Make Believe Mailer #137: Virtual Possibilities

Hoshimachi Suisei, VOLTCATION, Tsukino Mito And More From VTuber Music World

Hoshimachi Suisei’s Shinsei Mokuroku marks the biggest moment for the music side of Virtual YouTubing to date. Her third album arrived under a year after she delivered this world’s first bona fide crossover hit — “BIBBIDIBA” was one of 2024’s signature J-pop hits, going well beyond the web-centric ecosystem where VTuber songs usually flourishes. You could hear this one playing out and about in Tokyo, thanks to its presence on what I imagine are top-hits playlists provided to stores and establishments looking for a “now” soundtrack. The song soundtracked TikToks and other social media uploads, and snuck into global viral charts. Data in the digital age can be misleading — but “BIBBIDIBA” easily more than doubles the view count of Suisei’s previous defining cut “Stellar Stellar” on YouTube.

This is the moment VTuber music went from interesting development to something playing on the mainstream stage.

Her third full-length is the sound of the artist trying out different pop outfits, with a clear eye on the new opportunities in front of her. Suisei’s previous two albums featured a similar openness to sonic wardrobe changes, yet everything sounds bigger on Shinsei. It opens with stadium-ready guitar chug and big dumb “whoa-whoa” chants. That’s a statement of intent — Suisei sees what’s possible, and is engaging with sounds ready to face it.

It’s also her strongest album to date, and 2025’s first standout J-pop offering¹. The big pop stabs sound tighter while providing a defined point of view for Suisei the artist — “BIBBIDIBA” sashays between dance-pop and trap with irony-tinged lyrics about the realities of modern life and how to dance through them, while “AWAKE” opts for bright-eyed EDM² and a more optimistic message fixated on a “revolution” and veering away from “empty love songs.” There’s chances to showcase the laid-back qualities of her voice against sparse backdrops (“Moonlight”) and opportunities to just let it rip when needed (“Caramel Pain”). She sounds great over the swift minimal garage skip of “DEADPOOL,” an understated and slightly unsettling highlight³ showing her range.

Suisei is still very much in the process of figuring out who she is as an artist, and part of that experience involves misfires (see…the aforementioned stadium-sized rock cliche opening the whole shebang, great as statement but easily the worst song here). It also, though, allows for the chance to experiment and branch out. She links up with Natori on the previously mentioned “Moonlight” and J-pop’s premier villain Enon Kawatani for the rock-dance hyrbird “Venus Bug.⁴” She’s established the strength of her voice by now, so Suisei can instead go deeper into how she deploys it…and how it can help make this crossover moment even larger.

Virtual artists have been part of the Japanese landscape for decades, but what Suisei spearheads is something much more specific. VTubing as the world knows it today started off with Kizuna AI, who managed some musical success but her status as the “first” to really get mainstream attention always meant she’d be seen as a weird YouTube mutation than a serious artist. As this corner of the internet became more visible — and more profitable — this view changed. A VTuber, at the end of the day, is a human using an avatar to create online content.

If Hikkakin can release a weirdly meta song about YouTube, why can’t VTubers create music commenting on their own odd existence?

What’s happened since is a flourishing of VTuber music, whether from song-centric creators like Suisei or a Mori Calliope, or via more one-off works from those who in another era would be treated as “talents,” jack-of-all-trades entertainers who could do a little of everything. As the scene around this space grows, companies have approached it from new angles — most notably, in groups.

VTuber agency Nijisanji — which, as I write this, is holding its annual festival at Makuhari Messe, which features a prominent music component⁵ — has lead the way on this front. The group ROF-MAO, founded in 2021, brings some of the biggest names from that company to create a pop project capable of putting on idol-sized events.⁶ They serve as kind of a template — why not maximize the potential of a musical unit by bringing together stars to form something even bigger?

Or hey, why not go the extra step? Just debut new talent via a group, as is common across J-pop and K-pop.

With Nijisanji, you can point towards the quartet of VOLTACTION, which features talent who spent years in a virtual academy before appearing as part of this outfit. They released their debut album at the start of January — with several tracks gaining viral attention in the month-plus since — and they’ll hold their first live concert this Sunday at the aforementioned Nijisanji event in Chiba.

Meanwhile, Hololive introduced an entire new branch to its ever-busy stable called DEV_IS, with the VTubers appearing under this banner being music focused and corralled into one of two groups — the dance-pop five-piece ReGLOSS or the rap-oriented quintet FLOW GLOW. The talent involved in all of this still have to do more familiar YouTube activities to build the fanbase — nobody is just a musician anymore, even the virtual acts — yet the structure they present and the sounds they dabble in grasp for something beyond, closer to the structures of a STARTO or SM Entertainment than a tech company.

They take a new form of entertainment…and try to bring it closer to the traidtional.

What strikes me about all three of these groups — all be it in wildly varying song quality — is how they reject the wild proposition of being a virtual artist (in theory, capable of anything and going beyond familiar physical limitations creatively) in favor of trying to be like, I don’t know, LE SSERAFIM. ReGLOSS⁷ provides the best-case scenario for this, offering the sort of anthemic dance-pop that I personally vibe with…while FLOW GLOW’s “FG ROADSTAR” offers the polar-oppossite experience for me as the deepest artistic choice it chooses to make is “aware of BLACKPINK.” VOLTACTION falls in the middle, mostly reminding me of a modern STARTO outfit swinging between stabs at more “aggressive” hip-hop-lined songs and peppy pop. It’s…bad to OK across the debut album, but like not that much different than a Naniwadanshi.

Regardless of my personal taste on all of this, it’s clear in all three cases that these VTuber musical groups are inspired by IRL pop projects, and come across as more interested in fitting in existing boxes than creating their own spaces. That, to me, is disappointing, and feels like settling in every regard except character models (and maybe cover art).

Thankfully, others are reveling in sonic possibility.

Nijisanji’s Tsukino Mito might embody the talent-like nature of VTubing better than almost anyone else right now. She thrives making your usual content in this space — livestreams of her chatting, watching movies or gaming — while also dabbling in music. She’s done covers (including a really good one of MONKEY MAJIK’s “Around The World”), and released original numbers. The twist though is, you can’t peg her sound down to one style. She’s all over the place, silly and experimental — her 2021 debut full-length is ecclectic and at times funny, with an Avec Avec remix put on at the end to further cement my approval.

That continues on Mito’s latest, 310PHz. Released this week, it’s a slightly tighter set once again hop-scotching between sonic ideas and silliness. There’s stabs at straightforward jogging J-pop pleasures and what initially feels like a Suisei-like embrace of arena-rock swagger on “Lunatic Wars” — before it bursts apart to become a disorienting electronic number featuring spoken-word horror interlude (!?) like its part of the “Internet Yamero” extended universe. She staggers over discomboulated beats on “Hyaku Candela Yukaiten” and does a convincing Enon Kawatani impersonation on “Negoto Wa Nete Ie.” In the most pleasant surprise of the year, the final track is written by Tomoko Sasaki of Serani Poji…and it’s a musical hammock to get wrapped up in, total Shibuya Y2-Kei vibes.

Since coming out, it’s continually surprised me on every listen, with a new song becoming my personal favorite each time. It’s a shining example, alongside Suisei’s major moment in the J-pop sun, of where this area of artist in Japan can do so well. Shinsei Mokuroku and 310PHz join recent full-lengths from Houshou Marine and Peanuts-kun (which features Mito) as highlights of how great VTuber music can be, standing alongside anything released along it, in large part because the creators behind them don’t limit themselves. You’re already a virtual character…why settle for familiar musical boundaries?

Which, funny enough, gets to another central truth — VTuber’s are, behind it all, human artists. What these creators are doing isn’t something radical, but rather just being great creators willing to push beyond the usual.

Written by Patrick St. Michel (patrickstmichel@gmail.com)
Twitter — @mbmelodies
Check out the Best Of 2025 Spotify Playlist here!

1. This holds true, but when I started drafting this out, Creepy Nuts’ hadn’t released their LEGION, which is an equally strong set (and, like Suisei’s offering, quite self reflective). As someone who thought 2024’s crop of J-pop albums — not singles, but full-lengths — weren’t particularly notable, 2025 is off to a strong start.

2. Credit to TeddyLoid and Giga, delivering one of their sturdier productions to date, especially with that breakdown.

3. Which also features KAF, who — full disclosure — I work with on English promotion, which is also the reason I didn’t pitch this to like scrmbl, I already pushed it once, doing it again to say “my favorite song features the person who I also work for” is a touch too far.

4. Two details making it one of my favorites on the album. First, it seems slightly self aware of Suisei’s larger breakout by referencing Cinderella, and basically announcing she won’t settle for that role (ie no boxing her in). Second, while Kawatani grabs attention, the secret to this song is that he brought in Parkgolf — one of his netlabel crushes for like years now — to help program, and his wonkier touches really make this pop.

5. If you need further proof VTuber music has grown exponentially in recent years…as part of this, club Mogra has rounded up a bunch of top-level DJs to perform all weekend long at this event, playing (I imagine) only Nijisanji tunes and remixes.

6. While also being a kind of live-show-tech-leading outfit too…a friend who saw them live noted how in recent months, they’ve designed the models to now sweat during their performances, adding a touch of physicality to an otherwise inhuman spectacle.

7. It’s worth noting here that ReGLOSS lays claim to something that might be the strongest argument outside of “BIBBIDIBA” for mainstream acceptance — sparking a TikTok dance trend that then went furhter than just that site. Thank member Juufuutei Raden for that, as she created an annoying ear worm about mushrooms that inspired the “maitake dance.”