Aino Minako-chan

By coincidence, I've received a few comments recently talking about Gackt and Yoshiki doing a project. Now, I've been unfortunately out of the loop in terms of Japanese music for several months now, so I have no idea what anyone is doing. So I did a quick web search during lunch today, and it turns out yes, Gackt and Yoshiki are apparently forming a "super band". But that's not what made me sit up and stare at my computer screen. It was a recent Sponichi article about how SUGIZO was joining the band as the guitarist. Sugizo!!! [wave brightly] It's like the late-90's exploded in revival-band format. (lol)

In other music news, I jumped on the bandwagon and bought an iPod nano. (Actually, can you even call it "jumping on the bandwagon"? It's more like, I finally noticed that there was a bandwagon tottering off into the sunset and I decided, what the hell, maybe I'll ride my mule after it.) Anyway, I didn't technically want an iPod, but it was the only one that had the search function that I wanted, so now I'm "cool" and "hip to the groove" or whatever. In any case, it's a massive step up from the capacity of my old 1 GB Sony, so I'm pretty excited about the space. I spent the weekend burning a stack of CDs that I brought from the States, but haven't listened to in a few years thanks to [point back a sentence] 1 GB. There were songs that I had seriously forgotten about. Oh, Macross 7! How I missed thee!

Dude, I love White Day. For those who don't know of this randomly created commercial holiday, it's the equivalent of Valentine's Day. But while V-Day (Feb. 14) is the day where women give chocolates and other gifts to men, White Day (March 14) is the day where men give back to women. (I've also heard that Korea has Black Day on April 14, which is the day where singles get together and bitch about their single-ness. Now THAT sounds like fun.)

Anyway, while I understood giving presents to loved ones or friends or classmates, even, I didn't realize until I entered the workplace that people give presents to co-workers as well. All the guys at the company got bags of chocolates and candy last month, and today, I got a small bag of candy, lavendar bath salts, and a fairly large box of nicely wrapped, upscale chocolate. "Wow," I decided. "I like this holiday."

In America, of course, this would never happen. Can you imagine what would happen if you gave chocolates to your boss on Valentine's Day? There's a real possibility that sexual harrassment suits would be involved. Adults just don't give casual presents to other adults on Valentine's Day. In a way, it reminds me of the platonic Valentine's Days from elementary school. People who went to an American elementary school probably know what I'm talking about... You made little mail boxes, then you bought cheap little cards with pictures of cartoon characters and messages like "You're Berry Special" or "I think you're Smurftastic!!" Experienced teachers would know that you needed to require that students to bring a little card for every student and to require that any candy or treats had to be distributed equally among the whole class. Still, of course, we were elementary students, not morons, and we knew how to discriminate against kids we didn't like. The packages of little cheap cards always had one message that was more vague and bland than the rest (Share Bear says Hi!). And I still fondly remember searching through the chalky heart-shaped candy, looking for the ones with "Sad Sack" printed on the front. (I think they eventually got rid of the "Sad Sack" message, which is quite a shame, really.)

I was thinking of cutting back on desserts, since I'm starting to get dangerously dependent on a regular cake fix. But, dude, free chocolate!

In other news, I replayed "Dirge of Cerebus" to pick off all of the capsuls scattered throughout the game (these allow you to watch the movie scenes without actually playing). I also picked up the 3rd G Report that I was missing so that I could watch the secret Gackt ending. To be entirely honest, as a fan of FFVII and Gackt, I will say that the overall concept of Gackt in this game was highly misjudged. At first, I thought he would have been playing "Random new character who happens to look like exactly like Gackt," and that sounded like fun. Then, it became apparent that he was just playing "Gackt, randomly stuck in the FFVII universe," which was just very weird. But THEN, if I'm understanding the game correctly, he's REALLY playing "Gackt, aka Sephiroth Beta Version." And to be entirely honest, comparing Sephiroth to Gackt is almost insulting. (I mean, it's SEPHIROTH. NO ONE compares to Sephiroth!) I'm just praying that no one is stupid enough to follow the game to it's logical conclusion (based on the Gackt ending), where Vincent fights Gackt for the fate of Midgar. Someone would get laughed at, and it wouldn't be Vince.

Having said that, Square pulled out all the stops for the animation in the secret ending. It's really beautiful. And I think it helps that Gackt normally looks like he stepped out of a video game, so they managed to make animated Gackt look exactly like real Gackt, and exactly like a Square character at the same time. As long as there's no sequal, I'm overall happy with the results.

[Edit] I just got two cookies, too. This is an awesome holiday.

Okay, so apparently my Square-Enix gaming fit isn't over yet. Square updated the Dirge of Cerebus page with big news.

1) RELEASE DATE: 1/26/2006. Color me shocked. I had absolutely no idea it was going to come out so soon. I always assumed it was going to be one of those things where they opened the web page, started slowly leaking information, and then released the game two years later. But it's coming out before FFXII!? O-kay.

2) COLLABORATOR: Gackt. Watch as my mouth drops in shock. Apparently, Gackt is doing the theme song ("Redemption") and the image song ("Longing") for the game. But not only that, they did a collaboration with Gackt so that a Gackt-ish character will show up in the game. I assume it will be something like "Nami Tamaki" in "Radiata Stories", or even like Gackt in "Bujingai", while possibly including some of "Squall-who-is-totally-not-at-all-like-Gackt" in FFVIII.

I didn't go mad or anything. I simply don't have much to say about this week's Domoto Kyoudai. I know, I know, it's Gackt and I ADORE GACKT and all but... they also brought on a snake. A HUGE snake. A giant, big python, actually. To say that I have a snake phobia would be a giant understatement. I start shrieking at anything bigger than a worm, and I avoid worms, for that matter. I can't even stand animated snakes, short only of those that wear hats or other such fnny clothing. And I get REALLY freaked out by pictures of snakes. Like, I seriously couldn't touch a certain page of my high school psychology book, as it had a big picture of the snake on the opposite side. (The point of the photo, ironically, was to indicate that some people have a phobia against snakes. Um, YEAH.) I'm getting better, though. I could somewhat watch a few seconds of that part in Domoto Kyoudai without hyperventilating. Too much. Trust me, that's a major major breakthrough for me.

Anyway, there were two major points of interest, once the snake part was avoided. First of all, the guest was actress/singer Mizuki Arisa. She's probably best known for being incredibly tall, and not in a skinny way. She's the one who whacked Downtown back when she appeared on Hey Hey Hey Music Champ and nearly sent Hama-chan flying into the audience. Anyway, her omiyage was some sort of ultra special sushi. Gakkun was actually the only one on stage who had never tried it. So they passed it all out, when they suddenly realized that Gakkun was picking his apart (as he always does) and eating only the random things stuffed inside of the sushi roll. They asked him what the hell he was doing, at which point he explained that he doesn't eat rice. Because it makes you fat. Everyone gaped at Gakkun like he was from another planet (he gets that a lot, but this was even more so). Tsuyoshi told him that there are rice substitutes that are actually only half rice and half konnyaku (otherwise known as jellified nothingness) that therefore have half the calories. Gakkun responded to Tsuyoshi's thoughtful statement with a simple, "Hmmmmmm." It was amazing because it was the most uninterested, disbelieving, condescending "Hmmmmmm" I've ever heard in my life. I don't know how he managed that much emotion into one little noise. Tsuyoshi threw down his chopsticks in anger at that and shot back, "But think about it~! If something's 180 calories, it'll become 60~!!!!!" [long pause] Kouichi-kun: "What the hell are you talking about?"

The other part didn't seem to touch the others as much, but I nearly started crying. [raise your hand if this actually surprises you...] Doing the top 5 songs, Mizuki-san's #1 was I Will Always Love You. She said it was because it was one of those songs that makes your heart clench with emotion. They asked about the others, and Gakkun said for him, it was "Suki" by Dreams Come True. He said that there was someone who he had been really good friends with for a long time, and every time this person rode in his car, they'd always play this same song. Well, said person died, and all Gakkun had left was the CD. [getting choked up] Ummmmm.... yeah. You're thinking what I'm thinking. I'm going to go cry into a bucket now...

Happy Birthday to both Gackt and America. ^_^ In honor of the 4th of July, we ate apple pie. In honor of Gackt, I'll tell you about this week's Domoto Kyoudai.

The guest for the week was Fukada Kyouko. She's this actress/singer/bikini model.... the perfect idol, otherwise. I wasn't that hot about her since she always comes across as rather ditzy in interview. Gakkun was back this week, with Mako-chan on drums and Noi-chan on bass. I really really feared for Fukada-san. The only normal one was Tsucchi and, well, he ain't all that normal, frankly. Anyway, her omiyage was some sort of meat dish with lemons, which was perfect as it's Gakkun's favorite. he actually asked if it was okay if he could take seconds. As it turned out, she planned it. She's apparently a HUGE Gackt fan, so much that she couldn't look at him the entire time. It was sooooooooo cute. And made me like her a whole lot more, too. So Kouichi-kun pulls everyone off stage so that the two can be together. Neither one said a thing, so KinKi Kids had to yell at them. But then they brought out a cake for Gakkun's birthday. He turned 461, so basically it was this good-sized cake covered in flames. I don't know if it was really 461 candles, but it had to have been close. Gakkun flung a towel on it to snuff out most of the candls, then blew out the remaining like 2 to make the KinKi Kids happy. Kyouko gave him a tan umbrella (for the day time, since he hates the sun) and a really really cute dog carrier (for his ultra-kawaii doggie Bell). They ask her for her birthday so that Gakkun can deliver an "okaeri." She blushes.

Afterwards, they get to talk about nicknames, since everyone on the show has a nickname. Gakkun asks her what she should be called, and Kyouko really shyly responds that anything is fine. So Gakkun suggests "Tarou" (a stereotypical boys name, like Fred). She doesn't seem to like it. In a past life, she was apparently a dolphin and Marie Antoinette. Next she wants to be a black cat. Noi-chan gets up at the mention of the dolphin and runs around the stage screaming, like usual. It's Gakkun's first time with Noi-chan, so he's a bit shocked. Anyway, Kyouko says that she was a dolphin because she gets so happy when she swims in the ocean that she starts to cry. KinKi Kids suggest maybe she was a blowfish. She insists she was a dolphin. Then she was Marie Antoinette because she's always had an odd fascination for her and her life. Tsuyoshi-kun says that in a past life, Mako-chan was a mushroom (makes more sense if you've seen him and his haircut).

For Kyouko's top 5 songs, one was I for You by Luna Sea, and one was a song by Fukuyama Masaharu. She said that she loved him because of the piano work in his songs as she loves the piano. So, of COURSE, they get Gakkun to play the piano for her. She went completely starry eyed and just stared at him, while Tsuyoshi-kun did an impromptu cheesy drama. At the end, they decided not to even bother having her pick her favorite since everyone agreed beforehand that it was Gackt. Ah, well. Such is life.

Basically, the entire Domoto Kyoudai show was nothing but Fukada Kyouko looking incredibly cute and shy and nervous and trying not to stare at Gakkun but sneaking glances back at him anyway. It was soooooooo cute. Ah, such is the power of Gackt....

I had a great and INCREDIBLY tiring weekend. On Saturday, I first went out shopping at Akihabara with Crystal. I spent WAAAAAY too much money, but man if I didn't have a blast. That night, met some others in Shinjuku for dinner and karaoke. We ended up staying out really late and catching the last trains out of Shinjuku. About half of us couldn't make it home, so 7 of us ended up staying the night at Mimu-chan's place. From after 2 to before 5 I attempted to catnap, which basically ended up curling up in a ball on Mimu-chan's tatami floor and closing my eyes and listening to everyone talk and play Chinese CDs from Hong Kong. Some time a little before 5, I finally was too cold to even pretend to sleep and left the ones who were sleeping to join the others outside. Ended up getting the train at like 6:30 and was in bed by 7. I only woke up at noon because Mommy called from the states. I was really really tired all day. ;_;

Anyway, I managed to stay up to watch Gackt on Domoto Kyoudai. As it turns out, it was their 10th episode and celebrated with a clip special. ... yes, congrats on those hard earned double digits. Ah, well. Gackt needed to rest up for his big Yokohama Arena concert anyway. And it was a good chance for me to get a look at some of the episodes that I didn't get a chance to see. Plus, since it was Domoto Kyoudai, all of the good clips they showed involved Gakkun. Man I love this show. The first episode was Komuro Tetsuya. Through episode 4 (everything I haven't seen, btw) there was no audience; just the guys in the studio. Episode 001 was, for some odd reason, in a studio in Hawaii. Er... WHY? 002 was Aiko, so that was happy. As it turns out, Aiko is a massive video gamer and owns like 500 games. Aiko and KinKi Kids started going off on all of the video games that they played as a kid and had a great time. No one in the back seemed to have any idea what the hell they were talking about. Kouichi-kun finally turned around and asked them what kind of games they had as kids. Tsuchii said they had "koma" (those cup and ball things). Everyone started laughing. Afterwards, Shin-chan and Aiko got heated up talking about dogs, so they then moved into talking about how Gakkun a cat and a dog. Tsuyoshi-kun commented that Gakkun keeps both types, basically ("Ryouhou katteiru na"). Judging from everyone's reactions, it was intended to be the subtle pun that I thought it was, and Gakkun smiled a little and agreed. (If you read my journal, then you know about Domoto Brothers and Gackt, so I think you'll get it). It was fun. 003 was the female singer of Every Little Thing. They started talking about onsens and all, but apparently Gakkun HATES onsens with a passion. Not only does he hate hot water, but he hates tatami, too. So when he goes to the onsen, he can't handle the water and then ends up making a bed by putting his futon on top of the low table in the room since he can't handle the tatami either. Tsuyoshi-kun said that he had thought that they could take Domoto Kyoudai to an onsen one day, but he guessed that option was out of the question now. ^_^ The real surprise with her was that when they had her pick her favorite type, she picked Gakkun. And, of course, he was really cool about it, so no one even knew that she had finished making her choice for a while (the KinKi Kids, for example, tend to immediately break out of formation while saying loudly, "OKAY wow, wasn't THIS week fun!?"). She said that he just seemed really fun. That's... definitely one way to put it. ^_^ I love random specials...

Yet another great episode of the Domoto Brothers on Sunday, so I just have to tell everyone about it. Mako-chan was on drums again, which upset me a bit. I mean, Mako-chan's great, not just on the drums, since he's really quirky and when he talks, he tends to just burst out with some of the weirdest things ever. But still, I like Shin-chan. I miss Shin-chan. Ah, mah... Last Sunday's guest was Kanno Miho, who I know basically solely from SataSuma. She comes on every so often just to help out Shingo or Nakai on their little projects. She's apparently an actress and one of those people who've been working in major projects since middle school. Anyway, she brought harumaki (spring rolls) with her for her omiyage. Gakkun was happy, since it was the first one that wasn't sweet. He actually agreed to eat it, not just drink the water or something. They asked he what he wanted to eat his with, and he said that he wanted his Yuzupon (brand of sauce). They laughed at him for being so specific, but as it turned out, he actually brought the sauce with him. His manager told them that he couldn't find it, which Gakkun found unbelievable since he said he had already used it once that day. But he said it was okay and they all dug in to eat anyway. (Gakkun, btw, was the only one to eat the spring roll with his hands instead of chopsticks. Dude, even -I- use chopsticks for spring rolls.) So they talk for a little while longer, before they suddenly notice that Gakkun is not just eating with his hands, he's picking apart his spring roll into little pieces. They ask him what the hell he's doing. He says that without his Yuzupon, he doesn't like the shell. So he was picking it off. He assured Kanno-san that, no really, he liked her omiyage... he's weird.

Afterwards, they get into impressions. One of Kanno-san's rumors is that she can do a mean Doraemon impression. So she provides them with a horribly HORRIBLY slaughtered Doraemon impression. No one can stop laughing, she's so bad. Gakkun actually folds in half and can't stop laughing. When he finally calms himself enough to speak, he tells her that she's great. He seemed to really like that, even though she has the world's worst Doraemon impression, she just went ahead and did it. They asked if Gakkun could do any impressions. The fangirls were willing to step in, calling out that he can do Amuro-san (the Gundam character, Furuya Tohru, I believe). He agrees to do it. To set up the scene, he asks them all if they know the part where the white base is run over. ...... No one seems to believe that Gakkun knows Gundam quite THAT well. (Maybe he can hang with Midorikawa-san and play with Midorikawa-san's Gundam models. Yeah right. As if Midorikawa-san would let anyone near them...) Anyway, after setting up the scene in true Gundam fan fashion, he suddenly bursts out with a really cute, young Gundam hero-ish cry of "Gai-sa~n!" I've never heard Amuro-san, but from what I can imagine, Gakkun did a great job. Everyone else seemed impressed at least. Kouichi-kun summed it up when he sorta said a "sasuga Gakkun" because Gakkun's voice was just really darned cool. Yup. So true. So true. Afterwards, they were talking about brushing teeth (Kanno-san really likes brushing her teeth, apparently), so they asked Gakkun how he brushed his teeth. He starts with his tongue. Everyone agreed it was weird to start with your tongue; Gakkun looked a bit shocked. He apparently loves brushing his tongue. Kouichi-kun said that you get that "ugya" feeling when you brush your tongue, though. Gakkun said he loved that, too. He said that he loved to brush his tongue all the way back down his throat. (That, btw, brought some really really dirty thoughts to mind, but if I interpreted Tsuchii's sudden attempt not to snicker correctly, I wasn't the only one.) In the final rumor corner for Kanno-san, they talked her kitty rescue story. She apprently found a small kitty, trapped, on a weekend when no one was around and decided to rescue it herself. It was a really cute and fairly touching story. Or would have been. In the very middle of the cute kitty rescue story, Gakkun suddenly started flailing and nearly fell off of is stool, righted only by smacking Kouichi-kun on the arm to keep himself upright. Everyone just stared at Gakkun. No one could believe it. Gakkun quickly apologized, explaining that his leg fell asleep. Kouichi-kun said he thought that he had been suddenly attacked by a ghost touching his arm. After everyone had calmed down, Kanno-san realized that she had no idea what she had been talking about, and the kitty story was dropped.

Afterwards was Kanno-san's top 5 song countdown. The best one had to be her #2, some kiddie song entitled, "Oni no pantsu" (Big brother's underwear). Everyone was just staring at the screen; from the looks of it, no one had any idea what the hell that song was. She said it reminded her of her first love. Tsuyoshi-kun said that couldn't be a good thing. It was apparently from kindergarden, but it was still weird. Everyone said that their first loves were in kindergarden, too. Gakkun's was his teacher. It was also his first kiss. I can't even imagine a 5-year old Gackt. He must have been damned cute. They performed Kanno-san's favorite song, Zoo, as a live. It was KinKi Kids + Tsuchii on acoustic guitars and then the two KinKi Kids singing. It was quite good, despite the fact that I'm sick of that song. I dunno. At the end, they got together so that Kanno-san could pick her favorite type. They do this with every female guest: The guys line up at the front and the guest walks up behind them and touches her favorite type on their backs. They were also wearing their new matching black "Domoto Bros. Band" T-shirts. The band just looked really freaking funny in matching T-shirts. The idea was actually Gakkun's. The fangirls sound shocked and horrified that it was GAKKUN'S idea for matching T's. Gakkun sees no problem with it. He likes T-shirts. Anyway, they all lined up. Previously, btw, I've seen Kouichi-kun picked twice. This time, Kanno-san picked....... Onchan. Onchan is the one member of the band that I don't know. He's the older guy who was a rocker like 20 years ago. He's so cute about it though, since he just starts laughing into his hand and looks so pleased. Everyone else seemed really shocked. Onchan seemed shocked too, for that matter. I mean, Kouichi-kun DOES have a good track record so far... Anyway, that was Domoto Kyoudai for you, basically. I've never seen Gackt act so uncool in my life. I adore him even more, now. ^_^

This week's Domoto Brothers had as a guest Ezumi Makiko. I don't really know her, but I kinda recognize her. She's an actress and, if I'm getting my actresses right, she's the one who's currently the star of a drama called "Love Revolution." No Shin-chan this week, though. Mako-chan from Sharon Q on drums again. I wonder if they're going to start trading off every other week or something. And no offense, but I think that if KinKi Kids and Gackt can make it every week, the rest of the band should be there no problem. [sigh] Well, Shin-chan's still newlywed, so I'll give him a break.

Ezumi-san brought some different types of mochi as her omiyage this time. They asked Gackt which one he wanted; he replied he wanted the water. Gackt gackt gackt... That's no way to make friends. She's pretty darned tall, so they all asked her if she looks for a certain height in men. She said she didn't really care, but what she looks for is a good chest and all. Gackt looks for the collarbone first, then the nape, then the back. I think that intimidated the guest a bit, simply because she's sitting almost right in front of Gackt with her hair in pigtails. One of the questions to Ezumi-san was about the rumor that she goes to the supermarket in her sweats to buy large quantities of cheese and wine. She said she goes in her sweats, but not necessarily to load up on cheese and wine. So they asked Gackt if he ever wears sweats. He says that of course he does. The fans in the audience sounded extremely shocked. He said that he wears them while sparring. Everyone sounded ever more shocked. Gakkun asked if they didn't spar. He acted like everyone spars constantly. KinKi Kids found that funny. Gakkun later talked about how he has lots of flowers at his house (they were dicussing how Ezumi-san has lots of flowers around when she does a drama). They asked everyone who loves flowers to raise their hands. Gakkun wasn't one of them. When asked why, he said it was because he hates flowers. He said it was because all of his flowers were "zouge." Everyone nods for a while before he suddenly corrects himself, "Oh, not 'zouge,' 'zouka.'" "Zouka" is artificial flowers. "Zouge" is elephant tusks. Everyone couldn't stop laughing. Tsuyoshi-kun was especially making fun of him, so Gakkun asked why the heck Tsuyoshi didn't notice before he said anything. Tsuyoshi said that Gakkun had such a rhythm going when he spoke that no one noticed.

Another question was about Ezumi-san's longest kiss scene: she said it was about 4 minutes long. No one could believe it. That's got to be tough, y'know? They asked her when her first kiss scene was, but she couldn't remember at all. So she turned the question around. Both KinKi Kids remembered their first kiss scene: they pointed to each other. ;^_^ Yeah, apparently their first kiss scene was with each other on some drama. I don't know... So the two KinKi Kids pointed at each other for a while, and everything was kinda funny, until suddenly from the background Mako-chan chirps up, "A guy's lips are soft, aren't they." No one could believe it. I mean, out of ANYONE of stage to have said something like that, I think Mako-chan was the last person they expected to say anything. Tsuyoshi-kun asked how he knew. Mako-chan replied that, well of course, he's kissed Tsunku and all... Like, oh, of COURSE he's kissed Tsunku. Then Ezumi-san cut in and suddenly said, "Well SPEAKING of kissing men..." She then turned around and stared at Gackt. Gackt stared back. KinKi Kids thought it was hilarious. Gakkun looked less than amused, but then he rarely does. So finally, after Ezumi-san stared at him for a while, Gackt replied that he loves it. Everyone started laughing, so he asked if he said something wrong? Kouichi-kun just laughed at him. Gakkun continued to explain that sometimes the person you want to kiss happens to be a man, so it really just can't be helped. In the background, you hear someone insist that it's never happened to him... I forget how, but they got onto the subject of what kind of person Gakkun is. Ezumi-san sounds like she knows Gackt's music, since she was talking about how some of it is really soft, and some of it is really hard, but it's all very different and she seemed to really like that. Gackt looked incredibly pleased that she mentioned it, and I think forgave her for staring at him about the whole "kissing a man" thing. Kouichi-kun agrees and says that Gakkun's music is really all very different. Tsuyoshi-kun says that if you want to know everything about Gackt, you'd really really have to take a whole lot of time at it. KinKi Kids and Gakkun are really still learning about each other, after all. Everyone kinda started nodding in agreement, when suddenly Gackt started laughing. Everyone was a bit confused because no one had said anything to make him laugh like that. Gakkun explained that it was embarrassing to have people talking about him like that. Awwwww~! I love Gakkun~! @_@

Anyway, last segment was a countdown of Ezumi-san's top 5 songs. #5 was a Mozart song. She apparently played piano for a while, so this song had some good memories attached to it. She and Gakkun bonded a bit talking about the song. #4 was November Rain. She loves the song, the blend of classical instruments with rock, and the fact that it's not an A-B-C-B type song, but just one long story. She also said that her first concert was a Guns n' Roses concert. Tsuyoshi's first concert was apparently when he went with his older sister to a Hikari Genji concert. They're an older Johnny's Entertainment group, and they all wore rollerskates the entire time. I'm dead serious. I saw an old video of them performing on song and nearly killed myself laughing. They sang while skating around in circles and whipping each other around and nearly falling onto their butts. I tell you, THAT was entertainment. #3 was Pride by Imai Miki. #2 was Vogue. It's apparently her song that really gets her worked up. Tsuyoshi's "power up" song was the theme song to sentai series Thunder Rider. Of course. Tsuchii's song was Hit the Road Jack while Onchan's was Dr. Feelgood. Gackt went with the theme to Hokuto no Ken. Tsuyoshi completely agreed with that one, too (from what I can tell, he's really big into old school sentai/fighting anime and stuff so Hokuto no Ken was probably one of his favorites). Men. [shrug] Anyway, #1 was Kiss of Life, the theme song to her drama Love Revolution. Imagine that. Overall, another great end to a weekend with GACKT~! and KINKI KIDS~! @_@ shi-a-wa-se~!

BTW, big news from the ever elusive Tsunku, Morning Musume is growing. AGAIN. They slipped below the two-digit mark, I suppose... Well, good for them. I guess. Koho.

Nakai and Taka-san seemed really excited about the latest show of Utaban. I'd be, too. They bring on two of their favorite acts: 0930 (pronounced Okusama) and Gackt. First up is a 0930, a quirky female duo. They're completely not the normal female acts, since they're not pretty or sexy or cute, they're just... they're them. And they're really really funny; they love to banter with the Utaban guys. As usual, they spent the entire time picking on each other and eating the food that one of the girl's mom sent for them to eat on the show. They're great. Their songs are really interesting, too, since every single one of them is performed with the back-up singer on guitar, and the lead singer on tambourine and harmonica. That's, er, it. It's really amazing what good songs they make out of that, but you have to wonder if they've ever thought to themselves, "Hey, this time, let's have drums."

Next up, you see the darkened Utaban set, redone with skeletons, candles, chandeliers, etc. Classical piano music plays as they introduce the set. Yup, it's Gackt again. ^_^ The piano music is actually Gackt playing in the waiting room. Only with Gackt... They play a clip of the last time when he was on Utaban, the infamous "hidden meat" interview. Then they went back to Gackt for this time. He really liked the skeleton cup they gave him to drink out of, and loved the chandelier, too. (At the end, he even asked if he could take it home with him.) But anyway, bad news... Gackt can't go back to his grocery store anymore. He can't get his hidden meat anymore. He can't get it anywhere. The Utaban guys apologized, but that was a really awesome interview.

Next, they went to the Gackt calligraphy Q&A. They ask him a question, he writes it out on a board to show off his calligraphy. The first question was just about shopping (just like, "Shopping is..." type question). His answer was "kiru", short for "negiru." Or, bargaining down the price. Taka-san stares at him. Gackt asks if that's bad. He apparently tries to bargain down absolutely anything he buys, and he sounds pretty good at it, too. Next was the important thing for men: "Koshi." "Koshi" basically means the waist, but the meaning seems to blend into the hip area and sometimes very lower back or even very upper thighs. To talk about the importance of the waist, he asks Nakai and Taka-san how they shower and wash their hair at the gym. They do it like normal people, sitting on your little stool and washing off. Gackt insists that's no good, and says that it'll make your "koshi" sore. He says that what you need to do is turn so that your back is to the shower, step away, then basically bend in half backwards to wash your hair. Everyone fails to see how that method is better, so Gackt demonstrates. Of course, if you've seen his Mars live tour, you know that when Gackt bends in half, he can actually bend in half. Taka-san and Nakai looked really really shocked. Gackt said it was like the Matrix, and he was really really right.

Nakai somehow managed to turn the conversation to sex when they got back to their seats, and Gackt proceeded to shock the hell out of Nakai and Taka-san with his frank sex talk. Even I was a bit shocked, and I'm an American college student who's a Gackt fan. Literally, both were covering their mouths laughing. Nakai's eyes were absolutely round and he even covered his mouth to ask shocked questions back to Gackt. I think Gackt deflowered Nakai's virgin ears or something. That'll teach him. Next, on the same train of thought, was "what Gackt wasn't embarrassed about": being nude. He says that he's always nude in his tour hotel room. "Because it's my room" he kept saying over and over again. So Nakai asks if he's not embarrassed if people see, "Junior Gackt." Gackt doesn't really care either way, so Nakai asked if it was okay because his "Junior Gackt" is really "junior." Gackt replies, no, he's a magnum. The entire stage, Gackt included, suddenly burst out into really loud laughter. I think even Gackt couldn't believe he just said that.

Afterwards, Gackt performed. Papa lapped a pap lopped. KYAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA~~~~~!!!!!! It was NOT what I expected. First of all, the only musicians he had on stage were drummer Toshi-san, guitarist You-san, and bassist Ren-san. I mean, they did a great job, but I really don't think Paparapa is only actually done with ONE guitar, y'know? I basically think it's only because Gackt couldn't fit his other two guitarists on stage. With the set and dancers, y'know.

Yes, dancers.

Gackt had dancers.

I'm dead serious. Gackt was dressed up in baggy pants and a zip down hooded jacket, and danced the entire song with his two backup dancers. I was shocked to say the least. I didn't think I'd ever actually see Gackt dancing like that to one of his songs. That being said, the performance was, musically and vocally, INCREDIBLE. I really couldn't believe that Gackt performed a song like Paparapa so well in a live. I was completely in love. On a side note, with the outfit Gackt was wearing, I'm almost starting to wonder if he DOES mean "Parappa the Rappa" with that song. Errr...

After that, they went back to the interview. What Gackt really likes: it ended up being this strange contraption to help you stretch your center splits. I don't imagine it does Gackt much good, since he can open it 90 degrees in tight pants and didn't look distressed in the least. They stuck Nakai in it, so Gackt "helped" Nakai stretch out. The little subtitle asked if Gackt was really a sadist after all. Nakai kept telling Gackt to stop helping out.

After that, they went to Koyanagi Yuki, live, in the morning shooting a video in Los Angeles. Then they showed a taped performance of her song, "my all..." Honestly, I didn't listen to it. [sweatdrop] Well, it was okay, I suppose, but it was just one of those blah ballads that ends up blending into every other good ballad that every other diva has ever sung. And I still think her hair's all gonna fall out.

At the end, they went back to Gackt AGAIN and said that they really wanted to go out with Gackt some time. Or they talked about going over to Gackt's place and having him cook for them. Gackt sounded okay with that, and was talking about how he spends his time while cooking read a book or something in the nude. The Utaban guys laughed at him again. But Gackt says that he doesn't get to wander around in the nude a whole lot anymore since he lives with one of his band members (I've heard it was You; makes sense since Gackt has said that out of the whole band You is the one he's closest to...) and his older sister. The Utaban guys were shocked to hear he lives with his older sister. They were shocked to know he HAD an older sister. They asked if she wasn't married. Gackt said she was, but it was like they're married, then they're broken up, then they're married, then they're broken up, etc. Sounds like Gackt's sister and brother-in-law are in the "broken up" phase right now. But Gackt tells them to come on over. I'd... really like to see that. ^_^

So, that was Gackt, another priceless Utaban interview. There. I'm done. And I didn't even talk about Gackt's dancing. That's a whole other rant. ^_^

I seriously saw the best half hour of TV I've ever seen in my life. Watched my second ever episode of Domoto Brothers. It's hosted by KinKi Kids as the Domoto Brothers, with their band, cleverly entitled the Domoto Brothers Band. But the band consists of the guitarist from some older band called "Street Sliders", the bassist from Judy & Mary, Shinya "Shin-chan" the drummer from Luna Sea, and Gackt "Gakkun" on piano. The show is my heaven (and btw, has anyone else noticed that the KinKi Kids band is entirely ex-visual rockers? I just think that part is funny...). Anyway, the guest... ex-Luna Sea vocalist Kawamura Ryuichi-san. I nearly hyperventilated, I was so happy. @_@ U-RE-SHII~~!

It starts out with the band performing the Domoto theme as usual. I could tell immediately that it was Shinya on drums (he was missing last week) just from the drumming. It just... it SOUNDED like Shinya on drums. And lo and behold, I was right. Then, they brought out Ryuichi-san. He stopped a bit to wave to Shin-chan, then they all sat down for the interview. Kouichi-kun said that he already knew it would be a different type of show. First, they had Shin-chan and Ryuichi-san together again, which was neat. And second, they had Ryuichi-san and Gakkun on the same stage together, which was just pretty darned nifty for many reasons. Ryuichi-san brought them all Mr. Donut. I thought it was so weird. But apparently, that's the exact same thing he did when he first met the Luna Sea members. Yes, but Shin-chan pointed out that he only bought -4- donuts, which meant he had to share one with J. Whotta guy. I couldn't stop laughing. Kouichi-kun really wanted to give Gakkun the donut with pink frosting, but Gakkun just pointed at it and said that the pink meant it was sweet. (I've noticed that there are... not necessarily a lot of Japanese people who don't like sweet things, but it's at least not completely abnormal. Kouichi-kun doesn't like sweet things, either, and it's not unusual on a TV show for at least one of the guests to admit that they don't like sweets.) Anyway, they went into the Domoto list of top 5 rumors. One... well several had to do with dating and women, actually, but this IS Ryuichi-san, so that shouldn't be unexpected. They asked Gakkun how he picks up women, which he answered, as always, if he likes someone, he'll spare the words and kiss them. Tsuyoshi-kun was apparently really asking for it and insisted that Gakkun do a demonstration. So Tsuyoshi-kun and Gakkun walked towards each other across the stage, and when they got close, Gakkun stroked Tsuyoshi-kun's cheek and leaned for a kiss. Tsuyoshi-kun bolted. The rest of the guys couldn't stop laughing. Later they talked about what sort of ringers they use on their cell phones. Tsuyoshi's were all Rocky-esque themes, so he was talking about how he likes to pick it up and go "Moshi moshi" in a really tough voice. Gakkun's are all voices. Like, for example, he has the voice of the Lupin III heroine, who says stuff like, "Lupin, you've got mail" and "Ecchi~!" I can only imagine... you're in the train next to Gakkun, when all of a sudden you hear a female's voice shouting, "Ecchi~! Ecchi~!" No no, it's just Gakkun's manager. ^_^

One of the later rumors was that Ryuichi-san goes karaoke in cosplay. He didn't deny it. ^_^ He said that he likes going to karaoke and singing oldies, and he and solo band members all went in cosplay once, just for fun. Tsuyoshi-kun said that he once went to karaoke as a monkey, so he understood. They asked Gakkun if he ever did cosplay. Gakkun replied, "Shinai ne." You could hear resounding snorts and chuckles of disbelieving laughter from throughout the studio. But if you think about it, it's probably true. After all, he said, "shinai" which means it doesn't count his Malice Mizer days. Plus, since Gakkun seems to basically dress the same all the time, you can't even count his concert outfits as cosplay, can you. Besides, it is true that I HIGHLY doubt Gakkun does the "nurse" or "monkey" brand of cosplay, deshou? Anyway, he said that he did like to do to karaoke, and he liked singing older songs, too. For instance... he loves singing the Laputa theme song. Everyone laughed at that. I totally want to hear that. But Gakkun was really proud of it; he says he scores a 98 pt. ranking on that one. Afterwards, they had a little part where everyone brought in their favorite picture of themselves. Ryuichi-san's was his driver's liscence photo. His opinion seemed to be, "It's a photo for a driver's lisence. For a driver's licence photo, it's AWESOME~!" It was actually pretty good. He said that when he went to get that one, the woman taking the photos recognized him and offered to take his picture again and again if he didn't like the shots. Tsuyoshi-kun said it's never happened to him. Shouganai. Shin-chan's picture was him standing in front of a mikoshi, those portable shrines for festivals. He said what made the picture special was that it was a mikoshi he made himself. Sugoi. Everyone was extremely impressed. Gakkun's was one of his shots from the Miserable period, when he had white hair. He said he liked the picture because it had good memories attached to it. For instance, he said, when he looked at the picture, he thought about how he lost hair. Everyone started laughing, but he said that his hair was much longer before then, and it just slowly got cut shorter and shorter until it was the length of the picture. Ryuichi-san was completely understanding of Gakkun's hair issue and they seemed to bond over that. Only, of course, Gakkun's hair has basically always looked good, whereas Ryuichi-san's biggest haircut was a gift from the heavens.

After that, they all lined up to perform their impromptu song for Ryuichi-san. This time, they shoved Shin-chan to the end of the line to go last. It was a good idea, since Shin-chan's was really sweet and it seemed to kinda touch Ryuichi-san. Gakkun's was great this time. The lyrics were basically, "Banbanbanbanban kakkoii-yo Banbanbanbanban taihen-da-shin-chan" and stuff like that for his entire time. It was funny. Then Ryuichi-san grabbed Tsuyoshi-kun's guitar to sing an impromptu "Arigatou" reply song. It was more guitar than anything else, and sounded like everything Ryuichi-san writes, but it was still pretty. Good for him~! But then was the musical performace of the show. And that was when I officially died. It was Ryuichi-san, performing "Glass", with the Domoto Band. Yes, I think you know what I'm getting at... the most prominent instrument used in "Glass" is piano. Gakkun plays the Domoto Bros. Band piano. A good portion of the song was Ryuichi-san singing with Gakkun on piano. @_@ I was so happy I didn't know what to do with myself. I literally just ended up staring blankly at the screen for long periods of time. Talk about Minako-chan's ultimate dream, I tell you... That's definitely one of the most moving songs I've ever heard. I'm soooooooo happy...

The show ended with all of the Domoto Bros. Band (except Gakkun) gathered around, talking about going out to karaoke together and making up excuses for Gakkun's absence (although it most probably had to do with the fact that he's doing more music show appearances now than ever, despite the fact that he's touring). But they made up for it in two ways. First of all, Shin-chan did a really really good Gakkun impression while pondering the suggestion that he perform Enka at karaoke. "[staring off a bit] Sou nee... Enka da naa..." It was really really right on. Everyone was so impressed at his ability to do a Gakkun impression. Secondly, Gakkun read the little "This program was sponsored by..." announcement at the very end of the program. It was reaaaaaaaaaaaally funny. Gakkun is not the person to do public service announcements... in any case, I'm floating I'm so happy. CHOOOOOOOOOOOU U-RE-SHIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII~! @_@ Too bad I didn't really get to relax all weekend though... T_T

I'm in hell. Not really, but they did have a pretty damned bad trio of idols on Hey Hey Hey last night. Hey Hey Hey had Kahala Tomomi, Puffy, Spitz, Dicot, and Chenpalo or something along those lines. Tomo-chan is an idol who was big years back in Japan before moving to the States for a year to "grow up." (She was, from the looks of old interviews, a pretty big freak before.) Anyway, she comes back to Japan all calm and telling stories about how she had to cook her own Ramen. Too bad she's still one of the worst idols I've ever heard. She's not a bad singer, I suppose, although her latest song is COMPLETELY under her range and makes her sound like an OL at karaoke. She's also the WORSE performer I've ever seen. She just kinda leans forward and sticks her neck out and doesn't blink and bobs for 4 minutes straight. It's pretty damned bad. I only got by during her performance and interview by making strange mental Kahala/Klaha connections. It gets pretty fun after a while... Speaking of bad performers, Puffy came on after her. I finally figured out which one is married to T.M.Revolution, since they mentioned him in the segment. I still don't know what their names are, but the one on the left is married to Takanori-san. Puffy was talking about how they went abroad all over to record and whatever Puffy does in their spare time. Macchan made some comment about Takanori-san being left home all alone and becoming a latch-key husband. They emphasized this point by putting up a little SD in kids clothing with a big key draw around its neck and sticking a pitiful puppy-eyed Takanori-san head on it. It was sooooo cute and sooooo funny; it almost made up for the fact that it reminded me that Takanori-san is indeed married to a somewhat cute I suppose if talentless idol. She'd better have good cooking or something... After them was Spitz. Spitz is, as Spitz always is, rather odd. I mean, two of the members don't talk, one of the members is mysteriously extremely punk despite the fact that everyone else in the band is like white bread, and their leader was still nearly hyperventilating at the stress of being on TV. He really really really doesn't like being on TV. He starts stuttering and breathing heavy. But the band's getting better. The weird one insists that he's gradually getting more and more normal, which I suppose is true, as his yellow mohawk was pretty short this time, and his bug glasses seemed less pronounced (though he still wore the white contacts). And the leader insists that he's actually getting better at being on TV, although he says that his hands still go cold. Downtown laughed at him and insisted that wasn't a sign of getting used to TV. Leader laughed nervously and looked like someone needed to hand him a paper bag. They have NOT seriously been in the business for 10 years... in any case their new song "Haruka" is simply BEAUTIFUL, I'm so in love with it. Go Spitz~! After them was Dicot with "A*I*TSU." I had already heard the song, of course. Why? It's the theme song to the "Super Gals! Kotobuki Ran" anime series. I adore that song, and it's apparently Dicot's debut single. They're extremely good and incredibly hysterical. They spent most of the interview feeling up Downtown. Downtown complained to them, at which point one of them shouted back that she wanted to touch Hama-chan lots. Downtown seemed to like them. After Dicot was Chenpalo or something like that. In any case, they were okay musicicians but simply hysterical in interview. One of them also attacked Macchan, making him shout out why in the world was their day the sexual harrassment day. The interview was great, and the song didn't suck in the least...

Sunday night's Musix was pretty damned funny. It was the "Interview Special" for Musix, which is shocking since they've only been on air for like half a year at the very very most. Anyway, there were three main highlights. First was when Tsuji-chan, Kago-chan, and Gotou "Gotsan" Maki were competing for sushi. Tsuji-chan and Kago-chan are the two ultra cute newbie 12 year olds of MM. They're also, since they're 12, both pigs. Tsuji-chan especially, but anyway, they both literally just stared at the sushi with pained expressions and their eyes glazed over. The rest of Morning Musume was laughing hysterically at them; both of them were too entraced by the sushi to notice. It was soooooooooo funny. When Kago-chan finally won the sushi, Tsuji-chan looked like she was going to cry... Later on they showed an interview with MiniMoni. Yaguchi-leader is the oldest at 18, and she insisted that she was an adult. Tsuji-chan insisted that she was grown up, too, because she could ride the trains all by herself. They all laughed at her, but then they found out that Kago-chan CAN'T ride the trains by herself yet. She's old enough to sell millions in records, but she can't ride the freaking train. Kyai~n just went off about how cute that was. Kago-chan pouted and looked really adorable. Finally, something to make any interview special worthwhile, GACKT~! Yes, GACKT~! They apparently had to cut out part of his interview when he came on, but it was something about how he likes throwing surprise birthday parties for people. They were asking what he did for a surprise, and he said, well for instance, they get the birthday person there. They have him stand inbetween Gackt and someone else who's in on things. The other person will say something like, "Nanda yo." Gackt responds with something rude. And the two, with the birthday person in the middle, start up a fight. He says that they keep going until the person in the middle tries to calm them down. "Calm down, don't get mad, okay..." At which point Gackt and the others turn to him and sing, "Happy Birthday to you....." The Musix hosts couldn't stop laughing; they nearly fell off their couches at that one.

Congratulations to Ishihashi-san and Nakai-san, as their show "Utaban" had their 200th episode on Thursday. WAI~! OMEDETO~! They had nothing but a bunch of interview clips from Utada Hikaru, SMAP, Nakazawa Yuuko, Gotou Maki, PuchiMoni, MiniMoni, Tanpopo, Onizuka Chihiro, 0930, GACKT~!, and Yaen. I was sooooooo happy. The entire thing was funny as hell, from Gotou Maki snorking down bowls of soup so that she can pet an iguana, to Ishihashi-san doing the MiniMoni dance, to Yaen... wel being Yaen. My favorites had to be Utada Hikaru, SMAP, and, of course, GACKT~!. Utada Hikaru's was fascinating, since she has perfect English and is apparently studying at Columbia. O_o She's just amazing; I have so much respect for her. Plus, if that isn't enough reason to like her, her favorite guy is apparently Okada-kun of V6. GO V6~! ^_^ Anyway, as SMAP and V6 are both from the hell that is Johnny's Entertainment, Nakai knew that V6 was recording something on the next stage. So as a good Oniisan, he ran over, fetched Okada, and dragged him back to the set to meet Utada Hikaru. She was simply gaping and couldn't seem to manage a word for the longest time. Nakai-oniisan was sooooooooooo pleased with himself and seemed determined to set the two up. Utada Hikaru was just in shock the whole time, while Okada seemed mainly confused, and didn't seem to believe that he was Utada Hikaru's favorite entertainer. And Nakai-niisan was still soooooo pleased with himself. The SMAP parts were hysterical, mainly SMAP coming onto Utaban in the early days and dishing out dirt on Nakai-leader. I've never laughed so hard; those guys are plain funny. Nakai could barely sit straight when Kimutaku and Shingo started going off about what Nakai was saying the last time he was drunk, and everyone seemed impressed at how long Kimutaku and Goro's staring contest went (it apparently went on even longer than usual). They're just really funny guys. And of course, GACKT~!. It was his infamous appearance on Utaban that had both hosts howling with laughter. They, of course, skipped the part where Gackt talked about Nakai's beautiful smile, but they just did the part about the meat and 4 day cooking, and the spinning piano. I still can't get over the fact that all music shows use scary font for Gackt's parts, but that's okay. I'm so glad to have at least part of that interview on tape, at least. It's just the damned funniest thing I've ever seen in my life, as Gackt goes off and the Utaban boys howl with laughter. WAI~!