fields of maiZe and berryZ

About two weeks ago, the Wonderful Hearts 2008 Summer Concert was released, and I must say I had been looking forward to seeing this concert ever since I saw the setlist back in July. First off - Buono!’s new single (which I obviously hadn’t heard yet) was on the list, and secondly, KIOKU NO MEIRO!!!! OMG HIGH-KING! YES PLEASE!!! … XD Yea. Anyway, I’ve watched the concert and reviewed it, and I must say that while the beginning and the end (not including the last song) were a little bit less exciting, the rest of the concert - with a HUGE exception at one point (I’m sure you’ll notice where) was awesome and highly enjoyable!

So without further ado, here is the fields edition of a Hello! Project 2008 Summer Wonderful Hearts Kouen ~Hishochi de Date Itashima SHOW~ concert review!

1. OPENING

2. Natsu LOVE Romance
The concert opens with the H!P Eggs dancing around on stage with a blue sheet, and swimming like fish… o_O Okay….

I was surprised to see that Berryz Koubou got centre stage for the opening group poses. It probably means absolutely nothing, but seeing how central Mornig Musume is, it was highly unexpected. The song is lip synced, and I have to say that the song was not the slightest bit familiar to me when I listened to it.

Well, Koha definitely had her coffee (and probably 3 bags of candy) this morning… XD

3. Manatsu no Kousen
I absolutely love this song. Risa did this song solo at Morning Musume’s Spring concert tour and that totally made my day when I watched it. This is one of my favourite old school Momusu songs, and it upset me here that it was also lip synced. I’m a big tennis fan, but the dancing with tennis racquets was a little weird for me. There was this one part where the girls are all swinging and bouncing, and Risa really gets into it. Quite amusing to watch.

4/5. VTR - Member Introduction / MC1
My second surprise for the concert was Atsuko’s appearance in the opening MV. Where’d Mari go? When was the last time Atsuko was an MC for a H!P concert? I can’t say with 100% certainty who MCed with Makoto in the last few H!P concerts, but I really feel like it hasn’t been Atsuko.

6. Edo no Temari Uta II (C-ute)
I don’t listen to this song much, but I really do like it. Doing this review, I just realized that I never reviewed this C-ute single…. :O How in the world did I let that happen? I mean, come on! Chisato finally got her first solo line in a C-ute a-side, and of course, she totally rocked it at the concert! I was glad to see this song was live. Usually, when the girls have the hand held mics, they’re singing live.. Headset mics are a little more iffy on the lives. Sometimes, they sing parts live and others are lip synced, or the entire thing is lip synced. But this was a good performance, and CHISATO!!!! <3

7. Namida no Iro (C-ute)
The girls performed this song well… Or should I say Maimi and Airi performed this song very well, seeing as this song is the Maimi/Airi show. But, I have to say that watching Maimi dance to this song in her Edo outfit amuses me greatly. The hotness effect that her Namida no Iro outfit brought is totally lost in this big red monstrosity of a costume that Maimi has to wear for this song. I mean, for goodness sake, that dress eats her up! I’m sure many Maimi fanboys (and girls) are upset to not see Maimi thighs in this performance.

8. Papancake (Tsukishima Kirari starring Kusumi Koharu
… I had been able to avoid listening to this song until now. I am not rewatching this performance to comment further. Note the headset mic. Imagine that, Koha lip syncing? :O Gasp! I’m shocked. I’m sorry… I’ll stop with the Koha hate now. Her voice just puts me in a bad place. XD I’m not very fond of this song. I actually find some of her other songs okay, I mean, if I forget the fact that it’s Koha singing. I enjoy some of her tunes. But this song does absolutely nothing for me.

9. Anataboshi (Milky Way)
Here’s another lip synced number. You know, watching the PV for Milky Way’s new single made me realize that I really don’t like Koha as well as the blue girl’s singing voices. So… yea. Poor Yuu. She’s not bad..

10. Monkey Dance (Berryz Koubou)
I’ve seen pictures from the concert, so I knew they weren’t wearing the monkey suits here. Seriously, if they did, I would have cried for them. But goodness, these outfits are ugly too. I mean, Maimi’s outfit in Edo is large, but it’s not ugly. If you took out the puff, it’d be quite lovely, actually. But these things are so ugly! Why is it that at near the end of the song, Risako doesn’t have to head bang like the rest of the girls and instead just gets to pump her fist… What’s up with that? It just enables her to continue with the lazy dance. All the girls sounded quite good in the performance.

11. Dschinghis Khan (Berryz Koubou)
And here is the song with the dance that brought about that terrible photo of Risako. I won’t post it here, for it’s quite terrible and I don’t know what possessed UFA to ever let that photo off of the memory card it was taken on. In Risako’s first solo line, she sounds out of breath. She barely held her note. Miya, on the other hand, handled her line quite well. <3 And I think I say this every time Berryz perform this song, but even though Chinami doesn’t get any solo lines in this song, she owns it every time. This is Chinami’s song.

12. MC2 (Berryz Koubou)

13. Resonant Blue (Morning Musume)
I’m not a big fan of these outfits… I think the mix of polka dots and then criss-cross corset thing just doesn’t sit well with me. The quality of Koharu’s voice seriously messes with the feel of this song. But Risa with her “Oooh baby”s and whatnot is totally rocking it out.

14. Mikan (Morning Musume)
This is such a feel good song. And there’s actually a little bit of line distribution in this song.. Though Risa’s line gets cut out since it’s a short version. Not much else to say on this one.

15. MC (Niigaki Risa, Kamei Eri, Michishige Sayumi)

16. KoiING (Takahashi Ai)
I absolutely adore this song. I featured it on my second podcast where I played some of my favourite H!P b-sides. Aichan sings the song beautifully, which is no surprise. She gets a few Eggs to do some background dancing and singing for her, and that’s totally cool by me, ’cause really, that’s what the Eggs are there for, right? … However, I will soon have a lot of beef to share with the background singers/dancers in the upcoming songs.

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17. Hajimete Kuchibiru (Linlin, Suzuki Airi, Ogawa Saki)
This is one of my favourite Aya songs, and the girls here do it justice. I’m not surprised with Airi. She’s usually awesome as it. This little egg… Wow, she’s quite impressive. Only 12 years old, and cute as a button! Now Linlin, her voice is not my favourite, but she holds her own on this song. What I like here is that all the girls get a chance to sing. You’ll see why I’m happy the girls all get to sing here in a moment. Though, with Airi there, you HAVE to let her sing… XD

18. Chu! Natsu Party (Michishige Sayumi, Sugaya Risako)
The concert shuffle group makers love this pair. Robokiss, and now this one… Hmm. Quite the cutesy song, and I don’t find that Risako has a very cutesy voice, but she does okay here. Sayumi obviously has a very cutesy voice, so she’s set for this song. They’re wearing fluffy dresses that I’m not too fond of, but meh. That happens through most of the concert anyway.

19. MC (Umeda Erika, Hagiwara Mai)

20. C\C (Cinderella\Complex) (High-King)
Ahhh! High-King! I have so much love for this group, it’s not even funny. I saw the headset mics and was highly disappointed, but then they started singing, and IT’S NOT LIP SYNCED!!! That totally made my day. I was glad to see that the song wasn’t cut down. The girls all give strong performances here, and OMG… The 2 leaders and Captain are just so hot dancing this dance!

21. Kioku no Meiro (High-King)
I seriously had a heart attack when I saw this song was on the play list back in July. As much as I love the a-side for this single, the b-side is what completely won me over. I love that Maimi, Saki and Yuuka actually get a lot of spotlight in this song. I have to say that Yuuka’s cheeks are so cutely flushed during this performance. I was a little bit disappointed with the dance for the song, mainly because they spent some quality dancing time running the length of the stage, and once they got to the end of the stage, they did a lot of walking around in a circle. But what there was of the dance was awesome! And Yuuka held her own really well during her solo, despite a slightly wavering start to it. Yay Yuuka!

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22. MC (High-King / Mano Erina) Debut

23. Manopiano (Mano Erina)
Now, I have to say that I’m not a huge Manoeri fan. Her voice does absolutely nothing for me. It feels really unpolished and she doesn’t hold her notes. It makes the song feel really choppy for me (I have the same problem with her newer single ‘Lucky Aura’). Though, it is nice to see a H!P member playing an instrument during a concert (and something more substantial than the split second of what Aya did in her ‘AYA The Witch’ concert tour).

24. Tokonatsu Musume (Niigaki Risa, Kamei Eri, Mitsui Aika)
The girls are all cute here, and they get a pretty even distribution of lines, which is nice to see. I’ll take whatever I can get of more Risa singing time! I never followed Coconuts Musume much, but I like this song. It’s obviously got quite the summer feel, seeing as it was originally done by the Hawaiian H!P group.

25. Tropica~l Koishite~ru (Junjun, Sudou Maasa, Kumai Yurina, Okai Chisasto, Hagiwara Mai, Arihara Kanna)
I saw this and got all excited, because I love Aya songs (obviously), I’d get to see more of Junjun performing, and Chisato was also in this shuffle… And then I watched it and only Junjun got solo lines. WTF? I mean, at least Mai got to do the monologue, but seriously. The kids are big names in H!P now. And all of them definitely have seniority over Junjun time wise - screw the fact that Junjun is the only Morning Musume member in this shuffle. And yet, the kids all get shafted and demoted to background singers and dancers… BAAAAAH.

26. Kosui (Tanaka Reina, Shimizu Saki, Tokunaga Chinami, Umeda Erika, Nakajima Saki)
You think Tropica~l Koishite~ru got me upset… Well, that’s nothing compared to this song. It started up, and I was so excited because this is one of my favourite Melon Kinenbi songs. I have to admit that I haven’t actually followed Melon Kinenbi much. I know a few of their singles and I love some of them… But I actually first heard this song during the H!P 2007 Winter ~Wonderful Hearts Otome Gokoro~ concert where Ishikawa Rika, Risa, Eri and Sayumi sang it. That was where I fell in love with this song. I actually went and watched the original version and didn’t like it so much because it’s a Shibata Ayumi fest - nothing really against Ayumi, but I often find it depressing seeing how the other Melon girls get shafted in songs… I mean, at least for singles, Morning Musume only had Furusato for a single which was really a Nacchi solo with the other girls as back up. Off the top of my head, Melon has this song and Akai Freesia (another one of my favourite Melon songs, actually) as Ayumi solos.

Anyway, I’ve gotten way off topic. Seriously. Here’s another song where the kids get shafted for their Morning Musume “sempai” - though again, all the kids doing backup here have been around longer than Miss Tanaka Reina. I’m sorry. This just truly irks me. Like I was saying for Aichan’s solo of Koi ING, the Eggs are trainees… Their job is to be backup right now. But seriously… I mean, sure - all the leads from the Kids group are showcased elsewhere - Miya, Airi and Momoko in Buono!; Airi a second time with Hajimete Kuchibiru wo Kasaneta Yoru; Risako with Chu! Natsu Party; and Maimi with High-King (and luckily Captain gets some time to shine there too)… But otherwise, the other H!P Kids only get really focus time when with their respective groups - in the individual group songs… As I actually go through this, it’s pretty depressing for those other girls. I have lost most of my interest in Morning Musume (only Aichan and Risa really spark my interest over there right now), and yet even their background girls get spotlight in the Wonderful Hearts concert… It’s just very frustrating as an H!P Kids fan….

Um yea… That was a long rant. Basically - BOOO TO THE REINA SOLO!! … And on with the concert. - And a little aside: here’s the performance of this song that I absolutely adore.

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27. Gachinko de Ikou! (Buono!)
I have no idea how Wendy of Renai Revolution 21 can be bored with Buono! right now. As I said in my Gachinko review, this song is my favourite Buono! song thus far (even over Rottara Rottara, though I love that song as well). Buono! is seriously my favourite H!P group at the moment - Miya’s actually getting some lines here (unlike Berryz Koubou’s latest single where she gets a total of 1 line! - the least of anyone…. on an a-side…. My world is turning upside down… >_<).

I keep going off on tangents… XD Anyway, awesome song, awesome performance. I love Miya’s outfit… She looks so good in it! And there’s another reason to love Buono! - the girls aren’t made to wear horrendous outfits. XD Instead they get cool/cute/sexy outfits to wear. So much better than monkey suits, or those funny looking yellow/green outfits from Dschinghis Khan. Airi really doesn’t have much to complain about in the costume department…

28. Kiss! Kiss! Kiss! (Buono!)
Yay for Kiss! Kiss! Kiss! We get Buono! back into it’s PROPER formation - with Miya in the middle. XD All the girls are wonderful once again… Buono! is just filled with so much awesome, it’s ridiculous! Miya sings her “netereba ii” a little bit flat…. But that’s okay. It’s a lovely high energy performance by the lovely high energy group.

29. MC (Buono!)

30. Egao YES Nude (Morning Musume)
I don’t really have much to say about this performance. All the girls were pretty good… I just never really got into this song. I dunno why, but the song feels so low energy to me, being surrounded by Kiss! Kiss! Kiss! and Massara Blue Jeans.

31. Massara Blue Jeans (Berryz Koubou, C-ute)
And here we go into Berryz vs. C-ute battle concert - take 2! However, what I noticed here is that Miya didn’t have any solo lines in this performance… I’m almost positive that she had some in the battle concert. The only Berryz member that got solo lines here was Risako from what I saw. I really liked Maimi’s performance here - particularly her solo after running down the stage. And her dancing… I like watching Maimi dance this song most. - Oh, and a little side note: Berryz got the short end of the stick costume-wise YET AGAIN. I think their dresses are ugly and make them look frumpy. BAAAHHHH. C-ute gets a little bit of frills which I’m not particularly keen on either, but it’s not layers upon layers of frill…

32. Special Generation (Berryz Koubou, C-ute)
And now what annoys me here is the fact that while BK (meaning Miya) got shafted of their lines in Massara Blue Jeans, C-ute definitely still gets lines in Special Generation…. I amuse myself with how territorial I get watching these concerts. XD Okay… I say this every time this happens, but… Miya’s “woah yea’s” >>>>> Airi’s “woah yea’s”. Okay. Done. XD

33. Love & Peace! HERO ga Yattekita.
And here, we get another example of the Kids being back up to Morning Musume. I realize this is a Morning Musume song… But SHARE GOSH DARN IT!! However, I do enjoy the song. Unlike Egao YES Nude, it definitely keeps up with the energy level of the songs before it.

34. MC7
Just a little comment on this segment - Atsuko’s imitations are quite cute and amusing.

35. Ame no Furanai Hoshi de wa Aisenai Darou?
The closing song is a beautiful song. I love the harmonies in this song… But I have to say - poor little Eggs not singing during the verses. XD And if you watch closely, just a little bit before the pandas’ solos, there’s this one Egg behind and between Manoeri and Aika that looks really hesitant to sing… The other Eggs are singing their little hearts out, and this one girl looks out of place and awkward. I must say that Junjun and Linlin’s solos were absolutely lovely! I quite enjoy Junjun’s voice in general. As I stated above, I’m not usually so keen on Linlin’s voice, but this solo really suited her.

So, I this concert to be quite enjoyable. I wasn’t too enthused with the opening 2 numbers - mainly because they were lip synced; Manatsu no Kousen is an awesome song, and the energy of it hits you better when the girls are truly singing it out. I also wasn’t too excited by Egao YES Nude to Special Generation - the Momusu section for the reasons mentioned above, and the BK/C-ute section because it was done in the battle concert already.

My favourite section would have to be the High-King segment for this concert. Why? Because they were an awesome subgroup, but were unfortunately a one-shot subgroup… Meaning, this is probably the first and ONLY time that we will get to see these girls perform these songs together in concert. MAYBE in a few years they’d have a reunion performance (following in the footsteps of Aa!) but I highly doubt it. And I’m POSITIVE that we will never see ‘Kioku no Meiro’ performed live again. I mean, the fact that they performed it here boggled my mind because the b-sides to subgroup singles are generally NEVER performed at collaboration concert such as this one. Have you seen ANY of Buono!’s b-sides performed in a Wonderful Hearts or full H!P concert yet? … Or even a C-ute or Berryz b-side for that matter… Didn’t think so.

My least favourite part… Well, I hope that was obvious… But that’s okay, ’cause it let me put up one of my favourite parts from one of my favourite concerts (though Hare Ame Nochi Suki from that concert is up there too - but that’s mainly for Miya and Maimi, rather than the entire performance). Rika <3! Risa <3! … Eri and Sayu… Okay, I can deal with you guys. XD In general, all the girls get lines, and it’s not just the Reina show.

Anyway, this was definitely a fun watch. What would have made it so much more enjoyable would have been if the Berryz girls were given a better wardrobe… I mean, come on! The covers for C-ute’s upcoming single have been released, and SERIOUSLY!!! Compare those to the Madayade covers… Someone out there in the H!P closet has song evil grudge against Berryz.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, November 5th, 2008 at 2:50 am and is filed under Concert, H!P Eggs, Hello! Project, Review, Wonderful Hearts. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.