December 27, 2010
Pop chart domination
In a pop culture fluke, a girl group (AKB48) and an aging boy band (Arashi) completely dominated Japan's 2010 top-10 CD singles list, with the former taking four places, and the latter claiming six.
AKB48 is such a dazzling Ziegfeldian execution of theater and marketing I recommend reading the Wikipedia article here. Otherwise, all I can say about it is that it's yet another manufactured girl group from Japan's idol factories, a bunch of very cute but replaceable girls prancing and lip-syncing their way to instant but short-lived stardom.
The culture of cute is alive and well in Japan.
Arashi has been at work for a decade and has recently branched out all over the place. The music is perfectly okay--friendly, inoffensive, easy-easy-listening and occasionally harmonizing pop. Arashi's recent success seems more a product of sheer perseverance and the non-musical talents of its members, combined with its nice-boy-next-door image.
(Japan's previously reigning boy band, SMAP, lost a lot of good will and valuable endorsements last year when band member Tsuyoshi Kusanagi was arrested for wandering around a Tokyo park drunk as a skunk and stark naked.)
Kazunari Ninomiya (center) had a supporting role in Letters from Iwo Jima, and I've seen him in two television series. He's a seriously good actor. I'm looking forward to seeing Masaki Aiba in My Girl (I quite like the manga), about an engineer who discovers he's a father when his ex-girlfriend dies unexpectedly. Arashi did the theme song.
Arashi does a lot of theme songs. I like this "There's an app for that" attitude. If you can do X, and there's a big demand for X, then go ahead and do a lot of X! Laugh all the way to the bank! After all, the typical pop star in Japan has the longevity of an NFL lineman. So sock away those acorns for the long winter nights of eventual obscurity to come.
There's a whole sub-genre of manga and TV melodramas about a teenage girl in a group like AKB48 who ages out of the role after two or three years with no education, no real talent (other than her looks), and no realistic job prospects.
AKB48 is such a dazzling Ziegfeldian execution of theater and marketing I recommend reading the Wikipedia article here. Otherwise, all I can say about it is that it's yet another manufactured girl group from Japan's idol factories, a bunch of very cute but replaceable girls prancing and lip-syncing their way to instant but short-lived stardom.
The culture of cute is alive and well in Japan.
Arashi has been at work for a decade and has recently branched out all over the place. The music is perfectly okay--friendly, inoffensive, easy-easy-listening and occasionally harmonizing pop. Arashi's recent success seems more a product of sheer perseverance and the non-musical talents of its members, combined with its nice-boy-next-door image.
(Japan's previously reigning boy band, SMAP, lost a lot of good will and valuable endorsements last year when band member Tsuyoshi Kusanagi was arrested for wandering around a Tokyo park drunk as a skunk and stark naked.)
Kazunari Ninomiya (center) had a supporting role in Letters from Iwo Jima, and I've seen him in two television series. He's a seriously good actor. I'm looking forward to seeing Masaki Aiba in My Girl (I quite like the manga), about an engineer who discovers he's a father when his ex-girlfriend dies unexpectedly. Arashi did the theme song.
Arashi does a lot of theme songs. I like this "There's an app for that" attitude. If you can do X, and there's a big demand for X, then go ahead and do a lot of X! Laugh all the way to the bank! After all, the typical pop star in Japan has the longevity of an NFL lineman. So sock away those acorns for the long winter nights of eventual obscurity to come.
There's a whole sub-genre of manga and TV melodramas about a teenage girl in a group like AKB48 who ages out of the role after two or three years with no education, no real talent (other than her looks), and no realistic job prospects.
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Labels: japan, pop culture
Comments
# posted by 
Just wanna say some things.
I've been a fan of your Juuni Kouki's translation for years. By it, I was and am being introduced to one of great professional, which is rarely seen around me.
Sometimes, I will just come around and read again, and visit your blog, and read some interesting fact, opinion, points, and etc.
It does enlighten and broaden my eyes.
Thank you Mr. Eugene (hope you don't mind it).
Maybe this is inappropriate, but I wanna say, while I am around their age (28), I am a fan of Arashi, my sister and me. To read your writing about them and Japanese music/entertainment world also made me to see some things I didn't see and already know and to see it again from someone's who is not a fan and maybe just know them a bit.
Can I ask you a question and maybe a request?
Do you allow repost of your blog review/post?
If you allow it, could I repost it in my journal. I just want to put it into my journal, it is not my main one and it is just for me to read.
Anohino@dw
I've been a fan of your Juuni Kouki's translation for years. By it, I was and am being introduced to one of great professional, which is rarely seen around me.
Sometimes, I will just come around and read again, and visit your blog, and read some interesting fact, opinion, points, and etc.
It does enlighten and broaden my eyes.
Thank you Mr. Eugene (hope you don't mind it).
Maybe this is inappropriate, but I wanna say, while I am around their age (28), I am a fan of Arashi, my sister and me. To read your writing about them and Japanese music/entertainment world also made me to see some things I didn't see and already know and to see it again from someone's who is not a fan and maybe just know them a bit.
Can I ask you a question and maybe a request?
Do you allow repost of your blog review/post?
If you allow it, could I repost it in my journal. I just want to put it into my journal, it is not my main one and it is just for me to read.
Anohino@dw
