KAT-TUN 2 Me

Thanks to my new-found passion for animated .gif making, I got a bit…carried away with KAT-TUN’s “Live of Real Face” concert DVD. There’s three sections here: Kame, Jin, and everyone else.

oooh. Touch yourself more Kame-chan.

and this post has officially gotten kind of porny.

Who me?

Leave it to Kame to do the suggestive eyebrow thing in the middle of the pretty ballad when half of the group is crying.

Yay! Koki let me borrow one of his pimping hats for the encore!

Lastly, this isn’t a .gif, but it is one of the sluttiest pictures of Kame I’ve ever seen, so I had to share it.

Next, behold Akanishi Jin, the sexiest creature ever to walk this Earth. You think I’m using hyperbole? Tehehe

*swoons*

What a sex kitten.

Oh God. No more touching your mouth Jin. You’re going to kill me.

*dies*

And the oft. forgotten T-TUN of KAT-TUN! I put the multi-guy stuff here too.

Damn. Princess is flexible.

Stupid Koki face

Stupid Koki pose followed by impressive Koki backflip

Not to be outdone…

Yay! I win!!!

Jin makes Maru sing part of his line at the beginning of ‘Harukana’. Lol

I will try to restrain myself from doing this for the Cartoon KAT-TUN 2 U concert any time soon, but no promises.

~Celestia~

I’ve taken the liberty of uploading a much clearer version of KT’s Music Station performance than what’s been floating around youtube.

Online Videos by Veoh.com

That means it’s time to comment on the costumes and dance! They’ve gone with a black and white with shiny silver accents this time. KAT-TUN really isn’t a fan of bright colors, are they? They almost always wear primarily black and white, sometimes with color accents.

Jin’s costume mysteriously seems to lack the shininess. Also, whatever is going on around his neckline confuses me. You know what though, who cares? We can see a fair amount of his chest, and he’s not hiding most of his face with a hat, so I’m happy. Is it just me or is he looking a lot like he did back when “Real Face” was released? His hair is almost the same now as it was then. Not that I’m complaining. It’s a good look for him. Much better than blond hair, or his permed hair before that. Here’s hoping he doesn’t decide to change it to something stupid and unflattering again any time soon. The costume is similar to one of the from the “Real Face” PV too. Kame has a purple hat this time. It seems like an odd choice since the official accent color is silver, but I’m not going to question it. As expected of KT, the costumes all look like they got in a fight with an angry paper shredder. Kame’s twirl looks pretty cool with all the various strips of fabric attached to him fanning out. See?

Ueda is in white again, which I approve of. The “Fallen Angel” motif works well for him. Koki in something hooded and Maru in a blazer are also no big surprise. Junno’s jacket is very very shiny, and his haircut still makes him look about 5 years younger. In conclusion, these costumes don’t break into any new or creative territory for KAT-TUN, but they are certainly smexy and easy on the eye, and no one looks like a janitor this time so I’m going to give them a thumbs-up…..WAIT A MINUTE!!! Is Kame wearing fluffy, white, schoolgirlish socks/ankle warmers?? ROFL! He totally is!

The dance is really nice, and they look more synchronized than KAT-TUN usually does. My one complaint is that I wish that the moves had been just a bit bigger. I guess I should just be grateful that there is a proper dance this time. It’s been far too long since they actually made them, you know, move. KT was originally hand picked from the juniors to be a dancing unit, and they’re all good at it, so it seems like a waste to release danceless singles.

As predicted, the single is pretty much the Akame show. The stars are in their own little line in front for most of the song while the rest dance behind them. It wasn’t Kame’s best singing, but Jin was great. I don’t think anyone else got any solo lines either, though I do like the Maruda duet lines in there. I feel a bit bad for T-TUN, but my sympathetic pangs are quickly pushed aside when I see Akame doing sexy hip rolls side by side.

Oh, and they’re on Music Station again next week, so look forward to that. Hopefully they’ll perform in front of a live audience again like they did with their second “Lips” appearance.

TTFN,

~Celestia~

I was reading a recent entry in “Fly to High” and it got me thinking about a few things. I think my last “response” post went pretty well, so, a few thoughts on one particular paragraph. The actual post is about NewS’ new single, but the part I want to talk about is the comment on other Johnny’s groups at the end. To quote:

Every Johnny’s group has a gimmick: KAT-TUN markets their sexiness, Kanjani8 uses their Kansai roots to emphasize their funniness, Arashi sells the happy and gay. NEWS has always been the good boys you’d bring home to your mother group, but they’re getting more personality as a group lately. I think they’re somewhat a mix of the other group’s gimmicks - they play and laugh around while still looking hot and sexy, and love each other with their “member ai” - but not to the extent of Arashi - and add in a large dose of cute, having the members that can actually pull off making faces and peace-signing without looking too forced. Some could see this as being bland, I see it as having the most natural and multifaceted image - because really, who can be just sexy or fun or gay all the time?

          I kind of object to claims that KAT-TUN is just sexy or Arashi is happy and gay all  the time, and hence these groups are single-faceted. If you watch either of those groups enough, it becomes abundantly clear that that’s not the case. Junno is really dorky, and he makes no attempt to hide that. Maru is always being made fun of for his looks and general lack of sexiness. Koki does really bad impressions (not sexy) and Ueda is really shy. Kame is certainly sexy, but he works at it, and his insecurity shines through a lot of the time when he’s not performing. Jin is blessed with God-given sexiness and more self-confidence than any person has a right to have, but he’s only one out of the six of them. As for Arashi, they’re not always “gay and happy” either. Matsujun can be prissy and spiteful. Sho’s natural personality is more serious than when he’s with Arashi, they just bring out his dorky side. Nino is often critical, sharp-tongued, and withdrawn. Ohno… isn’t even that bouncy and happy when they’re performing. You just don’t notice because he’s dancing and singing so damn well and the rest of them have enough enthusiasm to make up for it. Aiba, well, I have yet to see or hear anything to make me think he’s not really that ditzy and hyper, so he might be this group’s exception. Still, being such a sensitive person, I’d imagine he gets upset pretty easily.

      My point here isn’t to entirely debunk these group’s images. They certainly weren’t arbitrarily assigned to them. Group images develop out of recognizing prominent and marketable aspects member’s collective personalities and using those. KAT-TUN as a whole does tend to have more attitude and sexiness than some of the other groups, so the company uses that in the kind of music they do and the sort of image they promote. Similarly, Arashi really are very close with each other, and they all have a lot of natural goofiness, so the company promotes that. The things that are pointed out about NewS are exactly what I personally don’t like about them. In my opinion, trying to seem sexy and cute and playful and hot all at the same time translates to a real lack of group identity. It’s not that the groups I like don’t have other sides to their personalities. Individually, they all have different personalities, but they also have a personality as a group. By emphasizing some things over others, they create a cohesive image for themselves, and I think that’s something NewS is sorely lacking. Without some sort of image, they’re just a random bunch of pretty boys, and I find it hard to find a reason to care about them as a group.

      I guess that’s my two cents on the matter. I hope the proprietors of Fly to High don’t take offense.

Best,

~Celestia~

Since I’ve started blogging, I’ve been working on expanding my “blogging skillset” which almost makes me sound professional, doesn’t it? So far, I’ve figured out the basics of screen-caps and OPVs. My next endevor is animated gifs. Here’s my first attempt, a batch from Arashi’s most recent concert tour. It’s just the animations. I haven’t quite mastered special effects or adding text or anything like that yet. Still, I think they look pretty nice. I’ll probably make some for h!p stuff next. Now I just have to figure out how to use photoshop, subtitle things, and if I ever get really really ambitious, design whole websites.

Hope you enjoy!

oooh. tough guys

Sho demonstrates some of the ridiculous lovely “Carnival Night” dance moves

jump my minions! jump!!

could he be any cuter?

Jun-pits! Lol.

What kind of Ohmiya fan would I be if I didn’t include this?

I think Matsujun is the most “gif-able” Arashi member

and whoever would have thought that the sexiest moment of the concert would belong to Nino? Maybe I’m just weak to guys “tsk”ing at me

Nice angst Aiba, but it would have been better if you’d ripped your shirt off too
Sho and Nino’s silly silly dance.

awww. Sakuraiba is Arashi’s 2nd cutest couple

My apologies to anyone with slow internet.

.Celestia

Excuse my language, but it’s about fucking time.

KAT-TUN III- Queen of Pirates, new album to be released June 4th. Lol that it’s queen of pirates. I mean, I know they have a pirate thing going on ever since Kaizokuban, but I didn’t know they were ready to own up to being queens.

Oh KT, you have been making me so very happy lately. <3

~Celestia~

Edit: And minutes later, the tracklist shows up. Credit to kattunlove lj community. Very glad to see that 6 senses is getting a studio release.

I just can’t wait to do a proper write-up on “Don’t You Ever Stop”, so I’ll probably be talking more about dance, PV, costumes, etc later. Right now, I’m just going to comment on the song itself.

As I said in my last entry, I really really love this song. About halfway through the first listen I had a goofy grin plastered across my face and was feeling the urge to dance along with the chorus. Those are both very good signs. Some KT singles, “Lips” for example, took a while to grow on me. Others like “Signal” and “Bokura no Machi de” I never really came to like. This is one, like “Real Face”, was love right from the outset. I can attribute my dislike of “Bokura” to severe Jin deficiency. As for “Signal”, I don’t think light sorts of songs like that suit them very well, so I was a bit concerned when I heard the genre for “Don’t You Ever Stop” would be less “rock” and more “pop”, but those concerns were unfounded. It’s certainly more pop than their last few singles, but still very KAT-TUN, with lots of guitar, intensity, and general loudness. The sound is kind of similar to pre-debut KAT-TUN stuff like “Fight all Night” maybe, but I’m also reminded of Arashi’s “Jidai” and some American BSB or N*Sync, but it’s stronger than those songs. Also, I’m surprised to see they’ve taken some of Morning Musume’s favorite tricks, namely opening the song with a monologue and inserting little sighs throughout. Interesting.

Jin’s just got to have his little “moment” in the middle of the song, doesn’t he? Where the music kind of stops and he says/does something sexy that makes the fan girls scream even more than they already were. The wink/tsking in Real Face, the “Sweety” line in Keep the Faith, now “hell yeah!” in the middle of this.

Speaking of Akanishi, I almost can’t even hear anyone else singing during the chorus (I’m sure the others are singing, I just can’t really hear them), and he has lots of solo lines in the verses as well. Not a bad thing, in my opinion lol. There are definitely some Kame solo lines in the verses and Koki has his little rap section, but I can’t say with 100% certainty that the rest of them are even there. That’s the thing with KAT-TUN. There’s such a huge discrepancy in popularity between KA and TTUN. I read an account where someone was in Japan and they asked a shopkeeper for KAT-TUN stuff to buy for their friend back home, and the shop keeper said, “Okay. Do you want Kame stuff or Jin stuff?” This large popularity gap is, understandably, reflected in the line distribution in their singles as well as focus in their PVs. Now, I love to see lots of Kame and Jin, but having the group be so very…unbalanced worries me a bit. It just seems like kind of an unstable existence, doesn’t it?

Oh, but I’m off on a tangent. Back to the song! Shall I make sales predictions? What the song has going against it is that it doesn’t have any drama tie-in, and that could hurt exposure a bit. On the other hand, they’re KAT-TUN. They will not be wanting for exposure. Also, I’m not sure how much Japan still has their collective panties in a knot over the whole Kame/woman more than old enough to be his mother thing. I’m inclined to think that the worst of that is over, since it has been confirmed that they definitely are not seeing each other anymore. Still, could have an impact. One main thing the song has going for it is that it’s hella catchy. I’ve said it before, but I’ll say it again: Catchiness sells. I think we’ve all seen “good” songs be far outsold by songs with very little musical merit other than a refrain with the ability to lodge itself in your brain for days at a time. Fortunately, I think this song is both good and catchy, a lethal combination when taking in to consideration that it’s coming from KAT-TUN who already have a sizable army of fangirls who will buy the single no matter what. In testament to that, pre-sales were already through the roof when all we knew about the single was the title. Another plus is that there are 4 editions, and if you want all of the solo tracks, which some people undoubtedly do, you will have to buy 3 of them. Also, the highly positive reaction to the radio rip is not limited to my blog. All over the fan communities, people are singing its enthusiastic praise. Based on my observations, the song is getting a warmer initial reception than anything they’ve done since “Real Face”. I can hardly find a word of criticism against it at this point. Honestly, the fan communities are kind of going crazy right now. Anyway, this all adds up to some very promising sales potential. I’d make a conservative estimate of at least 400,000 in the first week, but I really expect them to do even better than that.

This song will be just perfect for a concert, won’t it? I can see it easily working the crowd into a frenzy. Oh how I hope to be a part of that frenzied crowd…

Hell Yeah,

~Celestia~

http://www.savefile.com/files/1517425

Yayayayayay! Here is a radio rip (so not perfect quality, but still not bad) for your downloading pleasure. As for initial thoughts on the song, I think I’ll save those for after I see it performed, so excuse the fangirling, but I’ll leave it at “OMFG I love this song!!!” for now.

 Flails happily,

~Celestia~ 

Okay, okay. Last “Time” clip,at least for a while, but I somehow missed this on my first perusal of the concert. I want to do this soooo badly. It looks insanely fun.

Online Videos by Veoh.com
Happy Spring!

~Celestia~

There’s not a whole lot I can say about Arashi’s new concert DVD that hasn’t already been said more eloquently over at Morning Berryz , other than to agree that this is a truly awesome concert, one of the best I’ve ever seen, and mention that the costume designers have truly outdone themselves this time, but there was one particular performance that I felt obliged to share. You see, Matsujun, apparently feeling overheated, decided to rip his shirt open at the beginning of “Carnival Night” and…and… oh sorry. I lost my train of thought there. Actually, it’s a really entertaining performance from all of the guys, and even though it’s not my favorite song, I’d still really enjoy this even if we couldn’t see the sweat on Matsujun’s chest….but we can. And it’s hot.

Can I get a “kyaa!”?

~Celestia~

KAT-TUN’s new song is due to play on the radio in a couple of days with the first live TV performance (already??) a couple of days after that. In the meantime, I’ve been distracting myself with American Wota’s Johnny’s Singles Ranker, but since some of my favorite songs are album tracks or B-sides instead of singles, I just went ahead and made my own lists. I’ve already done KAT-TUN, but here are Arashi, Other (meaning not Arashi or KT), and an overall list. I’ve kept the explanations short so as not to bore you.

Others: I sort of regret that the entire discography of most of Johnny’s groups gets relegated to 5 “other” songs, but Kanjani is too crazy, SMAP can’t sing, I have an irrational dislike of NewS (i’ve got to hate at least one of the groups in the “20 somethings” catergory, right?), HeySayJump is too young, V6 bores me, Tokio isn’t cute enough, and I really prefer groups to soloists or duets. So now that I’ve effectively discredited the entire Johnny’s universe save two groups….

5. Weeeeeek, NewS- Is more of a chant than a song, but consistently gets stuck in my head, and that’s got to be worth something

4. Hakka Kandii, Kinki Kids- Beautiful song, but I like the KT/4 Tops version better than the original

3. Seishun Amigo, Kame/Yamapi- Let’s face it. This really only ranks so highly because Kame is in it.

2. Sekai ni Hitotsu Dake no Hana, SMAP- Sweet summer memories and unworldly catchyness

1. Hitoribotchi no Haburashi, Tokio- Such a touching and emotional song. LOVE it!

Now for Arashi! Generally, I like them a lot more than I like their music, but they’ve produced enough music over the years that it’s not difficult to pick out 10 songs that I really enjoy.

10.Rain (Ohno Solo)- I always find myself singing this. Ohno’s voice is awesome, as usual, but it mostly earns this place based on the “gets stuck in my head” factor

9. Pika*Nchi Double- Some of Sho’s best lyrical rapping, especially at the bridge with each member taking turns singing something behind it. That part totally makes the song.

8. Right Back to You- Kick-ass dance, and one of Arashi’s few songs that might almost be considered cool. At least it would if it was still the 90’s.

7. Kitto Daijoubu- Another relentlessly happy song that always puts me in a good mood. I like the section with the individual solo lines.

6. Love so Sweet- This song is so cute. Matsujun’s nasaly solo makes me laugh every time though, especially if he’s singing live. I know this particular single was for his drama, but I’m firmly of the opinion that Matsujun should dance in the front, look pretty, and never ever sing unless he’s being covered by Ohno or at least two of the other members.

5. Pika*Nchi- Very high energy. I like the guitar and how it breaks from the rockish sounding verses to the “dakishimete” chorus.It might rank higher if the star inserted in the middle of the title didn’t annoy me so much.

4. Kansha Kangeki Ame Arashi- Cute! I like the triumphant “Arashiiii” part and Ohno’s introduction

3. Sakura Sake- I love to sing along to this one, especially the “Wa-oh!” parts. I listen to this in the morning to wake myself up sometimes.

2. Happiness- Is Arashi defined. Shamelessly happy, shamelessly fruity, and full of “yay!”. It also has my favorite Arashi PV by far.

1. A.RA.SHI- They love the song so very much, and I love them so very much, how could I not also love the song so very much? That, and the “WE. ARE. COOL.!!!” line makes this an easy choice for first.

Are you tired of lists yet? Too bad! Here’s the overall top 20 ranking out of all of Johnny’s (that I’ve bothered to listen to)

20. Love so Sweet- Arashi

19. Butterfly- KT (Jin/Ueda)

18. Yorokobi no Uta- KT

17. Pika*Nchi- Arashi

16. Hakka Kandii- KK

15. Kansha Kangeki Ame Arashi- Arashi

14. Will Be All Right- KT

13. Seishun Amigo- Kame/Yamapi

12. Sekai ni Hitotsu Dake no Hana- SMAP

11. Sakura Sake- Arashi

10. Your Side- KT

9. Wilds of my Heart- KT

8. Gold- KT

7. Happiness- Arashi

6. Keep the Faith- KT

5. Precious One- KT

4. Hitoribotchi no Haburashi- Tokio

3. A.RA.SHI- Arashi

2. Harukana Yakusoku- KT

1. Real Face- KT

It’s mostly KAT-TUN by the time you get to the top 10, but that shouldn’t be too surprising. As my last order of business, to make this post more kattuny, a bit of Kame eyecandy. Oooh, sexy introspectiveness!

Over and Out,

~Celestia~