LOLA

L♀LA was the first female Vocaloid ever released. She was released along with fellow Vocaloid Le♂n.

History
Lola was released along with fellow Vocaloid, Leon, by Zero-G Limited. She received much better reviews than her male counterpart, and they were exhibited at the Zero-G Limited booth during Wired Nextfest. The Vocaloids won the 2005 Electronic Musician Editor’s Choice Award, despite mixed reviews on both. At the time of their release, Lola and Leon had no rival software to contend with and were the first Vocal synthesizers to be released of their nature. However, Leon and Lola failed to impact the American market due to their accents.

A Japanese electro-pop artist, Susumu Hirasawa, used Vocaloid Lola in the original soundtrack of "Paprika" by Satoshi Kon. Susumu Hirasawa announced that "If users can edit her perfectly, she can be a professional (singer). She can sing in soprano or whatever if they edit her overwhelmingly" on his blog. Since Susumu Hirasawa did not reveal which Vocaloid he used for a quite some time, except the fact it was a female vocaloid, many fans speculated it was Crypton's Meiko. However, later he mentioned in a magazine interview that it was Lola.

Concept
Lola's boxart was standard for her day and rival software package Cantor would later adopt the same boxart style. Lola has since been taken as one of the few "Avatarless" Vocaloids.

Marketing
Leon and Lola recieved standard advertisements 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 therefore and had no fan input in mind. Their boxart was standard for their day and rival software package Cantor would later adopt the same boxart style.

For a period she, along with Leon and Miriam, were not on 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 vocaloids and renewed demand, Zero-G began reselling Lola, Leon and Miriam from their own website via their virtual shop. According to Zero-G, the three may also get a redesign in the future.

Leon and Lola's boxart is from a stock image. The photographer is unknown but the image is on various stock photo sites. An example of the original is here titled "Profile of woman with finger next to lips" x13037575.

Vocaloid

 * Leon and Lola after heavy vocal cleaning

Lola

 * -|Lola=

Popularity
As there was not much of a Vocaloid fandom to begin with, most fan responses are relatively late responses to the Vocaloid and came as the result of the popularity of the Vocaloid 2 engine. Lola herself was relatively unknown until interest was sparked by a video related to Leon.

In the Nico Nico Douga 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 Vocaloid singing in the top 10.

A independant Vocaloid search on Nico Nico Douga revealed that most Vocaloids had less then 1,000 videos uploaded on Nico Nico Douga in between July 1 and December 15 2011. Lola fell into that category.

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.

Trivia

 * It was Lola and Leon's appearance at the NAMM trade show that would later introduce rival Vocaloid studio PowerFX 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 can be heard here.


 * The song, "Beloved Tomboyish Girl" was covered by Lola and posted on Nico Nico Douga on March 3, 2004. This was the first Vocaloid song to be uploaded onto Nico Nico Douga. It was originally removed and then later re-added in 2007.
 * Nico broadcast: [LOLA] *雪ちよちよ* also known as *雪ちゆちゆ
 * Youtube broadcast: [LOLA] *Yuki Chiyo Chiyo*

Notable for...

 * First female vocal ever released
 * One of the two first English vocals ever released
 * One of the first two Vocaloid voicebanks ever released
 * First noted Vocaloid to be used in a film
 * One of the two first specialised vocals ever released
 * One of the two first Vocaloids ever released
 * One of the two first Zero-G Vocaloids released
 * One of the first two avatarless Vocaloids produced
 * Has the oldest Vocaloid related song on NND