Key Sounds Label - History

History

Key Sounds Label has its origins in 1999, two years before the first album on the label was released. When the visual novel company Key, under the publisher Visual Art's, was about to release their debut title Kanon, Key produced the arrange album Anemoscope and bundled it with the first-print release of Kanon released in June 1999. The second music release, a single, occurred in November 1999. The third release, another arrange album, followed in September 2000 bundled with the first-print release of Key's second title Air, and was the first music release by Key to bear a catalog number, KYCD-0303. Each of these three were released in limited editions, and thus were not widely sold.

In 2001, Visual Art's and Key decided to form Key Sounds Label and start cataloging the albums and singles released by Key with the tag "KSLA–" followed by the four-digit label number. For example, the first release bears the catalog number KSLA-0001. The first two releases on the label were an album and a single released at the convention Comiket 60 in August 2001, and were sold by Key. Since then, Key has regularly sold singles and albums under Key Sounds Label at subsequent Comiket conventions. Following the convention established with Kanon and Air, Key has released three more arrange albums bundled with the first-print releases of Key's later titles Clannad, Little Busters!, and Little Busters! Ecstasy. These three albums were never re-released for general sale. In early 2008, three of the albums on the label became available through the iTunes Store—partial albums of -Memento- and Recollections, and the complete album Ma-Na—under the name Key Sound Team. Later, -Memento- was removed, and the full Recollections album became available.

Most of the releases on the label contain music directly related to Key's visual novels, whether they be original soundtracks, remix albums, or image song singles and albums. There are other music singles and albums produced by members of Key not related to Key's titles. For example, the first album released on the label, Humanity..., is the only album released by Shinji Orito's produce band Work-S. Two maxi singles containing songs sung by Lia were released on the label in December 2002 and August 2003. An album entitled Love Song was released in August 2005 containing songs sung by Riya of Eufonius. In December 2006, Key Sounds Label produced the first drama CD on the label, and two more followed in July 2007. In December 2006, the first anime music single to commemorate the second anime TV series adaptation of Kanon was produced on the label, and an anime single for the Clannad anime TV series followed in October 2007. A third anime music single, this time for the Clannad After Story anime TV series, was released in November 2008. A short remix album for Clannad After Story was released in December 2008. Music singles and albums for the anime Angel Beats! were released between April and December 2010.

The first EP on Key Sounds Label contained songs from Air and was only released during the first concert of the Japanese trance music group OTSU held in May 2006. The second EP contained songs from Little Busters! and was only released during the second OTSU concert held in May 2008. Both concerts were sponsored by Key Sounds Label, and both EPs were released on gramophone records. The first OTSU Club Music Compilation album primarily containing remixed music from Key's visual novels was released in June 2006. The second OTSU Club Music Compilation album was released in February 2008 as a promotion for the second concert, and contains remixed music from Little Busters!. The third OTSU release, OTSU:Blasterhead, contains remixed music from Key's visual novels and was released in February 2009.