Author Archives: Henkka

Berryz Koubou’s final Hello!Con tour ended on the 15th. Chii and Kumai-san reminisce about their first Hello!Con tours back when they’d just joined 12 years ago, and how the Kids have since become the oldest active members of Hello! Project. So much has changed and evolved within H!P over these years, and Kumai-san thinks that evolution was especially evident with the “DANCE MODE” pattern of the latest tour what with the high-level acrobatics and all. The two share a strained laugh, however, when they come to the realization that despite this having been their last tour with H!P, not even one member of Berryz was included in said acrobatics performance.

Chii asks what kind of music Kumai-san has been listening to lately. Of the 136 or so songs released by Berryz Koubou to date, Kumai-san says especially feels like listening to their album and coupling tracks every once in a while, naming “Kimi no Tomodachi” and “Gaki Daishou.” In other words, she mostly enjoys the lesser-known material, but as Chii points out, Berryz has lots of lesser-known songs that are also really great.

As for non-H!P music, Kumai-san has previously mentioned on the show that she likes NAOTO INTI RAYMI, an artist she still listens to. But lately it’s mostly the Western artists that have been getting her attention, including Ariana Grande, Katy Perry and Taylor Swift. When she hears Western songs she likes at shops and such, she uses an app on her phone to find out the artist so she can listen to it again later at home.

Meanwhile, Chii is completely hooked on Disney music at the moment. She enjoys the variety: they have the ballads but also the really energetic songs as well. Some of her recent favorites include “Umarete Hajimete” (“For the First Time in Forever”) from Frozen, “Part of Your World” from The Little Mermaid, and a song from Tangled whose title she doesn’t remember.

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We’re a week away from Valentine’s Day. Usually the members of Berryz hold a yearly Valentine’s Day gift exchange, but this year they’re discussing their options — there happens to be a Hello!Con performance on the 14th and they simply don’t have the time to make edible Valentine’s Day goodies for everyone from H!P.

Three members of °C-ute are celebrating their birthday this week: Nakajima Saki, Yajima Maimi and Hagiwara Mai, who are turning 23, 21 and 19, respectively. The hosts are amazed that three of °C-ute’s five members would all have their birthdays on the same week. “It’s like it was their life destiny to meet each other,” Kumai-san says. Chii assumes the members must be busy holding parties to properly celebrate all these birthdays.

And speaking of parties, °C-ute actually held a surprise party for the members of Berryz Koubou on January 29th. They’d been preparing for it for quite some time, and even all the managers were in on it: when Chii asked her manager about her work schedule, she was told that they had some kind of a “secret” job on that day. Somehow everyone managed to protect the secret until the party, and touching moments were had and tears were shed.

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“Talk about the non-H!P related goings-on in your private life as of late.” That’s what the script instructs the hosts to do, and Kumai-san begins by sharing that she did something very girly the other day: cooking! Chii has trouble believing this but Kumai-san insists it’s true: she baked a chocolate banana pound cake. “Why?” Chii asks, and Kumai-san explains that it was simply because she had some bananas laying around that had gotten a bit past their prime and she figured they’d taste better in a cake.

As for Chii, her big sister recently attended something called the Furusato Matsuri at Tokyo Dome. It’s an annual event with lots of stalls selling all kinds of prefectural cuisine for the people of Tokyo. Seeing her sister’s pictures from the event, everything there looked very delicious. And what does all this have to do with Chii specifically? Well, she recently thinks she’d like to attend this event. Next year.

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The opening topic is “things you’re really into lately.” For Kumai-san, that’d be a certain mobile phone game: Tsum Tsum. And it’s not just Kumai-san: Captain and Risako, too, are not only very into the game, but they have crazy high scores on it as well.

For Chii, the only thing she’s into as of late is her blog: she still hasn’t broken her run of consecutive daily blogs that started from January 1st. Well, for the most part: there was one day when she only managed to post her blog some minutes past midnight, and while this made her seriously consider giving up, she decided to keep going anyhow.

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The hosts begin by talking about how much they’d like to go overseas right now, especially somewhere warm. Kumai-san would especially like to visit the Hamilton Island to see its heart-shaped reef, whereas Chii wants to visit the Maldives — she appreciates the fact that Maldives apparently doesn’t offer much in the way of shopping opportunities or even things to do in general, so she figures it’d be really relaxing. In any case, the two are looking forward to their February trip to the warmth of Thailand and the many massages that await them there.

“So how are you lately?” Chii asks her co-host. Kumai-san recently bought herself a new wallet that she began using at the start of the year. This is good since Chii’s heard that it’s recommended for all people to change wallets at least once per year. If you don’t, it’ll cause bad luck: the money is going to “escape” from your wallet.

Meanwhile, Chii finally finished cleaning her room — a New Year’s tradition in Japan. Her room is a great deal neater now, and even the Barbie, Toy Story and Disney dolls she’s been collecting for the past five years or so are now all in perfect order. She actually finished this clean-up operation just before the recording of this show which means she’s kind of tired right now.

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January 12th is Coming of Age Day in Japan, and the H!P members celebrating the event this year are Iikubo Haruna, Suzuki Airi, Okai Chisato, Wada Ayaka, Fukuda Kanon, Miyazaki Yuka, and Sugaya Risako. Chii asks Kumai-san — their “senpai in life” — for her take on this. Kumai-san still remembers how tiny they were and is touched to see all of them now becoming proper adults. She feels proud of them, like they were all her own children. The two congratulate this group once more.

This is actually the first recording of BZS1422 in 2015, and the two talk about how New Year’s was for them. The two were in fact sitting next to each other the very moment 2014 turned into 2015 as they both took part in the Countdown Live. Kumai-san fondly remembers their seniors like Nakazawa and Yoshizawa talking to them about how big they’d gotten.

After the concert, they got back to the hotel and went out to visit a shrine. The next day, Chii slept until about 1 PM and later went to her grandma’s house where they had a crab party. Kumai-san, too, ate so much crab that day, she felt she’d come to hate it if she’d eaten any more.

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“Merry Christmas!” While this is the first broadcast of 2015, the hosts explain that this episode is actually being recorded on Christmas Eve. Still, as it still is the first broadcast of the year, Chii says she’s sure she isn’t going to flub her words even once during the show, partly also thanks to her recent enthusiasm towards rapping and “rhythm.” Kumai-san expresses doubt at this claim, and as probably goes without saying, Chii’s confidence turns out to be completely unjustified not many minutes after.

January marks the beginning of the final Hello!Con tour for Berryz, and our hosts were actually rehearsing for it prior to recording this episode. Chii says she has something she feels very sad about regarding this rehearsal: even though it’s Christmas, the members received no cake, no nothing from the staff! Chii couldn’t believe it.

Lack of cakes aside, the two talk about how there are now so many new members rehearsing with them. “It’s overflowing with youth!“, Kumai-san describes. But the rehearsal space seems to be overflowing with feelings of something else as well: Kumai-san has noticed how members of the staff — many of them who have been watching over Berryz for many years now — have been looking at them as they rehearse, some with perhaps a hint of nostalgia in their eyes.

Chii wishes to share something with the listeners before the first corner of the show. The other day, a fan who attended an individual handshake event with Berryz Koubou shook hands with Kumai-san and told her that they’d become a fan of the group through listening to BZS1422. The two were very happy about this, and they agree: if even one person became a fan of Berryz through BZS1422, then these 129 episodes of the show have all been worth it.

Chii: But for some reason, that fan didn’t come and shake hands with me.
Kumai-san: … Huh?
Chii: Let us move on to the first number of this week’s BZS1422.

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