2008 H!P Review

Okay, so it’s a bit of a bandwagon jump but it helps me get half of my 2008 general review out of the way and means that my own catagories won’t be monopolised by H!P.

Anyway, Amy of Merry Go Round put up a little poll and I gave myself some time to think about it and here are my responses.

BEST

Best Group Single - 
I thought for most of this year that I wasn’t really getting much from my new found fandom, but now that I look back single-wise, this is really hard. It’s a toss up between C\C (Cinderella\Complex), MADAYADE, Pepper Keibu, Edo no Temari Uta II and Renai Rider. I think my vote eventually goes to Edo no Temari Uta II because it’s the song that really made me pay attention to C-ute and C\C (Cinderella\Complex) because that was the smartest special group ever… and I love Yuukarin.
(and if it counts it actually draws with THE Possible’s Ijiwaru Crazy Love because that reminded me of my good old J-pop beginnings.)

Best Soloist Single -
I love Nacchi, but Screen didn’t excite me at all and I haven’t even listened to Aya or Miki’s recent releases. The only soloist I really pay attention to is Koharu (because I’m suicidal… or possibly on drugs) but I don’t vote for Papancake because it took forever for me to actually like it… I abstain from this category as I have no answer.

Best Group Album -
5(FIVE) or COVER YOU. 5(FIVE) made me like Berryz a LOT again, and COVER YOU surpassed all of my expectations… and Johnnie e no Dengon cemented my love for Risa.

Best Solo Album -
Well, there was only one. And that gets my vote because I do love Koharu’s Kirarin stuff for the most part. Plus it had Anataboshi and Tan Tan Taan! on it. Kirari to Fuyu

Best PV -
I wonder how many, if any, will vote for Resonant Blue. Yuke Yuke Monkey Dance… monkey suits, what more could you want?

Best New Group -
MilkyWay hands down. Both of their releases are golden, a-side and b-side, and I can’t help but love them. Kikka’s voice owns, how did she not get into Morning Musume? Oh and F.Y.I - if MilkyWay didn’t exist, Shugo Chara Egg would have won this category.

Best Established Group -
C-ute because I genuinely love them now. Morning Musume need a new original album before I come to a judgement on whether they’re better than their juniors. Berryz Koubou need to… I don’t know  – be better than C-ute?

Best Established Soloist -
This is probably an answer no-one wants to hear. Kusumi Koharu. I like her albums and single and I don’t really pay much attention to the others. Honestly I only really like Ayaya’s earlier songs.

Best Photobook -
Because Amy will cry if I don’t and I don’t really buy/download PBs, I choose 6gatsu no Kajitsu. :D

Hottest Idol of 2008 -
… I don’t know…
Umeda Erika’s getting more attractive, Airi is Airi – as always. Gaki is…
Niigaki Risa.

WORST

Worst Group Single -
Kiss!Kiss!Kiss! because in the end it just wound up boring me. I listen to it rarely and I just don’t really care. Buono! still rock though, and Gachinko and Rottara totally made up for it.

Worst Soloist Single -
Anything by ManoEri!!! Out of the three (though I haven’t heard the third one yet) I vote for Mano Piano - it was a great song… until she started singing! I can’t believe I still have it on my computer!

Worst PV -
FOREVER LOVE. The dance was brilliant, the suits ruled, the set was quite groovy but all it was was bit of dance/random shot of C-ute/bit more dance/another shot of C-ute. It bored me. I still haven’t watched it all the way through.

Worst Vocalist -
Kusumi Koharu. She’s my favourite but even I can admit that she gets a bit much. I absolutely abhored Papancake when it came out because of her voice, I don’t kow quite what happened to make me like it… This is all relative anyway. She’s the worst out of the people I can think of and listen to (therefore excluding ManoEri) but that doesn’t mean she’s the worst and I still love her new album. Did I just backpedal completely or what?
Or that egg from Shugo Chara Egg!!! Her voice is kinda sucky. I don’t know her name. It’s the one in yellow (I think)

Least Attractive Idol of 2008 -
LinLin. I love the girl, she has a kick ass voice and a sunny personality but she’s still a little funny lookin’.

Well that’s my two cents, and I hope my explaination was satisfactory even though I’m still confused about the Worst Vocalist category. Here you go Amy, add this to your results.

1 comment December 29, 2008

A Proper Write-Up On 2008 Wonderful Hearts Summer Concert

Click here for full tracklist because I can’t be bothered to take up the space here and I won’t necessarily mention all of the tracks.

First of all, this is just going to be a highlights post, because every other time I’ve done track-by-track concert reviews I have failed miserably. Another note, I think that all of the songs, or at least most of them, have had a great deal of time chopped straight out of the middle as well.

For the general opening, bits of it were a little lol-worthy. Especially the eggs doing their under the sea, swimming routine. But of course Summer = Hawaii is the general consensus.

Natsu LOVE Romance and Manatsu no Kousen are rather obviously lipsynched and I’m not quite sure if that’s okay with me yet, but I can feel the energy from both songs, and I have been converted to Manatsu no Kousen. I never liked it before. Of course Ai, Reina and Gaki really stick out here, but that’s because they’re the only focused on members.

Yes, Inaba Atsuko looks like she is hosting the Oscars. It’s really nice to see her here, she’s smiling and enthusiastic and I really like her now, even though we don’t have a Yaguchi Mari in the proceedings.

C-ute are the first group to perform without the back up crew. Two songs, Edo no Temari Uta II and Namida no Iro. I’m still questioning why most of the members have flying saucers on their heads, but I digress. I’m suddenly reminded why I like this song so much. It’s an energectic and fairly flawless performance but when the strains of Namida no Iro began I started to think… ‘In those outfits!?!’ But despite the wardrobe being in rather stark contrast to the song Airi and Maimi still embody the feeling of it really well. I love Airi’s lines. Plus, the dance is golden.

Following C-ute‘s very well performed set, we have Papancake by Koharu. And I no longer do not like this song. In fact I have listened to it several times today. Her vocal is good, even though it is pre-recorded, but her hyper-genki-ness is a joy to watch and she generally just performs the song. And then Anataboshi one of my favourite ever H!P songs. Lip-synched, but wouldn’t you want to be with all that hopping around? Trust me, you lose energy really quickly when you’re doing this dance.

Kikka and Saaya really impressed me here, they look so at home on the stage. I understand that they are eggs and have been performing in concert for a while but the confidence exuding from them is almost Morning Musume in quality. Needless to say, they keep up with Koharu very well.

I am also reminded why I like Yuke Yuke Monkey Dance so much as well. And if you needed any reminder of Maasa and Chinami’s awesomeness it’s right here. I love the audience participation in the verses! I so wish I was there to join in. Everyone’s sounding good, yes even Risako. Though I am slightly biased towards her, because she’s my favourite Berryz Koubou member. Especially that Wow! near the end, that rocks like heck because I don’t think I’ve heard Risako do that before.

After so long being rather ambivalent towards it I’m starting to actually fall in love with Resonant Blue. Despite there being the leads on this song there’s still decent enough coverage of all the other members. Thanks to this and a couple of tracks later on (which I will spazz about in due time) I’m really starting to like Reina a lot more and Ai is creeping back up my list, though she still irritates me ever so slightly. You know, I’m surprised I haven’t mentioned the outfits yet. They’re okay, but LinLin should have been given some sleeves, she looks like a badly drawn chibi at times. And while Lin’s looking like a small child, JunJun is hitting the performance on the head. She is seriously fierce in some of those shots… I mean really fierce. Risa just rules her parts as does Eri.

LinLin and Airi and an egg, who I’ve discovered is called Ogawa Saki, sing a nice little ballad. It’s nice to see LinLin with a good chance to shine because, personally, I think she has a great voice that more could be done with… and putting her with Airi hopefully means that other people think so too. And she’s not leading on just any song, oh no, it’s an Ayaya song Hajimete Kuchibiru wo Kasaneta Yoru. Vocally it’s very strong and Ogawa Saki is cute and she can hold her own.

Sayu and Risako’s version of Chu! Natsu Party is cute and fun. Ridiculous costumes and I still don’t particularly like Sayu, but eh… it’s worth a watch at least.

OKAY!!! Now it’s my time to spazz (this may be a very long paragraph)! High-King and Cinderella\Complex and Kioku no Meiro. It took me most of yesterday to find the right word to explain my feelings for this section of the concert. It’s my favourite part and I’m dissapointed that we’ll likely never hear anything more from High-King. The word that I finally came up with was ‘electrifying’. There’s so much energy and effort put in here that the atmosphere is tangible through my laptop screen. And despite the fact that I can’t understand most of what they’re singing I can somehow feel it, especially in Cinderella\Complex there’s something about the way Ai says her lines, and the expressions that make me think “Wow, I know what you mean” (even though I blatantly don’t). They’re all fabulous dancers too. Kioku no Meiro seems to fill the entire area with sound and is just generally amazing so I’m incredibly glad that it was performed. And can I just start a fanclub for Maeda Yuuka. I was sitting through most of KnM waiting to see if she’d get her solo chorus and YES SHE DID. I love her, she’s so cute, yet amazingly talented too. Plus she looks like a complete professional, even against all those H!P big shots. You have no idea how much I wish I cosplayed right now. (spazz over, you can come out from behind the sofa.)

This is the only MC I wil really talk about, apart from Inaba-san’s near the end. They bring back the tennis thing and the H-K girls answer questions while pretending to ‘rally’ with Makoto. And Reina is fail. Plus you realise how much she loves to talk. Yes, I really am beginning to like Reina. Yuukarin pwns with her cuteness and Saki looks like Gaki for a split second or four. There’s a little talk of Cinderella The Musical and Reina gives us a character preview that I did lol at.

I love Tokonatsu Musume so much I almost died when I heard it start to play and out came Risa, Eri and Aika. You know what, oddly enough I was disappointed when I discovered that I couldn’t see the shaka-hand movement thing properly, but that might be just because for the past two weeks I’ve been wandering around singing the song and that just stuck with me. Much like the fact that I’ve listened to and watched so much idol music I naturally respond to most questions with a peace sign. I love the dance break with the hula moves… but these girls generally are a lot more natural with dance than most of Coconuts Musume were.

JunJun gets her chance to shine next but I don’t care much for the song so… moving on. But well done JunJun.

Ah, wait. I don’t like Kousui much either. Moving on furthur.

The Buono! set is typical Buono! awesomeness and I’m not gonna talk about it too much because, honestly, you probably already know what to expect from a Buono! performance anyway. I will say that the girls are on top form all the way through Gachinko de Ikou! and Kiss!Kiss!Kiss! Oh, and that Airi’s Hai donmai is rather cute. No pun intended.

Berryz Koubou and C-ute team up again and relive the battle concert for a song or two. Massara Blue Jeans is a song I suddenly love and Special Generation isn’t quite there yet, but eh whatever. Those high notes are hit (Risako-voice-haters you may now eat your hats) and I still think that Mai is actually a twenty year old trapped in a younger body.

Now this is an MC that is really worth talking about. Inaba-san reads some messages from the members of Morning Musume + impressions. And it is amazing so I’m going to have to talk about all of them. Her Reina is absolutely hilarious, she’s got the attitude, even throwing in a wink and a CHANCE! XD She has a little bit of a problem remembering what to say for Aika, which is lol too. Usa-chan peace for Sayu. Her JunJun was rather accurate too from what I can gather. The Koharu-voice killed me dead the first time, absolutely and the look on Inaba-san’s face is totally “I can’t believe I just did that!”

I don’t like it when they end concerts with ballads but I’ll forgive them Ame no Furanai. Yes, I refuse to type the full title, because I can’t remember it. The most pointful thing to say about this performance is that only JunJun and LinLin get solo lines, their Chinese lines and the rest is sung by everyone. JunJun does really well but the focus is on LinLin and that last note. I love that moment from the first time I heard it and I love the fact that Jun’s singing along. As a side note Noto Arisa’s jumping really makes me worry for that microphone.

And as they walk off the stage to the strains of Ai Araba IT’S ALL RIGHT I find myself thinking that that is the most satisfying Hello!Project concert I’ve ever seen. Minus the battle concert. Two songs I didn’t enjoy, MilkyWay, High-King and most of all Inaba-san’s impressions mean that this is an amazing watch.

This is long and has no pictures.
Sorry

Add a comment October 26, 2008

~Berryz Kamen vs Cutie Ranger~ Who Will Win? Pt 1

I gave you a quick summary of where I was at in a previous post, but I thought I might as well do a proper write-up. I’ll add pictures later and I want to do a separate post for the VTR just because it warrants it. So, in-keeping with the ‘VS’ theme I shall be ranking aspects of the performance and judging who wins what. It’s great fun being a critic… seriously. 10 points a song.

1. Opening

COSTUMES FOR THIS SECTION; 10/10

2. Darling I LOVE YOU

• When I heard Darling I LOVE on both the Dschinghis Khan and Namida no Iro singles I really didn’t like it, but I appreciate it more now. The dance is simplistic and kinda boring but it makes a decent opening number.
• VOCALS; 9/10
• DANCE; 7/10
• OVERALL; 16/20
• WINNERS; Berryz/C-ute

3. Special Generation

• I’ve never liked this song much. They’ve got some really great formations going on, especially after the beginning even though I’ve never particularly liked the dance. I mean, the leg hoppy thing? Not my cup o’ tea and unfortunately the editing makes it look really bitty in places. Risako starts the song of with a kinda all over the place vocal, but it’s over soon enough. This is really when you appreciate the ♥ that is Chisato and Cap’n‘s hats.
• VOCALS; 8/10
• DANCE; 6/10
•  
• OVERALL; 14/20
• WINNERS; Berryz/C-ute

4. Ooki na Ai de Motenashite

• I love this song. The first non-Musume H!P song I ever heard. As much as it pains me to say this Airi AND Maimi sound absolutely awful in their opening lines. This is when they split and go back to their own stages as they’d come together at the end of Darling I LOVE YOU so that cuts down on how much of the dance they actually do. And when they’re doing the dance, there’s not a huge amount of moves anyway. They don’t perform the whole song either… which is a bit of a shame. Chisato is textbook charisma in every shot that you see of her.
• VOCALS; 6/10
• DANCE; 5/10
•  
• OVERALL; 11/20
• WINNERS; Berryz/C-ute

5. VTR

COSTUMES FOR THIS SECTION; 10/10

6. Namida no Iro

• This is my favourite performance. Their dancing is fierce and every move is tight. But I do have one main issue with this… How The F*** is Mai only 12 years old!? She hits each move like a pro and doesn’t put a foot wrong. If Maimi wasn’t my favourite C-ute member, it would be Mai instead. There’s absolutely everything perfect in this performance.
• VOCALS; 10/10
• DANCE; 10/10 (Possibly 20)
•  
• OVERALL; 20/20

7. Munsawagi Scarlet

• Now we go to the opposite side for Berryz performing Munsawagi. Which, unfortunately pales in comparison to Namida no Iro. The choreography just doesn’t work very well on the stage and half the time the leads just don’t look like they’re putting much effort into it at all. Especially Risako. Saki is awesome in this one though because of the way she’s smiling throughout the entire thing. Can I just say that, while the costumes (I say costumes, I mean clothes) are awesome they make the “Scarletto” move totally redundant as they are not wearing skirts. Vocals are good, just let down by everything else.
• VOCALS; 8(1/2)/10 Risako’s a bit off in her solo
• DANCE; 7/10
•  
• OVERALL; 15(1/2)/20

8. LALALA Shiawase no Uta

• Kill me. I actually like this song. It’s a stupidly happy song and it’s grown on me significantly in a very short space of time. The dark/dull/moody outfits don’t quite match the overly shiny/crazy/scary happiness of the song. But their facial expressions and overall demeanor match the song really well. The dance routine is very simplistic but gives the wota a chance to join in and the energy is astounding. Randomly, they have great co-ordination… the dancing arouns in a diagonal line.
• VOCALS; 8/10
• DANCE; 8/10
•  
• OVERALL; /20

9. Dschinghis Khan

• I really like the beginning with C-ute when they’re all running round in a circle doing the Uh-ahs. I’ve gotten used to this choreography since the release of the single, so I like it now but I don’t think it translates very well to such a big stage. Dschinghis Khan is an awkward song for them to sing anyway and the fact that they’re rather worn out isn’t helping. But they give it a good shot. Risako looks bored again. Running and doing the hand movements to the chorus looks sloppy and really not good – Should have just run.
• VOCALS; 6/10
• DANCE; 6/10
•  
• OVERALL; 12/20

10. Tokaikko Junjou

• I honestly did not like this song until I watched this concert. I just didn’t like the general arrangement of the song. After this I became a little obssessed with the song, I even made a Stepmania chart – but then my Stepmania game crashed and won’t work again. I still don’t like a couple of the moves but I love most of the dance and would learn it were there some form of tutorial. Basically this performance is on par with Namida no Iro.
• VOCALS; 10/10
• DANCE; 9/10
•  
• OVERALL; 19/20

Add a comment July 15, 2008