Hachiōji, Tokyo

Hachiōji (八王子市, Hachiōji-shi) is a city in Tokyo, Japan, about 40 kilometers west of the center of the 23 special wards of Tokyo.

As of June 30, 2014, the city had an estimated population of 563,265 and a population density of 3,023.26 persons per km². The total area is 186.31 km².

It is the eighth largest city in the Greater Tokyo Area. The city is surrounded on three sides by mountains, forming the Hachioji Basin which opens up toward the east in the direction of Tokyo. The mountain ranges in the southwest include Mount Takao (599 m) and Mount Jinba (857 m), two popular hiking destinations which can be reached by train and bus, respectively. Two major national roads, Route 16 (which connects Kawagoe in the north with Yokohama in the south) and National Route 20, the former Kōshū Kaidō.

History

Although Hachioji only gained city status on September 1, 1917, it has been an important junction point and post-town along the Kōshū Highway, the main road that connected the historical Edo (today's Tokyo) with Western Japan since medieval times, especially during the Edo period. For a short period of time, a castle, Hachioji Castle existed in the area. The castle was built in 1584 by Hōjō Ujiteru, but was soon destroyed in 1590 during General Toyotomi Hideyoshi's attempt to gain control over all of Japan. During the Meiji period, Hachioji prospered as an important location for the production of silk and silk textiles. The industry faded away, however, in the 1960s. Today, Hachioji mainly serves as a commuter town for people working in Tokyo, and as a location for many large colleges and universities.

Hatsune Miku

Hatsune Miku (Japanese: 初音ミク), sometimes referred to as Miku Hatsune, is a humanoid persona voiced by a singing synthesizer application developed by Crypton Future Media. Hatsune Miku is portrayed as a 16-year-old girl with long turquoise twintails. She uses Yamaha Corporation's Vocaloid 2 and Vocaloid 3 singing synthesizing technologies. She also uses Crypton Future Media's Piapro Studio, a singing synthesizer VSTi Plugin. She was the second Vocaloid sold using the Vocaloid 2 engine, and the first Japanese Vocaloid to use the Japanese version of the Vocaloid 2 engine. Her voice is sampled from Japanese voice actress Saki Fujita. Hatsune Miku has performed at her concerts onstage as an animated projection.

The name of the character comes from merging the Japanese words for first (初, hatsu), sound (音, ne) and future (ミク, miku), thus meaning "the first sound from the future," referring to her position as the first of Crypton's "Character Vocal Series."

Development

Hatsune Miku was the first Vocaloid developed by Crypton Future Media after they handled the release of the Yamaha vocal Meiko and Kaito. She was built using Yamaha's Vocaloid 2 technology, and later updated over time to newer engine versions. She was created by taking vocal samples from voice actress Saki Fujita at a controlled pitch and tone and those different samples all contain a single Japanese or English phonic which, when strung together, create full lyrics and phrases. The pitch of the samples was to be altered by the synthesizer engine itself, and was constructed into a keyboard style instrument within the Vocaloid software.

Leæther Strip

Leæther Strip is a Danish musical project founded on January 13, 1988 by Claus Larsen. Its influence has been most felt in the electronic body music and electro-industrial genres. Leæther Strip was one of the earliest and most prominent acts on Germany's now defunct Zoth Ommog record label. For distribution outside of Europe, the music has been licensed to the U.S. labels Cleopatra Records and Metropolis Records. After the demise of Zoth Ommog in 1999, Larsen signed to Bloodline Records, which only released a single before also going out of business. In 2005 Leæther Strip signed with the Belgian based label Alfa Matrix. On June 3, 2011, Larsen announced his split from Alfa Matrix in order to self release future material.

History

According to founder Claus Larsen, Leæther Strip is, and always will be, only him. Larsen was born on November 13, 1967 in Aalborg, Denmark. He first released music under the name of Leæther Strip in 1989. However, his 1995 release G.A.W.M.U.S. (Getting Away With Murder U. S.) included two early demos from 1982 and 1984, with the latter forming the unknown beginning of the band according to an interview conducted with Claus Larsen. In 1991, Larsen created a side-project called Klute in which he also remained the sole member.