Hellos and welcome, dear readers! :)
A well over a month since I've uploaded the English cover for bofuri 2 ending! Been busy trying to get back into shape for a little trip I'm planning in May!
But anyway, without further ado, let's jump right into the meat of this blog entry!
English Cover Video
Original Song Info:
Anime: 痛いのは嫌なので防御力に極振りしたいと思います。２ (Bofuri: I Don't Want to Get Hurt, so I'll Max Out My Defense)
Title: Step for Joy
Artist: FRAM
Lyricist: 東乃 カノ (Kano Tono)
Composer: AMAZUTI
Cover Info:
Inst./Arr./Mix: _Soma
English Lyrics & Vocal: Taka Pen
Comments on the Making
Bofuri anime: Maple is so Maple, and it's been fun watching the anime as well as reading people's comments on Twitter. lol
The song: It's been challenging to sing this fast -- wait, why do I seem to be saying this so often lol -- but it's been a very enjoyable experience because it's such a cheerful song. :)
On Translating the Lyrics
- Original Japanese lyrics
- Original Japanese lyrics in ro-maji
- My translated English lyrics
Step for Joy
suteppu foa joi
Step for Joy
Love it when the title comes in English and I don't need to translate. :P
はじめの一歩頼りなくて
風にゆられてた Our story
碧すぎる空の下
肩並べ歩いて行こう
hajime no ippo tayorinakute
kaze ni yurareteta our story
aosugiru sora no shita
katanarabe aruite yukou
The first step was a little bit wobbly
Shaken gently by the wind was our story
Bluer than blue, under such a sky
Shoulder to shoulder, let’s keep walking on
I also love it when an English phrase within the lyrics part fit in perfectly, and I don't need to move it around or change it. lol
So anyway, I wish I could say it's mostly literal translations, but it's not. I've kept truer to the meanings of the words rather than the dictionary translation. Not sure if that counts or doesn't count as a literal translation... :s
A dictionary would likely translate "頼りなくて(tayorinakute)" in the first line as "undependable" or "unreliable," which is a partially what the phrase means; however, the English words feel far stronger than the Japanese phrase.
In English, if something or someone is "undependable" or "unreliable" it leans towards being "not worthy of trust" and has a pretty negative connotation, whereas "頼りなくて" can and often is used to mean something or someone that lacks a little in stability. There's more of a fragility side to it than a negative side.
And for those reasons, instead of using the dictionary translation, I went with "wobbly."
In the third line, "碧すぎる(aosugiru)" would translate to "too blue" but due to the English having too few sylallables, I kind of rephrased to make it fit into the melody.
The rest of the lines were fairly literally translated.
世界は引き寄せられるみたいに
偶然と必然の間
sekai wa hikiyoserareru mitaini
guuzen to hitsuzen no aida
It’s as if the world it’s getting drawn in
Between chance and inevitability
These two lines are pretty straight forward translations.
Just that I wish there was a way I could've used the words "chance" and "fate" in the second line, which would've been a better match rather than using "inevitablitliy" but I just needed a word with more syllables, unfortunately! :P
And singing that was a mouthful. lol
描いた理想の遥か向こうで
私たち息をしている
egaita risou no haruka mukou de
watashitachi iki o shiteiru
Far beyond the reaches of imagination run wild
We’ve come this far and this is where we breathe
These two lines were literal translations plus a lot of decorations because the English translation just didn't have enough syllables to fill in the melody....!
Plain translation of these two lines would have been something like below:
We are breathing at a place far beyond the dreams we have had
Not very poetic, not to mention, the word order needs to be flipped around, and I'd like to try to keep the rough location of the words and phrases somewhat in the same places as the original lyrics. At least within the same line!
幕は上がる
芽吹く期待カバンいっぱいに抱え
まっさらな朝へ 何度でも
maku wa agaru
mebuku kitai kaban ippai ni kakae
massara na asa e nando demo
And the curtains go up
The sprouting hopes we’ll pack them all in a bag and carry
To a brand new morning, again and again
The second line took as long as heck to figure out the perfect word order and count of syllables to fit in, but other than that, the stanza itself is pretty much literal translations.
はじめの一歩 頼りなくて
風にゆられてた Our story
あの日から幾千の夜を超えて 今
hajime no ippo tayorinakute
kaze ni yurareteta our story
anohikara ikusen no yoru o koete ima
The first step was a little bit wobbly
Shaken gently by the wind was our story
From that day, thousands of nights we have overcome and now
Love it when they repeat phrases! So the first two lines are repeats.
The third line was new, but for some reason, the literal translation fit in perfectly without a hitch, so this part went by fast!
重ねた足跡 繋いだら
めくるめく日々へ向かうよ
碧すぎる空の下
どこまでも
肩並べ歩いて行こう
kasaneta ashiato tsunaidara
mekurumeku hibi e mukau yo
aosugiru sora no shita
dokomademo
katanarabe aruite yukou
Overlapping footprints once we connect them
To bright dazzling never ending days we’re headed
Bluer than blue, under such a sky
No matter how far
Shoulder to shoulder, let’s keep walking on
For some reason I kept on thinking "footprints" were "footsteps" until towards the very end and I had been practicing singing "footsteps," so I kind of tripped up mysef when recording because I kept on wanting to sing "footsteps" instead of "footprints." lol
I think the mix-up happened because of how close the original words sound in Japanese.
足跡 ashiato - footsteps
足音 ashioto - footprints
I mean, it's just a one letter difference.... :P
Even aside from that one part, the first line gave me such trouble. lol
On the same line, they have "繋いだら(tsunaidara)" which could be translated into any following number of ways:
had/when/if/once I join/connect/tie them
Went with the one that gave me the least trouble with the syllables and intonations fitting the melody. :3
The next line, "めくるめく(mekurumeku)" was kind of an interesting expression.
It could mean that something is bright and so it dazzles your eyes, and/or it could mean that you're dizzy... so I kind of went with the former. Couldn't quite fit in both. lol
不安が押し寄せ 眠れない日も
“大丈夫” ’君の声がする’
乾いた大地に降る雨のよう
希望 心に響いた
fuan ga oshiyose nemurenai hi mo
"daijoubu" kimi no koe ga suru
kawaita daichi ni furu ame no you
kibou kokoro ni hibiita
Even on a day when all the worries keep me up
“It’ll be okay” your voice I hear in my mind
Just as when the rain falls upon the dried up earth
That’s how hope came to ring within my heart
The first line I kind of took liberty in my translation. Literally it would be something like below:
Even on a day when I can't go to sleep because worries overwhelm me
which, unfortunately had too many syllables to fit into the melody, so I mashed together the "worries overwhelm me" and "I can't go to sleep because of the worries" parts into "when all the worries keep me up."
And then of course on the next line, I don't have enough syllables so I had to add to it a bit. The original lyrics is only saying "I can hear your voice" and doesn't have the "in my mind" part, so that's a made up part, although not straying too far from the original meaning since the implication is that you're hearing it in your mind, and not hearing an actual physical voice.
The third and fourth lines were also full of fillers due to lack of syllables when translated into English...! I mean the last line translates to "Hope rang in my heart (5 syllables)" when you need 11 syllables to fill up the melody!
奇跡よりも 魔法よりも 君の言葉ひとつで
こんなにも強くなれるから
明日（あす）への扉 まだ遠くって
果てない夢 目が眩んでも
空想や憧れも いつか追い越して
kiseki yorimo mahou yorimo kimi no kotoba hitotsu de
konnanimo tsutyoku nareru kara
asu e no tobira mada tookutte
hatenai yume me ga kurandemo
kuusou ya akogaremo itsuka oikoshite
More than miracles, more than any charms, only a single word from you
And so much the stronger I can then become
The door to tomorrow it’s still a bit far
Boundless dreams even if my eyes were dazzled
All the fancies and the longings I will overtake someday
I think this part was mostly literal translations, even if my word choices might deviate slightly from the first choice in the dictionary. :P
For example, the first translation choice for "魔法よりも(mahou yorimo)" would likely be "more than magic" which is fine, except it doesn't fit nicely into the melody, so it became "more than any charms." The "any" I added because I felt that the implied meaning was there in the original lyrics.
And everything else is pretty straight forward here despite all the lines. :)
永遠の途中 笑い合って
私たちのテンポで 今日も
一歩ずつ進めばいい どこまでも
旅はまだ 続いていく
eien no tochuu warai atte
watashitachi no tenpo de kyou mo
ippo zutsu susumeba ii dokomademo
tabi wa mada tsuzuite iku
In the middle of forever we’ll be laughing
We’ll take things at our own pace and today as well
One step at a time, that’s the way to go, no matter how far
Our story it still goes on
This was a bit of a tough one right from the bat. I mean "永遠の途中(eien no tochuu)" literally means "middle of forever" but you kind of second guess yourself and try to figure out what that actually means. I started second guessing myself and thinking that maybe it wasn't "middle of forever" but instead "in the middle of being on the way to forever" whatever that still meant. lol
And then the second part of the first line, "笑い合って(warai atte)" I'm still doubtful if I did that correctly. As far as I know, in Japanese, there's no difference between "smiling" and "laughing" so I can't quite tell if this part was supposed to be "smiling" or "laughing." Just that based on the cheerfulness of the song, "laughing" light-heartedly felt better suited than only "smiling."
Well I mean, I think I just lied. There are separate words for "smiling（微笑む）" and "laughing（声を出して笑う）" just that the word for "laughing" I think can be taken either way, hence the confusion.
The rest of the stanza is mostly rephrasing of literal translations to fit the melody lines, except for the last line:
旅はまだ 続いていく
tabi wa mada tsuzuite iku
This line would literally translate to:
Our journey will still continue
And I changed "our journey" to "our story" to loop back to the beginning where "our journey" is likened to "our story." So this was taking a pretty big liberty on my part, which I normally try not to do.
I just couldn't resist... :)
君との一歩 またひとつ
宝物が増えていくよ
思うまま行けるんだ ときめく方角へ
takaramono ga fuete ikuyo
omoumama ikerunda tokimeku hougaku e
Another step with you and so one more
It’s another treasure piling up
Wherever I wish I will go, where my heart leads me to
So then here comes pretty much the last part in translation, since the last sung stanza is a repeat.
The first two lines are pretty much straight forward translations. Just the end of the third line got a bit tricky.
"ときめく(tokimeku)" is probably a very Japanese language specific word. I don't know of a direct translation for this in English that actually means what it means. I think the literal translation is something along the lines of "one's heart throbs" which personally, doesn't really convey the light-hearted sparkly excitement that the Japanese phrase can.
Not that my lyrics do either, but using the word "throb" felt a bit too heavy, so I rephrased it to "where my heart leads me to."
重ねた足跡 繋いだら
めくるめく日々に向かうよ
碧すぎる空の下 どこまでも
肩並べ歩いて行こう
kasaneta ashiato tsunaidara
mekurumeku hibi ni mukau yo
aosugiru soranoshita dokomademo
katanarabe aruite yukou
Overlapping footprints once we connect them
To bright dazzling never ending days we’re headed
Bluer than blue, under such a sky, no matter how far
Shoulder to shoulder, let’s keep walking on
And the last stanza was thankfully a repeat!
It was kind of fun spending a bit more time on the lyrics than usual, and just the general cheerfulness of the song made it enjoyable to work with. :)
So, that's it for expalanation on the lyrics translation for "Step for Joy"!
Working diligently on my next two cover songs right now, actually. One should be uploaded early May, and the second one maybe later May.
I will actually be in Japan for a little over a week in middle of May, so I won't be able to do much during that time. I'm going to be enjoying onsen to the fullest! :)
So anyway, thank you for reading this far!
Until my next blog entry! :)
Taka, out!
