27 February 2010

Goodbye Team K.

WE'RE THE TEAM K

A little late but I didn't want to post this until I watched the LOD. I took 2 days to watch it completely because I had to stop in the middle as I was bawwwwwling too much.

On the evening of 21 February 2010, last Sunday 6:25pm JPT, AKB48's Team K performed their 5th Stage [Saka Agari]. But this was different from the rest. This performance is K5's senshuuraku (final performance), and is the last time Team K will be performing together. After this they will be rebuilt with members of other Teams to form the NEW Team K. It's also the last performance for Noro Kayo and Ohori Megumi as AKB members and after this they will be transferred permanently to SDN. Erepyon did not have a full performance due to poor health, and only briefly appeared in the MC. Meetan also did not do a full performance, but performed her solo song Amai Kokansetsu for her "graduation". For this special occasion, they performed the two K theme songs Sasae and Korogaru Ishi ni Nare.

There were lots of crying during the whole performance and it was quite emotional, especially during Sasae. Also there was the most emotional performance of Mushi no Ballad. That's Sayaka for you. All the members really went all out for this day including the replacements Katayama Haruka, Ishida Haruka and Matsui Sakiko. For those of you who haven't watched it yet and are planning to watch it, prepare for a massive bawlfest. One thing about Team K, is that they always manage to make things funny even on the saddest of moments. I never liked K5 as a whole but for this performance I loved every second of it.

Team K will always be remembered by me and I'm sure many others as the strongest, coolest, fiercest, but at the same time the most united and most loving Team ever. Nothing can ever replace the old Team K. Rest in peace. I'm not saying that the NEW Team K will be shit because the member lineup looks kinda good. I also trust Aki-P that he knows what his doing.

The NEW Team K will perform their debut stage K6 on 12 March. Titled [RESET]. Originally planned for 28 February this year but it got delayed again. This time the delay is due to filming for Majisuka Gakuen and practice for K6. At least their finally starting practice for it.

You can download K5's senshuuraku here, or watch pieces of it on Hina's blog.

More after the jump

21 February 2010

[Sakura no Shiori] Day 4, Day 5

[Sakura no Shiori] 4th day sales: 11,529
Still good for 4th day sales. Total sales now stands at 293,039. Only 7k more till 300k! Their sure to reach it tomorrow. Lets go!
Total Sales: 293,039
[Sakura no Shiori] 5th day sales: 9,166
And the sales for day 5 stands at 9,166. Down to 4 digits but who cares. They have surpassed the 300,000 mark! And in only 5 days! Congratulations to all the girls, the staff, Akimoto Yasushi, Iwai Shunji, and most importantly thank you to all the people who bought the single. Now the week isn't over yet, two more days remaining. How much more will it sell in the remaining two days? How high will it go? Will it be able to hold the 1st position? It's anyone's guess.
Total Sales: 302,205

20 February 2010

[Sakura no Shiori] Day 2, Day 3

[Sakura no Shiori] 2nd day sales: 34,294
Well I knew this would happen. 34,294. Massive drop from yesterday's sales. 2nd day sales are lower compared to RIVER's 2nd day (54,049). But well their still at 1st place and that's what matters. I think they will stay in 1st place for the rest of the week. There might be a good reason for the lower sales though, online stores are pretty much sold out due to massive demand and lots of people have been put on backorder. However not all is bad. 90% of the sales now are from the general population who are walking into stores and buying. That's still quite good. Oh and AKB's FIRST PLATINUM!!! *
Total Sales: 263,822
[Sakura no Shiori] 3rd day sales: 17,688
3rd day sales are still strong at 17,688. A little higher than RIVER's 3rd day (14,259). Their still first though, 2nd place only sold 5k. Total now stands at 281,510. They only need 20k more for them to reach 300k. If the sales will be similar to RIVER, sales for the rest of the week will drop to 4 digits and will only sell for the rest of the week around 10k to 20k. If it doesn't make 300k by the end of this week then it surely will at Week 2 Day 1. But I'm expecting it earlier than that. AKB performed in Music Station today and I suppose that will boost sales a bit.
Total Sales: 281,510

More after the jump

17 February 2010

[Sakura no Shiori] Day 1

Get yourself ready. I totally freaked out when I saw it for the first time. And from the reactions at the forums lots of others did too.

[Sakura no Shiori] 1st day sales: 229,528!!!!!


All I can say right now is YEEEEAAAAHHHH!!!!!!
Not only did they break the 1st day of RIVER and the 1st week of RIVER, they almost broke RIVER's total sales up to now, IN JUST 1 DAY!!!

30 mins later: Sorry bout that. This is just incredible. I had to visit the Oricon site more than 20 times cause I didn't believe it at first. I was only expecting like 80k to 120k for first day, 150k MAX. For them to hit 200k plus on the first day, that's like OMG WOW! Not many artists can hit this level nowadays. This is the level that only really really really popular artists such as Arashi can hit. And AKB just reached it. In fact, Arashi's [Ashita no Kioku/Crazy Moon] single sold 230,022, a mere 500 difference!

Now I am a little worried for 2nd day sales. I have a feeling that sales will drop massively to around the 30k to 50k region region, maybe even lower. But if tomorrow we see sales at around 70k, I can tell you that the forums will be in chaos. Platinum here we come! I'm still confident that they can keep the 1st place for 2nd day though but not sure of 3rd day and beyond. I'm also pretty confident that the girls can hit 300k before two weeks. A good sign is that most of online shops (Amazon, HMV, CD Japan) are out of stock due to huge demand.

A word to the haters of this single and all those other people who said that this single won't sell well, NEVER EVER doubt Aki-P. He knows what he is doing.

[Sakura no Shiori] final updates

In a few minutes, the clocks in Japan will strike 00:00, and the date will change to 17 February 2010. For those who do not remember, that is the release date for Sakura no Shiori. The wait has been agonising, three long months since the announcement of a new single. And just days before the release date, we have the PVs for all the songs, the bonus videos, mp3s, plus all the bonus pictures. 1st place for Oricon daily rankings is pretty much theirs as there aren't much, if not any at all, competition from other artists. Will SakuShio be able to reach RIVER's record or even break it? We will see in 18 hours.

Sakura no Shiori (Type A)
[CD]
01. Sakura no Shiori
02. Majisuka Rock 'n' Roll
03. Enkyori Poster (Team PB)
04. Sakura no Shiori (off vocal ver.)
05. Majisuka Rock 'n' Roll (off vocal ver.)
[DVD]
01. Sakura no Shiori (PV)
02. Majisuka Rock 'n' Roll (PV)
03. Enkyori Poster (Team PB) (PV)
04. Bonus Movie (Congratulations for your graduation)  
Sakura no Shiori (Type B)
[CD]
01. Sakura no Shiori
02. Majisuka Rock 'n' Roll
03. Choose Me! (Team YJ)
04. Sakura no Shiori (off vocal ver.)
05. Majisuka Rock 'n' Roll (off vocal ver.)
[DVD]
01. Sakura no Shiori (PV)
02. Majisuka Rock 'n' Roll (PV)
03. Choose Me! (Team YJ) (PV)
04. Bonus Movie (I really like you)
Sakura no Shiori (Theatre Version)
[CD]
01. Sakura no Shiori
02. Majisuka Rock 'n' Roll
03. Enkyori Poster (Team PB)
04. Choose me! (Team YJ)
(Theatre version receives 2-shot tickets,
1st press receives handshake tickets)

More after the jump

15 February 2010

Volunteer writers wanted

Feb 12 2010, 3:50am

OK I'm starting a new series of posts in my blog called [Know your AKB members: (insert member name)]. I'm not actually going to write this but instead inviting their fans to write it. Even though I follow all their threads in Stage48, I still don't know much about a lot of members, and I haven't been around that long so I don't know lots of happenings. Plus although biased, it tells us why their fans like her so much. Which is better than speculating reasons. So I'm looking for volunteers willing to write about their favourite members.

It doesn't have to be a professional like post. Just a simple one on why you like her, some interesting things about her, loads of pictures and videos, those kind of stuff. Like the typical fangirl/boy posts, but with more detail and information to make other readers take interest in her. The closest example I can give you is here

From experience, most of the newer members join the AKB fandom from the singles or dramas. For the singles, it is only the senbatsu who appear in the PVs (not counting SakuShio, BINGO!) and only the front girls who get much screentime in PVs. So it's mostly those girls who get their interest. It's not until quite some time later that they start to explore the hidden depths of AKB and realise that there are much more good stuff that they have been missing out on all those. *Remembers those times where I would watch a concert and skip all the songs that didn't have Acchan lol* So that's basically the reason for doing this. To promote those hidden girls to the newer members (and some older ones too). Of course, this doesn't mean that it will only be of them. Front girls and those pushed members and such are welcome too. Especially for girls like Acchan and such since they have haters.

Please email reply or comment it here if interested. (note: for security purposes I'll be using my old email but I still check it). If a girl has been taken already but you are interested, still email me and the 2 (or more) writers willing to write about her will both write the post and I will choose which one to post here, or I may put both into 1 post. Also choose girls who are only in AKB, plus the 5 that got transferred to SDN. SKE and SDN will come later after AKB. AKB RS are included under AKB. Oh and the writers of the other blogs are allowed too. You can write about multiple girls if you want to.

Girls chosen so far: Kitahara Rie, Kojima Haruna, (Maeda Atsuko or Nakagawa Haruka), , , Itano Tomomi, Miyazawa Sae

Finished: Oshima Yuko, Kashiwagi Yuki, Masuyama Kayano

14 February 2010

Happy Chinese New Year, Valentine's Day, Singles Appreciation Day.


Since they all fall on the same day, I thought I should put all three in the same post.
For all the Chinese readers in my blog (me included),
Happy Chinese New Year or Gong Xi Fa Chai.
Wishing everyone a prosperous year ahead.
Lets bring the Year of Tiger with a ROAR from AKB's very own Tigers
 
 
(Note: Tigers are generally cats. Cats meow or 'nya' as it is called in Japanese. The girls above have 'nyan' in their nicknames, except for Myao and Amina. Myao probably came from meow, and Amina well you can't expect to leave my Oshimen out lol :P. And that's a cute drawing of a tiger by Reinyan and Amina.)

Next up we have Happy Valentine's Day
Here's a picture of some chocolate made by Tomo~mi for Tomochin. Cute! Next we have a chocolates that Meetan received. After that a picture of Acchan and Yuko making some chocolates. (That's just a guess. The original blog post says that she, Takamina and Acchan will be giving their best on something. Since the post was on the evening of 13th and Acchan was holding a piece of chocolate, I suppose that's what happened.) And last but not least we have a picture of all the chocolates given to Miichan. Woah that's a lot of chocolates! Wish all couples a romantic time tonight.

 And last but not least, we have 
Happy Singles Appreciation Day
For people who are single and not in any romantic relationship (me included). Don't worry, your not alone. Mayuyu knows how you feel.

(Credits to the endless list of names of the people who uploaded this pictures)

12 February 2010

Miyazaki Miho 1st Photobook: [SHINING SKY] , Maeda Atsuko 2nd Photobook: [Acchan]

Myao will be releasing her first Photobook, entitled [SHINING SKY] on 25 February 2010. The DVD will be released one month later on 21 March 2010. The title of the PB and the DVD was decided by the fans and picked by Myao herself. The release date is the same as Acchan's PB (below). The publisher TOKYO NEWS which is the same one as Yukirin's PB. Judging from the price it's probably a hardcover book. I am really excited about this. I have been waiting since I joined the AKB fandom for Myao to have her own PB and it finally came! This will also be the 1st Photobook I will be getting!!! Already preordered it and now waiting for the days to pass quickly.

Miyazaki Miho 1st Photobook [SHINING SKY]
Release date: 2010-02-25
Price: 2800 JPY
80 pages, size A4
Publisher: TOKYO NEWS

Miyazaki Miho 1st solo DVD [Miyazaki Miho no Tore Taka Juubun!!] (宮崎美穂のとれ高十分!!)
Image
Release date: 2010-03-21
Price: 3990 JPY
Duration: 60 min
Publisher: HoriPro
Buy here: http://pc.akb48-horipro.net/campaign/
Preview: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uVTQe_FLoyk


Acchan will be releasing her 2nd Photobook, coincidentally titled [Acchan], on the 25 February 2010. That's the same release date for Myao's PB (above). The PB is shot in Hawaii. It's part 1 out of 3 PBs that she will be releasing. Judging from the price it's could either a mook (like Mizugi Surprise) or a softcover. But it's worth more than it's priced as you get a free bonus poster! This will be interesting because it will be split into 3 parts and each in a different country. Interesting because....*shudders at the thought....those of you remember Acchan's 1st PB should know....It was shot in Thailand remember....poo and dead chicken. I won't be getting this one however since I spent all my money on Myao's ;;.

Maeda Atsuko's 2nd Photobook [Acchan]
Image
Release date: 2010/02/25
Price: 1200yen
Buy here: http://www.hmv.co.jp/en/product/detail/3738388
http://www.cdjapan.co.jp/detailview.htm ... OBK-692451
http://shop.tsutaya.co.jp/book/product/9784087805550/

Includes special bonus "Oheya ni Acchan Poster" randomly selected from three kinds.

Part 1 - [Acchan] (あっちゃん) in Hawaii - release date: 2010/02/25
Part 2 - [Maeda Atsuko] (前田敦子) in Tokyo - release date: TBD
Part 3 - [ATSUKO] in NY - release date: TBD

Who will win in this war of pictures? My bet is on Acchan since she has more fans and all that. But Myao's looks kinda good too.

Previews below

11 February 2010

[Sakura no Shiori] updates: [Majisuka Rock n' Roll]

It's been a while since I've updated everyone on Sakura no Shiori (from now on shortened to SakuShio). It's less than a week till the release date! The moment of truth is approaching. Will this single be able to outsell or come close to it? Or will it be a failure? The wotas are split against this single. 8 out of 10 wotas do not like the song. However they will still probably buy it to show their loyalty, plus the 2-shot tickets. It all falls to the hands of the general public, specifically the graduating school students. Will they like it and buy it? Some sources say yes, some say no. We can only wait... Have you ordered SakuShio? If you haven't, do so now!

Sakura no Shiori (Type A)
[CD]
01. Sakura no Shiori
02. Majisuka Rock 'n' Roll
03. Enkyori Poster (Team PB)
04. Sakura no Shiori (off vocal ver.)
05. Majisuka Rock 'n' Roll (off vocal ver.)
[DVD]
01. Sakura no Shiori (PV)
02. Majisuka Rock 'n' Roll (PV)
03. Enkyori Poster (Team PB) (PV)
04. Bonus Movie (Congratulations for your graduation)
Sakura no Shiori (Type B)
[CD]
01. Sakura no Shiori
02. Majisuka Rock 'n' Roll
03. Choose Me! (Team YJ)
04. Sakura no Shiori (off vocal ver.)
05. Majisuka Rock 'n' Roll (off vocal ver.)
[DVD]
01. Sakura no Shiori (PV)
02. Majisuka Rock 'n' Roll (PV)
03. Choose Me! (Team YJ) (PV)
04. Bonus Movie (I really like you)
Sakura no Shiori (Theatre Version)
[CD]
01. Sakura no Shiori
02. Majisuka Rock 'n' Roll
03. Enkyori Poster (Team PB)
04. Choose me! (Team YJ)
(Theatre version receives 2-shot tickets,
1st press receives handshake tickets)

Sakura no Shiori: http://www.mediafire.com/?nmimvm2xgwn
Sakura no Shiori (PV): http://www.mediafire.com/?jhgme0oztny
Majisuka Rock 'n' Roll: http://www.mediafire.com/?rw1nhntma3m


Majisuka Rock 'n' Roll will be used as the Opening song for AKB's drama Majisuka Gakuen, Sakura no Shiori will be used as the Ending song for Majisuka Gakuen. Also Sakura no Shiori has been used as a tie-in for the Recochoku CM (below). Full PVs for Majisuka Rock 'n' Roll, Enkyori Poster and Choose Me! aren't out yet. From the 5 sec previews the Majisuka Rock 'n' Roll PV will be of the girls in the drama dancing in the classroom just like in the opening, and will have some scenes from the show added. Enkyori poster dance is in a plain white set like the PV for Yuuhi, and Choose Me! dance is at the beach. I can't find a video of SakuShio as Majisuka ending because YouTube are deleting all of them. Watch Majisuka Gakuen to view it yourself. Note these videos are likely to be taken down soon.

AKB48 - Majisuka Rock 'n' Roll (AKBINGO performance)


AKB48 - Majisuka Rock 'n' Roll (Majisuka Gakuen OP)


AKB48 - Sakura no Shiori


Recochoku CM

08 February 2010

Request Hour ~Set List best 100 2010~ (Epilogue)

Sorry for the incredibly late post. I'm really sorry. I've been suddenly overwhelmed by work this past few weeks and probably will be for the next few weeks too. I barely have time to check the boards and catch up on AKB media. So sorry again that this post got delayed for 2 weeks.

The Request Hour 2010 concert has ended. It was a blast following it in real time via IRC. By the way in case your wondering why I call it Request Hour instead of the usual AX2010 or similar, there is a rumour (or maybe already confirmed) that the building will be torn down sometime in March. Well I don't think AKB will stop the yearly tradition and instead move it to another concert hall. Then it won't be called AX** any more will it. Anyway I promised to make another post for the concert so here goes. For this post, I will give my opinion on the setlist as a whole.

Firstly, I have to say that I definitely prefer last years concert to this years. Sure this year's had lots of epic moments such as persona's real world debut, more SKE and SDN songs, just to name a few. However I feel that because of the disappearance of some songs, the strange use of substitutes, the unexpected position of songs and such made me favour more for 2009's.

Continuing with the tradition, graduates were invited back to perform their unit songs which were in the ranking. This is one of the main highlights of the whole concert, just seeing your once favourite member perform again and having fun with the rest of AKB again. Graduates who accepted the invitation were (I hope I didn't forget anyone) Ohe Tomomi, Komatani Hitomi, Masuyama Kayano, Narita Risa, Orii Ayumi, Oshima Mai, Watanabe Shiho,Takada Ayana, Hayano Kaoru, Tojima Hana, Kawasaki Nozomi, Naruse Risa, Nakanishi Rina (though she did not appear at the concert due to a sudden illness) However there were less appearances by the graduates, and each of them only performed one song, and a total of only 5 songs. Last year definitely had more graduates performing and they were all spread out over the 4 days unlike this year 3/4 of them were on day 1.

Arsen here made a categorised list of the songs. Team B totally pwned the rest of the Teams in terms of songs. Even though Team B only sand 14 songs, as you can see B has the most number of songs per stage performed (43.9%) compared to A (41.8%) and K (33.9%). I was trying to think of a reason why this was so, then it hit me right when I was playing Supreme Commander. Team K has too many songs and too little frontgirls (going by the Iiwake elections), and therefore lesser fans. Team A has many songs but has many frontgirls while Team B doesn't have much frontgirls but then doesn't have much songs anyway. In short, Team K is spread too thin defending too many songs with too little girls.

One of my disappointments is the disappearance of some songs. Songs like Boku to Juliet, Kissman, Kagami no Naka, Inochi no Tsukaimichi, Shinkirou. Even Singles like Romance, Keibetsu, Seifuku and even Meetan's solo Amai Kokansetsu didn't make it. I'm bewildered especially at the last one as I thought that would definitely make it in. Sure you will say that if the new songs were to make it to the top 100 then some of the old songs have to go too. I don't mind that but what I have a problem with is that there were lots of good songs that were removed. And the wotas voted up the songs which I didn't think were better than those removed. Songs like Manatsu, Sobakasu, Squall, Kioku. (AND WHERE IS MY SONG!!!!!!)

But well the above can be somewhat forgiven due to the appearance of some songs. SDN wotas managed to get 2 of their songs high up enough in the ranking, and one of them made the top 25. For lots of us, the only clips we got of these songs were 5 second previews on the official website. So this is the only time we can actually watch SDN stage songs. Then SKE performed 6 songs. Not really a lot especially for such an awesome stage but well SKE aren't really known compared to AKB. There weren't many K5 songs in the ranking but those that got in were definitely the good ones. Oh and of course we can't forget Kurukurupaa lol.

Then there was song positions. I'm not going to say much about this one because if I do this post would be incredibly long. I'll just say a few things. Generally, I feel that last year's top 25 felt more like a top 25 than this year's. And out of all the days I feel that Day 3 is the best. Last year felt more like a true voting unlike this year, the votes seem to be much more focused on the members than the songs compared to last year. And for the use of substitutes, I don't even want to go there.....

I will do a proper full review of the concert when the DVD is released and I get to see it. Another main highlight of Request Hour is the Commentary by the other members. It helps you to learn more about the girls and really can change how you view a member and even a song. Plus it's just fun to listen to haha. Perhaps this will change my opinions about the concert.