L♀LA

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LOLA
Character information
Gender	Female
Pronouns	She/Her
Technical information
Product code	ZGV2
Type	VOCALOID
Language	English
Illustrator	Stock image
Release date	January 15, 2004
Company	Zero-G Limited
Affiliation	YAMAHA Corporation

L♀LA is an English VOCALOID developed and distributed by Zero-G Limited, and was released in January 2004 for the first VOCALOID engine. She was one of the 4 known "Project Daisy" vocals. She, along with LE♂N, were among the first voice banks to be commercially distributed. LOLA is advertised as a "virtual female soul vocalist modeled on a real professional singer"; her voice provider has never been revealed, but was described officially as "Black" and is a well established musician in Great Britain. Her provider has her origins, however, in the Caribbean.

Concept

Etymology

While it is unknown why Zero-G choose this name, "Lola" is a Spanish and English name and can be used for both boys and girls (the male version having a different meaning and origin entirely). As a female name, its origins is from the name "Dolores". The name "Lola" means "Sorrows".

Appearance

LOLA's boxart was standard for her day and rival software package Cantor would later adopt the same boxart style, the boxart for both products are from a stock image. The photographer for LOLA's boxart is unknown, but the photograph is on various stock photo sites. An example of the original is here titled "Profile of woman with finger next to lips" x13037575. LOLA has since been taken as one of the few "Avatar-less" VOCALOIDs.

Relations

• LE♂N - A complementary voice bank with masculine vocals.

History

Marketing

Leon and Lola's original boxart

LOLA and LEON received standard advertisement for their day. They were advertised on the internet and in electronic magazines. At the time, this was normal for software synthesizers and there was no VOCALOID fandom to aid with their development. They were aimed at professionals and therefore, had no fan input in mind. Their boxart was changed, along with the method of marketing them, some time after Zero-G announced their role in the development of VOCALOID and both were intended to be marketed as a pair.

For a period she, along with LEON and MIRIAM, were not for sale due to the lack of interest in synthesized voices. This lack of interest was owed to the sudden change in indie music trends. After increased interest began to occur in VOCALOID and demand was renewed, Zero-G began reselling LEON, LOLA, and MIRIAM from their own website via their virtual shop. According to a Zero-G interview in 2010, the three may also get a redesign in the future.

Voicebanks

LOLA

LOLA was a female "soul singer" vocal and the counter-partner vocal to LEON. She has a soul singing female vocal with a deep contralto vocal and a real reggae vibe.

• LOLA (Project Daisy), unreleased
• LOLA (VOCALOID), January 15, 2004

Reputation

Sales

It is unknown how many units were sold, but as KAITO was the only commercial VOCALOID failure reported, it is safe to say she sold at least 1,000 units. According to Crypton Future Media, LOLA, along with LEON, failed to impact the American market due to their "British" accents.

Reaction

As there was not much of a VOCALOID fandom to begin with, most fan interest were relatively late in responses to the VOCALOID and came as the result of the popularity of the VOCALOID2 engine. LOLA herself was relatively unknown until interest was sparked by a video related to LEON.

Initially, according to official word upon LOLA's release, LOLA was rejected by user's as a soul singer due to the fact when LOLA sang outside of the soul music genre, her accent reverted back to a Caribbean one. Her accent left many users confused on if she was Spanish or Japanese. This meant that LOLA's results were carried by her vocal type being more genre matched, than the results of her English pronunciations. This in turn impacted the racial representation of the vocal in matching the soul singer genre and LOLA was the most criticized for her vocal racial representation than LEON.

Impact

LEON and LOLA's initial failure in America resulted in MIRIAM originally only being sold in Europe, she would not be sold in America until 2008 when all 3 were re-sold.

Misc

In the niconico International Vocaloid ranking 2010, LOLA held the second highest number appearances in the top 30 songs with 5 songs, 3 of which made it into the top 10. The top song of 2010 was also a song that used LOLA. She was the only English VOCALOID besides BIG AL to have a song where she was the sole English vocal singing in the top 10.

An independent search on niconico revealed that most VOCALOIDs had less than 1,000 videos uploaded on niconico in 2011 between July 1st and December 15th. LOLA fell into that category.

Trivia

• It was LOLA and LEON's appearance at the NAMM trade show that would later introduce rival VOCALOID studio PowerFX Systems AB. to the VOCALOID program.
• LOLA, MIRIAM, and BIG AL were slated to be featured in the original soundtrack of freeware RPG "Ad Lucem". The project remains unfinished.
• LOLA users often recommend that it is best to set her gender factor at "56" for best results within her voice.
• LOLA's voice provider is said to be heard in a demo, here. (Archived on October 27, 2005.)
• The song, "Beloved Tomboyish Girl" was covered by LOLA and posted on niconico on March 3, 2004. This was the first VOCALOID song to be uploaded onto niconico. It was originally removed and then later re-added in 2007.

Achievements

• First Female vocal ever released
• One of the two first VOCALOIDs ever released
• One of the first two VOCALOID voicebanks ever released
• One of the two first English vocals ever released
• One of the two first specialized vocals ever released
• One of the two first Zero-G VOCALOIDs released
• One of the first two avatar-less VOCALOIDs produced
• First noted VOCALOID to be used in a film
• Has the oldest VOCALOID related song on NND

External links

Articles

• VOCALOID Wiki