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So I just watched Princess Kaguya and I can't help but feel like I've heard the ending song in another anime before?

Anybody have any idea what others it has been in? I feel like I've seen it in Clannad or Clannad After Story or some other anime like that.

Any help at all would be greatly appreciated because we all know how stuff like this can drive you insane! :')

Here is the song link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0wmUQDR6zG4

Matt
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LadyShyla
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    It wasn't in Clannad, I'm 99% sure of it. In general, it's quite rare for anime to reuse songs from other anime. Unlike in Western film and TV, where the songs were all created independently and licensed for use, sometimes in more than one work, anime songs are pretty much all commissioned for a single show. – Torisuda Aug 22 '15 at 14:16
  • I agree, it's very unlikely it was the same song - perhaps it shares the same tune, but in that case this question seems kinda broad – Toshinou Kyouko Aug 22 '15 at 14:18
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    To add to Torisuda, it's even _less_ likely that this kind of song reuse would happen in a Ghibli film, arguably the artistic pinnacle of Japanese animation. – senshin Aug 22 '15 at 18:34

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I'm pretty familiar with the Clannad anime, and I can tell you with 99.9999% confidence that this song never appears in it.

As I said in my comment, and as Toshinou-san and senshin reaffirmed in theirs, it would be very unlikely for two anime to use the same song, especially if one of them is a Studio Ghibli production. Not impossible, but unlikely. As in "I've been watching anime for seventeen years and I've never seen two of them use the same song". That kind of unlikely.

However, that still doesn't mean "impossible", so I looked into the song, "Inochi no Kioku", to try and find out more about its origins. It was written and performed by Japanese singer Kazumi Nikaido. An Anime News Network announcement about the Kaguya Hime film mentions that the song was chosen as the movie's main theme.

The wording of the announcement makes it sound as if Nikaido created the song independently of the film's production, and the production staff decided to license it for use in the film. This is also supported by the release dates; the single for "Inochi no Kioku" was released 24 July 2013, according to GhibliWiki, while the film was released 23 November 2013 according to Anime News Network.

Licensing a song like this is somewhat unusual for anime; it's more typical for the production to hire a songwriter to write a custom song for the anime, and hire a singer (often one of the voice actors) to perform it. They also sometimes hire singer/songwriters to both write and perform the music. I can only think of a few cases (e.g. FLCL with The Pillows) where an anime production licensed music which had already been released.

However, the Anime News Network page on Nikaido only lists her as staff on one anime, The Tale of Princess Kaguya. This strongly suggests that "Inochi no Kioku" only appeared in that anime. I think your memory might be playing tricks on you :)

Torisuda
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