TSUBAKI FACTORY – 2nd Step For their first three years as a major act, Tsubaki Factory had been the model of stability and consistency within the Hello! Project, in terms of both song quality and lack of group drama. But a week prior to the release of their seventh single, someone discovered and made public the secret Instagram account of...
ANGERME – Hakkiri Shiyou ze / Oyogenai Mermaid / Aisare Route A or B? Up-Front dropped PVs for all three tracks of Angerme’s forthcoming single today, nearly a full month ahead of its release date (June 23rd). I like that Hello! Project releases are not tied to predictable patterns of promotion — Kobushi Factory’s fun skits for “Oh No!” and...
It’s New Release Season at the Hello! Project, and we have radio rips of all new songs from the forthcoming Angerme single, and official teaser videos featuring all new songs from Tsubaki Factory’s new album, which is only two days from dropping. Without getting too far into the weeds on either release, let’s see what we’ve got. TSUBAKI FACTORYTsubaki Factory’s...
JUICE=JUICE – DOWN TOWN / Ganbarenai yo If anyone is curious as to what motivated my recent four-and-a-half month hiatus from blogging, this single did. More to the point, the events leading up to this single being pushed back a month to facilitate the erasure of former member Sayuki Takagi from the single and the group going forward. All because...
MORNING MUSUME ’21 – 16th ~That’s J-POP~ The Fukumura Era of Morning Musume (2014-present) has been mostly frustrating for me personally for several reasons. From a production standpoint, their recordings have relied heavily on sounds and techniques established during the Michishige Era (2012-2014), even to this day. I’ve found the catalog during Fuku’s leadership to be spotty compared other eras,...
It’s been nearly a year since I reviewed PINK CRES’s major debut single, “Roulette,” and the tl;dr is I loved the song and performance, but hated the mix. HATED it. The vocals sit so deep in the mix that it’s almost impossible to enjoy, and it’s the second time PC has suffered this fate (the first being “Bukiyou na Jibun.”)...
State of the Hello! Project Address With 2020 finally in our rearview mirror, we can look forward to a fresh start for all of the Hello! Project groups and idols going forward. 2020 was a strange and turbulent year that saw H!P wave goodbye to a slew of talented idols, many of whom seemed to leave well before their time....
One of the few nuggets of gold to come out of the shit-pile that was 2020 H!P was the series of solo recordings released on Youtube. These are my five favorites, and you’ll notice some of H!P’s best singers missing from the list. The success of these recordings, for me, depends heavily on song choice, and these five were the...
Karin Miyamoto to graduate Juice=Juice and Hello! Project. Juice=Juice ace Karin Miyamoto has announced her intention to graduate from the group and Hello! Project following completion of J=J’s Spring tour. Reasons given for wishing to leave the group were many and varied, including the desire to be a solo artist, interests in DIY craft-work and interior design, and getting in...
PINK CRES. – “Roulette” PINK CRES has finally grown up. I know it seems odd to say that a pop group consisting of 24 to 27 year old women has “grown up,” but that’s how I feel listening to “Roulette,” the A-side of PINK CRES’s major label debut single. Whereas “Tokyo Confusion” was an inspired teenage rebellion against two albums...
Hmmm… And now Momona is leading ME:I I suspect HP scraping the bottom of the barrel is why ambitious talents…
Well! Fukumura is graduating, but only at the END of this year - LOL!
Fukumura and her cahoots are doing everything they possibly can to prolong their idoling careers. There's a certain amount of…
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