Mutou Mika graduating from Hello! Project

So, Some Boys! Blog today reported that Mutou Mika is graduating from Hello! Project in order to lead a normal life. =(
I’m not a huge fan of her- I mean, I barely know the Eggs in Ongaku gatas. But right after Mano Erina graduates to become a solo artist, we have another girl leaving. What does this mean for Ongaku? I really hope they don’t just disband. I really loved their singles; not so much their album tracks, but still! Maybe it’s time for new members, or maybe they’ll just continue on with the girls they still have. Either way, I really want them to keep going and releasing new stuff…

Well, good luck to Mika. Sad to see another H!P member leave, but if it’s what she wants, then it’s good that she actually went ahead and quit.

Catching up

So this is my first post after moving my former blog, ~ lurking in the shadows ~ (on Blogger, here) to WordPress. I got the idea for it about a week ago, then like 7+ j-pop blogs got deleted from WP so I decided against it, but after Kawaiirrhea figured out what was causing the shutdowns (Pony Canyon downloads), I decided to just go ahead because I don’t have any Pony Canyon downloads on my blog (and as of now I don’t plan on ever having any). I like WordPress better than Blogger, so…
There’s also a new name. I kinda was getting tired of the old name, and since I’m moving this anyway, why not? xD Resonant Blue was the first thing that came to mind…named after Morning Musume’s upcoming single.

As my first post here, I should catch up with everything I’ve missed lately. I’m going to attempt to keep this blog up-to-date, update it much more, and write some posts that have some actual content besides just quick news posts. xD

(my g key’s broken, and while I’m copy-pasting the lowercase g it’s too much trouble to keep copy-pasting the uppercase and then having to go back to the lowercase…so that’s why I might have random fail moments in terms of capitalization)

2008 predictions

Haha, I wrote a list out like two weeks ago, but forgot to post it here. Oops.
Thankfully, I remembered it now, otherwise it would have been too late! xD
Some of these are predictions, some are more wishful thinking on my part…xD;

2008 Predictions
–Morning Musume will release 3 or 4 singles and their 9th album. Their 9th album has gotta be coming up soon, they’ve already released three singles due to be on it, and there’s a fourth being released in March.
–Morning Musume 9th gen auditions. I know the 8th gen hasn’t been around for that long, but…
–Takahashi Ai graduates, becomes a solo artist. I’m kinda neutral on Takitty, I don’t love her but I don’t hate her either. I could totally see her graduating to become a solo artist at some point…she has a good voice, and because of that, she gets so many solos in Momusu. I want the others to get lots of lines too…xD
–Hello! Project Kids become uber popular, get a #1 single. I keep hearing people say that the Kids have taken over Hello! Project…I think it’s just a matter of time before some H!P Kids group, whether Berryz, C-ute, or Buono, gets a #1 single.
–One of the Berryz gets a boyfriend and is kicked out of Berryz. Haha, I kinda want to see this happen…8D I barely even know their names (I’m learning! I swear I am!) so if one of them got kicked out, I wouldn’t really care all thaaat much…
–Yaguchi Mari starts a solo career. Or at least does something, please! She’s my favorite ex-Momusu, and I really want her to sing again.
–Yasuda Kei does nothing. Still. Damn.
–Goto Maki signs with a new record label and releases first single. Please? I really loved Goto…
–GAM comes back. Even for just one single. I was hoping that because of GAM, Miki would still have something to do even after she left Momusu, but now GAM’s pretty inactive…
-As for the new units…Ongaku Gatas is permanent, and continues to release singles. Athena & Robikerottsu releases maybe another single after their upcoming one, then either actually breaks up or just fades into inactivity. Buono! keeps going until Shugo Chara ends, singing all the opening/ending themes, then moves onto another anime.

And just a couple of quick non-j-pop predictions…
–Prince of Tennis ends. This is the one prediction that I’d hate to come true the most. However, the end of PoT is obviously happening soon- it’s so close, they’re on singles 1, the very last match of the final round of the National Tournament. The author once said that he’d like to go through Ryoma’s second and third years at Seigaku. I think at one point this would have worked- when Prince of Tennis was really really popular. However, now it’s not, and so I think that he’s just going to end it where it is rather than go on with the chance of cancellation.
–Mx0 gets an anime. PLEASEPLEASEPLEASEPLEASEPLEASE
–Sket Dance survives in Jump. YESS

Upcoming releases

Ok, so there’s lots of stuff coming out either in the next two weeks or around the beginning of 2008, so…

Let’s start with Hello! Project:
-On January 16th, the duet between Abe Natsumi and Yajima Maimi, 16sai no Koi Nante, is being released. I just listened to a preview of it, and I don’t think it’s too bad. Probably not something that I’ll listen to a lot, but it’s not that bad either. And, btw, I don’t really know who Yajima Maimi is. I swear I’ve gone over the names and faces of the Kids like 5 times since I started this blog. I have a horrible memory, I guess. ;-;
-Buono!, the group formed with three H!P Kids that sung the opening and ending for the anime Shugo Chara!, is releasing their second single and their first album in February- the 6th and the 20th, respectively. I believe their second single, Renai Rider, is going to be the new ending theme for Shugo Chara!, it’s supposed to start airing soon so I’ll be able to check it out before the single comes out. xD As for their album, I really thought they weren’t going to be a permanent group, but I think an album usually signifies that they’ll be around for at least a little while longer.
-Ongaku Gatas also has their first album coming out, 1st GOODSAL, on February 6th. I loved both of their singles, so I’ll definitely have to order this one. I’m glad that they’re getting an album, hopefully this means that they’re a permanent group.
-Athena & Robikerottsu is releasing a second single on February 14th, Seishun LOVE Launch. I hope it’s as catchy as their first. xD I can’t wait for more Risa and Aika…and those two Kids that I can’t even remember their names. ;-; God I suck.
-According to wiki.theppn.org (I haven’t seen anything about these anywhere else), C-ute and v-u-den are getting new singles on February 27th. Both are still untitled. I probably won’t end up buying either of these, sadly…;-; There’s too much stuff out there, and I have too little money…
-And Berryz Koubou is apparently releasing a new single called Jingisukan on March 12th.

And on the other side of my blog, the other fandom I love…upcoming Prince of Tennis releases:
-This Saturday, at Jump Festa, three new Prince of Tennis CDs are being released. The first two are for the Prince of Tennis Musical- two new Best Actor’s Series CDs, #9 and #10 in the series. 9 features Sanada and Yukimura. 10 is a special Extra Seigaku 3rd Cast Memorial CD- a memorial for the third cast of the Seigaku regulars, who graduated (I feel like I’m talking about Hello! Project now. =P) after this summer’s Absolute King Rikkai feat. Rokkaku ~Second Service~ musical. The fourth cast debuted in the Progressive Match Higa feat. Rikkai musical, which started 8 days ago on December 12th. (sadly, I have yet to see photosets of the new Seigaku cast. I really really really need to see what the new cast looks like in character!)
The third CD being released at Jump Festa 2008 is a new Megane’s single, their fourth. Originally it was just going to be called “Odorimasen ka?”, meaning something like “Won’t you dance?”, but apparently they had to keep the tradition of having “Megane’s” in the song title (their previous singles have been “Go Go Megane’s”, “Kira Kira Megane’s”, and “Manatsu no Megane’s”), so they renamed it “Odorimasen ka? Megane’s”. =P According to the description on the official page, it has something to do with the National Tournament Finals OVA (which, by the way, is the LAST OVA SERIES and therefore THE LAST WE’LL SEE OF PRINCE OF TENNIS T_____T unless the manga keeps going after the Nationals, but that’s pretty unlikely) and the amazing 100 song marathon that’s taking place early 2008. It also says that apparently this song is a high tempo SALSA song. Oh dear lord. @_@
Oh, and they released the cover for it too: here. Ohhh wow, PoT cosplay’s fun, but…@_____@ WHAT THE HELL
“Won’t you also dance with these three people?” @_@
-After those three, looks like there’s nothing else until February 14th (which is kinda strange cause there’s been so much released lately, what with the Best of Rival Players for Shitenhouji and random other character songs). On 02.14, Kai Yuujirou, Higa Chuu’s vice-captain (I think), is releasing his version of Valentine Kiss. It’s the 5th year of this tradition, and he’s the 6th person to sing it- so far we’ve had Atobe, Oshitari, Sanada, Shishido, and Ooishi.
-And of course, the massive rerelease thing on February 27th. @____@

-not music related, I know, but the 3rd and final volume of the Prince of Tennis National Tournament Semifinal OVA series is being released January 25th. After that, which wraps up the match against Shitenhouji (this DVD encompasses Tezuka vs Chitose in Doubles 1 (er…well Inui and Zaizen are there too, but they decided to just stand at the side so it’s basically a single match. hey, playing singles in a doubles match makes more sense than Eiji playing doubles in a singles match. =P), and Ryoma vs Touyama Kintarou in that one-point match since the official match didn’t make it to singles 1), the first volume of the National Tournament Finals OVA series is being released on March 16th. During the finals, Seigaku plays Rikkai for the second time, but this time for the National title rather than the Kantou Tournament title. I’m not sure what this DVD will have- the first DVD of both the original National Tournament OVA series and the Semifinal OVA series only had one episode, which was a prequel to the actual match. So maybe this DVD will have the special Yakiniku no Oujisama / Prince of BBQ story that was originally between the semifinals and the finals in the original manga? It was a 4 chapter thing that started off as a party for winning the semifinals but ended up as a 5-school yakiniku eating contest. =P (everyone lost, btw, and they set the yakiniku place on fire. xD) I hope we get to see it animated. It’s not really a prequel-thing like the other first episodes, but since Seigaku’s played Rikkai before, there was no introduction set of chapters or anything in the manga…unless they take the scenes of Rikkai vs that exchange student team (they were originally mixed in with the one-point match between Ryouma and Touyama) and make it into it’s own episode.

Ongaku Gatas – Yattarouze!

God, today’s been crazy. My older stepsister and her husband and 14-month-old daughter (uber cute! _<
BUT PERSONAL ISSUES ASIDE…

I finally got around to watching Ongaku Gatas’ new PV, Yattarouze!. I tried to watch it on Wednesday on Dohhh UP, but video streaming sites hate my computer. >_< So I downloaded it from Hello Online, but I never actually watched it until just now.

The PV starts out with a nice shot of Yossi kicking the ball, then cheering- and then it turns kinda weird as her and four other members fall through the field or something? xD
Anyway, I love Yossi’s appearance in this PV. I think she looks awesome- definitely one of her best looks in my opinion.
It’s still really nice to see more of Yossi and Konkon- I mean, since Yossi wasn’t in a group before graduating, I figured she’d go the same way as Kei and Mari: not doing much of anything. And Konkon actually graduated from H!P about a year ago, so I thought I’d never hear anything from her again.
I still don’t know any of the Eggs, although I think I’m starting to be able to kinda pick out Mano Erina…I’ve seen blog posts praising her, so I looked her up and I can kinda pick her out now.

When I first heard this song, I thought it was kinda weird, but after watching the PV fully, I like it. It’s not as good as Nari Hajimeta Koi no BELL, but it’s still pretty catchy…
I think the dance in the PV is a bit weird, but…xD Some H!P dances are…

I might snag the limited edition of this in my next Yesasia run, whenever that is. Probably in a while, cause my mom doesn’t like that I’ve been getting so many packages lately. Especially when they come from a specific person rather than a company like Yesasia or CD Japan, which has happened quite a bit since I recently had this shopping spree on Livejournal. xD; I haven’t bought anything in a week, but I still have 4 packages that I’m expecting…xD;;;; One with Seishun Gakuen Paradise and two Love Prince anthologies (which should have arrived by now, but I’ll give it another week or so), one with all the stuff I bought from green-tea-river on LJ, which is lots of bromides, a pin, a couple of doujinshi, a shitajiki, and a card or two, one with my last Yesasia order which hasn’t shipped out yet (dammit why is it taking so long for them to find Sket Dance volume 1?), and one with that CD Japan order which won’t ship out until the Momusu PV collection DVD is released.
Though I guess it’s kinda a good thing that the Yesasia order hasn’t shipped out yet. Mom’s really starting to get suspicious, so if I got like 3 packages in a week I’d probably be in trouble…

On a kinda related note, according to ThePPN wiki, Ongaku Gatas is having a tour early 2008! <3 I’m definitely picking up that DVD once it comes out…

So I ordered new music today.

Yeah…
Buono! – Honto no Jibun (limited edition)
byTachikiritai – Koi no Gekidasa Ecstasy! (limited release)
Gyaruru – Boom Boom Meccha Maccho! (limited edition)
Morning Musume – 7.5 Fuyu Fuyu Morning Musume Mini (limited edition)
Morning Musume – ALL SINGLES COMPLETE ~10th Anniversary~ (limited edition)
Morning Musume – Eizou The Morning Musume 4 ~Single M Clips~
Ongaku Gatas – Nari Hajimeta Koi no Bell (limited edition)
Prince of Tennis 2008 calendar

I think this is the first time in a while that I’ve bought more general j-pop than PoT music…anyway, with this I’m finally caught up with Morning Musume’s CD releases, so now I have to start heading back and collecting everything before Chokkan 2…
Aaand I actually bought a Morning Musume DVD! YAAAAYYYYYYY I downloaded this DVD a while ago, and I liked it a lot~ it’s all their PVs from THE Manpower!!! to Kanashimi Twilight. Plus, it’s the only place to find their PV for Koi wa Hassou Do The Hustle!…
Then there’s Gyaruru’s single- it’s the limited edition, so it comes with the DVD. I heard that the DVD of this is basically like an H!P Single V DVD, so I’m looking forward to it~
I’m not exactly sure what the DVDs for Nari Hajimeta Koi no Bell and Honto no Jibun have, but whatever~
Lol, then there’s Koi no Gekidasa Ecstasy!. I wasn’t actually planning on buying this, but when the opening video came out the other day, I ended up listening to it a lot and getting addicted. xD;;;;; It’s too catchy…though I STILL don’t like it as much as Flower or Kakaeta Kiseki, it’s definitely good. So that resulted in me pre-ordering the single…
And the calendar, of course. Someone posted the images on the tenipuri LJ community, and it looked amusing. xD So…yeah, I bought it.
I was tempted to choose the split shipment option, but it was $10 extra, so…guess I just have to wait until the end of October for this to ship out (since Honto no Jibun and Koi no Gekidasa Ecstasy aren’t being released until the 31st).

On a totally unrelated note, Ao to Bin to Kan’s single Gather FINALLY SHIPPED! I ordered that over a month ago from one of those places through Amazon. Believe me, I’m not ordering from that site again…I almost forgot about it, but I got an e-mail a day or so ago telling me that it shipped. YAAAAYYYYY]

And on another totally unrelated note, 6 more PoT character CDs have been announced. From the looks of things, it’s the Shitenhouji Best of Rival Players set. Dunno how they’re gonna get 6 CDs…Shiraishi definitely gets one, same with Chitose and the freshman kid. Then I bet there’s gonna be one for Koharu/Yuuji…maybe Ishida Gin? And that’s only 5…maybe Oshitari’s cousin, Oshitari Kenya? Not like he plays an important role in the story at all, but…well, whatever. We’ll see when it gets closer to the release dates- two are coming out on November 21st, two on the 28th (Eiji’s birthday btw, yaaay), and then two are coming out the Wednesday after that (too lazy to look up the date).

Ongaku Gatas – Nari Hajimeta Koi no Bell

So I finally sat down and watched the PV of the song featuring Momusu graduates Yoshizawa Hitomi, Konno Asami, and Ishikawa Rika along with six girls I’ve never seen before in my life and one I vaguely recognize but I had to look up who she was (turns out it’s Satoda Mai from Country Musume).
My first thought was, the PV’s nice and everything, but there are barely any colors. At first I thought it was black and white, but not quite considering the girls themselves are still in color.
Then they started singing…and I’m so glad Yossi’s already singing again. I love Yossi, and I was afraid she’d pull a Yasuda Kei/Yaguchi Mari and disappear from singing for a couple of years. (by the way, Mari needs to sing more. She’s my favorite member of H!P, and it saddens me that she hasn’t done anything in more than two years…)
And then there’s Konno. Oh god. She’s back. She never was my favorite Momusu member, but I was still really sad when she left Hello! Project. I mean, someone graduating Morning Musume, ok, at least she’s still singing, but when you graduate from H!P in general…it’s kinda the end, isn’t it? At least, that’s what I thought. Now that I look back at my blog, I never posted about Konno’s comeback when it was first announced. Maybe I was really busy at that time or something…but whatever. It’s great to see Konno back in action. She wasn’t really a main member of Momusu, but I still kinda missed seeing her.
I’m not a review person when it comes to music/PVs, so all I’ll say is this: I really like this song, and the music video’s pretty nice. I really want this single now…I’ll try to grab it next order I make, whenever that happens to be.
And maybe at some point I’ll learn the names of the other six girls in this group. Are they Eggs? I honestly have no idea, I’ll have to look them up later…