Why did FUNi use different instrumental for their DB and DBGT covers?

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Why did FUNi use different instrumental for their DB and DBGT covers?

Post by ShadowDude112 » Mon Mar 20, 2017 1:13 am

When FUNimation brought Dragon Ball over and dubbed the theme song, they used some weird sounding instruments. I think it might be a midi. But it's not the actual instrumental version of Makafushigi Adventure. Why is this? Even for I'll Give You Romance, and the GT songs. They use these really shitty sounding versions. Is it FUNi trying to be cheap? Toei? It just sounds bad.
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Re: Why did FUNi use different instrumental for their DB and DBGT covers?

Post by simtek34 » Mon Mar 20, 2017 10:38 am

I... really don't know. FUNimation HAD the Indtrumental versions, as seen in old commercials, but they just decided not to use them. Did they think they sounded old? Were they bad quality?

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Re: Why did FUNi use different instrumental for their DB and DBGT covers?

Post by Danfun64 » Tue Mar 21, 2017 5:05 pm

Funi is nowhere near the first company to replace the instrumental of themes and insert songs for their dubs of DB media.
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Re: Why did FUNi use different instrumental for their DB and DBGT covers?

Post by floofychan333 » Sat Apr 08, 2017 10:51 pm

It probably would have been easier to make their own background instruments because the original music is really hard to transcribe. I've arranged Makafushigi Adventure with whatever I could find online but it's still not a full transcription.
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Re: Why did FUNi use different instrumental for their DB and DBGT covers?

Post by DB_Fan1991 » Sun Apr 09, 2017 2:49 pm

It's because Toei sent FUNimation bad quality instrumentals.
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Re: Why did FUNi use different instrumental for their DB and DBGT covers?

Post by veggiechan » Fri May 19, 2017 1:03 am

DB_Fan1991 wrote:It's because Toei sent FUNimation bad quality instrumentals.
If that's the case, how did Blue Water still dub an English theme song over the original instrumental?

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Re: Why did FUNi use different instrumental for their DB and DBGT covers?

Post by DB_Fan1991 » Fri May 19, 2017 3:26 am

veggiechan wrote:
DB_Fan1991 wrote:It's because Toei sent FUNimation bad quality instrumentals.
If that's the case, how did Blue Water still dub an English theme song over the original instrumental?
It's because they didn't care. FUNi wanted a higher quality instrumental.
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Re: Why did FUNi use different instrumental for their DB and DBGT covers?

Post by Puto » Fri May 19, 2017 10:26 am

If you look at the Dragon Box GT extras, you can see that the instrumental of the GT opening and first ending included is pretty low quality, significantly worse than the Japanese track. So that's probably why they re-recorded the songs.
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Re: Why did FUNi use different instrumental for their DB and DBGT covers?

Post by GreatSaiyaJeff » Sat May 20, 2017 9:52 am

It was standard practice back in the day, companies think that if it wasn't some kind of modern music to american kid's taste, then they may not like it. Luckily it doesn't happen much anymore.
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Re: Why did FUNi use different instrumental for their DB and DBGT covers?

Post by NitroEX » Sat May 20, 2017 12:21 pm

DB_Fan1991 wrote:
veggiechan wrote:
DB_Fan1991 wrote:It's because Toei sent FUNimation bad quality instrumentals.
If that's the case, how did Blue Water still dub an English theme song over the original instrumental?
It's because they didn't care. FUNi wanted a higher quality instrumental.
The Blue Water/Japanese instrumental was low quality? That's news to me and I watched it on television. Honestly, it sounded fine. Also, the Funimation cover might have clearer sounding instruments but in terms of actual production values, it pales in comparison to the original, especially those guitars, they sound like something from a Youtube cover. Not exactly what I would call higher quality.

Also, you do realize that Funimation's opening was only intended for DVD right? This idea that they strived for quality sounds like you're giving them far too much credit. Even the 2012 Nicktoons airings reused the Grand Tour rap.

One thing I feel the need to mention is that I hope no one literally believes that this was the only version of the Dan Dan instrumental they had. I think it's pretty obvious that they degraded the quality of that track (and footage) on purpose in order to better sell their "newer" version of GT, especially to fans at the time who only had poor quality bootlegs on VHS. It's all done purely for marketing reasons as well as for dramatic effect.

As for the question of the thread; I obviously don't know the real reason for the instrumental cover but if I had to guess I'd say it was either a money issue (maybe the song rights were expensive?) or perhaps Funimation's producers genuinely thought that their Japanese sources sounded too dated... which tbf, they might have, (even though it's highly unlikely for Blue Water's French/AB source to be vastly different in quality) OR maybe they were just being insecure about something that ultimately didn't need fixing, we'll never really know for sure. Sabat has mentioned similar quality issues when describing the background music for Z and their decision to replace that but, whether that's to be believed is your own choice. That could very easily be Funimation retroactively changing their story in order to give themselves better PR. Whether true or not it's a good excuse to feed the hardcore fanbase.

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Re: Why did FUNi use different instrumental for their DB and DBGT covers?

Post by SoundVox » Wed Aug 09, 2017 11:31 pm

In terms of Dragon Ball, I actually prefer their instrumentals for the covers. But with GT, yeeeeah, the songs don't really work for me. Vic singing Dan Dan sounds great, when it has the original instrumentals

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Re: Why did FUNi use different instrumental for their DB and DBGT covers?

Post by KBABZ » Sat Aug 12, 2017 9:37 pm

As far as Dragon Ball goes, I know when I first listened to the original Makafushigi that it sounded incredibly weird and old, probably because it uses a Chinese instruments in its mix that I had never associated with it due to being vastly familiar with FUNi's take on it. Using a more guitar and drums style was probably done to do the slightest bit of updating the music for 2000s audiences as they saw them back them.

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Re: Why did FUNi use different instrumental for their DB and DBGT covers?

Post by TheGreatness25 » Mon Nov 06, 2017 12:00 pm

I feel the same was done when they finally translated all of the Dragon Ball GT opening and closing songs. Did they get low quality versions from Toei for those too?

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