On the weekend of August 23rd, renowned VTuber agency hololive took over Radio City Music Hall in New York City for its English branch’s third concert: “All for One.” The concert featured performances from holoEN’s fifteen talents, along with appearances by their Japanese counterparts, culminating in an original group song by the same name.
Only a day prior, popular convention AnimeNYC hosted the ongoing “hololive STAGE World Tour ’25 -Synchronize!-” featuring a line-up set to perform around the world.
Half-angel, half-demon VTuber IRyS performed for both shows, taking the stage on all three days. Anime Trending had the exclusive opportunity to interview IRyS about VTubing, the NYC concerts, and her love for Eurobeat.
Radio City Music Hall, New York City. How was it?
IRyS: It was absolutely amazing. Being able to see such an amazing and historical venue, and being able to actually perform as a VTuber — something that is very recent as a cultural phenomenon — is absolutely wonderful.
I still think it’s like a dream come true. And it was a great show!
My solo song was “DIAMOND GIRLFRIEND,” which is a song that I released not-quite-a-year-ago for my birthday. Recently I’ve been into the Eurobeat genre. I’ve been indulging, diving into the Eurobeat genre for my [own] music.
Eurobeat is something that I discovered through the anime Initial D.
Initial D is a racing anime that includes a lot of cool Eurobeat tracks and I discovered how wonderful the genre is. I love listening to Eurobeat while doing housework, which I hate to do unless I listen to something.
It was also a genre that I don’t think was touched on by hololive [members]. I thought it was a good niche to try out and, thankfully, it was also well-received when I released my first Eurobeat song, “Carbonated Love!”
“DIAMOND GIRLFRIEND” is a follow-up to that. I did perform “Carbonated Love” for Breaking Dimensions. So I thought it would be a good idea to continue with that and sing “DIAMOND GIRLFRIEND” for this year’s concert.
Plus, I thought that “DIAMOND GIRLFRIEND” is a hype song — that is, a song that becomes complete with the audience cheering to the chorus. It is a very cheerful song, and I feel the audience had a lot of fun with it. I’m really glad with how it turned out.
For “DIAMOND GIRLFRIEND,” you worked with MOTSU, is that correct?
IRyS: Yes, I did. MOTSU-san is a very famous rapper and song creator for a lot of actual Initial D openings. He didn’t write the songs for the Initial D openings, but he was rapping and part of the group that made the songs move. I really liked their music.
He also did write the songs for the anime MF Ghost, which is not a sequel to Initial D, but like in the same universe by the same author. So kind of an Initial D spin-off. I really like his past songs, like “Jungle Fire” with Yu Serizawa, and I wanted to [make] a song like that, especially since I was diving into the Eurobeat genre.
I thought it would be awesome if I were able to collaborate with such a Eurobeat legend. And thankfully, it happened. I’m very happy with the result.
When you released “Carbonated Love,” you were surprised by how much your audience already loved Eurobeat. Back then, was this where you expected to take it?
IRyS: No, I did not. Since “Carbonated Love” was great, and I really liked how it turned out too, I wanted to release another Eurobeat song.
If I could get MOTSU in it, that would be great. It was very much a damemoto — asking for something that you weren’t expecting to get, but that would be amazing. It would be a dream if I could do it, but I wouldn’t be surprised if I got a “no.” So when I did get “yes, MOTSU is willing to collaborate with you,” I was just absolutely jumping for joy.
MOTSU has been in the music industry — has been writing songs and is pretty much a legend — for such a long time. So it really is a big honor to be able to do a song with such an amazing person.
I never imagined that it would be like this. It’s absolutely amazing. And I hope that in the future I can do similar collaborations with other Eurobeat legends. That would be amazing.
Is there more Eurobeat on the horizon for us?
IRyS: Yes, definitely. I do also want to dive into the subgenres of Eurobeat so that not everything is Eurobeat per se. But I would say that as of now — my current feeling — I really do want to dive more into the Eurobeat genre in general.
After you performed your first live at hololive 4th fes., you talked on stream about being stunned by the whole ordeal. How has that changed? Do you still feel the same way in New York today?
IRyS: Yeah. I would say that I’ve gotten much more used to performing in front of a large audience.
At my first [hololive fes.], I remember it was nerve-wracking, performing in front of a live audience where you can actually see them. Even doing MC, I just didn’t know what to say. I stumbled.
Compared to [then], I have gotten much more used to it.
I feel much more comfortable and I can concentrate more on my performance. I was able to interact more with the crowd compared to the past where I was just out of it, honestly.
Is there anything you enjoy doing when it comes to crowd interaction?
IRyS: It really depends also on who I’m interacting to the crowd with. When we do MC, we are either in pairs or trios. So depending on who my partner is at that time, we do something different or we try to think up something different.
Typical crowd interactions are usually “do the wave,” or “change your penlight colors,” and we used to do that pretty often. Since it’s already been three, four years, we decided maybe we should do something different.
So this year, what did I do on the first day? It was with [Tokoyami Towa] who doesn’t speak that much English. So it was fun to teach her English along with my fellow EN member Kronii-san. I don’t even know if it was actually New York slang, but we taught her something that was basically a meme and it was a lot of fun.
So instead of interacting directly with the crowd, we would interact with each other in a way that would raise hype inside the crowd. And that was a lot of fun.
On the second day, I was with Kiara. We did arm wrestling, because that is very much a staple in hololive. We arm wrestle each other with a live [audience] reaction.
We’re very serious about it. I was going full-on hard in the arm wrestling against Kiara.
So rather than calling to the crowd, we would interact with each other to have a lot of fun with everybody in the audience.
Is the experience streaming different between English and Japanese? People who are bilingual often code-switch between languages. Do you experience that at all? Do you think the culture is different between the EN and the Japanese talents?
IRyS: I definitely do feel there is a cultural difference in a good way.
Say, when interacting with fellow EN members: because we’re a smaller group — right now there’s a total of fifteen of us — there are a lot more chances for interaction between each other. So we’re very comfortable with each other.
English is a very casual language compared to Japanese. You can say things very straightforward. You can be very direct, and easily be friendly from the first conversation.
Even walking around New York, I noticed people are so [open] compared to when you’re in Japan, nobody talks to you in the elevator like, “oh, nice shoes,” or anything like that.
It’s very much like an American or English-speaking culture [thing]. Between EN talents, it’s much easier to talk and be friendly.
Whereas amongst Japanese members, obviously, I try to be friendly, I try to have fun. But at the same time, since it’s Japanese, it’s a very polite language. So when there is a part of me that is very careful. I try to be careful with what I say so that it doesn’t come off as casual.
You don’t want to be too casual. Especially because most of the JP Japanese members are also my senpais, they’ve been around [for longer]. I’d say hololive isn’t very senpai-kohai, it’s not a huge hierarchy, but it’s still a tradition to respect your senpais. Because that’s just Japanese culture.
Every company is like that to some degree. So I am definitely a little bit more nervous talking to JP members, except for the ones I’m [already] super comfortable with, the ones I talk to all the time.
I still find it very fun and interesting to have two different ways of interacting with two different cultures in general. And I’m really glad that I am bilingual and I get to experience such a difference.
How is the humor between the two different groups? Because we feel that can also vary with language and culture.
IRyS: Yeah, that definitely does vary. It’s really hard to explain exactly how it’s different.
I don’t know if it’s what you would call American humor, but American humor is, I think — along with language — straightforward. It’s simple.
Whereas Japanese humor — for example, Japanese TV shows (variety TV shows) — they’re very crass in a fun way. Because everything’s so polite, when it comes to humor, all of a sudden, there’s a huge difference from the [usual] politeness that makes it funny.
That’s what makes it funny, it’s just so different from the usual Japanese Keigo — classic polite Japanese where they go all out. It’s really hard to explain the difference in English, but I would say that it’s also more complicated.
I think dark humor is also very common in Japanese comedy and whatnot. So yeah, more crass. It’s not rude, but it’s for humor.
Though at the same time, I haven’t really been subjected to a lot of American humor recently since I’ve been so indulged in Japanese culture for the past. I don’t know how many years, but for quite a while.
So yeah, I might be a little biased, or my opinion might be a little outdated.
Official MMD models were made available for the members of hololive -Promise-, including yourself! Can you share your thoughts on videos as fan-made content?
IRyS: I mean honestly I think most of us really encourage fan content.
I really pushed for the Promise MMDs because I wanted an IRyS MMD model for a long time. So I was happy to finally release it to the public. I saw other generations in hololive releasing MMD models and I was like, “wait… I want to release one.”
I’m happy that my fans and listeners are finally able to make content with my official 3D MMD model, which was something that they couldn’t do until now because yeah, it didn’t exist.
A lot of other hololive members had fan-made MMD models of their default model — their official default outfit. Because I had a redesign, and because the design itself is very intricate and complicated, I have fan-made MMD models of my alternate outfits, but not for my official default model.
So I really wanted to release [an official MMD model] because I wanted to have that as an option for fan-made video creation.
You also participated in the Dodgers collab. Now, from what we understand, you were rather excited to be part of that?
IRyS: I was very excited for the Dodgers collab.
I remember seeing it happen last year, and I was like, “Oh man, I really wish I could be part of it.”
So it was very much a big honor to be able to perform at the Dodger Stadium and along with two amazing EN members — Ina and Biboo. It was a lot of fun.
And just the thought that — perhaps, maybe — Shohei Ohtani might have witnessed me is an amazing honor. And it was his birthday! So it was great to be there and watch the game.
Do you feel that the crowd there was different from the standard live crowd?
IRyS: Yeah, definitely. The game itself was obviously open to hololive fans, but not just hololive fans.
I feel like a big portion of the people watching were people who have no idea who we are or what VTubing even is.
So it is definitely more of an away experience. It felt like an away match for me. We did bring up that: “You might think that we’re not real people, but we are actually real people inside. We’re cute anime girls that are real.”
“We actually exist, you know, we’re here.”
So to explain that to a normal audience is obviously a little nerve-wracking. But it’s a really nice opportunity to broaden the culture of VTubing — to introduce this culture to people who have never even known about it.
And obviously, the usual hololive fans were also there, so they cheered us on — even louder than usual to represent hololive fans. I felt like the unity amongst fans was also strengthened through that. And I thought that it was a great experience.
You’ve also been part of “hololive STAGE World Tour ’25 -Synchronize!-” What is it like to represent hololive across the world in a series of concerts?
IRyS: It’s such an honor. I was very happy to be offered to be a part of the World Tour this year. It’s such an honor to represent hololive to the world, and to be able to sing and perform in all sorts of places — and in such a short time span too!
As VTubers, we don’t get that many opportunities to perform in front of a live audience — it’s not an easy thing to do technology-wise. So being able to be a part of that and performing for as many people as possible worldwide is such an honor.
I’m really happy to have been able to participate.
Is there anything else you would like to share?
IRyS: We are super grateful for having such a dedicated fan base that comes along with us, and we hope that hololive English can grow further. That VTubing can continue to grow, and the hololive presence in the otaku sphere can expand even further worldwide.
As for me — as an artist and a VTuber — I would like to say thank you so much for everyone’s support that I’m able to release music and perform music in front of an audience.
I hope that people can continue to support me and my music endeavors so that I can expand more to the audience.
And also I did release a recent EP that includes Eurobeats tracks. It’s called “YaBAI.” It’s on streaming services like Spotify. So please do check it out!
There are other amazing songs in the EP just like “DIAMOND GIRLFRIEND.” It would be great if everyone could check those songs out! And in future concerts, there’s a good chance I will be performing some of them!
IRyS can be found on YouTube, X (formerly Twitter), and Spotify.
