living idol legends
Since my last post, I have listened to Yajima Beauty Salon every single time I got on the computer. So addicted it's not even funny. Naomi Yajima is starting to look more glamorous every time I see her. For Halloween, Strawberry made a jack o' lantern out of her afro for their Music Station appearance = rockin'.
Teru's blog is completely defeating me. He blogs EVERY DAY, and they're not short entries either, but long detailed ones with cheerful rambling, random analyses, photos, and member sightings (like, he went to a fishing pond and ran into Hisashi). No way I can keep up, Teru! So I missed out an important October entry in which Teru casually mentioned he went to SMAP's concert with Takuro the night before. This is so awesome it bears repeating: Teru and Takuro went to a SMAP concert!!! Could you possibly be more awesome, GLAY?? I'm sure Teru enjoyed himself - when he was in elementary school, he wanted to join Johnny's. :D Had he applied, I think there was a high chance he would have been accepted. Young Teru was really pretty.
Anyways, skipping all the RL stuff as usual, this weekend my love for SMAP was re-ignited when Pop Up! SMAP - their 2006 concert dvd (their 15th anniversary and the last time they toured until this fall) -- fell into my hands. The dvd is 3 discs of awesomeness that i have not finished watching...yet.
In 2006 I was really busy and barely on the internet so I somehow completely missed Kimutaku's Pop Up! look. The video opens dramatically amid a jungle CG video and massive swirls of smoke. Then SMAP come flying out of the smoke on wires at high speed. And proceed to group dance idol-style, cos THEY STILL GOT IT, oh yeah.
And omg, Kimutaku. It was as if he had reverted back to his Long Vacation idol days from ten years ago, when he was the prettiest of all pretty boys. He's spent all the intervening years breaking out of that box, proving he's more than a pretty face, and here he is, looking like he hasn't aged a day, with long pretty hair and glowing tan and out-prettying the very prettiest of his over ten years younger kouhai, incl Kame and Matsujun (who I can now see are really influenced by Kimutaku in terms of their stage persona, but Matsujun is too cute to do ero) Oh, and he easily out-sexied his sexiest kouhai, Jin, too. Yep, the charisma radiating off Kimutaku was pretty much supernova level.
[as an aside, Kame went to one of SMAP's Tokyo lives this fall and Kimutaku called him up and they rode one of those carts together at the end. <3]
SMAP don't have to wear the monstrosities that pass as costumes for some of their more unfortunate kouhai (ahem Arashi). I believe sequins were not even heavily used in Pop Up! Nakai's shorts were unfortunate but not a stab to the eye.
Nakai was hyper and kept making faces at the camera, Goro's smile unexpectedly lit up the stadium, and Shingo looked good even with his Saiyuuki blonde hair. Anyways, they were all fantastic. Oh, and SMAP don't get Johnny's Juniors to backdance for them; no, they get professional dancers, and a lot of them.
Their audience is really varied. There were fangirls, but so many families, babies, kids, groups of guys, middle aged papas, and the atmosphere at this Tokyo Dome concert was so great. I don't know why, but it gives me great joy to see some dad enthusiastically waving his uchiwa while jumping up and down. SMAP and especially Kimura seemed almost deliriously happy to be there. It was like the entire Dome was just reverberating with joy and FUN. I got happy just watching the dvd. Only Arashi also conveys that sense of total happiness (but I don't think they've yet conquered as wide a cross-section of audience as SMAP) which is partly why I can only see Arashi inheriting the number 1 idol group crown from SMAP in the future. Plus, Arashi stick together like nobody else.
Oh and at the end Shingo and Takuya gifted some audience members with the shirts off their backs and therefore some eye candy and then ran around a lot. ^^
Yes, SMAP are all in their thirties but they still rule the idol world without having to act very idol-like. I mean, Goro hasn't changed his hairstyle in ten years, and does Tsuyoshi look like he's even trying to have remotely idol-like hair?? I'm glad to see Takuya survived all the predictions of doom from when he married. They've all managed to flourish with their own individual styles and talents. :)
Well, after all that, I surely have to put a Youtube video so I can watch Bang Bang Bang right now. Takuya kissed Shingo and Shingo showed off!
Teru's blog is completely defeating me. He blogs EVERY DAY, and they're not short entries either, but long detailed ones with cheerful rambling, random analyses, photos, and member sightings (like, he went to a fishing pond and ran into Hisashi). No way I can keep up, Teru! So I missed out an important October entry in which Teru casually mentioned he went to SMAP's concert with Takuro the night before. This is so awesome it bears repeating: Teru and Takuro went to a SMAP concert!!! Could you possibly be more awesome, GLAY?? I'm sure Teru enjoyed himself - when he was in elementary school, he wanted to join Johnny's. :D Had he applied, I think there was a high chance he would have been accepted. Young Teru was really pretty.
Anyways, skipping all the RL stuff as usual, this weekend my love for SMAP was re-ignited when Pop Up! SMAP - their 2006 concert dvd (their 15th anniversary and the last time they toured until this fall) -- fell into my hands. The dvd is 3 discs of awesomeness that i have not finished watching...yet.
In 2006 I was really busy and barely on the internet so I somehow completely missed Kimutaku's Pop Up! look. The video opens dramatically amid a jungle CG video and massive swirls of smoke. Then SMAP come flying out of the smoke on wires at high speed. And proceed to group dance idol-style, cos THEY STILL GOT IT, oh yeah.
And omg, Kimutaku. It was as if he had reverted back to his Long Vacation idol days from ten years ago, when he was the prettiest of all pretty boys. He's spent all the intervening years breaking out of that box, proving he's more than a pretty face, and here he is, looking like he hasn't aged a day, with long pretty hair and glowing tan and out-prettying the very prettiest of his over ten years younger kouhai, incl Kame and Matsujun (who I can now see are really influenced by Kimutaku in terms of their stage persona, but Matsujun is too cute to do ero) Oh, and he easily out-sexied his sexiest kouhai, Jin, too. Yep, the charisma radiating off Kimutaku was pretty much supernova level.
[as an aside, Kame went to one of SMAP's Tokyo lives this fall and Kimutaku called him up and they rode one of those carts together at the end. <3]
SMAP don't have to wear the monstrosities that pass as costumes for some of their more unfortunate kouhai (ahem Arashi). I believe sequins were not even heavily used in Pop Up! Nakai's shorts were unfortunate but not a stab to the eye.
Nakai was hyper and kept making faces at the camera, Goro's smile unexpectedly lit up the stadium, and Shingo looked good even with his Saiyuuki blonde hair. Anyways, they were all fantastic. Oh, and SMAP don't get Johnny's Juniors to backdance for them; no, they get professional dancers, and a lot of them.
Their audience is really varied. There were fangirls, but so many families, babies, kids, groups of guys, middle aged papas, and the atmosphere at this Tokyo Dome concert was so great. I don't know why, but it gives me great joy to see some dad enthusiastically waving his uchiwa while jumping up and down. SMAP and especially Kimura seemed almost deliriously happy to be there. It was like the entire Dome was just reverberating with joy and FUN. I got happy just watching the dvd. Only Arashi also conveys that sense of total happiness (but I don't think they've yet conquered as wide a cross-section of audience as SMAP) which is partly why I can only see Arashi inheriting the number 1 idol group crown from SMAP in the future. Plus, Arashi stick together like nobody else.
Oh and at the end Shingo and Takuya gifted some audience members with the shirts off their backs and therefore some eye candy and then ran around a lot. ^^
Yes, SMAP are all in their thirties but they still rule the idol world without having to act very idol-like. I mean, Goro hasn't changed his hairstyle in ten years, and does Tsuyoshi look like he's even trying to have remotely idol-like hair?? I'm glad to see Takuya survived all the predictions of doom from when he married. They've all managed to flourish with their own individual styles and talents. :)
Well, after all that, I surely have to put a Youtube video so I can watch Bang Bang Bang right now. Takuya kissed Shingo and Shingo showed off!
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