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{{trope}}
[[File:Vol__2_Yuki_Nagato_cd_349Vol 2 Yuki Nagato cd 349.jpg|link=Haruhi Suzumiya|right]]
 
A song specific in content and tone to a character from an anime, sung by the character's voice performer -- usuallyperformer—usually on a soundtrack CD.
 
The animation houses which produce anime are nothing if not masters of cross-marketing and cross-promotion. One means by which a series is promoted and supported in the Japanese media marketplace is (as is sometimes the case in the United States) the original soundtrack CD.
 
In the early days of this practice, such CDs usually contained nothing more than the program's opening and closing themes, as well as most or all of the incidental music heard in the show. Eventually, though, the producers of such discs began to take advantage of the fact that most Japanese voice performers are also professional singers, often of the "idol" variety which drives the Japanese pop music market. They began to write songs that typified -- andtypified—and sometimes explored more deeply -- thedeeply—the characters.
 
Thus was born the "[[Image Song]]", a uniquely Japanese variety of [[All There in the Manual]]. While a viewer can enjoy and understand a series without ever hearing the soundtrack, those that do listen to the music often receive a "bonus" in the form of a deeper understanding of the nature of the characters.
 
Occasionally the [['''Image Song]]''' makes its way back to the series, where it may appear as a character's theme music, or to punctuate a sequence which features them. As time goes on, this has become more frequent, to the point where in some shows the Image Songs almost (but not quite) supplant the traditional soundtrack entirely. And in some cases, the show's [[Anime Theme Song|theme song]] is treated as an Image Song -- usuallySong—usually sung by the most important female member of the cast, but also remade any number of times by other voice performers from the show.
 
The [['''Image Song]]''' differs from the [[Leitmotif]] in that it primarily exists outside of the show, whereas a leitmotif is created specifically for use in the show to represent a character or idea.
 
In Western musicals, the [[Cut Song]] has a similar function. [["I Want" Song]] is similar but occurs in the show.
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== Anime and Manga ==
 
* ''[[Digimon]]'' is an extreme example in terms of sheer volume of image songs; for instance, ''[[Digimon Adventure 02]]'' alone had one song for each of the [[Digi Destined]], one song for each of their Digimon partners, and one song where they sang together, for a total of 36 -- in36—in ''addition'' to ensemble songs and a Christmas album. ''[[Digimon Adventure]]'' and ''[[Digimon Tamers]]'' also had songs for secondary characters and antagonists. ''[[Digimon Frontier]]'' and ''[[Digimon Savers]]'' eventually leveled off on the practice, and ''[[Digimon Xros Wars]]'' and ''[[Digimon Xros Wars: The Young Hunters Leaping Through Time]]'' has none at all, but it's worth noting that ''Savers'' was years off when [[Serial Escalation|the 100th CD]] in the series was released. Tai's [[Image Song]] was used as an insert piece late in ''[[Digimon Adventure]]'' proper, Matt performed his in a concert in ''[[Digimon Adventure 02]]'', and several other characters' instrumental themes seem to be derived from theirs (or vice-versa).
** ''[[Digimon Savers]]'' did eventually get an Image Song CD, but [[Demoted to Extra|Yoshi and Lalamon were missing altogether]]. Frustratingly ironic, as their [[Backstory]] is that they met after Yoshi failed in a piano recital and Lalamon ''has an attack called Sing A Song'' which does [[Exactly What It Says on the Tin]]. Later in the year, another CD was released that included all new songs from the five "[[The Hero|goggle boys]]" for ''Digimon'''s tenth anniversary.
* ''[[Slayers]]'' has between one to three image songs between each of the major characters (including one of the villians, [[Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds|Valgaav]]), and there is also both the infamous "Maiden's Prayer" duet by Lina and Amelia's voice actresses from the second season of the anime, and a song where the four leads all sing together. However, these are usually overshadowed by the large number of [[Anime Theme Songs]] sung by [[Megumi Hayashibara]]
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** [[Nyoron Churuya-san|Churuya]] has 6 image songs.
* ''[[Mermaid Melody Pichi Pichi Pitch]]'', being a musical, uses every image song in the episodes, as well as every other song in the vocal box.
* The ''[[Tenchi Muyo!]]'' series -- orseries—or group of series variants -- hasvariants—has released a whole lot of cds, including a Christmas album. Characters have several songs that could be Image Songs, and some made their way into the first television series (which followed, and re-structured, the [[OVA]], during karaoke on-board ship. A few of these were released in America by Pioneer, including one CD called "Meet The Tenchi Muyo" that mimicked the appearance of several Beatles albums.
* ''[[Lucky Star]]'', too, has a large collection of image songs thanks to its overwhelming popularity. And it's not just the four main girls, either. Kagami's classmates and even Konata's deceased mother get songs. Misao, formerly one of [[Those Two Guys]], became enough of an [[Ensemble Darkhorse]] to get an album all to herself.
** In fact, Shiraishi got more songs than anyone else thanks to him taking the lead for the second half of ending songs. One of the songs that got a full version was none other than ''Ore no Wasuremono''.
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** Although not technically her character song, Hinagiku sings the ending of season two, it could fit for it though.
*** Also for the second ending of season two, Hayate and Nagi sing, what could be considered, an image song.
* Urara from ''[[Yes! Pretty Cure 5|Yes! Precure 5]]'' has two [[Image Song|Image Songs]] which, in the show's reality, she actually wrote herself. She regularly sings them in concerts, accompanied in at least one case by the rest of the main cast.
* In a rare English language example, there is a soundtrack CD released titled ''[[Pokémon (anime)|Pokémon]]: 2B A Master'' that features Image Songs associated with characters from the show, but not performed directly by their English voice actors. Later, there was even a live theater show -- ''[[Pokémon Live]]'' -- that—that featured the characters singing some of the songs from that soundtrack.
** The exception would be "Double Trouble", sung by [[Terrible Trio|Team Rocket]]'s VAs. The Totally Pokémon CD released during Johto had a particularly memorable one sung by Brock's VA, [[Eric Stuart]] ("Two Perfect Girls").
** On the Japanese side of ''Pokémon'', for Satoshi's theme, we have ''Spurt!'' which is also one of the openings, May's theme is ''Watashi Makenai'' (one of the ending themes) and Hikari has ''Kimi no Soba de''. Instrumentals of these are usually heard during their contest appeals.
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** There was also a CD of image songs sold in North America that is now out of print called "Lunarock!", which featured songs that were in episodes about each of the scouts. Sailor Moon had more than one for herself on there, and they [[Non-Singing Voice|hired different voice actresses]] to sing for the other Inner Senshi.
** And then there's [[Stephanie Beard]], who wrote the song "[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2kSRUKG1BuU The Real SugaBayBee]". Supposedly it was for her radio character persona, but she had to have at least drawn some inspiration from her [[Americans Hate Tingle|hated character]] in the series. Most people consider it her image song for Rini.
* ''[[Tokyo Mew Mew]]'' follows the suit, with two character songs for each Mew Mew -- exceptMew—except Mew Ichigo, who got ''five''.
* Even thirteen-episode ''[[Prétear]]'' has image songs for the four older Leafe Knights on the second soundtrack CD.
* ''[[Ranma ½]]'''s Song Calendars and the "Hot Song Battle Contest" album display the voice actors singing wholly in character, sometimes purely for humor (such as Genma trying to sing while in Panda form,) but for surprisingly dramatic effect at other times (girl-Ranma singing an unusually angsty song while crying in the rain.)
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** A little in-joke for the fans was the duet by Ryouga and the Jusenkyo Guide - the two characters share the same voice actor.
* ''[[Magic Knight Rayearth]]'' often mixed image songs along with traditional soundtrack themes. Although they were usually performed by [[Power Trio|Hikaru, Umi, and Fuu]], sometimes Emeraude and Eagle would get a chance to perform. Even [[Non-Human Sidekick|Mokona]] got in on the fun with at least two songs.
* Arguably, the [[Anime Theme Song|opening and ending themes]] for ''[[Slayers]]'' (sung by either Masami Okui or Megumi Hayashibara, or both) are all [[Image Song|ImageSongs]] for heroine Lina Inverse, as they tend to describe her personality directly.
** This doesn't prevent her from getting "normal" image songs like the rest of the main characters.
* An ''even more'' extreme case is ''[[The Prince of Tennis|Prince of Tennis]]'', which keeps delivering image songs, duets, group releases and/or image CD's for ''almost each player in the show'' in a more-or-less regular basis.
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* ''[[Rosario + Vampire]]'' has a usual share of image songs in both its seasons, as well as covers of 80's J-Pop songs. In both seasons, all of these have been gratuitously inserted into the anime, with the poolside karaoke in season one and the singing in class in ''Capu2'' being the most obvious.
* Several characters from ''[[Kinnikuman]]'' have one of these.
* ''[[Gundam Wing]]'' has four OSTs, five if you include ''[[The Movie|Endless Waltz]]''; out of those, two are peppered with Image Songs, while a third is given over to them entirely (the only non-[[Image Song]] track being the show's second opening theme). Most of the primary cast gets songs, with the central characters (the Gundam Pilots and Relena) getting at least two while lesser-but-still important characters like Zechs, Treize, Lady Une, and Dorothy each get one.
* ''[[Gundam Seed Destiny]]'''s second OST features "Shinkai no Kodoku", Stella Louisser's image song, which is also an insert song for her important scenes in the series, particularly her chance meetings with Shinn, her {{spoiler|[[Anguished Declaration of Love|death scene]] and Shinn interring her body}}.
* ''[[Zettai Karen Children]]'', being done by the same creative staff as ''Hayate'', has a pretty large collection to its name. There are songs for the expected characters ([[Power Trio|The Children]]) and some less expected ([[Hard Gay|Muscle Okama?]]).
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** ''[[Fullmetal Alchemist]]: Brotherhood'' gives us an image song by "[[Romi Park]] and the Alchemists", which is [[A Good Name for a Rock Band]].
* ''[[Saiyuki]]'' has numerous image albums from the three separate anime series and almost every major character has at least one song. And try not to count how many the four main characters have, you'll give up half way through (I have tried).
** The only exception is Hakkai, since [[Akira Ishida]] doesn't like to sing--whensing—when Hakkai absolutely needed an [[Image Song]] as part of the "Four Seasons" promotional CD for the movie, he simply delivered a monologue to music. This has led original author Minekura to playfully refer to the group of Goku, Gojyo and Sanzo's seiyuu as "-8," or "Minus Eight," as the "ha" in "Hakkai" is written with the kanji for 8.
* Pretty much the entire vocal soundtrack of ''[[Pani Poni Dash!]]'' is sung by the characters involved.
* Standard practice in ''[[Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha]]'' is to include three tracks worth of Image Songs in each [[All There in the Manual|Sound Stage]] as extra incentive to buy them. [[The Hero|Nanoha]] and [[Nana Mizuki|Fate]] naturally gets a good chunk of these, with Hayate a close third.
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== Film ==
 
* For the ''[[James Bond]]'' film that eventually became ''[[Thunderball]]'', a theme tune was written for its previous title, ''Mr. Kiss Kiss Bang Bang''. While the title was changed, necessitating a new theme, "Mr Kiss Kiss Bang Bang" typifies Bond's character so well that it served as Bond's [[Image Song]].
** Though the replacement theme, Tom Jones' "Thunderball", still fits the trope. And years later, in ''[[Casino Royale]]'', Chris Cornell wrote "You Know My Name" to serve as an Image Song for the inexperienced Bond (as the [[Leitmotif]] is only used at the final scene).
* Six years after ''[[My Cousin Vinny]]'', [[Joe Pesci]] revived his character for the album ''Vincent LaGuardia Gambini Sings Just for You''. Many who heard it wished that he hadn't.
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* ''[[Super Sentai]]'' releases yearly Image Album songs by the heroes ever since ''Abaranger'', with variable degrees of singing. ''Gekiranger'' had villains Rio and Mele be such major characters that they too got to sing.
** Even before that, there were sentai image songs-not usually sung by the characters, usually done by anime singers such as MoJo or Isao Sasaki. The villain songs were usually done up until the 90s by vocal trio Koorogi '73.
*** Previously, however, there are some Sentai character [[Image Song]], but not all characters get their own [[Image Song]]. These characters include [[Dai Sentai Goggle Five|Goggle Pink]], [[Choujuu Sentai Liveman|Blue Dolphin]] and [[Choujin Sentai Jetman|Black Condor]] (the last one even plays out in the middle of his [[Crowning Moment of Awesome]])
* ''[[Kamen Rider]]'' occasionally does this as well, but how many of the actors sing on the album depends entirely on whether their characters would be the ''type'' to sing.
** Den-O is a good example for ''[[Kamen Rider]]''. Ryoutarou has a duet with each of his Imagin and he has his own song. The Imagin also do their own version of the opening song!
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== Music ==
 
* [[Dos Gringos]], a band comprised of [[Yanks With Tanks|United States Air Force]] fighter pilots, has a song called "Last of the Breed" that (aside from being written in a future where they're all [[Retired Badass|Retired Badasses]]es) describes what modern USAF fighter pilots are like.
** "I'm A Pilot" also counts, though it's more satirical and [[Self-Deprecation]] (it's written from the perspective of crew chiefs and their perceptions of fighter pilots).
 
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** The tail end of it is even the short song that's played in his intro during KOF '98 if he's the first character out on the team or if it's a 1v1 match. The song, for the record, is called the "Choi Bounge Ondo."
* ''[[Sonic Adventure]]'', ''[[Sonic Adventure 2]]'' and ''[[Sonic the Hedgehog 2006 (video game)|Sonic the Hedgehog 2006]]'' have character songs for all the playable characters plus the game's theme tune. ''[[Sonic Heroes]]'' replaced individual character themes with team themes (fitting the game's gimmick). The trend varyingly continues with the most recent games (different songs for different endings in ''[[Shadow the Hedgehog]]'', only one theme song for ''[[Sonic Unleashed]]'', etc).
* The Masou Kishin/Elemental Lords in ''[[Super Robot Wars]]'' mostly had their [[Leitmotif|Leitmotifs]]s turned into [[Image Song]]. Other than Masaki's, they're usually sung by their own seiyuus (Masaki's [[Image Song]] is sung by [[JAM Project|Ichiro Mizuki and Hironobu Kageyama]].) There's also image songs by [[JAM Project]] about the SRX Team's [[Leitmotif]].
* Mai Shiranui, from the ''[[Fatal Fury]]'' games has gotten 2 image songs, based on her background music themes: "Kachou Fuugetsu Otome Mai" (not by her voice actress, but Reiko Chiba) and "Dear MAI Boy" (by her actual voice actress, Akoya Sogi). From the same series, Blue Mary also has an image song, "Blue Mary's Blues" which also has a [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=khbd5Pcj9g4 sprite-based video].
** Some image songs for ''[[Samurai Shodown]]'' also exist, at least for Nakoruru and Rimururu (like ''Egao de Iru'' for the latter).
** In fact, a couple of albums made of them were once released by SNK: ''SNK Gals Vocals Collection'' and ''SNK Guys Vocals Collection''; the former included one for [[Art of Fighting|Yuri Sakazaki]].
* The ''[[Disgaea]]'' series features [[Image Song|Image Songs]] -- [[Evil Overlord|Laharl]], [[The Lancer|Etna]], [[Unknown Rival|Mid-Boss]] and [[Nobuyuki Hiyama|Axel]] each have one ("Lord Laharl's Hymn", "Etna Boogie", "Ah, My Magnificent Life" and "White Tiger", respectively), featured in the characters' respective endings.
* ''[[Xenosaga]] Episode II'' contains a track called "The Image Song of [[Xenosaga]] Episode II" (a portion of it is played while fighting Margulis). However, it doesn't appear to be from the point of view of any particular character.
* The three leads of ''[[Final Fantasy X-2]]'' all got their own CDs.
* ''[[F-Zero]] GX'' featured image songs for all of the characters, some with lyrics. Yes, including [[Memetic Badass|Captain Falcon]].
* ''[[Super Mario Bros.]].'' combined this with [[Forgotten Theme Tune Lyrics]] to create ''Super Mario Compact Disco''. Oddly enough, Peach is only mentioned ''once'' throughout the soundtrack (specifically during the "Super Mario USA" song), as the rest of it is spent playing up Daisy as Mario's [[Love Interest]].
* The ''[[Harukanaru Toki no Naka de]]'' franchise got quite a bit of these; in fact, the ''Hachiyou Shou'' anime TV series makes a point of using the ten associated character songs -- eightsongs—eight for [[Cast Full of Pretty Boys|the main team]] plus two for the villains -- forvillains—for the [[A Day in the Limelight|character-centered episodes]]: either within the episode itself, often as a [[Theme Music Power-Up]], or replacing the regular [[Ending Theme]]. Even [[Artificial Human|Yasuaki]], who is voiced by [[Akira Ishida]], wasn't spared (one episode has a remake version of his [[Image Song]] as the ending).
* ''[[Umineko no Naku Koro ni]]'' is getting these; so far we have Jessica's [[Ear Worm]]-inducing "Dokkyun Heart" and Maria'a absolutely ''adorable'' "Happy Halloween MARIA." Coming up next is Beato and George. ...Wait, ''Beato and George?!?''
** The album Rokkenjima in Love (released alongside EP6) contains Image Songs for Battler, Maria, Bernkastel, Kumasawa/Virgilia, Kyrie, Beatrice, The Seven Sisters of Purgatory, Ange, and one for the EP3 myth battle between Beatrice and Virgilia. Beatrice's Image Song deserves mention, though, for being instrumentalized and used as epic BGM in EP7.
* ''[[Angelique]]'' has mulptiple image songs for all of the datable guys, including plenty of duet and group songs. The third set of [[OVA|OVAs]]s even includes ''music videos'' for the Cherry Blossom/Sunflower set of image songs.
* ''[[Metal Gear Solid]]'' has finally done this with ''Peace Walker'', which has plot-important image songs for Paz and Peace Walker that play in game, and an image song for Big Boss and Kaz each that came on a supplemental drama CD.
* Young Maylay, the voice of Carl 'C.J.' Johnson in ''[[Grand Theft Auto]]: San Andreas'' and accomplished rap musician, used the game's theme song as a backing track for the first song on his LP, ''San Andreas: The Original Mixtape'', where he raps about the game in character. Before that, ''[[Fake Band|Love Fist]]'' recorded a few original eighties hair metal pastiche songs for the in-game radio stations, as well as the game's soundtrack CD.
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* ''[[Fate/stay night|Fate Stay Night]]'' has one of these for Saber, Shirou, Rin, Archer, Illya, Sakura, Rider, and Caster, respectively. They come with a remix and an instrumental version.
* ''[[Saints Row: The Third|Saints Row the Third]]'''s [[Adult Swim]]-themed radio station includes a song by Unknown Hinson sung in-character as [[Squidbillies|Early Cuyler]].
* ''[[The Idolmaster (video game)|The Idolmaster]]'' has it ''in spades'', even down to ''character cover songs''. Doesn't help that this game is all about [[Idol Singer|Idol Singers]]s...
 
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