Back again with this year’s Kouhaku Uta Gassen to close another hectic year! It's the 72nd time around, Hosted by Oizumi Yo and Haruna Kawaguchi with assistance from Mayuko Wakuda!
Here are some highlight and moments that stuck with me this year…
Lisa opening up this year’s Kouhaku with a BANG with her song “Akeboshi” reminding me not just a little of Ringo Shiina…(She also returns midway in the broadcast for an anime special)
Hiromi Go
singing” 2 Oku 4 Sen Man no Hitomi -Exotic Japan-“ as he bumps elbows with Eiko Koike, Kaya “Mone” Kiyohara and the Mopey Doc! JAPANNN!
Kaya: “Who was that masked man?”
Introduction of the judges which include, of course, Kaya and Kentaro "Dr. Mopey" Sakaguchi among others...
DISH– Neko: An ode to a cat while the members seem to be shrinking inside of their suits, LOL. Obviously taking a note from David Byrne of Talking Heads!
NiziU – "Take a Picture"...As I recall I was pretty taken with this group last year and they continue their “K-Pop flavoured” pop!
Sakurazaka46 – Nagaredama- WOW this
has to be one of the most energetic perfs ever, DYNAMIC choreo, TOTALLY grabbed me the SECOND it started!!! Awesome!
LOL, “Awesome City Club” looks EXACTLY like you would expect a group called “Awesome City Club” to look! Pretty catchy song, though lead singer looks like a City Pop Lily Frankly, LOL
While performing “Kimi Shika Katan“, the Hinatazaka46 girls did this cool costume-change thing where they twirled and their skirts changed color…I blinked and was like Whoa!
I would tell the guys in “Junretsu” to leave the hamming it up for Kanjani8, but any skit that involves Kaya is OK in my book, so I’ll allow it, LOLOLOL
Are SixTONES a Johnny’s Band? Man, they remind me SO MUCH of SMAP back in the 90’s, especially their “Aoi Inazuma” days…There’s even a dude who sounds like Kimutaku!
YAYYYY,
Tendo Yoshimi brings the “Matsuri” act again this year,she always sells it!!! Has this officially become her designated role in the Kouhaku?
And in the “Well, It’s About Damn Time” slot we have Johnny’s act KAT-TUN finally making their debut, years after HALF of their namesake has long since departed! I said about this before, but the hierarchy regarding Johnny’s debuts has seriously been skewered with junior group ‘jumping” over senior groups. But they sound just fine, doing their song “Real Face” from years back
Like Sakurako Ohara, Mone Kamishiraishi is someone I only found out was a singer long after knowing her primarily as an actress, however, unlike Sakurako (who sang the ending theme songs to quite a few of her dramas), this was the first time I’d ever heard Mone singing, and WHOA, what vocals! NOT what I expected!!!!
Kamishiraishi Mone – Yoake wo Kuchizusametara
King & Prince – Koifuru Tsukiyo ni Kimi Omou...Much like Hey Say Jump, KisMyFt2, and SEXY Zone, there are a lot of up and coming actors from these boy bands and it’s jarring seeing them onstage singing after seeing them in dramas, Sho Hirano (from Love is War!) and Kaito Takahashi (as Kasumi’s brother in Neechan No Koibito), and ESPECIALLY Ren Nagase, as the brooding Ryo in Okaeri Mone!
They acknowledge the "Okaeri Mone" connection and I Love Ren's shout out to Kaya!!!
Terrific perf by milet, singing the Winter Sports Theme “Fly High”, but why does she look like she’s emerging from a fungus?
Mafumafu – Inochi ni Kirawarete Iru. Hmm…interesting performance by this goth-looking troop. I thought I was a watching a music video til they pulled back.
Kaori Mizumori does her rendition of the classic Momoe Yamaguchi song “Ii Hi Tabidachi”. This was, in fact, the very first song I ever heard from Momoe and HER live performance was intercut with
the same visuals as Kaori’s, beginning with a train ride out….
Entering the stage on a skateboard is risky stuff in a live performance (anyone remember SharanQ’s Iiwake where Tsunku almost fell on his butt?) but Matsudaira Ken went for it! LOLOL,
gotta love how the utterly flamboyant song "Matsuken Samba II” totally became his signature song, who would have ever thought that that dashing Shogun in Abarenbo Shogun was such a dandy guy???
After the mid-show anime-tribute, they had their obligatory promotion for the current NHK Asadora “Come Come Everybody” with Mone Kamishiraishi on hand to help introduce Ai singing the theme song ”Aldebaran”!
With Kanjani8 you never know which Kanjani8 you’re going to get, the serious or the wacky- this year it seems they’ve decided to go with the more respectful aspect of their image, doing “Re:LIVE”
