(H.)

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Software restrictions mean this page has been named (H.). Ideally it should be [H.].

[H.] is the name of a band comprised of Sega Sound Team members and acted as a spiritual successor to S.S.T. Band. It was created much later and contains more contributors.

History

[H.] (then known as H.) was founded in 2001 during the development of Crackin' DJ Part 2, originally comprising the 3 major sound team members of said game: Hiro on keyboards, Takenobu Mitsuyoshi on vocals, and Fukku Fukuyama on trumpet and other instruments. Their live debut was Crackin' DJ Part 2 Super Live, a promotional event held on August 4th of 2001 at Tokyo Joypolis, where the band played 5 songs which were then included as bonus tracks on Crackin' DJ Part 2 Original Sound Track.^[1]^[2]^[3]^[4]^[5]^[6]

Another Crackin' DJ Part 2 event, this time promoting Crackin' DJ Part 2 Original Sound Track (which was still short of its 500-order goal needed to be produced), was held Amusement Machine Show 2001 with the same set list played, except there were also 2 additional songs hailing from Takenobu Mitsuyoshi's history: それ行け！ココロジー2 and 愛が足りないぜ, as the performance was also part of Mitsuyoshi's yearly appearances at Amusement Machine Show.^[7]^[8] [H.] would appear at every AOU Show up to at least 2011.^[9]

A third significant performance of the band occurred on November 23rd: Game no Hi (also called H.Live in Sunshine City Funsui Hiroba), located in the same venue where the Sega Sound Staff Band performed their infamous After Burner Panic show in 1987. In tribute to said show, one of the guest members was Funky K.H on keyboards, and the show ended with a rendition of the song After Burner from After Burner. Music from the Virtual-On series was also played to promote the newly released Dennou Senki Virtual-On: Force.^[10]

January 21st 2002 marked the first time merchandise related to H. was sold, with a limited run of T-shirts being sold through HIPS, the Hitmaker's Interactive Products Store.^[11] Some solo outings of Hitmaker sound staff, such as Takenobu Mitsuyoshi's solo performance at Virtua Fighter Carnival or the release of Dennou Senki Virtual-On Force Official Sound Data: Marsinal, were listed on the H. history page on the Hitmaker Sound Page (affectionally known as Sounpe).^[1]

One of the people in attendance at Game no Hi was Segagaga composer Tsuyoshi Kaneko, who would become the most frequent guest collaborator with H., starting at Game Jam 2. They would collaborate to create both of Sega Mobile Friends's original songs, which were included in Kaneko's first solo album Life, an album that was sold before street date through Dreamcast Direct. An event promoting it, Kaneko Tsuyoshi With GUEST "Life@Life", was held at the J-POPCAFE in Tokyo Joypolis and featured guest performances by 大石有里子 and Dai Takemura.^[1]

2 more members made their live debut for the return to Amusement Machine Show in 2002, guitarist Chiho Kobayashi from the sound department, and singer Shiho Miyaoka from the art department, who had previously helped with lyric writing for Crackin' DJ Part 2, and had sung モバってますか～っ(^o^)丿 for Sega Moba. As the opener of the show, she sung another song composed for promotional purposes, the Sega no Hi campaign song セガって行こう！.^[1]

The band's first show of 2003 was AOU Show 2003, which has 2 firsts. 1. It was the first time Kensaku Nishimura (then 27) opened for the band, which he would do many times in the future, despite being immediately demoted from this position at the time. 2. It was the first time several songs from represented games were combined into a medley and branded their own original song, which applies to both "The Winners" from World Club Champion Football and "Dona Nobis Pacem" from Avalon no Kagi.^[1]

"The Winners" was again the opening song at GameJam Storm on January 5th, the first of several times the band performed at Ariake TFT Hall, which also housed a Virtua Fighter 4 tournament where Takenobu Mitsuyoshi performed solo. "The Winners" was also chosen as the event was home to a World Club Champion Football: Serie A 2001-2002 earlier on.^[12] The event is infamous for living up to its name and being plagued by bad weather, but despite this it was considered successful.^[1]

Members

[H.] was conceptualized as "Hitmaker Sound Team + Guests", with its main members officially being Hiroshi Kawaguchi and Takenobu Mitsuyoshi (both previously part of the S.S.T. Band), though Mitsuharu Fukuyama was a common performer from the start, all of whom remained with the band until it was dissolved in 2015 (and joined its debatable successor Chain Band). Notable guests during the Hitmaker period include Katsuhiro Hayashi and Tsuyoshi Kaneko.^[13]

Following Hitmaker becoming Sega AM3, it still mainly consisted of sound staff from AM3 (and later AM1, such as guitar players Keitaro Hanada and Takahiro Kai, but a notable exception is Hidenori Shoji from the console departments, and who often featured arcade sound creators on the Yakuza series, which he was usually sound director for. Indeed, every regular member of [H.] has contributed in some way to Yakuza.

Its first regular outside member added was Eisei Kudo as drummer, his first show being the Extra: Hyper Game Music Event 2008, which took place a week after his 14th birthday.^[14]^[15] He currently works for Noisycroak.^[16]

Regular members

Guests

Brand

The original H. logo, designed by Nobutaka Arii.

The band was named H. in reference to 2 things which begin with the letter H: Hitmaker and Hiroshi Kawaguchi. The period was added to round out the look of band's logo (designed by Nobutaka Arii), as it would have been boring to simply be an H.^[13]

Another potential name for the band, jokingly suggested by Kenji Kanno, was Tenmusu (てんむす), likely named for the Tenmusu being served at the restaurant where the formation meeting was being held.^[17]