UBerserker · @Outhouse_Deco
26th Feb 2017 from TwitLonger
#BEMANI hidden aliases resume pt.4
With no more outphase, the thread that covered all the hidden BEMANI aliases is dead and buried; it was the only thread in a Bemani website to cover mystery aliases so at the moment we have no real resume of them, which made me lead to just write a new one in the form of a twitlonger post.
This will be about the most known old hidden aliases and all the newer ones. Anything that is already known (that is flat out confirmed, read) won't be listed. Thanks to the people on Twitter for reminding me about some of the aliases that I might have forgotten about otherwise!
Six > = alias name
Three > = song appearance
Two > = list of identities, from strongest to weakest
NEW VERSION - February 26th 2017
-Removed the 黒脛 entry, confirmed to be Qrispy as everyone expected.
-Changed the UNVEIL description (new prediction is 96).
-Small and crucial update to owl*tree being indeed t+pazolite after all.
>>>>>>BLACK STAR 幸広-YUKIHIRO-
>>>You'll say "Now!" (IIDX)
The classic mystery alias that will never ever be confirmed. Most people at first thought he was Tatsh because of how much the song resembled The Dirty Of Loudness but as we know Tatsh only returned from RA onward and there's no way that during a departure he'd be suddenly part of a Mitsuru joke.
Nowadays BLACK STAR's identity is heavily implied to be 96. 96 means Kuro, aka Black, and various things he's involved too are about the black: Full-Combo Title Achievement of GIGA BREAK is called "BLACK STAR", he has an album named "BLACK ALBUM", he made songs called In The Blackest Den and Far Beyond Blackened. So much black that twitch chat would spam TriHard a million times by now. So it'd be easily given the fact that he's BLACK STAR; some of the sounds in You'll say "Now!" are also similar to ones heard In The Blackest Den (scratch ones particularly). Even though I'd be questioning why he'd end up making a techno-only song considering 96 solely made rock stuff (but might explain the strange nature of You'll say "Now!"'s sounds, plus both songs have long scratch interludes).
The only other appearance of BLACK STAR (never confirmed it was him but who could be otherwise) was himself at the end of SA.YO.NA.RA. SUPER STAR's video (Visual Emotions 9 DVD version). To this day no one recognized who is the guy. His skin is dark like 96's but the facial features don't seem to be. Maybe PON? Considering PON popped up in Bemani right in the EMPRESS year and was also listed in the staff for that IIDX game; however it wouldn't explain why that mysterious "black star" person never appeared anymore.... NAOKI? You'll say "Now!" had such a DDR-style ending and the artist left some time after Visual Emotion 9 was released. Another factor is the English comments for You'll say "Now!". They don't suggest absolutely nothing (aside PON writing English comments being really out of place) but they'll come in handy for another alias.
Recently on twitter I got reminded that DJ YOSHITAKA was, back in the day, the first candidate of BLACK STAR's true identity. It was on Remywiki once, major evidence was "Yuki Hiro" apparently translating to "Lucky Vacuum", one of the DJ YOSHITAKA's main aliases, then it was removed for reasons unknown (it was replaced by the 96 evidences, instead). It could be believable but even then sound-wise there's nothing much to compare between You'll say "Now!" and any YOSHITAKA song that comes to mind. Plus, You'll say "Now!" in the EMPRESS ID list was not in the YOSHITAKA song group and back then the ID lists were really strict on one artist's songs being all grouped together; I'm Screaming LOVE was also away from the YOSHITAKA's EMPRESS group but that's easily explainable for the fact that another artist was involved on that song.
Also yeah, YOSHITAKA is definitely not that mysterious guy in SA.YO.NA.RA. SUPER STAR's video (assuming that guy is still BLACK STAR).
So overall, I'll mainly stick to 96, my main reason (aside the whole BLACK word thing) is because of the scratch sounds of You'll say "Now!" and In The Blackest Den being almost identical (and the similar way they're used, late-song interlude).
>>96, NAOKI, PON, DJ YOSHITAKA
>>>>>>Fantastic Bubbly9
>>>Bubbly Time (pop'n)
Another classic mystery alias, this time from pop'n, that will never be revealed. This one is a bit more straightforward as Qrispy Joybox is the only known artist believed to be behind the alias (he wasn't new to this thing - see Aegis on IIDX). Bubbly Time resembles Music-U quite a bit in sounds, and Qrispy wasn't seen in fantasia when he had an appearance in pop'n 19, 21 and 22, which further suggests he was hiding behind the Bubbly9 alias this time. Plus, 9 is read as kyuu, aka Q (Q for Qrispy). There were also sayings about Qrispy confirming somewhere he was him but I'm not sure if it was ever true.
>>Qrispy Joybox
>>>>>>sonic-coll.
>>>Flourish (DDR)
>>>Trigger (DDR)
Once again, another known mystery alias that won't see any reveal. This time from DDR X, the only AC DDR game which had Jason Borenstein as a sound director (the Micheal a la Mode guy which sadly died due to an aortic aneurysm). Only in this game we saw the neuras and sonic-coll. names. The former's identity has been discovered not too long ago and he's just a commissioned artist named Shuhei Naruse.
For sonic-coll. instead still nothing is known, and most likely he was an in-house artist - considering Trigger is DDR X's last boss I 100% doubt a commissioned artist was behind it.
It's suspected it's either NAOKI or actually Jason. Jason never did a song on Bemani beforehand (so we don't know what alias he would have used) and unless there's an exception I completely forgot about, sound directors always do songs for their games. Jason was the SD of DDR X and we had sonic-coll right there, and neither of them appeared afterwards. SDs are also known to make last boss songs for games. So yeah, it could be Jason.
Now I heard NAOKI said in an interview he isn't sonic-coll but could never find where he said it. NAOKI was usually the last boss guy of DDR until U1 came in with 2MB remixes. And somehow Flourish ended up in a DDR X course with all NAOKI songs. Trigger itself also sounds like a stereotypical NAOKI DDR boss song like Chaos.
No explanation why sonic-coll. as a name wasn't seen anymore but NAOKI has an history of random aliases being used once and never more. Difference is, we all eventually knew that trance star and the latenighters were NAOKI names, sonic-coll. instead never; which gives more of an edge to the Jason suggestion.
>>Jason Borenstein, NAOKI
>>>>>>Project B-
>>>Deceive Your Insight (IIDX)
>>>M.D.Injection (IIDX)
>>>Knell (RB)
>>>超青少年ノ為ノ超多幸ナ超古典的超舞曲 (IIDX)
>>>太陽SUNSUNボンジュールアバンチュール (IIDX)
>>>乱れた風紀に天罰を (pop'n)
>>>Glitter Flatter Scatter (jubeat)
>>>Sarutobi Champion is 拙者 (IIDX)
The current Mystic Moon (aka PON if you missed out the fact that he revealed it this year) of BEMANI, Project B- is an alias that will eventually be revealed. Everyone already refers to him as Akhuta as crapload of things regarding Project B- point straight at him; literally what's left is Akhuta himself making the announcement.
Project B- came technically before Akhuta in tricoro, so it was pretty impossible to figure out the identity at first. Once Akhuta started to appear, it became more apparent that he was Project B- because his first few GFDM songs had the same guitar solos as Deceive Your Insight's one. Piano in Knell and M.D.Injection was also done in the same fast and gothic style as Stella Sinistra's.
Other things are Akhuta's blood type which is B(Rh-), Project B-'s SPADA system voice sounding like Akhuta if the pitch is increased and how Project B-'s longs have a modified song title which was what Akhuta did to Stella Sinistra.
Now this year on jubeat Qubell, Akhuta became a sound director of the jubeat series and soon after the game got a Project B- last boss song (for the first group of Qubell tracks) after days of introduction on the G.F.S. website. And the person on Glitter Flatter Scatter's jacket looks pretty much like Akhuta.
>>Akhuta
>>>>>>麒麟 (Kirin)
>>>Broken Sword (IIDX)
Oh man this song.
So besides Kinjishi aka the Lion guy aka dj TAKA we have this giraffe guy who popped up in the 4th KAC live event in the most cringe-worthy way possible.
Giraffe is heavily implied to be Akhuta. The latter was nowhere on the stage when the Giraffe was around. Giraffe was also tall like Akhuta. A giraffe is also shown on Peragro's jacket, a song where Akhuta is heavily involved.
The piano of Broken Sword's second half is also a bit similar to 超青少年ノ為ノ超多幸ナ超古典的超舞曲's one. Considering the song's poor reception I doubt Akhuta will ever reveal himself as 麒麟.
>>Akhuta
>>>>>>HEXA
>>>CODE:1 (RB) + revisions
>>>CODE:2 (RB)
Definitely TOTTO by the samey bass sounds and by the trademarked TOTTO-style progression we see in all his trance boss songs like vajra and also (most especially) Gravigazer.
Other than that, CODE:1 was the first song listed in the VOLZZA's ID list, which means it was likely the first song ready for the game and most probably the SD (TOTTO in this case) made that. Also, CODE:1 had two revisions and also had a sequel. I don't think anyone's song revisions would be even put in a game outside of the major authority (the SD) himself - and they're almost all on the same game including the sequel. SDs can do whatever they feel like.
>>DJ TOTTO
>>>>>>IDEA NOTE
>>>Attack NO.3 (IIDX)
A small one everyone forgets - a techno/electro song from EMPRESS that sounds very much like SLAKE stuff; in The Invisible Force live stream he did play a song that sounded extremely similar to Attack NO.3.
During the EMPRESS era, SLAKE was only appearing in IIDX CS games from GOLD only but that didn't mean he wasn't going to appear on AC anymore (not to mention, he had that one random appearance in pop'n fantasia years later).
>>SLAKE
>>>>>>Hirayasu Matsudo
>>>Pet Peeve (SDVX)
A person with a wig and a mask that appeared in Bemani live events and it's credited in SDVX for making the infamous knob-only charts. You'd think this guy is part of the Konami staff but... nah. Commissioned just like most of the people working on the SDVX series.
And of course, only outsiders can participate to music contests, even if they already closely work with Konami (see RHYZE artists). Of course, Hirayasu Matsudo's background is completely unknown and yet he's skilled at song making.
Hirayasu Matsudo's most suggested identity is of course MAD CHILD. If you heard The Vice from one of the J/P-HD# albums (fourth one I think?), you can easily find the similarities between it and Pet Peeve. And Pet Peeve in general is pretty much rhythmic-only techdance that MAD CHILD always seems to make.
Other than that, some of the MAD CHILD's SDVX charts have patterns found in Matsudo's charts (or Bob Shimantogawa too, same person). MAD CHILD himself is a pillar of SDVX's charting and he's quite into Bemani things considering he was involved in that BEMANI SUMMER DIARY event's final boss (SDVX version). Yet another evidence is that both MAD CHILD and Hirayasu returned to SDVX as effectors in almost the same time frame after a long absence.
>>MAD CHILD
>>>>>>Destron
>>>All is Wrecked (IIDX)
One so forgotten to the point that the song had a very low playcount and getting eventually axed in SINOBUZ.
The name "Destron" quickly makes you think about Des-ROW, as some of his aliases started with "Des-" plus a word afterward, depending on the artist he'd collaborate with or for another reason. Thing is that Destron is one whole word instead of using the Des- format which is sort of suspicious.
All is Wrecked's song comments are written in English as well; and from there I make a call to those comments in BLACK STAR's song: 96 is involved? And this would also mean he's indeed BLACK STAR?
SPADA is the first IIDX without 96 since he popped up in the series, unless he was actually behind All is Wrecked. The guitars are sophisticated enough to believe it's 96 who made the song, and Des-ROW probably did only the shouting (definitely Des style). Or perhaps 96 just helped greatly because All is Wrecked at its core sounds more like Des-ROW composition than 96's, it's that the guitars are on another level of quality (let's be honest the song really sounds like INNOVATIONS at parts).
Quite difficult to speculate honestly but I still believe 96 had a hand. Des-ROW wasn't making metal for a long time by now. I believe All is Wrecked was a last-minute emergency song made for SPADA after the abort process started.
Another theory could be Qrispy Joybox (always with Des-ROW). He had no song on SPADA and the guy did REALIZE on GFDM.
>>Des-ROW and 96, Des-ROW and Qrispy Joybox
>>>>>>Kagutsuchi
>>>背水之陣 (Kagutsuchi Remix) (pop'n)
Another big mystery of pop'n that isn't going to lead anywhere. Appearing for a remix only and disappearing quickly like Kagutsuchi in the myths, it's quite hard to figure out who's behind the alias.
The most picked theory is the Ryu* one. Various things point at him: the high-speed nature of the remix, that "somebody scream" sample which is a trademark of him by now (not that anyone else can't use it though), no Ryu* song whatsoever in Sunny Park - he was going to have an original one according to the HDD data but I'm pretty sure this is unrelated, unless he really ended up with nothing at all (he had nothing in Lapistoria and éclale either). Finally, the song comments are very similar to NNRT and Do It!! Do It!! ones. So is it Ryu*? Well, the comments seem to very imply it but I'm not convinced. Kagutsuchi is like, a weird alias for him. He mostly always use dragon aliases except tūmahaB (and we're still talking about a dragon here) and Kraken (alright, but it's still a water thing and Ryu* likes WATER a lot, not Fire whose Kagutsuchi is made out). The rest of the aliases have a second person alongside Ryu* (Starving Trancer most of the time). The remix itself is also not very Ryu-ish. Ryu* high-speed remixes generally involve a lot of happy hardcore voice sampling, and feature a very clear hardcore bassline; they're also straightforward and those times Ryu* used guitars (Red Dragon), the style was completely different.
You know, I'm going to throw my own suggestion, which also went around quite a lot: Hommarju. The remix style reminds me of Hommarju more than anything else. The vocals being constantly repeated like crazy (Oh My Jam anyone?), and the very bass+guitar combo is extremely reminiscent of Verflucht (we're around the same time frame where both songs were made). I feel like I'm hearing Verflucht all the time and there's a bit of HYENA's distorted guitar synths too.
It's very open to speculations but knowing both artists for years now I'm just going by instinct; Hommarju is a more popular pick in the JPN community at least. Then it could be a completely different person.
>>Hommarju, Ryu*
>>>>>>CapsColte
>>>existence(エレクトロポップン！MIX) (pop'n)
>>>運命のパラドックス (pop'n)
The alias that made me want to write all of this article. For a lot of people CapsColte was considered a completely new person out of the blue but upon hearing the song and the female vocals when the OST still solely credited CapsColte for everything I was getting super suspicious. A bit too good for a random commissioned person that Konami found from exactly nowhere. Turns out JPN people thought the same.
CapsColte seems to be, indeed, DJ Genki. Hearing the long version of 運命のパラドックス cleared things to me a lot. I actually already imagined CapsColte being Genki when I listened existence(エレクトロポップン！MIX) because of the very familiar electro-pop style a la Sweet Radar and the chiptune-ish sections that Genki loves to do.
Let's take 運命のパラドックス. It has a long, and Genki's BEMANI songs most of the time come with one. The intro of the long version is clearly the same one as in Sidragasum (SPEEDBALL GT) - bells with a closed door sound. Same method. The rest of the song's progression follows Genki songs very closely with the vocal section being repeated twice, a new long interlude then vocal section again and then the end. Just like MAGIC & LOVE or most of the Genki vocal songs on doujin releases like the Sunao ones on his two albums. The guitars and the piano style is also the exact same as Genki's and you can easily hear his trademark happy synths every now and then. It was very easy to figure out by this who CapsColte was. Good example for a 運命のパラドックス comparison: アルファルドの花 from Elder Dragon Legend II ～The Revenge of Swamp Queen～. It doesn't have the same guitar riff outro but you can find that in Genki's Sunao songs in REALIZE/StarryOrange or just at the end of MAGIC & LOVE. And also at the end of Rave Cannon too now that we know Genki did the guitars for it.
Lastly, 運命のパラドックス's comments end with the "until we meet someday" phrase which Genki uses a lot.
Not sure why lyrics and vocals are credited to CapsColte solely but I guess if they revealed the vocalist it would have been too easy to figure out the artist's identity (vocalist is definitely yukacco). Genki did the same thing on one doujin album (used an alias named DOMISO for him and yukacco).
>>DJ Genki (feat. Yukacco)
>>>>>>ACRID-9
>>>Pleasure with VOLZZA (RB)
This one would be an easy Des-ROW pick but I'm definitely rushing toward the Qrispy Joybox option.
Aside the the 9=kyuu=Q thing like Fantastic Bubbly9, the jacket features Pastel Kun who's basically the Qrispy mascot character other than RB's one. It's also a RB VOLZZA BGM medley and I see Qrispy Joybox working more on that than Des-ROW. Plus, the guitar riffs in this song are on par with MAX MAXIMIZER's stuff (DEADLOCK and Misera especially), and most of the rhythms/sounds heard in the second half resemble a lot CHERNOBOG.
>>Qrispy Joybox
>>>>>>EOOZ
>>>Ausretious#1-まどろみ、或いは嘆色の夢- (jb)
January 11th and we finally got the new jubeat OSTs. Everything of Ausretious is credited under another name: 木夏木一 (Kiichi Kinatsu). Now, to me, this doesn't sound like a proper name at all, in fact it's surely another alias (we had already similar cases, think of all the Courage Brothers' aliases and ADULTIC TEACHER) and most other people think the same thing. The jubeat staff also tweeted about EOOZ, an image containing text (in a very crazy way) of Kiichi Kinatsu introducing... themselves.
Kiichi Kinatsu is indeed a duo, consisting of the artist himself (the cat) and the illustrator (the rabbit). Focusing on the artist person, just notice how he's referenced as a black cat. In BEMANI, anything cat, especially if black, can be seen as a direct reference to wac, coincidentally the same artist being suspected the most being EOOZ because of how Ausretious sounded like. Not to mention wac in the jubeat series has mostly used hidden aliases for songs (アストライアの双皿 and Milchstraße) so he could be doing it once again.
Other than that, the reason why I strongly believe EOOZ/木夏木一 is an alias is because if it was really a new artist, Konami would have marketed Ausretious in a very overwhelming manner like how they did for TOTTO/HuZeR/SYUNN (they didn't AT ALL for EOOZ), EOOZ didn't appear anymore after Ausretious (year 2015) and that's very typical of pre-existing artists using aliases, the way how oddly Kiichi Kinatsu sounds as a name and the very weird way how it was introduced, just almost two years later in a tweet.
I'm not fully saying EOOZ couldn't be a new person but there are myriads of clues that it isn't, even speaking by experience. It could be though another artist (preferably in-house) that isn't wac.
>>wac
>>>>>>Bazole
>>>アガット (jb)
The first jubeat prop last boss. Most people instantly said Bazole (first it was Jerico but changed because there's already a known artist named Jerico and Jerico himself said it's not him) was S-C-U because of, you know, light-hearted chip synths and such but I don't think it works that way.
At least, at first, I believed it was ZUKI but after the OST still not revealing anything (still Bazole), and the fact that ZUKI already did one song for prop afterwards (twinkle noise), I think people are right about Bazole being S-C-U.
A quick comparison between アガット and Timberwolves shows similar progression styles and most of all, the same exact bassline beat synth. Being S-C-U jubeat's sound director, it's perfectly normal for him to do a boss song and more than one too (though it seems like they consider Slluuddggee to be the boss of the second prop group). We're just not too used to S-C-U doing very high BPM songs or generally tryharding for something more imposing-sounding. Also to note, S-C-U seems to enjoy song titles made out of four kana/kanji characters.
>>S-C-U
>>>>>>Captain KING
>>>Siberite (DDR)
A great show of TAKA's passion on music. Here we have a slowed down trance version of Frozen Ray.
>>dj TAKA
>>>>>>South Carolina Duzzle
>>>good night , mommy (pop'n)
I really forgot about this one because you listen to good night , mommy and you instantly realize you're listening to a remix of December Breeze and already imagine that the artist is already revealed as Risk Junk. Even the alias suggests it (Duzzle -> dj razzle dazzle).
>>dj TAKA
>>>>>>上ノ瀬つかさ
>>>ruin of opals (RB)
>>>Dracophobia (RB)
Finally a tricky one. There are a bunch of clues to go forward with figuring out who's behind this Tsukasa Kaminose alias but I just cannot stop imagining the artist being actually female. Another thing is that I strongly believe it's a commissioned artist as the appearances are only limited to REFLEC BEAT - if it was an in-house artist you'd see this person on every single game by now and Konami of course would celebrate it in the most hilarious of ways, which right now they aren't doing at all aside reserving the artist for secret/boss songs only so far.
First of, Tsukasa appears so far in REFLEC BEAT only, which means it has to be probably a person that TOTTO knows. And TOTTO likely knows a lot of doujin composers thanks to his Riverside past. A lot of people have dropped wac, TOMOSUKE and OSTER as names. I'm sure none of them are Tsukasa.
For wac, doing quickly two songs under the same alias is completely out of his style, not to mention I can't see him behind the songs. TOMOSUKE on the other hand does like a new song once per 1.5 years because he's too busy with Hinabita. Considering he actually appeared in VOLZZA 2 under his main alias it'd be unthinkable that he'd do two new songs for one single game. OSTER could have been a pick but both her and Tsukasa appear in Reflesia; the trick here is that Tsukasa should be no one of the artists that appeared so far in Reflesia.
Before I thought it could have been m@sumi because ruin of opals does feel a lot like her stuff (there's one part that almost sounds like Les Vague) but then Dracophobia came by and that definitely is not m@sumi's doing, the soundwork is vastly different, way too rough and dark. Plus it looks like she'll be sticking to the pop'n music series only.
Tsukasa reminds me of PRASTIK DANCEFLOOR back in the day when people dropped out a crapload of names because of music similarities, only to then finding out it was a completely different and commissioned person. I believe it might be the same case here; there's a twitter user going by the name of @kaminosetsukasa and all there's to it is just him/her following the REFLEC BEAT staff twitter but who knows if it's legit or not.
Conclusion: new artist. Too many factors to count, too much confusion, feels like another PRASTIK DANCEFLOOR case.
>>New artist.
>>>>>>UNVEIL
>>>刹那のカーリギッド ～セトリオスの6の赦罪より～ (RB)
The big similarities with recent IIDX's iNO songs and also a bit with In The Blackest Den really suggests it's 96 (it's definitely something like he would make). Also 96 has no solo songs in Reflesia so far.
>>96
BONUS ALIAS FROM CHUNITHM
>>>>>>owl*tree
>>>Teriqma (CHUNITHM)
>>>Paqqin (CHUNITHM)
SEGA's star music game CHUNITHM has its own mystery alias thing going on and it's already quite next level. If you haven't listened both songs, do that now - both are electro EDM-ish and are extremely well-produced - maybe you can think of something as well.
Some names have been already thrown by people: kors k, Ryu* and Massive New Krew. For sure the first two can't be and for MNK, even if Teriqma uses a vocal sample from MNK's VELVET (Groove Coaster song), I don't agree because MNK's sound style is way too rough for Teriqma and Paqqin (not to mention, MNK has not set foot in a SEGA game yet).
CHUNITHM's artist list is made up by people who worked on Japanese games' soundtracks and also high-level indie artists made popular throughout BMS and other music games. So yeah, that sets the mood that whoever owl*tree is, it's of course a pretty big artist in the scene.
My personal pick has been always t+pazolite. t+pazolite has a tendency to cram a song with complex melodies as much as possible, Paqqin synths at certain points become straight clown-ish t+pazolite stuff and overall they recall an old t+pazolite song from the TANO*C series, Drunk Crank Franken (mostly the slowed down part of it which sounds a lot like Paqqin), as well as t+pazolite's medieval stuff from the Elder Dragon Legend comps. What doesn't convince me is Teriqma/Paqqin's lack of voice samples, wobbles and the bass being a bit too strong, all things that aren't much present in t+pazolite's works.
t+pazolite already appeared on CHUNITHM also and I doubt owl*tree can be somebody that doesn't have a song on CHUNITHM with his true alias. Also, Paqqin appeared in an update alongside the C-Show's, Maozon's, Cranky's and -45's songs, and t+pazolite really sits well with these guys (it helps also that the successive CHUNITHM AIR update had all artists related to the vocaloid/utaite world).
At JAEPO 2017's CHUNITHM stage, t+pazolite played live the owl*tree songs after he asked to the public if he liked the artist's songs. This is almost the final nail in the coffin as the JPN community is finally realizing that t+pazolite is owl*tree after all.
>>t+pazolite
-End.