The Groove Music Life

BERRYZ KOUBOU
5 (FIVE)
(Piccolo Town/King)
Available on CD, CD/DVD, and iTunes Japan
Rating:

Five albums. That’s how long Berryz Koubou has been with us so far. OK, technically, one of those “albums”, 3 Natsu Natsu Mini Berryz, was actually a six-song mini-album, but it was numbered not much differently than a full-length release), but that makes then the only Hello! Project group other than Morning Musume to have more than four studio albums in their discography, and ties them with Aya Matsuura for number of studio releases released in their career to date – only Ayaya has been in the music business for a few years longer than Berryz, who only started making records in early 2004.

Berryz Koubou albums have been enjoyable yet imperfect affairs. Their debut long-player, 1st Cho Berryz (the only Berryz album to have the original 8-nin lineup) was a very good start, but their sophomore release, Dai 2 Seichouki didn’t have much memorable material besides its five previously released A-sides, all of which were recorded after founding member Mahia Ishimura left the group. The aforementioned 3 Natsu Natsu Mini Berryz, despite the inclusion of the band’s first mature-sounding single “Jiriri Kiteru”, is more notable for the three covers of summer-themed Hello! Project songs by various subclusters of the group (including fan favorite Risako Sugaya doing a fine solo turn on Aya Matsuura’s “Yeah! Meccha Holiday”). Last year’s 4th Ai no Nanchara Shisu was their best long-player since their debut, although I have to admit that the album’s closing two tracks, while OK, seem anti-climactic.

Thirteen months to the day their last album came out, Berryz Koubou released 5 (FIVE), and with it they manage to maintain the personal best they established on 4th Ai and then some.

Opening track “HAPPY! Stand Up” opens with a great fuzztone guitar riff that deceptively leads both band and listener into heavy disco territory. The seven Berryz seem to have matured considerably as vocalists in the past year, and the song boasts some of the best harmonies they’ve ever recorded – a far cry from the (admittedly kawaii) cheerleader/soccer chant unison vocals they employed on early releases.

The album stays in disco mode (specifically, the kind of post-Travolta disco one might have heard Larry Levin spin at the Paradise Garage) for “Kono Yuni Tomare!”, the first of five album tracks that feature subclusters of Berryz – in this case, members Momoko Tsugunaga, Chinami Tokunaga and Maasa Sudo. The song, which employs several different strains of music – a frequent creative tactic of songwriter/producer Tsunku – takes its time to build in its first verse, making the arrival of the pre-chorus and chorus a nice payoff.

“Baka Ni Shinai De” is another subcluster group track, placing Saki Shimusu, Miyabi Natsuyaki, Yurina Kumai and Risako Sugaya over Kim Wilde-esque 80’s synthesizers and sequencers, and employing an interesting change of key signatures from chorus to verse.

“Yuki Yuki Monkey Dance”, the band’s most recent single and the first of three previously issued A-sides on the album, is a song only Berryz could pull off. Musically, the track is reggaeton as played by Devo, or maybe a Devo song played in reggaeton style, depending on the listener’s viewpoint.

“Ah Merry-go-round”’s title might imply a more upbeat song. Instead, after some fake record surface noise (which would probably piss off an pro-analog audiophile were he/she to buy this album on 180-gram vinyl), Saki and Momoko get their young adult on for a beautiful ballad whose urban contemporary arrangement suggests that it could be a lost Aa! song.

“CLAP!” – sung by Chinami, Miyabi, and Yurina – recalls some of Morning Musume’s early (post-first album, pre-Aibon and Nono) album tracks with its acoustic guitar-dominated arrangement.

“REAL LOVE”, a solo feature for Risako Sugaya, brings the listener back into 80’s techno-pop territory, this time recalling early Madonna. This song, arrangement and all, could have been done by Aya Matsuura back when she was the kawaii singer of “Momoiro Katamori” and “Ne-e?” rather than her ongoing attempt to be the Japanese Norah Jones.

“Yume Wo Hitotsubu – Berryz Kamen Ending Theme” starts as a tango before shifting to a house-style bit in the chorus and back to tango. The instrumental bridge features a heavily effected 12-string electric guitar clashing with the accordion-sounding keyboard that dominates the proceedings. If any song on the album could be considered weak, this is it – but the song isn’t as weak as I may be unintentionally implying, and the bizarre shift in the song’s musical styles, as well as its placement in the album sequence, is what saves this song from being anything less than an interesting interruption in the album’s proceedings.

Berryz’ cover of “Dschinghis Khan” (the remix single with Dschinghis Khan, the band, came out this week – I know broomhead is stoked) follows, and it still sounds as good as it did when it came out earlier this year. Part of the credit for the track’s artistic success has to go to veteran H!P arranger Dance*Man, whose arrangement brings the Eurovision Song Contest chestnut squarely into the 21st century.

“Tsukiatteru No Ni Kataomoi”, the oldest of the three single A-sides heard here, is the type of pop/ska hybrid Hello! Project have employed in the past (examples: Morning Musume’s “Koko Ni Iruzee” and 11WATER’s “Be All Right”). This time around, though, the song’s pace, while still upbeat, is less frantic and punky than the aforementioned H!P classics, and digital keyboards dominate the arrangement rather than a live rhythm and horn section.

“BE” ends the album unusually for the group. The song, featuring heavy keyboard orchestration and a children’s choir, sounds more like something from a Broadway musical than anything you’d normally hear on a Hello! Project studio LP. However, it ends the album proper on a nice note.

Or at least it would, had not an unnecessary remix of 2005’s “Special Generation” been tacked onto the end of the album sequence. Why this particular song – one of Berryz’ best singles – was remixed and added, considering that it dates back from when Mahia Ishimura was still in the band, is a mystery. The only reasoning I could even guess on is that since 4th Ai had 11 tracks, someone at Up-Front Works or Piccolo Town/King decided that the number of tracks had to be even this time around. The remix is an interesting listen but quite honestly, it seems like an afterthought in the context of this album. Thankfully, it’s the only real blemish on what is definitely Berryz Koubou’s finest studio album to date.

Four and a half out of five stars.