Morning Musume '22 -- Dai Jinsei Never Been Better!（大・人生 Never Been Better!）

 

I've always seen the group Morning Musume（モーニング娘。）as the big return of female aidoru to Japanese popular music after a good chunk of the 1990s was left bereft of the teenybopper set. Coming into view from the latter part of that decade, my generation's Morning Musume had members including Yuko Nakazawa（中澤裕子）, Maki Goto（後藤真希）and Kaori Iida（飯田圭織）with hits like "Love Machine" (LOVEマシーン）and "The Peace"（ザ☆ピ～ス！）. Plus, there was their television heyday with all of those shows they hosted like above.

Of course, since those early days, there have been other Hello Project acts and individual singers who've come in and they've been joined by Yasushi Akimoto's（秋元康）fleet of aidoru groups including AKB48. However, Morning Musume has continued to stay the course and now there is the current team known as Morning Musume '22. I haven't bothered to count how many members there are and I have no idea who any of the ladies are.

But I've got to say that I've been enjoying "Dai Jinsei Never Been Better!" (Big Life Never Been Better) which is officially part of the group's 71st single from June 2022 under the big title of "Chu Chu Chu Bokura no Mirai （Chu Chu Chu 僕らの未来...Our Future）/Dai Jinsei Never Been Better!". For one thing, it's got some of that disco funk that I've loved in some of Morning Musume's songs including the two that I mentioned back in the first paragraph. The horns are so good and tight that I thought they came over from a Sing Like Talking concert. And once again, Hello Project's guru Tsunku（つんく）was once again behind words and music. The single went Gold, hitting No. 2 on Oricon.