts it out by talking about “Henshin”, giving some fun facts about its conception:

Jin had already worked with Natsume before, but this was his first time working with Janku

Jin and Natsume are actually quite close and Jin calls him “Nacchi”

It was the peak of summer when he received the proposal to write the song, so he didn’t want to do it at first (as mentioned in the previous livestream, the rainy season and summer are the worst times of the year for him)

He reconsidered it, because summer is also a time of the year when he feels like listening to fast-beat songs

He jokes that when he contacted Inpine about it, the latter “emerged from the shadows” asking, “Mister, Mister, I’m sniffing the smell of a new song in the air. You called?”

By then, Jin had already decided that he wanted insects to be the theme (specifically, insects that are omnipresent during Japanese summer, such as cicadas and moths)

After this, Jin personally contacted Natsume and Janku to play with him

Now, Jin knows that the listeners might be at loss about the guests, as it’s their first time there, so he also gives some trivia about how he met them. He got to know both of them through a common friend and they first met through an app. The name of the app was not revealed, but it’s used by musicians for remote music sessions.

Jin then asks the guests to talk about what they’d been working on recently. Natsume was doing usual bassist work. He plays for all sorts of artists and even does livestream concerts. He also makes clothes as a hobby. The first time he played with Jin was during his livestream with Peanuts-kun.

Janku’s work life is pretty much the same as Natsume’s, the only difference being the instrument he plays. He uploads his performances to social media every now and then.

Jin explains that the reason why he wanted to work with them for “Henshin” was that they were very loud players and the beat of their sound was exceptional. He describes it as a “pang-pang” kind of sound and jokes that he made the request by asking them, “Please lend me your pang-pang!”, to which they replied with, “Guess we got no choice”.

Back to the topic of the song itself, Jin dives into the production:

The making of this song was different from usual in many aspects, starting with the fact that they didn’t have lots of meetings to decide on things

No studio was used for the demo

The composition was made entirely without recordings

The sessions were held at Natsume’s and Janku’s homes

In order to test out what kind of sound would fit the song best, Janku spent a whole day on a call with Jin, playing the drum for him to listen

Once they reached the intensity that Jin wanted, Janku started working on the base melody by himself, sending samples for Jin to listen to and approve

Janku was very worried about whether or not he’d manage to make the melody sound “Jin-like”, but Jin was pretty satisfied with the result

When Jin asks Janku how he felt while working on the song, Janku says he had a lot of fun and that the sound felt rather nostalgic to him, for some reason – even though it was a newly produced melody, it felt like something he had already heard somewhere before

Jin asks Natsume the same question and he answers that, although he’s taken part in the songs of so many people, there was never one that he felt so much like playing, and asserts that that there’s something inherently grotesque about it, which Jin agrees with (because of course he would)

When Jin and Natsume listened to Janku’s drums, it was like a wake-up call for them – they realized that they were lagging behind him, and went all-out in order to catch up

Jin comments that Natsume did some pretty nasty stuff with his bass and thanked him for it (this is obviously meant to sound ambiguous because Jin just Be Like That, but he’s referring to the sound that Natsume produced with his bass, not... anything else)

Natsume played in a way that didn’t match the drums at all, on purpose

He took the liberty to do that without receiving any instructions for it, and instead of feeling disrespected, Jin thinks it was a genius move

The only thing Jin asked him to do was to “make it gross”

Jin believed that Natsume was confident he could take on the job, but in reality, Natsume was at a loss back then

When he asked Jin what he wanted specifically, all he got as an answer was a “Pleeease!”

After he got samples of Natsume’s “gross play”, Jin sent it to Inpine, who replied on LINE, “Wow! This sounds so disgusting! It’s the best thing ever!”

Finally came the time to add the guitar to the demo, but even on the previous night, Jin was very much at a loss as to how to go on about it, so he texted Natsume about it

Natsume says the message looked like Jin was saying his last words, as he decided to start out with a totally unsuspecting and not at all dramatic “It is time for me to go”

Jin explains he had no choice but give his utmost after the other two had delivered such fine performances

On the day he was supposed to play, he announced that he would do it without any clothes on, “I can’t give my all with clothes on. Sorry. It was wrong of me to try to do that before. Sorry for trying to wear clothes. I’m gonna do this butt-naked.”

Up to this point, he had been playing while seated on a chair, but this time, he “had to stand up” and began playing after screaming, “TAKE THIS!!”

While playing, he accidentally hit his guitar against the wall... thrice

This was a brand-new guitar and that was his first time using it

When he got to the outro, he went batshit without hesitation

He wanted to have recorded himself playing naked, so that he could send it to his mother with the caption, “This is the work you’ve made”

After listening to this demo, Inpine got the idea of doing a rewind in the MV

He did that before the song itself was ready, and the rewind just so happened to match it perfectly

Jin didn’t want this to be a “good” song, so to speak – he wanted the listeners to feel uncomfortable and sickened by it

He requested the sound engineers to add a “pang-pang” beat to the finished product

Jin says he really did something terrible in making that song and laughs at the fact that he hasn’t offered a single word of praise to it

Inpine jokes that even “Hatsune-san” would find the song repulsive (yes, this is meant as a compliment)

Jin writes a lot of songs in the summer because it’s “a season in which not everything is all beauty”

Inpine says that the refreshing summer that everyone has in their minds only happens for a couple hours in early morning, while the rest of the day is all about fighting against a scorching heat under the dark, dark shadows cast from the overwhelming sunlight – that’s why he decided to make the MV’s color palette jewel-toned and somber

Jin bought all sorts of effectors to produce the sound he wanted for the song, which cost him 30K yen in total, and he was in shock when checking on how much he had spent

He hoped everyone listening to the livestream would go watch the MV, as it cost him a whole lot of money

He wanted “Henshin” to sound like a time slip back to one’s old self

 (T/N: This doesn’t really translate in summary format, but when they were talking about the song, there was an endless number of jokes involving the “pang-pang” thingy.)

At this point, Jin realizes that they’d been talking about music for the near entirety of the livestream. It was expected, since the two were the first musician guests of the channel, and as such, Jin was aware that it'd be fine to just talk about music, but he also wanted to have a lighthearted chit-chat. He asked Janku the day before about ideas for topics, which they couldn't decide on, so they decided to roll the dice. What they got as a result was something that, according to Janku, would’ve turned the livestream into a broadcast disaster. Jin then asks the others if they had any topics they wanted to discuss and Inpine says that’s the scariest way possible to pass the baton.

Natsume decides to answer the question first and Inpine is thankful that he’s able to take it forward from there, saying that Natsume “really is very capable”. Jin asks if he can go ahead and “eat the squid”, implying that they have snacks with them, and everyone agrees that they should eat first. While Natsume talks, there are sounds of plastic bags being ripped open in the background. These guys are a mess.

Natsume talks about a time not so long ago where he was sick and had to lie down in bed for days. He was bored out of his mind because he was allowed to do nothing but rest, so he decided to binge some anime. He wanted to watch something long and that he had never watched before, and as if on cue, he saw that Togashi Yoshihiro had created a Twitter account. This reminded him that he had actually never watched HunterxHunter, so he’d been binging it, and the day that the “Henshin” MV came out was exactly the day that he began the chimera ant arc. He felt that this was fate at work. When he saw the MV, he was like, “Whoa! That’s chimera ants right there! Inpine-san!?”

Inpine is a little embarrassed at this, because he had the feeling that they’d been making “Henshin” together all the way. He really thought that he’d been sharing with them the whole process of the video making, but in fact, the musicians were in the dark about most of it.

On the topic of the MV, Inpine admits that he doesn’t like insects and that he was put-off when finding out that insects would be the theme. He confesses that, because of this, he kind of avoided the insect element in the video, up till the latter half of it. He says that, back when he was making the video, he was driving down the street one night and had to open the window to see what was ahead of him. Turns out that what was blocking his vision was a swarm of moths. According to him, the swarm was covering the road for about 200 meters, and he couldn’t close the window in time. About three moths got inside the car, which had him shrieking like a little girl, “Nooo! Why does this kinda thing always happen to me!?”

Jin: And then you got bitten by a radioactive moth!

Inpine: Yeah, yeah, yeah! And then “Henshin”! I transformed!

Inpine says the moths were dead on his dashboard the next morning. He decided to observe them, which helped him finally grasp the concept and the feel of “Henshin”. He says that this, in a way, was his chimera ant arc. Natsume jokes that the experience might as well have broken him.

Jin says that, when writing the lyrics of “Henshin”, he thought about his kindergarten years a lot. “Henshin” is a song about the things people deem beautiful and the things they deem disgusting. People usually have weird tastes when they’re still little kids, and when Jin was in kindergarten, he was even weirder. There was a corner for hanging coats at his nursery school, and he used to sit there the whole day, just playing with the keyboard harmonica. Everyone could tell that he was one hell of a weirdo. He adds that Inpine, his first-ever friend, was just as weird. After all, he used to draw nothing but cars all the time. Jin says that this thing they used to do, throwing away their concern with what people would think of them, was his inspiration for making “Henshin”. A representation of early childhood summer, much like everything else Jin has ever made.

It is here that, at long freaking last, Jin decides to talk about the wallpaper for this livestream. He says he and Inpine made it together and everyone agrees that it’s “too damn gross”. It’s pretty obvious that it was made exclusively for that one livestream, since Natsume’s picture has moth antennas.

The group suddenly sobers up when Jin says that making this song with them was very fun and he hopes to make more with them in the future. Both Natsume and Janku are very flattered and agree to it on the spot. This heartwarming moment only lasts for a little bit, until Natsume remembers a good thing that happened recently. He starts talking about his experience going to a sauna, where he felt so refreshed that it was almost like the air he’d been breathing up to that point wasn’t real air. After he was done, he went outside, threw himself on a sunlounger and “entrusted his body to the sunlight”. According to him, it was the best feeling ever and everyone should go to a sauna at least once. The other three joke that maybe Natsume is actually an insect. Inpine says he likes sleeping inside his car in the parking lot after going to the sauna, affirming that it’s “the best way to wake up”.

The topic turns into what to do in the next livestreams, and Jin says once again that he wants to play games in the upcoming episodes. Janku says he’s pretty good at Gartic Phone and Natsume agrees that playing it with him is pretty funny. Jin says he’s seen Janku playing the game before – he saw him drawing a playground slide, except he also drew both himself and Jin sliding down on it. Natsume and Inpine lose it. Jin says he’d love to play with the three of them, plus Saiyuki. All of them agree that Saiyuki would be the strongest at it.

Time comes for them to end the livestream. Jin once again talks about making songs with these members in the future. He also talks about keeping eyes open to announcements on Twitter and asks the listeners to tell everyone they can about “Henshin”, even people sitting next to them at train stations.

The way they say goodbye in this episode is a tad... different from usual.

Jin: This has been Jin...

Inpine: ...Inpine, whose favorite food is beef tongue...

Natsume: ...Natsume Yuuki, whose f-favorite drink is Gogo no Koucha Oishii Mutou... (T/N: That’s the actual name of a bottled tea brand.)

Janku: ...and Janku, whose favorite drink is Boss’s café au lait.

Jin: That’s it!

All: That’s iiit! *whistles and weird voices* Byeee~!

[ayara-resara]

[ayara-resara]

Titular song of Jin's 3nd full album. MV was directed by INPINE and illustrated by Ishikawa Kaori (her comic), whom I mentioned earlier.

Also a snippet of Summering Acoustic Ver. (along with few others).

[ayara-resara]

[x0401x]

Jinpine Radio #4

Translation of the radio segment from Jin’s official YouTube channel. Original video here. Done on commission!

The livestream starts in total silence this time, with eventual clicking and rustling. You’d think Jin hasn’t realized that he’s on, but in fact, he and Inpine seemed to be getting ready for this time’s skit.

Yes, instead of Inpine making a fool of himself alone, this time, they’re being fools together.

So this time the skit is being done with full-on acting. There’s no background music and their voices are echoing. It comes without any warning, and they take it very seriously until close to the end.

Inpine: *pants* This is it. The underground cathedral. Finally got here. I haven’t had anything to drink or eat for... three days now. *pants* What... is this place? I already...

Jin: [agonized noises]

Inpine: Ah! Jin-kun!

Jin: Ouch... Ugh!

Inpine: Are you okay?!

Jin: I screwed up...! Ugh...!

Inpine: What happened?! What’s wrong?! *gasps* You’re injured...!

Jin: It was over there! That thing! That thing... bit... b-bit me...!!

Inpine: [disgusted grunts] W-What’s that?! Go away! You... thing! Be gone!

Jin: Uuugh...!

Inpine: You hand’s bleeding!

Jin: It’s numb...! Uh, uuugh...!

Inpine: T-This is...! What an awful color!

Jin: Ugh...

Inpine:It’s poison! We gotta get it out of you! [sucking noises]

Jin: *losing his shit* Uuugh...! I-It’s not working at all!

Inpine: *laughs*

Jin: It didn’t have any effect! *laughs*

Inpine: Ah, no good, huh?

Jin: Yep, no good.

Inpine: Agh, your hand... It looks like it’s about to rot off!

Jin: Aaah...! At least in the end... aah, I wanted to watch... a nice movie or something...

Inpine: Dammit! If only... we had some great artist’s artworks in times like these...! *gasps* There’s a light over there!

Jin: Eh? Ah, that’s...!

There’s a moment of silence and then another click. Their voices go back to normal as Jin thanks the listeners for humoring their ridiculousness. He was unsure at first whether they had or not managed to stream it (the whole thing was apparently pre-recorded and played during the stream, which is why we can hear clicks right before it starts and right after it ends), but Jin’s staff sent comments affirming that it was indeed streamed.

After the confirmation, Jin and Inpine finally greet the listeners, adding the usual “we still don’t have any idea why we’re doing this, though”. Then, they introduce the very first guest of their streams: Sayuki. Yes, the illustrator of the Children Record Reboot MV, the most recent short comics of KagePro and Jin’s other manga, Nirvana. A white board shows up in the middle of the video, which is showing Sayuki’s screen. He clumsily writes “Hello, this is Sayuki” on it and Jin and Inpine proceed to lose it over how small and cute his handwriting is. Sayuki also ends up laughing.

Of course, his entry begins with him apologizing for his awkwardness and the other two dismissing it. Inpine jokes that he and Jin had already warmed up the crowd with their bullshit earlier. They welcome Sayuki with applause, introduce him to the listeners and thank him for his participation. Jin notes that he’d been working with Sayuki for five years, but it was the first time they were doing something like this, because Sayuki is your usual shy Japanese illustrator who doesn’t show up anywhere ever. Sayuki says there was no way he wouldn’t come to this livestream after Jin asked him to join.

Jin and Inpine proceed to explain how they usually do things. They know that Sayuki knows the ropes, since he listens to all their livestreams, but this was their first time with a guest, so things were going to be a little different – they wanted Saiyuki to be the focus of this episode. Therefore, they were going to include Sayuki in the reading of the fanmail, which was going to be about Vtubers this time. Jin and Inpine comment that they’re often involved with Vtubers due to work.

They begin with reading the normal, non-themed fanmail while Sayuki draws random characters on-screen.

Neko no Hige (Cat Whiskers): “Jin-san, Inpine-san and Sayuki-san, good evening. I’ve been eagerly waiting for a guest episode till this day! I enrolled into high school this April and finally got used to the classes and subjects, but I used to think that I passed off a certain kind of image, and sometimes, it turns out that I don’t! Jin-san, Inpine-san and Sayuki-san, do any of you have a side of yourselves that was unexpected to the other two? If you ever happened to think that there’s anything surprising about each other, I’d like you to tell us. I’m supporting the works of you all!”

The answer is Sayuki. He’s basically the only one in the group who has surprised the other two, which I guess is predictable enough, given that Jin and Inpine are childhood friends. Jin says he’s known Sayuki for 8 years now, and his first impression of Sayuki is that he’s a very gentle person. What’s surprising about him is that, despite being so mild-tempered, he has an unyielding will. He really cherishes the things he places value upon. As for Inpine, the first time he met Sayuki, he also thought Sayuki was a rather soft person. The first time he saw Sayuki making art, however, he felt like Sayuki was enveloped by something hot.

In the end, rather than Sayuki being different from what the two of them had initially thought, their initial image of him only deepened. And that image, in Jin’s words, is of a “kindhearted Sayan whose heart is wide-open”. Sayuki says that’s not really true, as he does have a bad side. Jin doesn’t believe this one bit.

Another thing that surprised Jin about Sayuki is that, although Sayuki makes a lot of action and battle-related art, he loves cute things. Jin jokes that Sayuki “has a maiden living in his heart”, adding that “he has many sides” and “is a wonderful person with a lot of depth to him”.

Inpine then brings up the topic of how quickly Sayuki draws. Even though he’s doing it live, it’s “as fast as the devil”.

Engai: “Good evening. I have a question for Sayuki-san. Sayuki-san, what is it that made you start drawing? I want to know!”

It was in grade school that Sayuki started drawing. He’d always been sketching stuff up. It’s pretty hard for him to pinpoint whether or not there was a trigger for him to start drawing, though. He doesn’t have much recollection of that – before he realized it, he was making art. As an extension of this, he began reading manga, and it went on from there. He started off drawing characters, and in the beginning, he found it very difficult to draw anything other than people (mostly because he had no interest in anything else). It was finally once he started reading manga that he began drawing backgrounds. Even now, he still isn’t very good with backgrounds, and if he doesn’t need to draw it, he prefers not to.

Jin takes that opportunity to say he wants to draw like Sayuki and to praise Inpine, who makes very good backgrounds. Sayuki agrees, saying he’d throw all backgrounds onto Inpine if he could. Inpine laughs but says they could do that.

After this, they talk about fellow musicians and illustrators for a while, and then go back to the fanmail.

VVV-kaa-san (VVV Mum): “Jin-san, Inpine-san and Sayuki-san, good evening. I’d been looking forward to the fourth episode of the Jinpine Radio, eagerly waiting for this livestream where the guest is Sayuki-san, who has created and been entrusted with several works! As for what Vtuber I recommend, although their stance is the realistic type, my recommendation is Akatsuki Yuni-san. Their calm voice and way of talking are quite addictive. Jin-san, Inpine-san and Sayuki-san, if there’s any Vtuber or artist that you hope will be around for a long time, please tell us about them.”

Inpine is the one who answers first. Turns out that he also loves Akatsuki Yuni. He also is a fan of Mochizuki Himawari, who is from the same office as himself. She introduces video games in her channel, and although they’re not Inpine’s type, she’s so excited when talking about them that he can’t stop watching. Both he and Jin have met her in real life. Jin says she’s unhinged.

Sayuki suddenly starts drawing another character, distracting the other two completely. Neither has any idea what he’s really doing and he plays dumb, refusing to tell them.

Matsuri: “Jin-san, Inpine-san, good evening! My heart is racing because Sayuki-san is a guest this time around. Regarding what Jin-san said in the last livestream, that ‘getting hit by cars is what life is about’, it sounded to me like nothing other than a line from someone who got hit by a car and incarnated into an alternative world. Even now, I feel like laughing every time I recall this. Everyone, do you have any isekai reincarnation story that you like? I believe it’s a very popular genre nowadays in manga, anime and whatnot. If there’s any such series, I’d love to hear about it.”

Jin doesn’t remember having said that at all. Inpine jokes that he hit his head and forgot about it completely.

About the isekai question, Inpine likes “Youjo Senki”. Jin also thinks it’s pretty good, although he doesn’t like the idea of the protagonists being little kids. Sayuki likes “KonoSuba”. He explains that it gave him personal support in a time when he needed some. Jin and Inpine also like that one. Jin spends a lot of time thinking, and in the end, his answer is the manga “Ninkyou Tensei”. He takes the opportunity to comment that their answers are all very much like them. Inpine does give the impression that he’d enjoy stuff like “Youjo Senki” and Sayuki that he’d enjoy stuff like “KonoSuba”.

Ashiya: “Jin-san, Inpine-san, good evening. Congratulations on your first guest episode. I heard the guest would be Sayuki-san and it automatically made me think of ‘Gojitsudan’. Ever since ‘Gojitsudan’ was released last year, I’ve listened to it while watching the MV over and over. It’s obvious enough that Jin-san’s song, sung by Jin-san himself, is the absolute best, but I also love Sayuki-san’s MV matching the melody. I watched the MV of ‘Children Record Re:boot’ as well, and it felt almost like being at the border between reality and fiction. The worldbuilding of that song really drew me in. How did you make this wonderful MV? Also, if there’s anything that Sayuki-san or Inpine-san are particular about when making MVs, I’d like to hear it. I’ll be supporting your activities from now on too.”

Jin praises this message by saying it’s textbook-perfect and very nice. Inpine and Sayuki agree.

Inpine’s way of making MV’s goes roughly as follows:

1.       He sends a storyboard to the original creator.

2.       Based on what gets approved, he pieces together the elements that the video will consist of.

3.       He pitches the proposal to the animator, who, in this case, was Sayuki.

Usually, Inpine adds some ideas and twists to the video as it comes together, and Sayuki also offers his own, which he found to be extremely cool. They keep adding things even as the production is about to reach its end, and sometimes, it’s very last-minute. Some things are decided on the very day that the shot is supposed to be finished and they have no idea how to go on about it up until the previous day. Their work together has a very “let’s just try it out” kind of approach to it.

Jin used to think that Inpine made videos in complete seclusion while reflecting carefully about every detail. When he saw the realistic elements of the MV, he thought it was quite Inpine-like. Sayuki comments that he was shocked when he heard that they’d be adding real-life cuts to the MV and was confused as to where they’d put them and how. He also comments that he’s the one who drew the scene where the main character is running. Jin and Inpine shower him with compliments for it, yet he thinks it wasn’t a very good job, as it was his first time doing hand-drawn animation. And right after that cut, there’s a scene where someone is running in real life. When Sayuki saw it, he thought to himself that he’d been defeated. Jin, on the other hand, says that he could never bring himself to run again after seeing Sayuki’s animation. Yes, he was the one running in that shot. With all his might, he adds. His shoes weren’t supposed to come off back then, but they did and Inpine got it on camera, so he used it for the MV.

Jin thinks the ending of the MV was cool as hell. He left it completely to Inpine and Sayuki to do whatever they wanted. He doesn’t usually says he wants the MV to be like this or that, just leaves it up to the makers. In the initial stages, Inpine kept sending him pictures that he’d took as inspiration for the MV after listening to the song and asking, “This is probably what the song feels like, yeah?!” while in tears, to which Jin would reply, “There’s no way I can know until you make the storyboard”.

The making of this MV, according to Jin, had a clear division of labor. The three of them were each doing what they’re best at. They were already close, often phoning each other and playing video games together, but when it comes to working as a team, Jin feels that they’re in top form. It’s not that Inpine and Sayuki stick exactly to what they’re told, but they don’t betray the expectations. When it was decided that they’d be making the MV, Jin didn’t want his sound to lose to their art, although he also didn’t want to make it a trendy song.

Inpine thinks creators are a funny thing. When they’re doing whatever together, it’s all fun and games, but the moment they touch upon work, he’s reminded that, “Oh, right, this was the kind of brain that this guy had”. This makes him think that he has to do his best and that he can’t lose to them. Jin agrees with him, saying he can’t bring himself to avoid his own hurdles – he has to overcome them. Inpine totally understands, as he’s very quick to destroy the things he creates. Jin admits he does this too. His creations are all about mustering out his agony but without using the words “this is me”. He finishes this topic by saying he wants to work with them again this year. The two love the idea.

Rere: “Good evening! I watch all your livestreams. The MV of ‘ZIGI’, which came out on YouTube just recently, was fantastic. Since the theme is about a Vtuber that we recommend, I thought this would be my chance, as I love Vtubers, so here I am, sending a fanmail for the first time! My recommended Vtuber is – I believe you know her – Pmaru-sama. They recently got into TikTok. She’s so fun; I love her! What’s wonderful about P-chan is that she’s great at singing, her voice is awe-inspiring, she can draw, she plans out their own stories, she can edit videos and her talk is interesting! Although the other Vtubers mainly do livestreams, P-chan makes videos, which adds up to the quality of her content! They say that ‘God doesn’t give with both hands’, but P-chan truly possesses several talents, so I really respect her! I recommend her video titled ‘I’m sorry for finding love’, which is about when she created a couple channel three years ago. You’re sure to be soothed by this cute girl! Sayuki-san is coming as a guest for this episode, so I’m very excited! I’m looking forward to what’s going to happen! Please keep doing your best from now on too!”

The trio jokes that if this person was looking forward to the three of them having a refreshing party, she probably must be disgusted by now, ‘cause this livestream’s been anything but that. In regards to her recommendation, as expected, they all know Pmaru. They also know about the aforementioned video. They think the blatant sarcasm of it was absolutely terrifying, but it’s a pretty good example to follow (gotta admit that this one surprised me because, heck yeah, fake fans who want their idols to stay single forever can stick it).

Inpine is thoroughly amazed by Pmaru and how she manages to do everything on her own, from making and editing all her videos to handling all kinds of social media, without any staff to assist her. Jin compares himself to her as a “reverse Pmaru”, since he’s the complete opposite of her – his singing sucks, he doesn’t have a cute voice, his creations are confusing, he has no talking skills, he can’t make or edit videos without help and his art is horrible.

Sayuki is drawing the third character now.

Mentai Pasta Yamamoto: “Jin-san, Inpine-san, good evening. I’m the person who wrote to you about my grandmother’s mourning dress. I went to my hometown recently during Golden Week and visited my grandma for the first time in a while. I asked her if she remembered this story and told her that it was read publicly on a radio segment. My grandma’s been getting forgetful lately, so she was very surprised at this and asked how I knew about that story. I cackled and said that she was the one who told me. By the way, it seems she had attended a dressmaking school for about a year back in the day and could make even suits by herself. Thanks to the Inpine Radio, I have one more topic for conversation with my grandma. Thank you very much.”

Jin and Inpine are ecstatic when they see the name of the sender. They’re also impressed by the grandma once again. They say they’ve reached the peak of this radio. Nothing could top this message. There’s nothing else that they could wish for.

On the topic of grandparents, Jin muses aloud that he hasn’t had much conversation with his grandma in quite a while. Every time they call each other, she’ll either comment on how busy he is with work or compliment his clothes. No matter what he’s wearing, she’ll always say that it’s a nice color. She’s been into YouTube lately, he adds, so she might actually be watching his channel.

Inpine tips in by saying that his grandma is doing well, but she lives in an elderly home, so he hardly gets to see her. Jin says he, too, hardly ever sees his own grandma even though they talk so often, and Sayuki adds that the same is valid for the three of them. They talk and play video games with each other often, yet hardly see each other in person. Inpine says that, in his head, Sayuki is his icon. Which means that, sometimes, he’s a cute girl. He jokes that there’s a small chance that Sayuki actually is a cute girl in real life.

Jin expands on what Sayuki had said by justifying it with the fact that they simply don’t have time to see each other lately. However, once things settle down, he wants to meet up with the two of them. He and Inpine joke about the three of them doing a livestream when they finally get to hang out and each of them would show one finger on camera. They promise to do that at Sayuki’s place, far away as it might be, and perhaps they might even hold hands in front of the camera. Jin and Inpine talk about taking their computers, wi-fi routers and guitar to Sayuki’s home, to which Sayuki responds by saying that, if this is how it’s gonna be, then he’ll be the one visiting them instead, but they shoot him down.

Monomi Yuuzan: “Jin-san, Inpine-san and Sayuki-san, hello! The Vtuber that I want to recommend is someone called Kenmochi Toya, who was my number one savior during the covid pandemic – a time when I couldn’t attend university properly and was almost spiraling into depression. Ken-san is very pure-minded and both his vocabulary and his beauty are incredible, but above all, what’s incredible is the almost pro-wrestling that goes on amongst his viewers. I’d love if you watch his videos! Thank you very much!”

Jin talks about a livestream that he did with Vtuber Peanuts-kun, where the latter started singing a love song that he’d composed for Kenmochi. Although Jin wasn’t close to Kenmochi at all, he sang along. Kenmochi watched this and said it was very funny. He then invited the two to play an online game, which, according to Jin, was one hell of a fun time. Some of their fans (about eight of them) also joined. Jin is literally living the life.

Jin comments that the Vtubers from Nijisanji really love what they do, so it’s interesting to watch their stuff. Inpine agrees, saying that it’s like watching a presentation of what the other person loves. He then has a small heart attack after his screen goes blank for a split second.

Katsudansou: “It’s suddenly been getting too hot for my body to handle lately. I’ve been looking forward to summer because I love it, but I’m feeling down because I’m not a fan of the changes in weather or of the rainy season. Jin-san, Inpine-san, is there any season of the year that makes you feel depressed?”

Jin says that the current season might be it for him. The rainy season usually makes people feel sleepy and drains their energy away not just because of the volume of rain, but also because of all the shifts in temperature, air pressure and humidity. Jin also muses that, until now, he’d never realized how much this affected him.

Inpine says it usually takes him a while to notice that the seasons are changing. He starts feeling hotter and hotter every day, until he realizes that summer has arrived and stops wearing warm clothes. The more I find out about these guys, the less I can help the “bitch you live like this” thoughts.

While talking about lack of appetite and weight loss in the summer (and how Inpine almost thins out into oblivion every time summer comes around), they notice that Sayuki has put the three characters in the same layer and is now coloring them. Within a couple minutes, the art is finished. The two are impressed by the fact that the whole process took one hour and ten minutes. Sayuki thanks them for the compliments and announces that he’s done. Jin and Inpine applaud him.

They finally ask who the characters are, and Sayuki says it’s a trio from Nijisanji. That alone is enough for them to understand who it is. Sayuki reveals that he’s a big fan of them. He’s not particularly interested in Vtubers and it’s not like he watches the videos of these three separately, but he does watch all the videos where they’re together.

When asked by Jin what he thought of this livestream, Sayuki answers that although he didn’t talk much, actually being part of a livestream made him realize what it’s really like. He points out that he’d never talked much about Vtubers with either Jin or Inpine. It was Sayuki’s first time seeing this side of them and he had a lot of fun with it.

Jin and Inpine say the same about getting to see Sayuki drawing in real time. All the while, they kept thinking to themselves, “He’s so fast”. Jin adds that they should do something less distracting next time, though, because he kept finding himself hypnotized by Sayuki’s drawing skills. He could just watch Sayuki draw until the end of the livestream. Both he and Inpine think they should do something more dynamic in the next opportunity, such as playing a video game together. After promising to do so, the two thank the listeners for tuning in.

Jin casually throws in that he loves not having a set objective for their radio, as he enjoys the freedom of being able to do whatever the fuck he wants, and presumes aloud that, now they’ve had a guest come over, he and Inpine are going to feel even more underwhelming as hosts next time. Inpine suggests they take turns streaming alone for a couple episodes in order to “increase their worth as individuals”. Jin and Sayuki call him a genius for that one.

On a serious note, Jin brings back the topic of giving long livestreams a shot. Inpine proposes they stream themselves camping or going on a car ride.

The two thank Sayuki for his participation and he thanks them back. They once again thank the listeners for tuning in and say their goodbyes. This was the first livestream that ended smoothly and without ado.

Bonus: Sayuki’s screen!

“Hello, this is Sayuki.”

“I’m going to draw Vtuber-san(s).”

Green letters: “Sayuki-san is drawing at the moment.”

[x0401x]

Jinpine Radio #1

Translation of the radio segment from Jin’s official YouTube channel. Original video here. Done on commission!

The livestream begins with a cute background music. Jin greets the listeners and checks the sound. He thanks everyone for tuning in and explains that he’s using a proper BGM this time because a lot of people complained that the cicada cries that he had used the previous time were too loud.

He introduces himself and lets Inpine do his own introduction as well. Inpine comes in with, “Good evening, everybody! I’m the one who lives his life hiding in the darkness, Inpine!”

Jin laughs and asks if it’s really okay for him to keep doing those crazy intros every single time (let it be known that, for each one, he uses a different kind of playful voice). Inpine says it is.

Jin introduces Inpine as a creator who makes designs and MVs, which Inpine applauds, joking that it almost sounds like he’s a guest instead of a co-host. This prompts Jin to wonder if the name of their radio, “Jinpine”, consists of “Jin” and “pine” or “Ji” and “npine”. Inpine says it consists of “Jin” and “ne”, and the “pi” (pronounced as “pa”) is what binds the syllables together. This is a pun with the word “hipparu”, which means “to bring together” in Japanese.

Jin calls the whole joke a pain in the ass and they both laugh, yet he gets into it as he says that someone whose name starts with “pa” might turn up and become the next MC. Inpine doesn’t miss a beat with, “I see, so there’s the chance that a new fighter will show up”, and that’s where Jin cuts him off. Inpine wonders aloud what the theme color of a “third player” would be, and Jin says their own colors are already enough of a mess. For some reason, he claims their colors are corn-yellow and white, which I assume to be the colors they were wearing during the livestream.

Finally, the two decide to get serious and thank the listeners for taking part in the first episode of their radio segment. Just like in the last episode, they joke about their lack of goals in doing these livestreams and about robbing everyone of a precious time that they could be using for anything else with this “worthless broadcast”. They clarify that this is the first episode not because there were any issues with the previous one, but because the #000 was a test episode.

Jin then introduces this episode’s corners. First, they were going to read fan mail from Twitter. Both Jin and Inpine were very surprised that people had not only listened to the entirety of their previous livestream, they actually paid attention to it. Many listeners had sent several messages, which Jin and Inpine thanked them for.

As Jin announces that they’re going to read the messages one by one, the BGM changes into one of suspense. Before they begin reading, someone in the comments asks them to lower the volume, which they do while laughing at how unused they are to this livestreaming thing.

Each time they read a fan mail, they go through the same process: announcing the person’s “radio name”, thanking them for sending the fan mail, expressing gratitude for every nice comment they read aloud in the message and thanking the OP one last time once they’re done reading. Occasionally, they thank the person yet again after commenting on the contents of the message. I’ll be leaving these parts out just so that it won’t get repetitive and annoying to read, but this is how it goes for all of them.

Chikuwa: “Jin-san, Inpine-san, hello. I’ve never sent a question to a radio segment before, but since you’ve started streaming one, I decided to send it for the very first time.”

Jin and Inpine stop the reading for a moment to jokingly ask the OP if they don’t regret wasting their first time like this.

“I’d like to ask what the first impressions you had of each other were when your friendship was just beginning. Please keep taking care of yourselves and making great music.”

Jin and Inpine first met in grade school, when Jin moved to Inpine’s town in April. Inpine had always been in the same class all six years of grade school. The class was pure chaos, with the male students divided in roughly three main groups: the otaku, the wild kids and the pretty boys. Most of the pretty boys were from families with good incomes, whose parents were doctors or dentists, yet this was the group that Jin got into at first. Meanwhile, Inpine belonged to the introverted otaku group.

When Jin had just transferred schools and nobody knew what group he’d join, Inpine was wondering which one he’d mingle with. He kept observing Jin to see what group he’d find himself into eventually. Inpine says Jin was a very charming person even back then and thought Jin was an artist at first, because he’d be drawing sketches on his notebook during break time. Jin’s art, according to Inpine, was extremely interesting. He’d often draw figures that resembled characters from “Kinnikuman”, which they both liked a lot as kids. From this, Inpine assumed that Jin was the kind of person who enjoyed creating things and was moved by that, so he wanted to get along with him. In order to do that, he also sort of got into the popular boys’ group. Thanks to this, he was able to spend a wonderful last year in that broken class.

As for Jin, he had transferred to Inpine’s town from the island he had been born in, which was really out in the sticks, so he didn’t know how anything worked. For starters, he had never even seen so many people in just one place before. So rather than joining a group, he didn’t so much as have proper comprehension of what a “group” was. After getting into the pretty guys’ group, he slowly descended into the otaku side. He jokes, “Damn, should’ve stayed where I was.”

Jin admits he didn’t have much of an impression of Inpine, as he was always hiding. Inpine jokes that he was like a side character from the corner of a manga panel. However, Jin adds, Inpine was an incredibly talented artist. They’d praise each other’s drawings a lot. Inpine often drew cars, as he’s been passionate about vehicles since forever. Jin thinks that even if he saw those drawings in the present time, he’d still think they’re awesome. Inpine was able to draw cars in detail without looking at any reference material and Jin respected him for it.

At the beginning, the two did nothing but that, but since Jin had interest in music, he started pulling Inpine into it. They’d do things like going to see the boy scouts playing wind instruments and other music-related stuff. They’d also play together after school and do miscellaneous activities, like planting vegetables and baking bread, and so, their time together increased. They didn’t really hang out to play video games and such; their get-togethers were more organic. That was how they got close to each other.

Jin spots a comment asking for confirmation if he had an uncle who played keyboard. He says yes, and comments he started playing the keyboard due to said uncle’s influence. When he found out as a child that his uncle was a keyboardist, Jin was like, “I knew we had a musician in the family”. His uncle also got him into music not only by example, but also by giving him a keyboard on his birthday when he was little. And that, in Jin’s words, is where his life took a turn.

Next question came from someone whose surname Inpine couldn’t read. He pronounces it as “Kongami Mitsuki”, but having no idea whether or not it’s right (it probably wasn’t, lol): “Jin-san, do you ever write down any notes or memos when making music? If yes, I’d like to hear what you write on them.”

Jin says he doesn’t really write notes, but he does keep memos. When an idea comes up, he takes out his phone to write it down. He also makes voice memos for melodies by humming them and uses them as samples. However, whenever he takes a moment to listen to what he recorded, he’s already forgotten what most of them are supposed to be used for. There are also interferences such as car noises or the sound of the wind, so he has actually never birthed any songs from these memos. Still, when he makes the melody samples, he does remember the intention behind the tunes, as they stay with him. Even though he doesn’t use them as actual references, they exist so that the melodies will stick with him. It’s like taking a picture – by looking at the memos and listening to the samples, he can recall what he was feeling when he made them.

Next question is from someone with an even more confusing username, Bunkei Shosshima: “Jin-san, Inpine-san, good evening. I admire Jin-san and am making VOCALOID songs of my own.”

This is where Jin and Inpine make a quick stop to joke that Jin has corrupted this poor guy and apologize to him.

“I believe creating melodies for each instrument, especially the guitar, is essential for you, Jin-san. If you have any particularities on how you express them, I would like to know about it. I have bought myself a sonic driver from Providence. I would also like to know if anything interesting happened when you and Inpine-san first met. Please keep doing your best in your activities from now on as well.”

Since the part about their first meeting had already been answered, the two skipped it. As for the rest, Jin starts out by explaining that the aforementioned “sonic driver” is a small effector used to alter the sound of the electric guitar. It’s something like an iron box that sits on the floor next to the guitarist’s feet.

Jin’s favorite type of guitar is Fender’s telecaster. For plug-ins, he uses several different ones, but mainly Shigemori’s MUSE, which is a little expensive (about 50k yen). When he connects the plug-in to the guitar and the guitar to an amplifier, the sound that comes out is exceptionally good, in his opinion. He jokes that his grandmother used to say, “You don’t play the telecaster, you hit it! Make sure to check if there’s blood coming out of your hands after performing”. He adds that she advised him to buy a black telecaster because then the bloodstains wouldn’t be visible.

Comet Sword: “Jin-san, Inpine-san, good evening. Was there ever any moment when you thought, ‘Whoa, this guy is bad news’ about each other?”

Inpine asks if he can talk about something that had happened recently, although there have been many such instances. Jin lets him do it, and so, he reveals that Jin had been utterly addicted to barbecue lately. So addicted, in fact, that he’d make it at home by himself 4 to 5 times a week. Whenever Inpine came to visit, he’d be like, “Wow, barbecue again?” and even when they were making plans to hang out on New Year’s, all Jin wanted to do was eat barbecue outside. And by God, he did it. At first, Inpine was actually pumped at the idea, but when he saw Jin set up his kotatsu out in the cold, pull up a stove and grill meat on it, he thought to himself, “This guy is insane.”

Jin justifies himself with the fact that he’s been too busy with productions and hasn’t had a single day off for 3 months straight. He couldn’t go anywhere or do anything, so at the very least, he wanted to be able to make barbecue at home. Hence, he bought an all-purpose expansible stove called Yakimaru-kun. Rather than being addicted to barbecue, he was trying to find ways to save himself from the burnout. He felt he had to give himself some sort of compensation. He wasn’t able to get a break even on New Year’s Eve, so he wanted to do something bad on purpose in order to rewire himself.

Inpine then admits he thought Jin was cool for attempting to keep himself motivated, as it was very professional of him. He was hesitant to join Jin at first, since it was -1o C, but when he saw Jin going at it, he felt that he just had to make him company. So he sat with Jin under the kotatsu and ate with him. He also brought cushions for them to sit on, as there was nothing to warm up their butts. Both of them agree that the barbecue was delicious.

As for Jin, the thing that made him think Inpine was bad news actually happened overseas. There was a foreign type of car that Inpine really wanted to have, so he traveled to England, bought the car and rode on it for about 6000km around all Europe. That’s 20 or so days of him going about several countries, even ones where English isn’t the native language. He stayed only in the car, never stopping by inns or hotels. When he came back, Jin thought he was completely crazy, but in a good way. In his defense, Inpine says he just loves going as far as he can without making plans. Jin says they should go overseas together someday and he agrees.

Mur: “I really like the name ‘Jinpine Radio’. I wonder which of you came up with it. It has a nice ring to it and is a wonderful name!”

Jin answers that it simply became “Jinpine Radio” before they even realized it. For starters, they don’t even know what they’re doing or how it turned out the way it is. All they wanted was to talk to their fans and a place to speak freely. Jin also says that, although many artists are often invited to host TV and radio shows, he has never once received this kind of proposal. So he figured that if the opportunity wouldn’t come to him, he’d create one. Then he got Inpine on board, and Inpine came up with the name.

Kakkoii Goma: “Jin-san, Inpine-san, congratulations on episode 1’s broadcast. I always enjoy listening to Jin-san’s music and watching Inpine-san’s MVs. I have a question for you two. If there was a pill that could develop one of your abilities to the maximum and one that could improve all of the abilities you possess but only moderately, which would you take? I’d love if you could explain your reasons why. I’ll be supporting your activities from now on too.”

Jin says he’d rather have the second pill. As he’d commented before, if he were athletic and good-looking and had other talents, he wouldn’t be making music. If he woke up one day and found out that he has all of this, he’d quit being a musician on the spot. He’s only been making music because he has no choice, but it’s extremely painful for him. Therefore, he’d rather have other things that he can do. He wants to be a normal person.

Inpine would also choose the second pill. He used to wish that he had one talent people would know him for – something that could be his specialty. However, he now believes that the more, the merrier. He prefers to have several vocations, even if his skills are just moderate. The duo ends this one jokingly asking the listener to send those pills to their respective offices.

Ryuu: “What do you guys do when you’re feeling so depressed that you can’t help it?”

Jin says he just stares at the walls. He elaborates that, during such times, he can’t allow himself to receive any sort of stimulus, or else, something tragic might happen. So he makes his room dark and simply stares at nothingness. He slowly recovers by doing little things, like eating something good or going outside. He recommends staring at the walls because it clears up his head. If he attempts to fall asleep, he ends up overthinking too much about too many things, so he tries to “reset” himself instead. He admits that maybe there’s something deeper behind these actions, but he hasn’t yet realized what it is. If he ever became aware of it, he might just be a goner. Whenever something like this happens, he always believes he can get through it, but one day, he might not manage to.

In contrast, Inpine does a lot of things, but his modus operandi is, first of all, going to sleep. He also overthinks when he’s depressed, so he opts for taking a breather and shutting off. Sometimes, he doesn’t really have time for a long sleep, so he just takes a short nap. By doing so, he’s able to do a switchover once he wakes up. He does this so that he can “turn down the volume” of his sadness.

Jin adds that sleeping is a cure for many things. Even though the situation doesn’t change when you open your eyes, you just feel better.

The two also comment about how corona affected everyone’s mental health. Even though they live relatively close to one another (and other friends and acquaintances as well), they hardly saw anyone for a long time.

9151: “Jin-san, Inpine-san, I have a question for both of you! Did you spend Christmas alone? Of course, there is no ill intent behind this! It’s 100% a genuine question!”

The two say that if the listener wanted to know whether they’d spent Christmas with a girl or not, they wouldn’t get anything from this. Both were doing recordings on the 24th and 25th. In the first place, they completely forgot that it was Christmas on those days, even though the staff of the studio they were recording in had bought stacks upon stacks of Santa Claus stocking caps.

According to Jin, everyone put them on, despite not looking at all like they were having any fun. He simply sang and played the guitar while watching, in horror, as everybody wordlessly put on the caps from beyond the glass wall. Meanwhile, Inpine was having a conference call with the staff, and he could see that the person on the other side of the line was holding a Santa cap the whole time while talking to him. That’s where he realized it was Christmas, and he thought the mood would be very lively and cheerful at the studio, but turns out it wasn’t. When Jin, who wasn’t wearing a cap, came into the call to say goodbye to him after finishing work like usual, Inpine noticed that nobody was enjoying the situation in particular. Jin was told to put the cap on but refused vehemently. In short, both were working hard last Christmas.

Ruri Karakusa: “Please tell us what each other’s coolest moment was.”

Jin starts out by saying that Inpine was the only person who visited him when he stopped going to school. Looking back, he thinks the way that Inpine chose to spend time with him even though most people would’ve preferred to hang out with their groups of friends was very cool.

He shares one more moment, along with a funny story from when they were playing in a band during high school. Whenever they played at live concert houses, a lot of people would gather up and cheer for the bands that played before them, but as soon as they’d come up on stage, everyone would leave immediately, even though the show was entirely for free. One time, two girls were too slow to run away, so Inpine saw that as a chance and jumped off the stage and onto the floor next to them. Apparently, he was on a verse of the song that begins with “help me”, and he yelled that very loudly onto the mic when landing. He also went, “LISTEN TO OUR MUSIC!!!”, which made the girls scream. Jin says Inpine was cool as hell back then and that he’ll never forget this scene.

Inpine has a similar story from when they were performing in a music contest in their first year of high school. A bunch of horse carriages passed by while they were in the middle of a performance. That’s a normal occurrence in the countryside, of course, and it could very well have ruined their turn if Jin hadn’t done a drum solo and stopped the song on the spot. They waited until the carriages were gone so that it wouldn’t disturb their sound, being praised by the MC for pulling off such a smooth pause. In the end, not only were they able to resume without problems, but also the elderly people who were there to see the horses decided to join the audience. They won the contest, and for the first time, someone asked Inpine for an autograph. It was also the first time they were ever applauded. To this day, Inpine still thinks Jin was really cool in that moment.

Ashiya: “Jin-san, Inpine-san, good evening. I was looking forward to the Jinpine Radio. I love the works of both of you. I was so excited to listen to you talking about the making of your productions and the memories you share with each other that I couldn’t help but send this letter. It’s my first time sending a fan letter to a radio show, so I’m sorry if it’s hard to read. This is something personal, but last week, February 22nd, was my birthday. Just like you two, I was a second-year in middle school in the year 2004, so I believe I’m the same age as you. Also just like you, I have a friend from way back in kindergarten whose birthday is one day apart from mine, so we contacted each other last week to celebrate. My friend got married last year and just recently had a child, so it was my first time sending baby goods to someone. I feel like I did something very adult-like, so I was listening to a certain song that goes, ‘So I’ve become an adult already?’ while doing it. Jin-san and Inpine-san, was there ever any moment that made you think, ‘So I’m a grown-up now’? If there was any event in which you realized that you were an adult, I would like to hear about it.”

Jin jokes that he’s sometimes assaulted by nausea when he’s brushing his teeth, and whenever this happens, he feels the limits of his body and thinks to himself that he’s gotten old.

Inpine says he’s often reminded that he’s an adult whenever he’s able to eat an entire chocolate bar in one bite. His logic is that chocolate bars have partitions so that they can fit into a child’s mouth, which he doesn’t need anymore.

The two then notice that they’re only talking about body limitations and that’s probably not what the listener was talking about. Jin then says that, compared to when he was a child, he’s come to enjoy ballads and other similar music genres a lot more. He used to think they were pretentious and boring. Inpine chimes in by revealing that he’s become more emotional over the years.

When he was younger, Inpine used to be really into series with battles and action, but nowadays, he cries like a baby whenever he watches a tearjerker. He admits to have cried during every single episode of “Violet Evergarden”, and this was where he realized that his tolerance to crying has changed.

Jin tells him that’s what being an adult is about. “There will be times like that,” he adds, “just as there will be times when you feel like peeing but the pee won’t come out.” Inpine then replies in monotone, “Go see a doctor. I can go with you.”

Yoru: “Please teach me how to force my circadian cycle to reverse from morning to night.”

Jin says he once tried forcing himself to stay awake for 32 hours. Inpine witnessed it all and to him, Jin looked like he was agonizing. He asks how Jin felt after waking up, and Jin basically says he felt like shit, because he’d have to get up at 7AM to make it work, but he was wide awake by 5AM. Thanks to this, he wasn’t able to go back to a normal sleep schedule in the end.

As for Inpine, he tries to make himself tired by going on a run and taking a bath when he comes back. While soaking in the bathtub, he drinks a bottle of Regain (a Japanese energy drink) and goes to sleep. He always feels renewed when waking up and advices the listener to look up whether this is something safe to do or not if they ever decide to give it a go.

KBM: “Hello, Jin-san. I’m a fan living in South Korea. I listened to your songs for the first time when I was in fifth grade. Lots of bad things kept happening to me back then, so I was feeling down, but I was able to do my best after listening to your music. I’d listened to all the songs in your latest play-and-talk livestream. I hope you’ll be able to keep making wonderful music from now on too. Congratulations on your 10th anniversary. I’ll be rooting for you even from South Korea.”

Jin and Inpine are amazed and humbled to have received a message from overseas. They praise the fan for their Japanese. When Inpine muses on how difficult it must be to write in a language that isn’t your own, Jin points out that Inpine can speak other languages too. Inpine laughs, saying he’s not fluent in any language aside from Japanese – he just happens to know how to say random things in English about stuff he likes.

He then reminisces to when he was in Europe with his new car and met a teenage kid in Poland who asked him about the types of car he liked. He answered with a very heavy accent, “FS Polonaise is cool” and other things along those lines. At this point, Jin is making the decision to evolve their radio show into something more globalized.

The next question is from someone whose name Jin completely forgot to read at first, because he accidentally logged out (of Google Forms, probably) and then had to log back in during the livestream.

Nayu: “Jin-san, Inpine-san, good evening. Congratulations on the release of your first mini-album. I learned about Jin-san exactly 10 years ago, and ever since then, I have been keeping up with Jin-san, VOCALOID and the works of similar artists. I attended the celebration of the release of ‘Mekakucity Reload’ in 2018. I told Jin-san, ‘You are my all-time favorite artist. Please keep doing your best from this point on too’, and Jin-san said, ‘Thank you. I will keep working hard to stay as your number one from now on as well’, which was a huge honor for me. The fact that you said this with a smile on your face made me very happy and it became my most precious memory.”

Jin is extremely grateful for this one. The BGM now has changed into a track that sounds ridiculously motivational. Jin comments that he has received lots of messages like this from his fans after releasing “Gojitsudan”, which Sayuki also took part in.

He says he wants to invite Sayuki to one of their livestreams, but Sayuki is too busy lately, thus Jin hasn’t been able to contact him. Inpine suggests they make more effort for him to come over, so that their radio might become more uplifting.

The two thank the listeners for their fan letters and Jin puts up the ending theme – a piano solo accompanied by a mastered beat. The two talk about how the episode flew by like air and they did basically nothing the whole time. However, they had fun. They also apologize for not being able to answer all the messages and promise to keep doing their utmost, asking the fans to watch over them warmly. Jin says they’ll announce a theme for the next batch of fan mail on Twitter once again.

Jin notes that Inpine’s voice cut off abruptly last time at the end of the livestream, and Inpine explains it’s because the stream ended too suddenly. Jin admits he has no idea at what moment exactly the stream comes to an end after he presses the button. They then decide to end this one properly and bid their goodbyes with Inpine doing a funny voice. Jin finishes the livestream (you can actually hear him click on the button) and after a few seconds, he asks, “Isn’t this timing just fine?”, to which Inpine replies, “It’s pretty okay.”

Both seemed to think the stream was over and that they were no longer on, but it actually ended immediately after Inpine’s reply. Good timing, indeed.