I Like AKB48 But Wait A Minute…
My comrade in J-blogging, VeePinku, has a very succinct video-blog post (shared below because a lot of what she says I am in full agreement with – hope you don’t mind, VZA) about the fan in Japan who bought 5500 copies of AKB48′s new single.
Feel free to make a comment/remark/joke/whatever about why this guy is wearing a bandana over his face.
I’m not making that up. That’s, spelled out, FIVE THOUSAND, FIVE HUNDRED COPIES. I have been buying CD’s since 1988 (there I go showing my age again) and I’m not sure I even own 5500 different CDs. I’ve bought multiple editions of some Morning Musume and AKB48 CDs in the past and will continue to do so (stupidly, I forgot to pre-order the new single – D’oh!), and when Mike Watt’s newest album came out I fully admit that I am responsible for the sales of four different copies (Japanese CD, download from Japanese iTunes because I couldn’t wait for said CD to arrive in the mail, domestic CD and domestic vinyl).
Let’s put this in mathematical terms: This nut bought 1,375 times as many copies of “Everyday Katyusha” as I did of hyphenated-man. At the time of this writing CDJapan is selling both retails versions of the single for 1524 yen, or $18.36 in US dollars. That’s 8,382,000 yen or $100,980. That’s more than myself, my wife, and Vee probably make in a year.
To this extreme AKBWota, I ask: default your credit cards much, dude?
I’m sure at least 5,498 copies of the new AKB48 single will be turning up on eBay and Yahoo! Auctions soon, though. Take it away, Vee:
GROOVE MUSIC LIFE VIDEO: MORNING MUSUME “Only You”
Straight from the band’s own YouTube channel, the new PV for their forthcoming single, and in beautiful HD, too. The anticipation continues…
REVIEW: BORIS “Attention Please” and “Heavy Rocks (2011)”
Attention Please and Heavy Rocks (2011)
(Sargent House)
Available on CD, LP, iTunes, AmazonMP3 and eMusic
Rating:
With some bands, you know what to expect before you even bust the shrinkwrap on your newly purchased LP or CD or click that download link. Boris is not one of those bands. When it was announced earlier this year that the veteran Japanese experimental rock trio was dropping both a rock album and a pop album simultaneously, I’m sure a lot of eyebrows were going up. Since we’re dealing with Boris, however, these descriptions of their new material are vague at best. The music, however, isn’t.
Attention Please, the so-called “pop” album, actually sees the trio bringing their experimental tendencies into the pop-rock format with often surprising results. Lead guitarist Wata is the sole lead vocalist on the entire album; while she doesn’t possess the range of many of her more visible countrywomen like Kumi Koda and Morning Musume’s Reina Tanaka and Ai Takahashi, her whispery, almost fairy-like singing does carry its own distinctive recognizable signature. Terming the album as “pop”, however, doesn’t mean that the album is loaded with radio-friendly tracks like the first single “Hope”. “See You Next Week”, for example, marries an industrial found-sound loop to Wata’s reverberated vocals and slowly arpeggiated guitar figures. I’ve noted several times in the past that most Western J-pop fans are usually fans of alternative, punk, and indie music. Attention Please may very well be the album those fans reach for when they can’t decide between listening to Sonic Youth or Morning Musume.
Heavy Rocks – borrowing a name from another album of theirs from ten years ago, and thus a methodology not dissimilar to Weezer’s self-titled, differently colored trilogy of albums – actually seems like the more accessible of the two albums. Here, the band concentrates on various forms of guitar-based riff rock – Anthrax-like riffing on “Czechoslovakia”, raucous hardcore punk on “Galaxians”, first single “Riot Sugar” sounding so much like the Cult that they invite their pal Ian Astbury over to chip in a few trademark vocal interjections. They let their experimental side rest, save for the ambient cut “Key” and the Merzbow-like noise explosion that interrupts “Missing Pieces”. Most of the vocals are handled by Takeshi, but a guest vocalist, Yoshito Kawakita, takes the mic over to kick some Puffy AmiYumi-like “do-do-do”’s over the grunge-influenced barre chords of “Window Shopping”.
Also curiously, both albums contain a track called “Aileron”, but both songs, like the albums they are on, are rather different. The Attention Please “Aileron” is a William Ackerman-esque acoustic guitar instrumental, while the Heavy Rocks track takes one of the other version’s guitar figures, transfers it to an electric, slows it down, and makes it a lengthy full band piece with lead vocal.
They’re two separate albums, with their own packaging and musical concepts, but together they make one complete whole – and you can’t go wrong with that.
Four and a half stars for each one, or five stars for both.
ETA: When this was first written, the album was reviewed from legally downloaded editions of the albums that contained no credits. We thus originally identified Wata as the vocalist on “Window Shopping”. Having received physical copies of the albums from Sargent House today, we have since corrected that error and apologize for any confusion.
NEW MUSIC: MORNING MUSUME “Only You”
A full HQ copy of Morning Musume’s forthcoming single “Only You” (out 6/15) has already surfaced. The band is back to the mature sound of “Nanchatte Renai”, “Naichao Kamo” and “Onna ga Medatte Naze Ikenai” after kicking off 2011 and their 9th-generation period with this past spring’s much needed dose of sunshine known as “Maji Desu Ka Ska”. And Takitty and Reina, the two best vocalists in the band, are right up front as they very well should be. Loving it already… how could I not? How could you not? Summer’s already starting to sound good and it’s not even Memorial Day yet…
ETA 5.20.11: Sorry – I wasn’t aware that the original stream had been removed – here’s a replacement.
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REVIEW: MORNING MUSUME “Maji Desu Ka Ska!”
MORNING MUSUME
Maji Desu Ka Ska!
(Zetima)
Available on CD, CD/DVD and on iTunes
Rating: 
Thanks to Mother Nature’s most recent (and worst) menstrual period in recent memory, it took a little longer for this long-awaited single to hit people’s stereos and iPods. With all of the previews going around, I already had a good idea of what I thought of the single before the release date; As is my standard operating procedure, I prefer to wait until I have a high-quality sound file or the CD itself – whichever I can get my hands on first – before I commit my thoughts to word-processor file.
The ska in “Maji Desu Ka Ska!” is indeed ska, lying somewhere between the 2-Tone [Specials, Selecter, Madness, (English) Beat] and Third Wave [Mighty Mighty Bosstones, Less Than Jake, Toasters] eras. (I mention this because it would have been disappointing if Tsunku had put the word in the title and didn’t tip his hat musically to that style.) Having the four newest members of the group, whose names I still haven’t matched to their faces yet (the lack of personnel turnover between 2007 and last winter, plus the less populated additions to the group in the two years beforehand, appear to have spoiled me), start off the song was a calculated risk, but so far it works – for the next singles, they’ll have to keep topping themselves. Then again, Reina Tanaka was prominent on her first single with the band, and now she’s considered one of the best vocalists in the band, so that may be a good sign for our newcomers. If there’s a flaw in the song, it’s because the prominence of the Ninth Gen makes the song threaten to come off like an early Berryz Koubou or C-ute track at times – and the last thing Morning Musume should be sounding like is any of their Hello! Project stablemates. Fortunately, once the more experienced members of the group take over the song, that fear is subsided.
On the B-side, “Motto Aishite Hoshii no”, the veteran members dominate more, and the musical style returns to an uptempo version of what was employed on the last three MoMusu albums and their related singles – upbeat pop combined with more serious vocals. It’s definitely one of the better Morning Musume B-sides in recent memory, which is saying something.
Combined, both tracks look back at Morning Musume’s recent past while looking ahead to the future. And that’s what the first Morning Musume single of the new year should do.
Four and a half out of five stars.
NEW MUSIC: DREAM MORNING MUSUME “SEXY BOY ?Soyokaze ni Yorisotte?”
Aaannnddd… we have a leak from the forthcoming Dream Morning Musume album Dorimusu 1 (dropping April 20th – no 4:20 jokes, or references to that Six Feet Under song, please!). It’s been awhile since most of these O.G. MoMusu participants (save primarily Hitomi Yoshizawa and Rika Ishikawa, who have kept busy with Hangry & Angry) were heard from in the studio, but they still have the skills that made them MoMusus in the first place. Definitely makes me look forward even more to Dorimusu 1, even if it is dominated by retakes of MoMusu classics.
Stream: Dream Morning Musume “SEXY BOY ?Soyokaze ni Yorisotte?”
JAPAN EARTHQUAKE 3.11.11: Your Favorite Artists And Their Status
The following is a list of artists in Japan and their known condition since the earthquake. The list will be updated throughout the day.
Continue reading
Dream Morning Musume – Am I Awake?
Eagle-eyed readers will have spotted already that I’m not CJ, so I’ll introduce myself nice and early. This is Kd, formerly of IroIro Aru Sa!, that old chestnut of a J-Pop blog which CJ mentions occasionally. Having recently gotten into a few lengthy discussions about J-Pop with him, I’ve been offered a guest contributor spot here at TGML and I’ve taken it with both hands. As a near complete contrast to CJ – I’m a Brit female in her early 20′s – I hope you’ll find my style and POV to be complementary but not identical. I give you… my first post. Enjoy!
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Too Much, Too Soon, People. WAY Too Much, Too Soon…
No sooner do the 9th Generation additions get added, than we get this announcement a week later:
It has been decided that, I, Takahashi Ai, during Morning Musume’s concert tour this Autumn,
will be graduating from Morning Musume and Hello! Project.
At the time when Kamei Eri, JunJun and LinLin’s graduations were decided,
Tsunku-san told me, “It’s about time Takahashi should think about your own graduation’s timing!”
which has gotten me thinking.I will have been in Morning Musume for 10 years comes this August,
So I thought it will be a good time! to graduate in the Autumn Morning Musume concert tour.As there are still around 9 months left, I will do my best as leader until that time to shape up this new Morning Musume.
I will be affectionate to the newly added 9th generation members as I try to teach them various things, everyone please rest assured.
OK, seriously, I think the past few years in the life of my favorite band have spoiled me and my fellow MoMusu fans rotten. Up until the fall of last year, the membership changes have been small – one or two members added at a time, and the departures of other members happening with less frequency. And of course, between late 2008 and September of last year, we were blessed with the band’s steadiest lineup in years, one that gave us four solid albums and their related singles releases, their American performance debut, and only one major graduation in Koharu Kusumi to briefly interrupt it all.
Now, in less than six months, we get three departures, four additions, and one planned future departure.
I love Morning Musume, but wait a minute… Can we get a few singles and a new studio album out of this new 9-nin, Takitty-led lineup before September, and then leave the band’s lineup alone for a couple of years?
And while Tsunku is at it, if he wants to make another big announcement about the band so soon, it should be something alone the lines of, “I am proud to announce that Morning Musume have finally signed an American record deal…”
BEST ALBUMS OF 2010
This list took forever – for which I’m sorry.
I knew some of the sure fire candidates that were going to be on here – but had to think back to some of the others that had come out this year that I enjoyed. My rather slack blogging activity probably didn’t help matters, and this year I’m determined to review albums within days of their issue (JapanFiles’s sudden licensing split with UFW blew my usual trend of reviewing Morning Musume’s newest album before I had gotten my physical copy, and I never found a leak in time.) My marriage plus the holidays on top of that… you get the picture. And I wasn’t going to pull a stunt like I did in 2007 and do the entries in small installments either, at first, but since I’d rather move forward, this methodology will have to do this time around.
One caveat: the new albums from Morning Musume (Fantasy Juuichi) and Ayumi Hamasaki (Love Songs) that were just released this month are not going to be considered for this list for one simple reason: They’re too new. They’ll be eligible for the 2011 list as I’m sure I’ll be playing them a lot over the next twelve months. And with regard to Mike Watt’s hyphenated-man album, even though it came out in Japan in October, I’m holding off on both counting it for this list and reviewing it until the domestic release happens this spring.
So, here goes nothing…
10. ERODE AND DISAPPEAR – Scythian Lamb (self-released 12” EP/CD package; visit www.erodeanddisappear.com) This duo is actually 2/3 of the Philadelphia trio Northern Liberties, singer/percussionist Justin Duerr and bassist Kevin Riley, and the band/project’s name comes from NL’s first full length album of the same name. With NL’s drummer (and Justin’s brother) Mark having to semi-curtail his participation in the group in the wake of becoming a father, Justin and Kevin chose to occupy the idle time by continuing to make music solidly in the NL tradition, this time with Justin taking over the drum kit as well as singing. A long time in coming since the project started, Scythian Lamb makes for a more than adequate continuation/tideover of the NL sound until the trio’s next release (set for later this year).
9. GIRLS GENERATION – Hoot (SM Entertainment) – The unstoppable Korean nonet seems best taken in EP-length doses (Their second album Oh! and its companion “deluxe reissue” RunDevilRun seem to be very slow growers as far as listener appeal, despite many stellar tracks), and in the 007-vibed title track the group has its strongest song since “Genie”. How soon will SM fully target the US with these ladies, now that they’re making inways into Japan?
8. DEVO – Something for Everyone (Warner Bros.) – A fine comeback from the influential quintet. Sadly, Warners dropped the ball after their initial support for the group’s comeback, failing to release the uncharacteristic ballad “No Place Like Home” as a follow-up single as well as failing to continue their remastered back catalog program (Oh! No It’s Devo and Shout still await the deluxe treatment afforded the band’s first four albums).
7. RICK ROSS – Teflon Don (Maybach Music/Def Jam) – Although materialistic rap in general may be fading (witness the relative sales and critical failure of Lloyd Banks’ “comeback” album after making such a strong impression saleswise with his first post-Interscope single “Beamer Benz and Bentley”), Ross has a strong, booming voice and an unlimited supply of clever punchlines going for him, and when he has stellar production behind him (see: first single “B.M.F. (Blowin’ Money Fast)”, “Maybach Music III” with its live orchestral[!] backing), the songs work. When of his guest vocalists can hold their own next to the big man (see: Cee-Lo Brown on “Tears of Joy”, Jay-Z and John Legend on “Free Mason”, Drake on “Astin Martin Music”, Kanye West – who also produced – on “Live Fast Die Young”), it’s icing on the cake. When the production isn’t all there or the guest features are just lame (Gucci Mane’s terrible vocals bring down “MC Hammer” drastically), it weakens the album – but fortunately those moments are rare.
6. BUONO! – We Are Buono! (Pony Canyon) – Still unstoppable even after three albums. Does one even have to be reminded why? Now if only Miyabi, Airi and Momoko would actually pick up instruments…
5. SCANDAL – Temptation Box (Epic/Sony) – And speaking of unstoppable, the Osaka Four’s second full-length outing finds our heroines progressing nicely without losing the edge that brought them to the dance in the first place. (The companion cover versions EP R-Girls Rock!, issued a few months later, also helps ground the young ladies by reminding them of how they got to the dance in the first place.)
4. KODA KUMI – 8th AL Universe (Rhythm Zone/Avex) – Kuu-chin goes organic for the first half of the album, then goes back to her more urban/electronic side for the second half, and it all works.
3. AYUMI HAMASAKI – Rock n Roll Circus (Avex) – While not as entirely rock-influenced as the album title suggests, Ayu reached high, made up for the somewhat weak Next Level, and handed in one of her strongest albums in years (and kept going strong, what with the late-December release of yet another studio album, Love Songs).
2. NICKI MINAJ – Pink Friday (Young Money/Universal); KANYE WEST – My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy (Rockafella/Def Jam) – 
Two artists, one a rookie and one a veteran, both with something to prove, and both succeeding both artistically and at the cash register. And both did it with high levels of creativity and without resorting to gangsteresque/materialistic bullshit. The fact that these albums outsold G-Unit flunkie Lloyd Banks’ would-be “comeback” album several times over – apiece – says, along with Nicki’s labelmate Drake and mentor Lil’ Wayne – more good things about the direction of hip-hop rap than had been said at least a year or so before.
1. MORNING MUSUME – 10 My Me (Zetima) – MoMusu at their most experimental, closing out their “emo” period with finality and looking forward to the future – and this would be just part one of their current story. The December 2010 release of the equally strong (and less experimental) Fantasy Juuichi and the addition of the 9th Generation members are merely the beginning of another chapter. They’ll keep going and going and going, and music will be better for it.
