Hey, look at this obscure UTAU musician I found!

Trust me on this, please!

I'm no stranger to VOCALOID and vocal synth music. Definetly not in it as deep as some of my friends, still at that point where I would like to consider it a kind-of not-really genre and an instrument, but it's been one of my main interests since I was a kid. Trust me, the figure collection is divided by "miku" and "everything else" these days. I'm also really into obscure things. Obviously. We're talking on the "i'm important enough to have my own website, right?" side of the web.

So when I get any sort of vocal synth song in my reccomendations with sub 5K views, it's usually an instant click just to see what they have going on there. Usually, the song is pretty decent, although made by an amateur musician, and unique! Independant music leads for more variety, obviously, but one of my favorite examples of this was a song about the partygoers in the Backrooms i found. And then I get a pretty interesting looking video in the same gist as these, and, of course, I want to listen.

Now, this article won't be going into lyrics or meaning too much because I'm not a translator, and I don't trust machine translation for even the name of this producer who I've quickly come to find as one of my favorites for "please become the next iyowa" potential. Their channel name is 砂糖の缶詰, but I did translate that and get "Canned Sugar" out of it, so that will be the name I will use to refer to this producer.

Canned Sugar's youtube channel, as well as Canned Sugar's twitter

The first Canned Sugar song on my reccomendations was apparently their first, and was drawn to my attention because the entire PV is also a game of minesweeper. That is also the song name (Minesweeper), and may be a reoccuring pattern, judging by their most recent song, Number Place, which features Sudoku. I'm extremely drawn to their video work as well as the music itself -- the loose, nearly abstracted style of their art adds a certain flow that is nice to see in a world where vocal synth work is unusually polished most of the time. I'm utterly taken and fascinated by their artwork in general.

Their music is also, while obviously independant, independant and new in all of the right ways. Most of their songs feel like rough cracks in instrument, like the rusted metal of a factory without being actual industrial music. A great thing about indie music is that they don't have a genre they particularly adhere to yet, and Canned Sugar is no exception to this. I can't really place genres too well, either. The tuning is also very well-done, espessially for their peak choice of UTAU. I think their instrumental style shines espessially in this specific song, hard without going to deeper hardstyle. It's particularly unique, and that really is what I love about obscure/newer producers.

Speaking of UTAU choice, I also really appreciate their choice of UTAU voicebank -- it fits with the music as well. Most of their songs use Defoko/Utane Uta, which is known for being the first UTAU, a port of an Aquestone voice, and robotic and choppy. This also makes Defoko one of my favorite UTAUs, and I do wish people used her for music more. Canned Sugar also makes great use of Adachi Rei, who's voicebank was generated in Audacity for a similar feel to Defoko, and the UTAU version of Kasane Teto, which has been swept away in favor of SynthV as of late. Don't get me wrong, Teto coming to SynthV is great for everyone, but her UTAU version just has a specific 2009 charm that didn't get transferred over. These choices of older (not Rei), less advanced UTAU help piece the music together -- it's choppy in the best way possible. It's an obvious stylistic choice.

What I'm trying to say here is that you should go give this guy a listen. A lot of really great musicians don't get the fans they deserve, and I want to use my influence as "having like five maybe more people who read my site" to spread another artist's work. Please check Canned Sugar's music out. Please.