A Look at English Dubbed K-ON
I've had this up on the main site for awhile now, but thought I'd share it with those who might not check that part regularly. It's an official English dubbed episode of K-ON!! Specifically, it's the sixth episode of the second season. But wait, you say. How can an official English dub of the second season exist when Bandai hasn't even begun to release the first season yet?
Actually, this isn't Bandai's dub. It's a completely different official English dub, done by Animax. Animax is an Asian-based television network that specializes in bringing anime to English-speaking Asian countries, such as Singapore. Usually they do this by subbing series, but sometimes they do dubs for series that were never licensed or dubbed even in North America. We've highlighted very examples of this in the past as well, such as the Asian-based English dubs of Yakitate Japan & Nodame Cantabile (though that one actually used known American voice actors).
You wont recognize any of the English-speaking actresses playing the gals in this K-ON dub. They're certainly not big American industry names like Cristina Vee or Stephanie Sheh. But they do a capable & sometimes admirable job. Some voices & actresses work better than others. Pronunciation of names can be hit or miss, such as Azusa's name in particular being pronounced off a bit, & Yui's pronunciation of her nickname "Azu-nyan" being especially awkward sounding. It's pretty typical sounding of an English speaker who doesn't know the correct way to say Japanese names (kinda like how before their dubs, American fans called Naruto "Na-ROO-to" or Ichigo "Itch-igo"), but hopefully Bandai's dub will perform better. I'm pretty sure I trust Stephanie Sheh enough for her to nail "Azu-nyan" correctly.
We still got a while to wait for the first K-ON DVD to get released in the states, so in the meantime you might wanna check out this English dub. Hopefully it'll tide us over in the meantime! As of yet this is the only Animax dubbed ep that I've found online, but I'll keep my eyes peeled for more.