Nogizaka 46 -- Juu-san Nichi no Kinyoubi （13日の金曜日）

Happy Friday the 13th! Yes, believe it or not, even before the concept was associated with hockey mask-wearing nutjobs, it had already been known as a bad luck day. As such, I decided to see if there were even any kayo out there to signify this auspicious day.

Well, yes and no. I didn't find a kayo per se but I did find something from the recent J-Pop realm, and it turned out to have the exact title "Juu-san Nichi no Kinyoubi" (Friday The 13th). The song was one of the tracks on Nogizaka 46's（乃木坂46）5th single, "Kimi no Na wa Kibou"（君の名は希望...Your Name Is Hope）from March 13th 2013. I had wondered whether that single was released on a Friday but nope, it was actually a Wednesday.

In any case, far from it sounding like a Halloween tune, "Juu-san Nichi no Kinyoubi" had that pleasantly fun & cheerful (if eminently forgettable) melody by Naonobu Amimoto（網本ナオノブ）backing Yasushi Akimoto's（秋元康）lyrics about a boy and a girl having fun together with a group of other friends, only when it's time for everyone to head home, said boy and girl are back alone. As Akimoto wrote down pretty insightfully, this is when horror and love actually share a common feature: both spike the emotions.

The other notable thing about "Juu-san Nichi no Kinyoubi" is its music video. It all centered on a flash mob performance by the Type-B group of Nogizaka 46 (I take it that means the second-stringers of the group) at Mitsui Outlet Park Yokohama Bayside about a month before the single's release (the poor lasses must have been freezing in those spring dresses). I have to say that the production staff and the 46 planned it out with the precision of the Impossible Missions Force. The customers who were caught off-guard apparently were there for some big sale, according to J-Wiki.

We can all hope that our Friday the 13th is as happy.