j1m0ne’s blog

Most seiyuu treat voice acting purely as a job; something that puts food on the table, keeps clothes on their backs and the taxman away from the door. It’s no different from being an office lady - paywise it’s not a whole lot different, but at least you get to sing and appear at live events, you might even earn a few fans along the way; who knows?

And then there are the mad ones who wanted to be seiyuu since they were kids, working hard at achieving their dreams so that they could one day bring their favourite animated characters to life. This is the life story of such a person, who describes being a seiyuu as ‘a way of life’ (生き様) and something she feels privileged to do….

…..なんちゃって。(As if). Actually, that was originally the intro to the Kitamura Eri profile I wrote some 7 months ago which I ended up discarding because it sounded lame. Still, I ended up saving the whole thing just in case I found a chance to use it someday… so there you are ^^;;

Moving on, I feel that KitaEri generally doesn’t get enough coverage (on English language sites anyway) and since I appear to be one of her few religious followers…. I’ll do my best to cover what she’s up to once in a while, in the vain hope of converting others.

Seijin Shiki - Coming of Age

KitaEri turned 20 last August, so her coming-of-age ceremony (成人の日 falls on every second Monday in January) was this year. Unfortunately she spent most of the actual day at work as her 90-minute live ChoRaji radio program falls on Mondays, so she couldn’t wear a kimono - the pic from above was taken a few days later.

Kitamura also appeared with fellow Seijin Shiki-er Akesaka Satomi on Anispa the Saturday before Seijin no Hi. There they discussed turning 20, shared tips on how to act like an adult in strange situations and also promoted Koharu Biyori, the anime they’re actively involved with now. Kitamura complained that she looked old standing next to Ake-chan, with people telling her ‘I thought you were around 25 years old’.

To mark her ‘coming of age’, Kitamura has moved out of her parents’ house (Or maybe they kicked her out cos there was too much manga lying around…..) That got me thinking - which seiyuu still live at home with their families? Obviously, most of those who weren’t born in Tokyo live on their own - the likes of Shintani Ryoko, Chihara Minori, Asumi Kana etc. Ueda Kana lives with her younger sister, and Nakahara Mai & Saito Chiwa live with their cats. Of the Tokyo-born (or nearby areas) seiyuu, the likes of Kadowaki Maii, Nazuka Kaori and Goto Saori live on their own while the ones who still live at home include Inoue Marina, Kobayashi Yu and Takagaki Ayahi. Oh, and Nakagawa Shoko lives with her mother too.

Back on topic…..

OtaEri
Manga + Otaku Speech

Kitamura appears to spend much of her spare cash on manga and games - she has a PSP and two DS Lites. Some of that stuff above includes upcoming the manga of spring anime Amatsuki (she had a role in the drama CD), horror manga Satanister and Senki Senki Momotama by Chrono Nanae (Peacemaker Kurogane).

On ChoRaji and also on her blog, KitaEri employs frequent usage of otaku/2ch speak, though not quite on Shoko-tan-making-up-her-own-speech-levels. サーセン instead of すみません, all those silly 〃(*o´∪`)o〃 emoticons and real-life panting/fapping (ハアハア) are all in constant use. In real life, Eri tends to talk at the speed of a bullet train, is really, really LOUD and hyperactive (テンション高い in Japanese) and tends to confuse unsuspecting radio show hosts with her over-the-top mannerisms and general weirdness, causing everything to descend into chaos. Only people like Asumi Kana (her Buso Shinki Radio co-host) know how to handle her properly….

Kitamura also went to Winter Comic Market for a Kojika (Kodomo no Jikan) event, and ended up mingling around with other attendees including two seiyuu from the Idolmaster booth - Takahashi Chiaki and Imai Asami as seen above. She also lined up for yuri PC game Solfege’s signing event, bought the two ave;new albums and met seiyuu Hirota Shion (a good friend of Kadowaki Mai and Shimizu Ai) for the first time at the Comic High booth, although they’d spoken regularly over the phone prior to that….. Kitamura also apologised on her blog to anyone who was traumatised by her constantly screaming 買って下さい御主人様 (Please buy this, My Master) and おっとな～！ (Adult! - it’s a Kojika catchphrase) at random passers-by.

Seiyuu Obsessions

Strangely, Kitamura sort of worships Chihara Minori which is bizarre when you consider that KitaEri actually beat Minorin to the Gold Prize in the Pony Canyon Voice Artist & Singer auditions back in 2003 (as mentioned in the profile). There is an age gap of 7 years between the two of them… Still, it took 4 years before the duo got a chance to work together (in last year’s Ikkitousen: Dragon Destiny).

They can currently be heard in the Minami-ke series as classmates Chiaki and Uchida (as seen above). Incidentally Uchida is the only character in the series apart from the members of the two Minami families who has a full name (Uchida Yuka) - everyone else is only known by their first name (Keiko, Makoto) or surname (Fujioka, Hosaka).

And of course, there’s her fixation with Mizuki Nana - referring to her alternately as Nana-sama and God (神) and going into (´Д｀；)ハアハア mode everytime she talks about Nana-chan. ‘Vomiting blood’ (吐血) and ‘fainting in agony’ (悶絶) are terms Kitamura commonly uses to describe her feelings for objects of her affection i.e. 千秋声で ‘内田～’ と言ってもらえて、悶絶吐血をしてた。“When I got her[referring to Minorin] to say ‘Uchida~’ using Chiaki’s voice, I vomited blood and fainted in agony”. . . . . I’ll make a mental note to add those terms to my vocabulary.

Kitamura went with Morinaga Rika to the Saitama leg of Nana’s Live Formula tour, and met up with a bunch of other seiyuu in the VIP section (Fukuen Misato, Matsuki Miyu, Toyoguchi Megumi and Noto Mamiko were the names mentioned). KitaEri spent an episode of ChoRaji relating her experiences; about how they got lost on their way to their seats and about how she wished she was standing in the crowd with the rest of the fans so she could wave a penlight around. Kitamura also really likes Okui Masami and wants to one day, hold live shows as powerful and energetic as Makkun’s.

Potemayo!
Oh yes, and Kitamura is a fairly decent seiyuu too if you didn’t already know; very versatile - her voice tends to be pretty hard to ID at times - can you tell that Saya from Blood+, Rin from Kojika and Sunyao from Potemayo are voiced by the same person? Eri is good at imitations too - witness her versions of Kugimiya Rie’s Nene, Mudo, Hatsushiba & Guchuko from Potemayo during her guest appearance on MayoRadio (Cheers D, for the tip-off about this episode):

Random Stuff
1.Eri to Satomi no Hentai desuka?
A little mention for the Koharu Biyori radio show, which is this month’s Chara Radio special feature. KitaEri and Ake-chan were thinking of a word to fill the blank in the title of the show - ‘Eri & Satomi no ____ desuka?’ Kitamura suggested ‘oppai’ (boobs) which of course, Akesaka vetoed.
2.Kitamura’s allergic to cats but loves them anyway.
3.You can hear Eri as Cinnamon in the quirky Noramimi, a role that requires her to speak in a Kansai accent despite her telling the sound director she didn’t have a clue how to do one. So she’s getting speed lectures from another Eri - the Kobe-born Nakao Eri aka Nakaopro who voices Naomi in the show.
4.Final Fantasy>Dragon Quest, according to Kitamura. But like 98% of female seiyuu, she is obsessed with Monster Hunter.

Ah, the joys of being a KitaEri fan. It makes me feel better about (the possibility of) being called a female otaku when I look at her ^^;;

Posted on January 28th, 2008 under seiyuu, 喜多村英梨 • RSS 2.0 feed • Leave a response, or trackback