AAA

A few weeks ago I came across to this J-Pop group called AAA. A mixed group (i.e boys and girls) are rare and it is even more rare to find a great and successful one. Again, I support songs rather than artists as all artists definitely will have good and bad songs. However, being used to idol groups (like Johnny's Jimusho boys or AKB girls), I have to admit that AAA members are great singers. Each member has a unique voice and it is nice to hear different voices/solo parts in a song. Even when a few members singing together in harmony, you can still hear the individual voices as each voice is unique enough to be recognisable. In addition, they also sound great when singing live, unlike AKB or Johnny's live singing which make me cringe. 

AAA is under Avex and I am happy that Avex is quite generous in uploading their full MV. Here are some of the songs which I like:

Love

Sayonara no Mae ni

Live version. Does not sound the same as the recording but not because they were singing off-key ^^

Niji (this is actually a song from Greeeen, another J-pop band which have quite a few great songs)

They just released another single on 22 July and holy molly: Avex already makes its full music video available in Youtube on the same day!! The song is quite catchy, although I may not like it as much as the songs I put above, and I enjoy music video as it feels very fun and light-hearted. I like this kind of video better than those "formally" directed and shot.

AAA is celebrating 10th anniversary this year!! I am surprised I never came across their music much earlier. Earlier this year, they even came to Singapore wor...

After graduation of many of the familiar faces that made me like AKB48 in the first place, it is quite difficult to sustain my interest, especially when AKB48's songs tend to sound somewhat similar. I watched newer AKB48 videos where new members singing the old hit songs and they sounded terrible. They were worse than the old members who were not very good in singing live to begin with.

It is more than half a year since the release of their single Kibouteki Refrain. The songs are okay but what makes it very interesting is that it features the members which have graduated. There are a lot speculation behind the music video: from it simply being a cash grabber using the old members which are more "loved" than the newer members to how it simply features various AKB48 centers throughout the years. There are plenty of interesting theories and observation from the PV. Oh there is actually another reason for its popularity upon the release: Tomo-chin violent boobs XD

Although Hey! Say! JUMP perhaps is my favourite Johnny's group, I tend to be quite lagging in their music release. Thus it was a record that I discovered their 4th album JUMPing CAR just a few days after its release. Lol. Sadly, I enjoyed this new album even less than their 3rd album s3art which is kinda expected given the fact that I don't really enjoy their recent singles since Come on a My House, except for Asu e no Yell. Usually there are plenty of good non-single songs in the album which I will like but there is not any with JUMPing CAR.

Album cover

Surprisingly, I decided to get Sexy Zone's album Sexy Power3 which was released in May after coming across their version of Let's Go to Earth. Although the PV was lazily made, the song is good and a lot of Jrs are featured. By the way they credit the song to Sexy Family. Faints -__-"

[PV] Sexy Zone Let's Go to Earth[PV] Sexy Zone Let's Go to Earth
Posted by Sunrise Nippon ♥ on Tuesday, March 17, 2015

I am pretty biased against Sexy Zone after they 'relegated' Sou and Marius to the background. I am not a fan of their PVs as a lot are very lazily made: they are just dancing in front of green screen and they put animated backgrounds etc. But when I listen to the album, some of the songs are actually pretty good. Haha.. For example is Otoko never give up. I never like the song when watching their performance or their PV. But after only listening to the audio, it has some nice parts too. Lol.. This album reminds me of HSJ previous album: there is a medley with all the singles (although Sexy Zone's singles do not blend as well as HSJ singles to form a medley) and there are a few nice non-single songs. By the way I notice something interesting. When they were a still 5-member group, there were a lot of criticism towards Shori's vocal as he does not get as many solo lines as Kento or Fuma despite being the center of the group. After they become a 3-member group, I think Shori can sing pretty well. I think his voice is not a generic boyband type of voice. I hope he remains cute without trying toomuch to be cute or to be cool like Kento or Fuma. 

The other song in their Otoko never give up single is actually quite nice and has a pretty fun PV as well. Quickly watch this before it is being taken down.

I actually don't like their newer singles Cha Cha Cha Champion and Maware Miracle. Let's see if my sentiment will be repeated again when they release their next album. Haha.. 

To end this post, I want to share this funny short clip featuring Kento and Marius.