(via Chiyo)
SynthV did not have any English male voicebanks for a very long time. The only male voicebanks at all were VOLOR’s Genbu and Medium5’s Muxin, who were limited to Japanese and Chinese respectively. This was also before Dreamtonics had the massive quantity of voicebanks they do now; the SynthV lineup was mostly third-party voicebanks: elaborate characters with non-English names. The few native English voicebanks (Eleanor Forte, SOLARIA, ANRI) still used charming and fantastical names.
So when an English male voicebank was announced, everyone was beyond excited. Finally, the SynthV boy of our dreams to join the rankings of other Vocaloid boys like KAITO, Kagamine Len, and Camui Gakupo! What’s he gonna look like? What’s his name gonna be?
Kevin.
If you’re not aware, “Kevin” is an extremely……. mundane name to English-speakers. It’s a name you’d imagine for a stereotypically boring coworker or an extremely unfunny classmate. Definitely far from the whimsical and fantastical vocal synth characters we know and love. And of course, as a Dreamtonics vocal, he didn’t come with a character design.
This didn’t stop people from making their own designs, though, and since they still wanted Kevin to be the SynthV dreamboat that could stand with the likes of KAITO/Len/Gakupo they went all out. I need to reiterate again- as hard as it is to imagine now, Kevin (and Ryo) were the only male AI voicebanks available at the time, so everyone was going crazy with self-indulgent designs with little regard to how well it matched the voice or name.
(via rice)
I’ve only included what I think are the two most relevant ones to Mr. Kevin SynthV’s creation, but there were truly countless more. Making your own hot Kevin design was The Big Trend…. But no matter how hot the designs were, he still had this goofy ass, normal ass name.
Twitter user ivylare also took note of how funny this was, and made the following tweet:
This joke was such a far departure from all the Bishounen Kevins thus far, it caught the attention of others who also thought the Hot Kevin trend was a little bit silly. Just look at him! Ugly little stickman scribble wearing the most stereotypical Boring Gamer Dude Outfit. Farthest thing you can get from an anime dreamboat, that’s so funny. Yep, this is Mr. Kevin SynthV.
(The name probably stems from the trend of people calling characters “[Character name] [Name of the franchise they’re from, with the implication of using it as their last name]”, i.e. “Sans Undertale”. And then “Mr.” is because he is deserving of respect.)
So people started drawing ironic fanart of Mr. Kevin SynthV, because how funny is that? And hey, he’s got a simple design. It makes him easy and fun to draw, especially for beginner artists! And if you don’t care for any of the Hot Kevin designs floating around, him being this big shared joke made him shared and recognizable. Hey, aren’t there other vocal synths that started as a big shared joke…?
Fondness for Mr. Kevin SynthV quickly grew past the ironic. Maybe people saw him as like, a little creature or pet, but regardless, the love for him was real. People drew sincere and beautiful art of him for covers and originals. He got a limited run plushie. Someone even put him in a DJ set for Miku Expo Digital Stars (Hey where’d that footage come from
Personally I think Mr. Kevin SynthV is the purest expression of Vocaloid culture. A shared community joke with real love behind it that helps elevate and unite artists, especially amateur ones. That’s the main reason I really pushed to use the Mr. Kevin SynthV design over the VIMALION design when we decided to use Kevin for “When Spring Comes”.... . There was a second reason, though.
(back to the FLAVOR FOLEY FILES)