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Old Mar 29, 2013, 03:45 PM
isdapi isdapi is offline
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Let's take it in parts:

Quote:
The Jiro Nakajima on those three albums (most of the Buck-Tick DVD credits come from the 1998 album release) was part of Sound Sky Studio during the '90s & 2000, and I've never been unable to find his name in kanji. How sure are you he's the same person as the 中島次郎 who shows up in 5pb records starting around 2007?

I've found some of those same album listings when trying to find something definitive for his name myself, but I've never been totally sure they're the same guy.
Have you looked at his twitter account? I mean, his nickname is nakajilow and if that's not a direct reference to his real name (Jiro Nakajima), I don't know what else could be. If you're wondering if this nakajilow is a recording engineer working for 5pb., then translate this '録音のお仕事してます。' and look at the artists with whom he tweets (Zwei_Megu, HIMEKA, chiyomaru5pb). All of them are affiliated, in one way or another, with 5pb.Records.

And if you're asking me how I know if the Jiro Nakajima who was part of Sound Sky Studio is the same guy that 中島次郎, I'll tell you that there is no absolute certainty,. Even so, it's reasonable to think that if someone named "Jiro Nakajima" worked as sound engineer previously in another company is reasonably sure to accept that he followed his career as sound technician in another company (It would be a totally different story if this Jiro Nakajima had credits as sound engineer for Sound Sky Studio during the years he has worked for 5pb, but that's not the case). You know, in an ideal world all the artists would have official pages where you could verify with absolute certainty in which albums the artists had participated. I mean, when we all submit a new artist romanization there is always a little uncertainty associated with it.

I would go even further, how do we know for sure that a freelance musician who has worked in several albums and with different people throughout his career is the same and not a different artist with the same name/romanization? Easy, we just guess it because there is no ultimate proof (except the artists' discographies) that demonstrate he's always the same artist. All of this is to say that if you have an artist whose name is "Koichi Setsumaru" and all the credits he has as musician is as guitarist and then you add an album with a Koichi Setsumaru credited for guitar performance and you link this album to his profile, you're guessing that he's the same artist credited several times before, and you'd be certain almost always (99% of the time) but there is always a little uncertainty about the fact he may be a different artist. So, in short, if you know that a certain guy is credited for a fixed role in several albums (maybe not vgm or anime related) and if you see the same guy credited on an album in our database, then what's more likely: that they're the same artist or that they're different artists because they've worked on not related albums, with different people and different studios.

It all comes down to what amount of uncertainty one is willing to assume. There is always risk involvement in this bunissess, and it's decision of each one of us what it's acceptable and what it's not. My only guide in dubious cases (or not so obvious cases) it's the common sense and if I see more than one evidence pointing to the same direction, then I'll think that will be the right direction.


Quote:
Haha, well, let's have a discussion about that. It's not a big deal, but just as a personal rule, I don't romanize names that are entirely in hiragana or katakana unless they're obviously a first and last name, because they frequently turn out to have stylized romanizations. Especially ones in katakana.

As an example using ハルナ, HΛL vocalist Haruna Hamada used that name when she was still with the group, but in English it was stylized as HΛLNA, not Haruna. (I don't think it's her on this album.)

Again, not a big deal, and certainly not VGMdb policy. Just my policy.
As far as I know, each one of the katakana's syllabograms corresponds to just one sound, but I know that the some artists take liberties with their 'stage names', and for japanese artists and their eccentric romanizations is even worse. That's the magic of the romanizations of the japanese language, you can stylize them as you see fit. But one thing are unusual cases, like the HΛLNA you mentioned, and another thing is the common practice. I'd say that 90% of the time is used ハルナ it's intended to be read as Haruna, plain and simple.

Anyway, I understand your point of view and your policy in this case and I don't mind if you prefer to revert to ハルナ.
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