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| Ayase Haruka, Kuroyanagi Tetsuko (!) and Inohara Yoshihiko |
It was another year of Nostalgia for me with this year’s Kohaku Uta Gassen as many of the guests appearing were from when I FIRST got into J-pop, not only was seeing their faces again a throwback, but they even performed the songs from way back when that I loved!
Masaharu Fukuyama doing "Hello", V6 doing "Music for The People, I had to check to make sure I hadn't timeslipped abckk to 1995!
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| V6 |
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| TOKIO |
TOKIO rocked out with their great “Ambitious Japan”, a song that has in a lot of ways become their signature song! Is it just me or is Nagase getting scuzzier and scuzzier with each Kohaku, LOL
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| AAA |
AAA were back and I'm always happy to see them appear…just wish they’d sing some of the more FUN type of songs they used to sing back in the day! Mmm, the girls Chiaki and Misako are looking as fine as ever!
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| Takashi Hosokawa |
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| Ayako Fuji |
On the enka side my two fave perfs were Hosokawa Takashi doing a fun song called “Kokoro No Kori” and on the Red Team’s side I was THRILLED to hear Ayako Fuji doing a smooth version of Eternal Idol Momoe Yamaguchi’s rocking “Manjushaka”, WOW!!!
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| Akiko Wada |
The first time I ever saw 1970’s Akiko Wada performing, it was doing her cool song “Waratte Yurushite’ and so it was a real gas seeing her performing it here in all her masculine glory, LOL! Gotta say, this woman really gets the crowd up and at ‘em!
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| E-Girls |
Though this night was all about the acts of the past, a few newer acts I loved were E-Girls’ performance of “Dance Dance Dance”, a VERY catchy song, and AKB48 doing their (now classic) “Flying GET”. One interesting thing about AKB is now that I’ve gotten to know Anna Iriyama from the drama SIREN, I can’t help but see her adorable face smiling out from wherever she happens to be standing! So Cute!
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| AKB49 with Anna Iriyama, center behind |
(BTW, Anna Iriyama as Sailor Mars? Hell YES!)
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| Yumiko Udo and Nao Matsushita |
Ikimonogakari performed their song “Arigato”, the theme song from the NHK Asadora GeGeGe No Nyobo froma few years back, and while it was a very good perf, what really made it for me was having cutie pie Nao Matsushita on hand to introduce the song!
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| X JAPAN |
One of the first acts I ever saw on the Kohaku back in 1995 was X Japan (doing their incredible “Rusty Nail”) and it was great seeing them reunited once again 20 years later!
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| Miki Imai |
The absolute highlight of this years Kohaku for me HAS to be the Miki Imai performance, where she sang “Piece Of My Wish”, one of my all-time favorite J-pop songs and one that I’ve always wanted to see her do on the Red and White! Finally got my wish, and she was as awesome as I’d hoped!
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| SMAP |
SMAP were back again and besides doing their latest single, they performed “Triangle” one of their later songs that I really like, one that they’ve actually done a few times on past re dand Whites…
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| Seiko Matsuda |
After getting over the shock of not seeing Saburo Kitajima on the show, I was pleasantly surprised to see fave Seiko Matsuda as the closer of this year’s Kohaku, and more pleased to see that she wasn't doing her Red and White staple “Anata Ni Aitakute”, but the awesome, awesome “Akai Sweet Pea” instead!
Aw yeah, It was another blast from the past for me this year!
Posted by zdorama @ zdoramaagain.blogspot.com
