Trivia and amusing anecdotes about PassCode
- Creative Differences: One of two reasons Yuri Kurohara is believed to have left the group. Speculation is she disagreed with Hirachi on the direction he was taking PassCode. Indeed, after she left, the girls' songs became harsher and much more liberal with the Autotune/Vocoder.
- DVD Commentary:
- The Bluray box-set of four of PassCode's major shows from 2016-2018 features audio commentary for every concert – Nao & Kaede on the Virtual and Zenith concerts, and Yuna & Hinako on the Miss Unlimited and Versus PassCode concerts.
- The 2019 Zepp Osaka and 2020 Clarity Tour Final Blu-rays have commentary tracks, this time with all four girls.
- Early-Installment Weirdness:
- Throughout 2013, PassCode sang standard cutesy Idol-pop.
- Every music video made to promote All Is Vanity. In addition to Yuri being in them, they clearly had No Budget, often being shot in tiny rooms or public places. Oh, and the "costumes" that barely count as such compared to what they'd wear later.
- The music video for "Orange",
which is a sort of montage of early PassCode, shows the girls at times wearing much more Idol-like costumes at shows, no backing band, etc. It also happens to be the final music video and song Yuri took part in. - "over there" has almost no English in it (same with most of their early songs) and sounds like it could have been made by The Pillows.
- Keep Circulating the Tapes:
- All their music videos from "Asterisk" onward are still up on their YouTube channel, and their music & most concert videos from 2014 onward are easily obtainable, especially in Japan. However, their pre-UMG discography along with the First Live DVD are out of print. So, PassCode's earliest output is slowly becoming this, at least in hard-copy.
- Good luck finding ANY material from 2013, before Yuna & Kaede joined.
- Information about 2013-era PassCode is notoriously sparse to the point that even their well-sourced Japanese Wiki page – created on March 12th 2015 for the record – doesn't have much to say. Nao, the only member remaining from that period, doesn't like to talk about it.
- The English Wiki page for the group was created on June 7th 2020. That's over a year after some Tropers decided PassCode deserves a space here.
- No Budget:
- The group was this prior to being signed by Universal and especially before All Is Vanity came out. It's easy enough to tell simply by watching the earliest music videos – nearly every scene was shot in a tiny room or public places.
- They initially had no choreographer; Nao admitted in one interview they made up dance moves for the earliest songs themselves before they could afford to hire Kohmen.
- No Export for You: Only the Universal-era albums and singles – Miss Unlimited onward – are available for streaming or download outside Asia (Youtube aside). All Is Vanity and Virtual plus the early singles are missing.
- Like many successful Japanese acts, PassCode has its own storefront for The Merch. Also like many Japanese acts, that store doesn't ship internationally.
- The Other Marty:
- The single versions of "Nextage" and "Now I Know" feature Yuri in both the tracks themselves and the music videos. However, Yuri's vocals were replaced with Hinako's for the Virtual album.
- This is one of two reasons for the existence of Locus (the other was to showcase Yuna's improved screaming). All the songs on this album were rerecorded – the additional ones where Hinako replaces Yuri are "Toxic", "Progressive Upheaval", "Kiss Bouquet", "Club Kids Never Die", and "Seize The Day!!".
- In their joint interview to support the Virtual Tour, Hinako told the interviewer she looked forward to fans hearing her voice in the older songs (instead of Yuri) and hoped she would be accepted.
- Paying Their Dues: Nao discussed this in a roundabout way during an interview in January 2020. As far as she's concerned, as of this edit PassCode is still doing so. She specifically pointed out how they'd performed at Studio Coast (capacity >2400) twice – once for the Miss Unlimited Tour Final in 2016 and then again the day of that interview – and that their first gig there was only filled to half-capacity.
- "I thought, 'Why aren't more people coming to see us? Our songs are so good!'."
- Nao also said in that interview (and elsewhere) that she wants PassCode to perform at the Budokan – its capacity is 10,000, far larger than any venue they've been in to date. Whether they'll be able to pull that kind of crowd by Nao's self-imposed deadline of 2021 is, as of this edit, unknown. Having a #1 single under their belts certainly doesn't hurt their prospects, though.
- Turned out she and PassCode WOULD reach that goal in February 2022… albeit two months late and only at half-capacity due to Covid restrictions, plus Yuna's retirement happened during the lead-up. Regardless, chances that Nao cried happy-tears upon hearing the news: very high.
- Of course, Nao has been part of PassCode since the days when girls would regularly quit the group and they were lucky to get two dozen people to watch them perform. No shock, then, that she gets emotional when PassCode fills a 2000+ venue and "Thank you!" is almost her Verbal Tic.
- The Pete Best: Yuri left suddenly on October 19th 2015, during production of the group's third single Never Sleep Again (that song's music video does not include her). Only a few months after her departure, PassCode was signed by Universal, gained a permanent backing band – in early live shows they (like most Idol groups) performed to a backtrack, and sometimes Yuri or Nao got to play guitar – and started selling out midsize venues in Tokyo and Osaka. Nao hinted in the Natalie interview that they expected Yuri to leave soon, as they had rehearsed choreography for four. Even so, the call still came out of left field.
- She Also Did:
- In 2011 at age 13 (7th grade), Hinako auditioned for a slot in Morning Musume's "10th Generation". She failed. Worth noting temporary Babymetal backup dancer Riho Sayashi, who joined MM's 9th Generation some months earlier, is only about one month older than Hina.
- Yuna:
- She was part of SO-ON Project, a high-school girls' dance unit run by the Osaka School of Music. Not coincidentally, OSM is Koji Hirachi's alma mater, and he had written material for the group which is how Yuna knew him.
- During her time in SO-ON, Yuna decided to audition for NMB48. According to her, she was told at the outset she would fail due to her inability to make her dancing match everyone else's. Nonetheless, she continued the process partly out of spite and made it to the final round. She had this to say about it…
Yuna: "if I had joined NMB, I would’ve had to quit SoPro. But because I enjoyed being in SoPro so much, I didn’t want to. I understood I would have to eventually anyway as I’d graduate from the school, but even then I wanted to continue for the time being and said so during my last interview at NMB’s auditions."
Interviewer: "You could have made your debut!"
Yuna: "Even if I had been accepted I think I would’ve quit right after anyway, so I don’t have any regret. I didn’t feel like making my debut or anything like that because I’m the kind of person who just does whatever she feels like doing at the moment. SoPro recognized my dancing personality and it was fun, so I would’ve hated being corrected on every one of my moves [at NMB]." - She was part of SO-ON Project,
- Nao:
- In Summer 2015 (aged 18), Nao auditioned for the MissID modeling contest. She even mentioned being in PassCode during her talk. This is the same contest Ladybaby's Rie Kaneko (one year younger than Nao) had won the previous year. Nao failed.
- In 2016, Nao did a model shoot in several cosplay costumes …for the same company that regularly employed Rie. She also met Ladybaby 2.0 (Rie and Rei) at an Osakan Idol Festival in 2017. Amusingly, PassCode would headline that same festival five years later.
- Emily Arima, Yuna's replacement, was a member of the final incarnation of Ladybaby and wrote her own scream lyrics in the group's final songs. After the group disbanded, Emily continued to write lyrics for other groups and sometimes filmed herself in the studio screaming covers. This is how Nao found out about her.
