Remember to Get Your Nominations in for the Animusic Tourney and, Incidentally, Here are my Picks to Help Jog Your Memory

Since those reading this are probably already aware of the impending start of the , I'm writing only to remind people that the time to nominate their favorite OP/ED/insert songs is fast running out.



To help those that haven't filled out their nominations yet let me help you with a look at the 15 songs I nominated after an exhaustive search through my anime music collection.:)




1. GURREN LAGANN - "LIBERA ME" FROM HELL - 2007, INSERT



2. NEON GENESIS EVANGELION - CRUEL ANGEL THESIS - 1995, OP



3. FLCL - RIDE ON SHOOTING STAR - 2000, ED



4. PARANOIA AGENT - YUME NO SHIMA SHINEN KOUEN - 2004, OP



5. MOON PHASE - NEKO MIMI MODE - 2004, OP



6. CLANNAD - DANGO DAIKAZOKU - 2007, ED



7. LAST EXILE - CLOUD AGE SYMPHONY - 2003, OP



8. ONLY YESTERDAY - LOVE IS A FLOWER, YOU ARE THE SEED - 1991, ED



9. K-ON! - TENSHI NI FURETA YO! - 2010, INSERT



10. KAIBA - NEVER - 2008, OP



11. KATANAGATARI - BAHASA PALUS - 2010, INSERT



12. SAYONARA ZETSUBOU SENSEI - RINGO MOGIRE BEAM - 2009, OP



13. MARIA+HOLIC - HANAJI - 2009, OP



14. SAYONARA ZETSUBOU SENSEI - KUUSOU RUMBA - 2008, OP



15. AIR - TORI NO UTA - 2004, OP



The only fixed criteria I had was that the whole song had to be great. Granted, most 1.5 minute snippets of the songs used for the OP/ED reflect the overall quality of the song but not always, which is always such a disappointing development when that happens. There were other criteria that I was tempted to use; but, I disregarded these in the end. For example, I didn't make it a requirement that the accompanying video for an OP/ED had to excellent but many of my picks - like the OP from Paranoia Agent and Maria+holic - are as memorable for the video as for the song.



Looking over my final picks I can't help but pick out a few themes running through.



* The first is the concentrations around a few animation studios. The top three songs all come from series animated by Gainax, Kyoto Animation nabbed three spots as well - 6, 9, 15 - and Shaft took four - 5, 12, 13, 14.

* The second is the uneven breakdown of where the songs came from. I had initially thought to use quotas to make sure I picked songs from all three sources (OP,ED, insert) but I decided to judge these songs solely on their merits. The result was that only 3 insert songs and 3 ending songs were picked, with the other 9 spots being earned by opening songs.

* The third theme is the slightly older age of my list compared to many of the other lists I've seen. I did not intentionally dismiss the more recent stuff; instead, I think this is more of a reflection of the relationships I've developed over the years with the songs on list.



I hope my list helped jog the memories of, at least, a few people reading this; which, in turn, will convince a few people to vote for these songs.
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