Tacoyaki Rainbow -- Zesshou! Naniwa de Umareta Shojo-tachi（絶唱!なにわで生まれた少女たち）

Toronto had its love affair with Japanese souffle pancakes last year, and I think although the initial bloom of excitement has worn off, it looks like places like Fuwa Fuwa are here to stay. I always wondered how those folks were able to make those flapjacks so fluffy. Well, I watched tonight's episode of "Gatten!", that NHK educational variety show that goes into the wonders of health and food, and apparently the power of gluten has a lot to do with it. But that's all I will say about that since really I wanted to focus on the aidoru group that helped out in tonight's episode. The ladies there helped out by having their adoring audience shake up some bags of dough during the performance of one of their songs to create some venue-made udon (I guess you had to have seen the show).

This particular group is called Tacoyaki Rainbow（たこやきレインボー）, and the members all hail from the Kansai region of Japan where Osaka, Kobe and my ancestral home of Wakayama Prefecture are located. I was surprised that Tacoyaki Rainbow has been around for quite a while now (from 2012 according to Wikipedia), and there have even been some changes in the lineup. Apparently, each of the members get their own colour.

So, intrigued by Tacoyaki Rainbow appearing on "Gatten!", I decided to take a look at what could be seen on YouTube, and I found this lively number which was their 3rd single from September 2014 during their early indies days with Stardust Records. Given the lengthy title of "Zesshou! Naniwa de Umareta Shojo-tachi" (Epic! Naniwa-born Girls), it's nearly 5 minutes of happy and bouncy pride for Naniwa and themselves as Tacoyaki Rainbow; incidentally, Naniwa is the old name for Osaka.

"Zesshou!" has got some generous splashes of jazz and old-style kayo. To be honest, I thought it was a tune that could have been created by Ringo Shiina（椎名林檎）but actually it was written and composed by Kenichi Maeyamada（前山田健一）who's made frantic songs for himself and anime. Considering the antics by the quintet in the colourful music video, I could just about say that it has all the energy of an Osakan year-end party, and I'm surprised that it didn't become the theme song for some sort of anime. There's something quite similar to the aidoru group Momoiro Clover Z（ももいろクローバーZ）...not surprising since both groups come under the Stardust Promotions umbrella.

"Zesshou!" peaked at No. 13 on Oricon and is also a track on their debut album "Maido! Ohkini!"（まいど!おおきに!...Always! Thank You!）from December 2016. Up to now, Tacoyaki Rainbow put out 5 singles under Stardust Records (September 2013 to December 2015) and then have released 4 singles with the major label of Avex Trax. So far, they also have three albums.