After much anticipation, the staff for Hiroyuki Ohashi’s “On-Gaku: Our Sound” announced that singer-songwriter Yasuyuki Okamura has been cast in the movie.
Okamura stated his role in the film had to be a secret until its premiere next year. Okamura composed music for Space Dandy, which he is most famous for, as well as the themes for Blood Blockade Battlefront & Beyond and City Hunter 2.
The film will premiere in Japan on January 11th, 2020. So far it has heralded great responses from critics and fans. The movie won top place the Ottawa International Animation Festival’s Grand Prize for Feature Animation last month. Its award run isn’t over yet! It’s up for the sixth annual New Chitose Airport International Animation Festival’s Featured Animation Competition category in November.
Humble Beginnings
Hiroyuki Ohashi announced the project on Makuake in July 2018 in which he sought to raise three and half million yen (equivalent to roughly thirty one thousand dollars). The campaign easily smashed that goal in just four months. Ohashi had originally announced the project in 2012, with Kenji Iwaiasawa as the director. Iwaiasawa has made a name for himself over the years with various animated shorts such as “Fukurai-cho, Tunnel Roji no Otoko,” and “Big Boss.”
The movie features an all star cast:
- Shintarō Sakamoto as Kenji (Yura Yura Teikoku)
- Ren Komai as Aya (The Name)
- Tomoya Meno as Ōta
- Tateto Serizawa as Asakura (Miss Zombie, Their Distance)
- Kami Hiraiwa as Morita (Happy Flight, Welcome to The Quiet Room)
- Naoto Takenaka as Ōba (Your Turn to Kill, Hideyoshi)
Ohashi self-published “Ongaku” in 2005 – on which “On-Gaku: Our Sound” is based – and it tells the story of young punks who decide to start a band despite never having played instruments before. Ohta Publishing later serialized the manga in its 2009 “Ongaku to Manga” collection of Ohashi’s work.
Ohashi was responsible for the work’s character designs and for overall supervision. Rock n Roll Mountain will distribute the film, with distribution cooperation by Arc Films.
