Anyway, here are my answers! Enjoy! ^_^

Gender: Female

Approximate age: 21-30

1. What was the first pop song you remember liking?

The first pop song I liked completely of my own choosing (meaning having no influence from my parents, and not from watching Kids Incorporated – thus being current music) was Ace of Base’s “The Sign”. It released in North America in 1994, and I remember when I first heard people talking about the song at recess, I was completely against it. Don’t ask me why, ’cause I have absolutely no idea.

2. What bands/music groups/singers did you grow up listening to?
I grew up listening to a lot of music my parents listened to such as The Beatles, Chicago, Peter Paul and Mary, Bread, The Eagles and The Monkeys. As I started listening to my own things, I picked up the boybands ex. Backstreet Boys (first), NSync (after I accepted the fact that it was okay to like both groups), Mandy Moore, The Moffatts, Britney Spears (her first album only), Spice Girls, Will Smith, Ace of Base (of course) and Hanson (my favourite band of all time)!

3. What bands/music groups/singers were popular when you grew up? (ie. Were on the radio a lot)
Backstreet Boys, NSync, Britney Spears, The Moffatts (I’m from Canada. I don’t know how popular they were in the States, if at all), Blink 182, Hanson (their first album, at least, circa 1997), Sum 41, Spice Girls, etc.

4. When (What year) did you first hear Jpop that you liked? What groups were popular?
Probably around 1997 for Sailor Moon music, but I didn’t look up other Jpop at the time. So I’m not sure who was popular around that time (though that was the year of Morning Musume’s debut). Next up was either BoA or Ayumi Hamasaki (in 1998), and outside of them, I have no idea who was popular in that time.

5. What kind of Jpop/Jrock did you initially like?
Ayumi Hamasaki and BoA of the late 90s. I didn’t get into Hello! Project until 2001.

6. Do you still like said kind of Jmusic?
I haven’t followed Ayu’s career since around the time of “I am…” and “Rainbow” (2002). It seems like H!P consumed me at that point.
i haven’t followed BoA’s career all that closely either for quite some time. The last BoA single I really got into was “Shine We Are” and “The Love Bug” (a collaboration with m-flo) before “Eat You Up” came out… Though, “Eat You Up” doesn’t count as Jpop does it? XD I bought her debut English album at a local HMV. I must say it felt awesome to buy a BoA album from the mall.

7. Do you still listen to the music in your native language (or some other language) as often as Jpop?
I get into moods where I listen to a load of English music. Hanson is always played intermittently during my Jpop kicks. Other English artists I listen to are Mandy Moore, Eva Avila, Lea Salonga (when I get into my musical listening moods), Bury the Bully, Coldplay, Jack Johnson, KT Tunstall, Melissa O’Neil, Michael Tolcher, Mike Doughty, etc.

8. If so, what other kind of music to you enjoy listening to?
I mainly listen to pop and rock. There are the random songs from other genres that I’ll get into, but I don’t listen to other genres regularly.

9. Do you go to concerts/performances of your favorite groups from your country? Do you go to ones for J-pop groups?
I have been to every one of Hanson’s concerts that they’ve held in Toronto. I’ve been to a total of 7 or 8 Hanson concerts (if I’m counting correctly) in the 12 years that I’ve been a fan. Other musical acts I’ve seen live are Coldplay, The Backstreet Boys… Is that all?

I know that No Doubt is going on tour and will be doing their old school music in order to get inspiration for their next album. I would totally go to that concert, except they’re going to be in Toronto when I’m on vacation in Florida. That realization was terribly depressing for me, for I LOVE No Doubt’s “Tragic Kingdom” album.

10. What do you think about the Jpop industry’s future? Do you think that you’ll continue to like it for another 5 years?
I really have no idea what I’ll like in another 5 years. From the acts I listen to now, I would say that I will follow anything that Matsuura Aya, Natsuyaki Miyabi, Takahashi Ai, Niigaki Risa and Angela Aki does in the future. As for new acts, well, we’ll have to see what the future brings, right?

11. What’s your favorite group?
For English music, it’s Hanson. For Japanese, it’s Buono!

12. Is your favorite song/single/album a Jpop one? Is it from your favorite artist?
This is a difficult question. I don’t have an overall favourite album ever. If I had to pick, I’d have to pick 2, one from Hanson (The Walk) and another from Buono! (Café Buono!). I loved all the songs from both albums (with varying degrees for each song, but there wasn’t a song I didn’t enjoy), which is a rarity for me. As for a favourite song, I wouldn’t even know where to begin in choosing one.

13. Do you like pop from outside of Japan, such as Hannah Montana?
I don’t follow much pop from outside of Japan. The pop acts I did follow don’t release much of anything these days. However, I don’t follow Hannah Montana, and The Jonas Brothers DO NOT equal the new Hanson. Are you friggin’ kidding me?! One of them doesn’t even play an instrument when the perform! BUUUUH! … Don’t get me started on that comparison. XD

14. Do you like musicals? If so, what’s your favorite, and one you really want to see? (This one is just to humor Midori)
I LOVE musicals. Lea Salonga is my one of favourite singers ever. If you don’t know who she is, you’ve definitely heard her if you’ve watched the Disney movies “Aladdin” and “Mulan”. She does the singing voices for Jasmine and Mulan. My favourite musical is Miss Saigon (which Lea Salonga had the original starring role in). I also love Les Miserables, Phantom of the Opera (my first favourite musical), Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, The Sound of Music, Avenue Q and We Will Rock You. Thoe are all that I can recall from the top of my head. I’ve seen all of those musicals I listed.

I’d really like to see Miss Saigon again. The version I saw was a travelling show, so I don’t think I got the full effect of it. Also, they lyrics were changed in the show. I don’t know if it’s been changed from the original London Cast recording, but I didn’t like how they cut the finale song.

Also, as I was looking for pics to insert into this post, I stumbled upon this YouTube video of Lea auditioning for Miss Saigon. She was so young! <3

It’s time for another installation of Wota Wonderings. Volume 4 was delayed by a month due to my brother being swamped with finals for school, but it’s better late than never, right?

The question posed this month is:

Hoping we’re not all shallow wotas, imagine your favourite idol (or musical personality) switched bodies with someone you don’t find “visually pleasing”, would it affect your love for that idol in any way/shape/form?

I think the best way to look at this question would be to look at my top 4 girls of Hello! Project at the moment.

From left to right: Natsuyaki Miyabi, Takahashi Ai, Niigaki Risa, Yajima Maimi

First let’s take a look at the remaining 5th generation of Morning Musume. When these two first joined Morning Musume, I was just getting in to Hello! Project. I hadn’t watched the 5th gen auditions at this point, so my first viewing of them was when Mr. Moonlight was released. Unlike 6th gen (particularly Reina) who got solo lines in their first single with Morning Musume, 5th gen had practically nothing (with the exception of Risa’s opening line, which rotated between the other girls at other performances some times). So, what were my first thoughts on these two girls?

For Aichan, I was not particularly fond of her, for I found her very awkward looking. Was it the hairstyle? The ears? I’m not sure, but I have to admit that I didn’t find her very attractive and that threw me off from liking her initially. But come the next single they were involved in, I heard Aichan sing her “hontou no kimochi wa kitto tsutawaru hazu” line at a live performance and I immediately fell in love with her. She still looked awkward as heck to me, and it wasn’t until much later when she truly blossomed into the beauty that she is now, but with that one line, she immediately moved up to near the top of my Morning Musume ranking.

I have to say that for Risa, while I thought she was a cutie, she stayed in the bottom half of my Morning Musume ranking for some time. This had nothing to do with her look, but rather her voice was quite painful to listen to in her early days. In the same performance where I fell in love with Aichan, I cringed with Risa’s follow up “We’re Alive” line. It wasn’t until I heard Risa sing her solo version of “Furusato” (in 2003?) when my opinion changed for her. I think I was kind of amazed that she wasn’t yelling for once. Now, I find her voice absolutely soothing, and it’s one of those voices for me that can calm me down anytime I need calming (she’s on a short of people who include Miyabi, Matsuura Aya, Taylor Hanson, Lea Salonga and Angela Aki).

In regards to Miyabi, I fell in love with her voice first, from listening to her in Munasawagi Scarlet. I knew she was in Aa!, but I didn’t follow the Kids until October 2007, after re-discovering Miya. It really was Miya’s voice that pulled me in, for I wasn’t too fond of her hairstyle in the Munasawagi Scarlet PV. Though, I did watch VERY BEAUTY soon after that, and she was quite pretty in that one. I think a lot of H!P fans just started to acknowledge Miya’s hotness fairly recently – with the release of Buono!’s “Gachinko de Ikou!” if I’m recalling correctly.

Finally we get to Maimi, and unlike the three previous girls I’ve spoken about, I did not start liking Maimi because of her voice. Back in her days of ZYX, she looked really awkward. Nothing near the stunning beauty she is today. I wasn’t hugely fond of ZYX in the first place ’cause back then, because Shimizu Saki and Tsugunaga Momoko of Berryz Koubou annoyed the heck out of me in that group. So, I really started paying attention Maimi after watching C-ute’s Tokkaiko Junjou video, and I have to admit that she was already quite beautiful at that time. Airi was initially my favourite C-ute member, but Maimi slowly worked her way past Airi and Chisato to make it to my top C-ute spot. I think the trigger for me was a mix of watching her spacey, absent-mindedness in video and the photoshoot photos of her 1st UTB feature.

So, in most cases, my favourites have come about due to their vocal abilities. It’s not my fault that these girls have grown to be stunning young women. If they switched bodies with someone less attractive, they’d still be my favourite girls simply because I love their voices. Though, I think Maimi would drop a bit in my list, or at least drop back to the #3 spot in C-ute, for if she wasn’t as gorgeous as she is, Chisato and Airi would definitely hold an edge over her with their voices.

Also, I think I should mention my current favourite J-music artist outside of the UFA umbrella, Angela Aki. She’s probably the least glamourous pop-singer ever. Sure, some of her album or single covers have her in slightly dressy outfits, but have you seen her live? She’s in jeans and a jersey or hoodie. The first live I watched of her was on youtube of the Final Fantasy Voices concert where Angela’s in jeans, a t-shirt and a zip up hoodie. She sits at her piano and has a full orchestra in formal attire behind her, and I was just amazed. I’ve talked with my brother about this and his response to me is always, “With a voice like hers, she can wear whatever she wants.” And I have to agree with him on that.

Though, while she obviously doesn’t dress to impress (unlike the H!P girls who are almost always [minus monkey suits] glammed up), I think she’s quite pretty. But I think it’s quite obvious that on the Angela Aki front, her looks have very little to do with my love for her and her music.

All right, so the title of this post was a little more dramatic than the actual post was, but that’s okay. Here are some other Wota Wondering answers for this month:

Wota Wonderings 4 – Are You a Shallow Wota (Solo Space)
WW04 – Are Looks Everything? (Tsuyoki de Yukoze!)
Wota Wonderings: On looks versus abilities… (boylikesmusic)
Wota Wonderings 004:Looks Or Talent? you decide (take off is now!)
[Wota Wonderings 04] It’s what’s outside that counts. (Renai Revolution 21)
Wota Wonderings 004 – Are You In The Shallow End Of The Pool? (Selective Hearing)

In the few months that I’ve been listening to Angela, I have slowly started to build my Angela Aki collection. I have her latest album, ANSWER, and the one previous to that, TODAY. I also have her single “Kokoro no Senshi” because one of the b-sides is her version of “Eyes on Me” which was obviously a “must-get” for me. XD

My current Angela Aki collection

Now, my two most recent Angela Aki purchases are my favourite ones thus far. The one that arrived first (about a week and a half ago) were her 2 concerts which I purchased on blu-ray. I love HD.. It’s beautiful to watch, and seeing as I can’t actually attend an Angela Aki concert at the moment, blu-ray will have to do. HMV Japan has a sale going on where buying 2 music DVDs or blu-rays gets you a 23% discount, so I went for it. The price even with shipping was cheaper than buying through yesasia, which is where I usually go for my J-music needs.

But what has really got me excited was the package that arrived today… Angela Aki’s piano books for her albums Home and TODAY!! <3 I made the order for these two books on March 13th... It took nearly a month for HMV Japan to find the books from suppliers, but they did and it finally shipped out on the 12th!! ^_^ It would have been nice if they would have arrived yesterday - that would have been an awesome birthday gift (one of my many gifts to myself XD), but I guess a day late isn't too bad, right? I mean, I got my gift from my grandma today too, so HMV Japan is as cool as my grandma. ^_^

I've already gotten started on learning some songs. When I made the purchase, I told myself the first song I'd play would be Rain (I absolutely love that song), and I followed through on that! Rain is actually quite a simple song to play. I can already get halfway through the song without too many mistakes. However, what I'm finding is that I'm having the hardest time singing along and staying on beat. XD It's like my brother playing the guitar and singing at the same time. However, I will make it my mission to master this song and be able to sing along with it too (I should learn the lyrics, I guess). After Rain, we'll see what song comes next - "Tashikani" maybe? Or possibly "Kiss me Goodbye".

So, this was a bit different from my usual posts, but I was just so excited to get these piano books that I thought I’d share my excitement with you all. XD Don’t worry, we’ll be back to the regularly scheduled H!P post soon (not that I’ve been posting all that regularly). I’m almost done my Elder Club graduation concert review, just a few touch ups and screenshots are required. I’m hoping my DVD comes in tomorrow (also from HMV Japan). ^_^

This month’s topic:

The music industry has had many tie-ins with animes and doramas. Of those tie-ins, did one manage to capture your interest and get you hooked on their music? Or, did one manage to change your perspective of a musical act?

As a 2nd part, did you end up watching the anime or dorama in its entirety or give up once the musical act’s tie-in ceased?

And for you non-anime/dorama watchers, have there been any CM tie-ins that had a similar effect on you?

My first real brush with J-music came from watching the anime Sailor Moon. Back in 1995, I stumbled upon this annoying wide-mouthed crybaby on TV with tearing pouring from her eyes and I was intrigued. I quickly became engrossed in this cartoon with a different drawing style from what I was used to and immediately started looking up anything I could related to it. I became interested in the Japanese version of the show when I realized that the North American version had cut some episodes due to irrelevance and/or “inappropriateness” for American television.

As I looked up information on the Japanese version, I found some image songs and was quite interested to see that the seiyuu were the ones who actually sang for their characters, unlike in the NA version where a singer would be brought in to sing for the characters (ex. Sailor Mars singing “Oh Starry Night”).

I fell in love with the main song of the Sailor Moon R Movie “Moon Revenge”, and I was able to find some of the individual Senshi’s image songs, like Sailor Venus’ (my favourite Senshi) “Route Venus” and Sailor Neptune’s “Unmei wa Utsukushiku” which is a beautiful song which I still randomly feel like listening to today.

Moon Revenge – The Peach Hips (LOL Sailor Moon R movie. So dramatic. XD)

Unmei wa Utsukushiku – Katsuki Masako

Though I never really followed up with these seiyuu after watching the series, they hold a special place in my personal musical history, for this was the beginning of my musical journey into the J-music sphere.

Moving away from anime, a Jpop artist that I discovered through a video game and followed up with for at least a little while afterward was Hamasaki Ayumi.

I am a huge video game fan, particularly of the RPG genre. So, back in 1999, bought the game Thousand Arms for the PlayStation. The game interested because me because in addition to it being an RPG, it also had a dating simulation aspect to the game – the main character would take girls out on dates through the game, and as your intimacy increased with each girl, you could forge more powerful weapons. I have to admit that this is one RPG that I never got very far into (unlike the Final Fantasy series where every installment that I’ve played, I’ve at least gotten to the last disc, if I haven’t beaten the game).

However, the opening theme for this song was “Depend on You” by Hamasaki Ayumi. It was quite surprising to have the original Japanese theme song for the US release, but I wasn’t about to complain because I fell in love with that song.

Hamasaki Ayumi – Depend on You (Thousand Arms Opening)

After that, the next Ayumi song I got into was “Boys & Girls” which was again featured in a video game – this one being Unison for the PlayStation 2. I had gotten the North American version of the game, and for whatever reason, my brother decided to look up the Japanese tracklist. There, he found out that Ayumi’s “Boys & Girls” was the song for KC and the Sunshine Band’s “That’s the Way (I Like It)”, and Morning Musume’s “Love Machine” was the Japanese song for Apollo 440’s “Stop the Rock”. Oh man, that Japanese track list was so much better than the North American version (and looking at this track list right now, LOL!! Dschinghis Khan was on the Japanese version too XD). At that point in time, my brother got me to listen to Boys & Girls because he really enjoyed that song, and he knew I liked Ayu from Thousand Arms. He didn’t introduce me to Morning Musume at that time, for he hadn’t been particularly impressed by “Love Machine”. We didn’t appreciate their being on the original Japanese track list until a few years later.

Hamasaki Ayumi – Boys & Girls (Sorry, I couldn’t find the PV for the song, or a clip from Unsion.. -_-; But awesome song)

I followed Ayu on and off for the new few years, loving quite a few of her album songs and singles. I stopped paying attention to Ayu in around 2003, with the last singles of hers with songs that I know being “&” and “Forgiveness”. Looking through her discography is getting me into an Ayu listening mood. I think I need to put on some “Real Me”, “Ourselves” and “Greatful days” now. XD

More recently, I have become a huge fan of Angela Aki. A few months ago, MorningBerryz wrote a post on her favourite final fantasy themes. In the midst of her favourites, which contained some of mine as well, she mentioned Angela Aki singing the theme for FFXII. Somehow, when I played through that game (and I beat FFXII), I never paid attention to the theme song. I think it may have been because I was a little upset with game for it’s lack of romance. XD But after reading that post of MB’s, I listened to the song and fell in love with Angela Aki’s voice.

Angela Aki’s “Kiss Me Good-Bye”

After that, I looked Angela up on youtube, and saw that she did her own version of my absolute favourite Final Fantasy theme song, “Eyes on Me” from FFVIII. I love Angela’s piano version of the song. I love the simplicity of just piano as the instrumental, and again her vocals are absolutely superb.

Angela Aki’s cover of “Eyes on Me” to FFVIII video (Squall & Rinoa <3)

So with respect to Angela Aki, I am a brand new fan, but I have quickly become enamoured with Angela. I got her latest album “ANSWER” and I’m sure I’ll be looking forward to any future releases by her.

Now, I didn’t cover much on anime like the original question asked. However, I find that with the songs I like from anime’s I don’t tend to follow the group afterwards. I only listen to the songs from the anime soundtrack. The one exception would be Buono!, but I was listening to them because they’re a part of Hello! Project (and Miyabi’s in that group) rather than because of Shugo Chara! I tend to watch anime for the anime rather than for a musical group who does the opening or ending theme.

There are obviously some musical acts I enjoy who do enjoy who have done anime themes, but I didn’t watch the anime to listen to their music and I didn’t get pulled into an anime (again, excluding Shugo Chara) because of a certain music group. I watched through most of Inu Yasha, but I wasn’t watching because artists/groups like Hamasaki Ayumi, BoA, Do As Infinity, Every Little Thing or Day After Tomorrow were singing the themes. I listened to those people outside of the anime and watched the anime for the story. And in most cases, I think it was my brother who got me listening to the musical acts (minus Ayumi in this particular bunch).

*EDIT: This is my bad, but I realized there is one anime that got me into a musical artist, and that would be RahXephon.

Oh Ayato, you hot anime man. <3

For all intents and purposes, RahXephon introduced me to Sakamoto Maaya, and while I didn’t follow her after watching RahXephon, I did love the music she did for the anime. “Hemisphere” is a wonderful song, one of my favourites of hers. Another of the RahXephon songs that I absolutely adore is “The Garden of Everything” which features Steve Conte

Sakamoto Maaya “Hemisphere” – RahXephon opening

Sakamoto Maaya feat. Steve Conte “Garden of Everything”

Like I said, I didn’t follow Maaya after watching RahXephon, but a few years later, while watching the anime Tsubasa Chronicle, I realized that Maaya sang the ending theme “Loop”, which made me feel reminiscent towards her RahXephon works and look up what other music she had done. And it when at this point that I realized that Maaya had also sung a song for Card Captor Sakura, which blew my mind because I loved a lot of Card Captor Sakura music. Anyway, Maaya is one of the few artists that I picked up through an anime intrigued me enough to find out what else she had done outside of the anime(s) that I discovered her in. So in her case, it was the anime that brought me to her, so of course I finished watching the series’ (though I actually dropped off of Tsubasa Chronicle at some point – I should finish off that series because I do love Syaoran and Sakura).

Sakamoto Maaya “Loop” – Tsubasa Chronicle 1st season ending

And now that I’ve pushed far too many youtube videos at all off you, I’m done! XD /EDIT*

Check out other responses to this month’s wota wonderings!
Wota Wonderings 003 – The Ties That Bind (Selective Hearing)
Wota Wonderings 3 – Tie-Ins (Solo Space)
Wota Wonderings: Mendol – where the guys are girls and the girls are hot. (boylikesmusic)
Wota Wonderings 003: It’s All Yui Horie’s Fault (Somewhat) (The Groove Music Life)
Wota Wonderings 003: Kirarin Revolution and Hot Guys (Merry Go Round)

I had a few technical difficulties, but meh. It’s done. It’s long, clocking in at around 1:07 ish. I rambled too much, and there isn’t THAT much J-pop talk in here… Some J-pop talk, some wotachat talk… Some responses to topics covered in pengie’s podcast. Ugh… The technical difficulties threw me off my train of thought…

All the music here is Hanson music, ’cause I’ve been itching to do a podcast featuring Hanson’s music. Tracklist as follows:

1. Yearbook – Hanson (Middle of Nowhere 1997)
2. Save Me – Hanson (This Time Around 2000)
3. Lost Without Each Other – Hanson (Underneath 2004)
4. In A Way – Hanson (The Walk 2007)

One note: I mentioned that I like being able to not have to talk like an adult on my blogs… That is not to say I don’t take the time to think about what I’m blogging. I do have my random gushy points, but I definitely put thought into most of my blog posts, and I hope that comes across, even though I use this as a escape from the troubles of life…

Hope you all enjoy my ramblings! XD

EDIT: Here are the links I said I’d add to this post… XD I forgot about them at 3 in the morning… (Heck, I almost forgot to upload the podcast… Oi…)

TOMS Shoes
AkebonoNoMyojo’s H!P Remixes

So to start this thing off right, I’ll share some nice eye candy of a hot J-music man – Yamamoto Ryohei! XD (And, as I went looking for a pic of him online, it seems he now goes by just Ryohei… My bad…)

Now that that’s been taken care of, on with the survey!

1. What was the first Japanese song that you ever listened to?

The first Japanese song that I ever listened to was probably Moonlight Densetsu from Sailor Moon back in 1996 or so. The first non-anime song that I listened to was Hamasaki Ayumi’s ‘Depend on You’. I heard it through a video game (the game was Thousand Arms, and I never ended up finishing that RPG) but she’s obviously not immediately related to video game music when she’s mentioned.

2. Did it inspire you to like that group/singer, or did it turn you away?

For the Sailor Moon related music, I listened to anything I could get my hands on. I still know the lyrics to Sailor Venus’ image songs, Sailor Netune’s ‘Unmei wa Utsukushiku’ and ‘Moon Revenge’ from the Sailor Moon R movie. Even though I don’t listen to them much anymore, I still randomly get the urge to pop it into a playlist (like right now… XD). As for Ayumi, I haven’t listened to any of her new stuff, but I listened to her a bit more for a while. I love ‘Boys and Girls’, ‘Grateful Days’ and ‘Ourselves’ to name just a few off the top of my head.

Unmei wa Utsukushiku – Katsuki Masako

Moon Revenge – The Peach Hips

3. What is the one song that you have been listening to for the longest time?

I’d have to say the one J-pop song that I have listened to constantly for the longest time (as in it’s almost always on my J-pop playlist) is Matsuura Aya’s ‘Love Namida Iro’, which just so happens to be my second favourite H!P song ever.

4. What group/singer have you liked the longest?

That would definitely have to go to Morning Musume. I started liking Ayaya a little bit after finding MoMusu, so unfortunately I can’t give her this one.

5. What is the song with the most plays on your itunes/media player?

Berryz Koubou’s ‘Kokuhaku no Funsui Hiroba’ currently has the most plays on my iTunes with a count of 320-ish. I doubt that’s the song that I’ve listened to the most within my J-music lifetime, but it looks like it wins from my most recent computer reformat.

6. Is that song your favorite?

‘Kokuhaku no Funsui Hiroba’ is my favourite Berryz Koubou song, but definitely not my favourite J-pop or H!P song.

7. If not, what is?

H!P wise, my favourite song would be Matsuura Aya’s ‘Zutto Suki De Ii Desu Ka’.
Outside of H!P, I’d have to say ‘miss you’ by m-flo featuring Yamamoto Ryohei (so hot! and I LOVE his voice… It’s so soothing) and melody. I’ve been listening to miss you since it came out in 2003, and it’s a song that I could listen to continuously and never get tired of (and trust me, I’ve done this… My brother actually got tired of my playing the song so often back in the day).

m-flo feat. Yamamoto Ryohei & melody

8. Is there any one group that you can listen to all/most of the songs by? If so, who?

I wouldn’t say ALL of the songs, but most songs, probably Berryz Koubou and Matsuura Aya. Outside of H!P, possibly Sakamoto Maaya. I find her voice to be amazingly soothing, no matter the song. I have only recently listened to her things outside from what I’d heard from her through the animes RahXephon and Tsubasa (and Cardcaptor Sakura, which I belatedly found out she sang for), but from what I can gather, I like most of her stuff.

Hemisphere – Sakamoto Maaya (AMAZING song – the instrumental here blows my mind)

THE GARDEN OF EVERYTHING – Sakamoto Maaya feat. Steve Conte

9. What is your favorite agency?

… Um.. what’s an agency other that UFA? I don’t know these things… Does this include record labels? Oh bah! I’ll answer UFA, simply because I don’t know what goes under this category other than JE, and I don’t follow Johnny’s. So um, yea. UFA it is!

10. What is your favorite group/singer?

In H!P: favourite group – Berryz Koubou; favourite singer – Matsuura Aya
Non-H!P: male singer – Yamamoto Ryohei (like I said, sexy smooth voice – and HOT to boot! XD); female singer – Sakamoto Maaya
Non-H!P groups of note: Every Little Thing, Day After Tomorrow (I unfortunately lost all of the songs of theirs that I had during one of my hard drive crashes, and I haven’t been able to recover any of their stuff as of yet [actually, have been lazy and haven’t bothered search… But I think pengie of unchained is going to help me out in that respect, so YAY for pengie! (She also helped me out with my lack of Sakamoto Maaya music. I <3 pengie!)

Now, I personally cannot read Japanese, but I went searching and found someone had already translated Maki’s blog entry to help out Maki fans. This information is courtesy of Ayabie from the JPH!P forum.

2008.03.25 Tuesday

It’s a bit sudden…

But I’m actually in L.A at the moment! I just got here a few days ago…
The weather is really good, warm, and yet there’s no pollen.
It’s really good!

The buildings and streets are spacious, I think I’ll rank this third on my future places to live in. ^^
Also, this is my 2nd time in L.A. I only stayed here for one night last time, but I wasn’t sure of what part of L.A I was in. (lol)

This time I’ll be staying for about a month!
I’ll be sure to learn about the greatness of L.A. ^^

Anyway, for those who are wondering why I’m in L.A…

Well, I’ll leave that for tomorrow.

Now, I’ve never been the biggest Maki fan, but this is certainly interesting news. She was certainly a large part of Morning Musume’s success back in the golden age, and even though I wasn’t too fond of the direction her image went once she graduated from Momusu, I can’t deny that she’s a great entertainer, a consistent singer, and a great dancer.

If her update scheduled for tomorrow indicates a return to the music industry, I can see many many Goto fans being absolutely ecstatic. Here’s hoping! ^_^

EDIT: I’m now home from work, so I thought I’d add a few more comments. Earlier today (but not before I posted this), Hello!Online posted translations to Maki’s blog entries as well. My post only covers her first entry.

I’ve read that some people are hoping Maki’s in LA to announce a move into the American music scene. I personally don’t see that happening, because the last that I remember, her English isn’t that great. Does anyone remember her English lesson with Ayaka where Ayaka asked her what time it was? Ever since then, my brother and I have jokingly asked each other “What the is it now?” which confuses the heck out of other people who are around us. XD I haven’t followed her all that closely in quite a few years, but seeing how busy she’d been before leaving H!P, I don’t know if she spent her extra time learning more English.

Well, whatever the reason, it seems we’ll find out tomorrow.