About the series
Re:cords is an interview series at Re:Sample delving into people’s experiences with Otomad/YTPMV.
This interview was conducted by Brando.
About the interviewee
beat_shobon is a Vocaloid Producer and a seasoned Otomad/YTPMV creator, previously under the name MatrixMarioX in the Otomad/YTPMV community.
This is part two of a two part conversation with beat_shobon. Check out the previous part here.
Has any recent Otomad event or trend left an impression on you?
OTOMAD DREAM MATCH really left an impression on me. I think there’s a lot to say about the scene lately, about how, as time passes, Otomad has started to match high production remixes and music videos in terms of audio and visual production. An event where teams of creators “compete” and showcase not only their skills but their creativity on how to transform a variety of known media and memes into impressive music videos or fun stories and jokes was a complete treat to the ears and eyes. Even without the aspect of it being a “competition”, there’s a clear sense of hype and desire to impress the audience and your peers on the scene.
In a creative circle, it’s always inspiring to be surrounded by an attitude like that. I don’t really know any of the creators who participated in OTOMAD DREAM MATCH closely or personally, but I have no doubt it was exciting to participate with and alongside people well known in the scene, and watching the videos at the end of the event proved how good of an idea it was.
It was definitely a fun event to watch from the sidelines. Did any particular video leave an impression on you?
It’s hard to pick one, I think the event did a great job showcasing the different styles from the participants with overall really solid results.
I remember liking [ i ] a lot with how the audio really matched the intensity of the song and how much you could do with such a visually limited source.
savan houten - Kali☆.mp47 was another fun video that really made good use of its source material on both audio and video, they feel like prime examples of a fun Otomad.
However the one that really caught me off guard was 封印されし音MAD, the entry that you had to play on 5 separate windows at the same time so you can experience the video fully. I remember asking myself “How do you come up with something like that?”, but then I figured that every team had to ask themselves “What can we make that makes our video stand out? What can we make in our own style that feels different?” and that probably just reflects the way a creative scene like Otomad feels when trying to figure out a new idea or how to make something new out of a previously known meme, or song.
I should say that just as I was about to finish this response, トラァーーーーーッシュ！！！！ came into my mind, which was a video I couldn’t stop replaying for a while. It feels like the exact type of video you’d see on the visuals of a DJ set or a music festival and it’s great! I was a little mesmerized by it! It adds a lot to the equally fantastic audio.
OTOMAD DREAM MATCH -TEN- happened not so long after and this follow up event absolutely blew my mind. It feels like the participants went even harder on the idea of impressing people or making something unique.
女の子がかわいい合作（変わるかもしれません） may perhaps be the one that stood out for me this time, where you’re already presented with a high quality Otomad only to little be little get jumpscared more and more with a dark twist. Considering a lot of MADs focus on fun and comedy, it’s amazing when they attempt to make you feel sad or frightened, in this case, scared and maybe a bit sad over a girl trapped in one of these videos.
Braglight comes to mind as well, a video that I thought would be the winner. Background BGM and a sole picture of the Doraemon cast already makes for an unusual pick for source material but to take that and make an entire music video out of it, full of jokes and elements that come directly from these two pieces of music and illustration is crazy to me. The level of creativity to come up with this kind of idea is truly amazing and it’s absolutely worth a great amount of praise.
Again, it’s incredible to see how, in a creative scene like this one, there’s this need to figure out how to impress the audience, the natural desire to sit down in front of your computer and make something really cool. It’s inspiring.
They were definitely inspiring. Besides the format itself, do you think there are any differences between regular Otomad collabs and OTOMAD DREAM MATCH?
I think regular collaborations are bound to the theme of either their medley or their source material. Not to say that they can’t try and freestyle or that they don’t have any freedom to go wild with their theme but there’s obviously some standard or some “rules” that they gotta try and stick to when in a medley collab.
Events like OTOMAD DREAM MATCH have full freedom on your sources, your music and your theme. You can freestyle as much as you want, remix or play with the song as much as you need to to fulfill your vision. You can’t stop a song in the middle or change the tempo or change the theme in the middle of your part in a medley collab unless it’s done in a way that it doesn’t ruin the flow of the medley, but in an event like OTOMAD DREAM MATCH you can.
Additionally, medleys that have no restriction with sources or that have a specific theme but allow multiple source material for each part might be right in the middle where you can get creative on how and what to pick for your part, but depending on the project you might still be bound to the limitations of the medley and the parts surrounding yours.
Neither is bad, just different kinds of projects with different possibilities.
For a slightly more controversial topic: As impressive as these events (and collabs) are, I’ve seen some who criticize them for being inherently “exclusionary” - By nature of them being invite-only, others may be “left out”, creating a sort of hierarchy. Do you have any opinion on that matter?
Some of them do feel that way, and I suppose it’s up to the hosts whether they want them to be this way for the sake of the collaboration’s quality. However I don’t think every collab or event should be this way. Newcomer collabs have proven that there’s a lot of talent in lesser known Otomad makers, and while they won’t have the skills of the seasoned veterans, I think it’s still worth making, joining, or checking out these less serious collabs for a good time and to find new people who are interested and invested in the hobby.
I definitely agree - Do you have any advice for someone who’s looking to join something like that for the first time?
If you feel you’re ready for them, never hesitate on joining a collaboration, it can be a bit scary at first but it’s a great way to meet other Otomad makers in the community, to learn from them and to gain experience for the future, including more “private” collabs. A good thing about these collabs is that a good amount of them will give you the choice on whether to do audio or video so you can comfortably pick whatever you feel you’re better at, and maybe feel comfortable enough to communicate some cool ideas with the person you’ll be working with on your part.
Speaking of newbie collabs, do you remember your first time joining a collab and which collab was it? What was the experience like?
If I recall correctly, it was MADORAEMON from 2011, and it was a fun experience and a fun collab, even though I felt so shy to reach out and ask for help at the time. I remember seeing the invitation and I had no idea how to apply through the atwiki, to choose my parts, or to contact the host, so I had to reach out to Nprp/ネプリピ on Skype at the time and Google Translate my way into asking what’s the process to reach out and join, as well as any details I should know before submitting.
To this day I have to thank him for the patience of dealing with a foreigner trying to figure out how any of this worked. I was happy with the audio and video I provided but if you watch the collab you can actually tell I rendered my parts with the wrong aspect ratio and the host compiled them into the final video as-is… I remember feeling so embarrassed! Regardless, people were very supportive and the reactions in the video’s comments were quite uplifting, not only about my parts being good but also some would just be happy to see my name involved in the collab. It was a motivational experience that would give me the confidence to try it again in the future and continue participating in projects like these.
Besides the obvious audio/video skills, do you think there’s anything important to have for collabs and events such as OTOMAD DREAM MATCH?
- Be willing to try and brainstorm different ideas, figure out a proper way to approach them as a team.
- Understand that the creative process sometimes will not be smooth and could take many tries or scrapped attempts.
- Be diligent and remember any deadlines you could have to properly plan ahead and be ready to deliver your results in due time.
- Most of all, keep an open mind and be communicative. Once you’ve chosen what each person is going to do, keep communicating to make sure you’re both on the same page as you build your own part of the project, and maybe you can come up with new ideas during the process.
- And of course, have fun with it.
I personally believe that for a lot of Otomads that stand out in events like OTOMAD DREAM MATCH, you can somehow tell that the people behind them had a great amount of fun working on them, that they enjoyed their own idea enough to get crazy with it, or to polish it enough so the audience enjoys it as much as they enjoyed making it.
We talked a bit about collabs and such, but are there any other Otomad events you would like to see in the future?
Note
nerdtronics 3 was a primarily Otomad-themed club event held on April 19, 2025 in Shibuya. Aside from works from Otomad creators, the event featured sets by DJs and popular Vocaloid producers, among them Haraguchi Sasuke, Hiiragi Magnetite, and Frog96.
Definitely more DJ events like nerdtronics and RealSample. I’m aware that there are already DJs who make their own mixes and sets anew, or have previously made Otomads. But seeing full events more often with Otomad/YTPMV makers, and other interested parties like composers and Vocaloid producers would be really fun, both offline and online.
Additionally I’d love to see more collabs with a gimmick, rather than just a specific source or medley. From collabs that have to include source material in a specific color, to others where the visuals get blocked if they were previously used by someone else in the medley, there are a lot of fun ideas to try out.
This is more of a general question since you brought up these sort of events, have you tried DJing before? While Otomads and music making obviously have some connection between them, do you feel the same is true for DJing? It’s obviously music related, but are there transferrable skills between those fields?
I’ve done some DJ sets in the past, although they’ve all been premade and I have no experience with live sets yet (although it is something I want to learn at some point in the future). I think the sense of rhythm that grows as you practice making Otomad and music is similar to the one you’d need for DJing. Not to say they’re all the same, but they benefit from the other where learning one will definitely give you some sense of what sounds right in any of the other two fields.
Staying on beat, knowing what’s a good transition, knowing what songs could be mixed together or would sound well right next to the other, figuring out fun ways of playing with your own setlist, I think these are all skills that could be transferred from other music fields to the DJ area. The winner of OTOMAD DREAM MATCH -TEN- actually feels like a DJ set, which I feel justifies this somewhat.
We talked quite a bit about events both on and offline, but they’ve been mostly based in East Asia. Do you think events like the ones we have discussed are possible to do in the west as well?
Perhaps. I think the first thing to be concerned about is how to gain interest. Otomad and YTPMV have always had a presence online, and it’s normal (although a bit of a shame) that maybe every month or so you’ll see an older video get reposted without credit with a great number of people feeling nostalgic for this kind of remixes, despite the fact there’s still an active scene behind them.
Every now and then videos of varying quality that could be classified as Otomad or YTPMV get viral and spread around as well. So there IS an interest for this kind of content, but the challenge is to attract people to the active scene, even just as spectators.
Maybe trying out these events online to “test the waters” could be the wisest choice for now, but introducing Otomad culture in offline music events that are already based around otaku or anime culture could be another way to start making these ideas happen.
We hope to be able to test the waters more and more in the future. As someone who’s interacted quite a lot with the Japanese community, do you think there are any hurdles to bringing them to the west? If there are, what are they and what do you think could help overcome them?
Re:Sample’s efforts to spread the appeal of this scene and make it more appealing to newcomers have not gone unnoticed, and I’m looking forward to seeing any future plans and events.
I know there can be problems with language barriers, although with the right people to help these can be easily solved or at least make them less troublesome in the long run. The freestyle format for either events like OTOMAD DREAM MATCH or DJ sets may be something novel for some in the west, so it’s also something people would need to get acquainted with, additionally looking for the right hosts and organizers is a big task of its own, although I expect that in the near future Re:Sample and other future projects supported by veterans in the community can address these issues.
As someone who’s seen their fair share of events and collabs - do you have any opinion on what makes a good host/organizer? What sort of qualities would make you, a participant, feel confident in a project?
I think it’s not easy to be a host or organizer for an event or collab, considering that you have to consistently keep checks on everything being worked on for said project.
Of course you don’t want to be bossy, but you still need to encourage deadlines and consistent updates for the collaboration to progress smoothly. You need to be able to talk and communicate properly with your team as well with potential team members if the project is invite only or in the case of emergency when someone needs to be replaced. Otomad is mostly a hobby and real life can always get in the way, so you need to plan and be prepared in case someone needs extra time to finish, or needs to exit the project. This goes for the hosts themselves at times.
Additionally, some collabs really stand out when the host has a vision or specific theme for them, and I’ve seen the hosts of said collaborations do their best to help out as much as possible so each part matches the planned standards or ideas. In the end, I think I feel confident in a project when I see the host has great commitment and over everything else, lots of patience.
This is part two of a two part conversation with beat_shobon. Please look forward to future editions of Re:cords at Re:Sample!