Mix Speakers Inc. Anime USA 2012 Interview for JrockRevolution.com
Reporter: Ruiki
Translator: Midori Maejima
Reporter: How long does it take to get ready for live shows or concert?
Seek: Five hours.
Reporter: For makeup and hair?
Seek: Three hours (for makeup and hair. Five hours for everything)
Reporter: How long for yours? (towards Seek)
Seek: Fifteen minutes *laughs*
Reporter: Who comes up with every release’s theme and costume ideas?
Seek: Miss Aya! (everyone laughs)
Reporter: Why is that?
Aya: I’ve always been the one who’s thrown ideas out there naturally. Also it’s because I play games and takes influences from there.
Reporter: What advantages and disadvantages are there of having two vocalists as opposed to one?
Miki: In reverse, I think it’s more, so only good things, so definitely all advantages.
Seek: I think that is another reason why Mix Speaker’s, Inc. is lasting so long.
Reporter: How much work do you have to put into being your own management?
Seek: It actually doesn’t take that much time to make yourself your own management company so it doesn’t mean that we’re tied to being our own management right now. In our history from here on out, there may be a time when we’re going to be under someone else’s management, but for now we believe this is the best way for us to be able to do what we want to do. On an advantage side, there is a momentum of speed we can feel when creating things we want to make right now and bring that into shape.
Reporter: If that is so, do you recommend being your own management instead of being under one?
Seek: That is a hard question. We do say that we are self-managed but when it comes to lives and recordings, there are other staff members who help us out, so we’re not really doing it just ourselves. In regards to holding the initiative, we have that in our hands but that differentiates depending on the band. But when we are creating our pieces, we have a wonderful team working with us and we believe are able to create great things.
Reporter: Where do you see yourself 15 years from now?
Seek: I’m sure in 15 years, S will be very famous. Well, let’s put that story aside.
Speaking realistically about the band, in the past 5 years, each one of us has done 12 characters, so in all, we have 72 characters altogether. So if we formulate this it’s 72×15. Saying this, there will be many stories that would be created.
Aya: Meaning, they’ll be around 200 characters.
Seek: I’m sure there will be many more characters born.
Also, since this is our second time in America, in 15 years, we wish to have become a band traveling and performing around the world.
Reporter: Speaking of which, how do you feel to be invited back to perform in the U.S.?
Seek: We always say that we will come back right away, so we were able to actually keep that promise from the last time that we were here. We do believe that we were able to perform a live that actually ties into our next live here at AnimeUSA. We would like to come back soon again.
Reporter: What is a routine you always do before a show?
Seek: As a band and as a whole, we don’t really have any routine before a show. If we do that, we tend to mess up. So we don’t really do anything.
Reporter: For Miki-san, you have participated in Mint NEKO fashion show, is there any plan in the future to do that again, or to collaborate with a different designer?
Seek: After that fashion show, his new nickname is “Captain Model” *laughs*
Miki: If Mint asks me, I would like to do it again even though it is a little embarrassing because I don’t actually have any modeling experience, so I have no idea what expressions I’m supposed to have *laughs*
Reporter: A lot of Visual Kei bands are doing fashion collaborations lately, if you could collaborate with any fashion designer, who would it be?
S: Not quite clothing, but if we can do a collaboration for an animation that features our costumes, that would be great.
Miki: I would like to collaborate with Alex Streeter.
Keiji: Ann Demeulemeester. This designer has a lot of originality so it would be interesting to collaborate with that brand.
Yuki: I don’t have much interest in it but, why don’t we all be in a Uniqlo commercial? *laughs*
Reporter: What is your favorite English word?
Seek: Promise
Aya: Food
Yuki: Love
Miki: Rock
Keiji: Peace
S: I’m so happy
Seek: What’s that word you learned yesterday?
S: Oh, “pervert!”
Seek: Yes, he learned that word yesterday. (laughs)
Reporter: Please give a message to your fans
Seek: It was actually our second time in America, and we do believe that we had a live that can connect to the next one the next time we come back. All the members are always looking forward to coming here. If you can come see us, Mix Speaker’s, Inc. who has an original world created again it would be great. So thank you very much for having us back.
Reporter: Thank you very much.
Note: Due to time constraints, we were unable to ask all the interview questions. Should the interview be completed, we will update the article. Thank you for your understanding!
Edited by: Ali W.