Happy New Year 2023!!!
Finally finished watching the second half of Kouhaku. I watched around 40 minutes after posting my first blog post last night, then went to my friend's New Year party, and ended up waking up at 1pm today! Anyway, I'm going to wrap up my thoughts on Kouhaku's 2nd half.
Let me say this upfront. This is the most entertaining Kouhaku in the past 5+ years. Hours flew by without notice. I'm not sure if anything was cut from the version I was watching (I watched it on a Chinese website called bilibili). I'm quite sure I watched the full version, but there're a few things that I found:
(1) There's no ceremony at the beginning that marked the starting of this year's Red vs White team competition. There's no team captains. Maybe this is new this year? Or maybe this started a few years back? I also felt that in this year's Kouhaku, the producer seemed to have deemphasized the competition. I think this is heading in the right direction.
(2) In the past few years, I remembered that they showed the competition results midway through the show but I didn't recall seeing it this year. The results were shown only at the end after which they announced that the White team won this year.
So, here are some notes that I jotted down while I was watching the second half of the show.
(1) This Kendama けん玉 thing has become a fixture now of the show. Congratulations! I wrote about this before that I was indifferent and I still feel the same way.
(2) There's been some controversy surrounding Twice's appearance. I think this also happened many years ago when some Korean girls group appeared on Kouhaku stage. Usually the hosts will talk to the performers before and/or after the performance but when it comes to Twice, they were introduced by the host and that's it. No talking, no short interview. Maybe this is damage control so that it doesn't stir more controversy?
(3) I know Disney is probably a big sponsor but I don't quite care about this section of the show. Ooizumi 大泉洋 and Hashimoto's 橋本環奈 singing were not bad though.
(4) Speaking about that special Disney performance, it was done inside Tokyo Disney, wasn't it? Also, Misia was the one singing on the boat, wasn't she? So, Misia was then teleported back to the NHK studio for the last Red team performance?
(5) I enjoyed Junnretsu's 純烈 performance with Dachou Club ダチョウ倶楽部 and Ariyoshi Hiroiki 有吉弘行. I am familiar with Ariyoshi's face as I saw him in Japanese dramas before. I didn't know he can sing.
(6) Another impressive performance by back number. I like Shimizu's 清水依与吏 voice. It's powerful.
(6) Kudo Shizuka 工藤静香 looks really old. I knew her as Kimura Takuya's 木村拓哉 wife and I never listened to her songs. This is the first time I listened to her. I'm not particularly impressed by her song or her performance though. I can't help but think that she performed in order to give her daughter a chance on the Kouhaku stage.
(7) Both Official Hige Dandism (Official髭男dism), Aimyo あいみょう, Superfly and Fujii Kaze's 藤井風 performancs were very enjoyable. I found Fujii a bit too showy though. This stretch of the Kouhaku was very entertaining.
(8) Kayama Yuzo 加山雄三 doesn't look like he's 85!
(9) I found Shinohara Ryoko's 篠原涼子 performance a bit underwhelming.
(10) I don't quite understand what's the point of this "Yumin with Yumin" (松任谷由実 with 荒井由実) thing utilizing AI technology. It's a pure gimmick.
(11) This is my first time listening to Kinki Kids. I knew Domoto Tsuyoshi 堂本剛 from his appearance in Kindaichi Case Files 金田一少年の事件簿 but I never heard him sing before. I was impressed. And I like both songs, both of which were written by Yamashita Tatsuro 山下達郎.
(12) Anzen Chitai 安全地帯 didn't disappoint. I wish they could sing more songs. Tamaki Koji's 玉置浩二 voice always has this special character that mesmerizes me.
(13) After listening to Ishikawa Sayuri's 石川さゆり performance, I just realized that there were unusually few enka 演歌 songs in Kouhaku this year. Maybe this is intentional? Also, Ooizumi went wild again after Ishikawa's performance 😂
(14) They should have really saved this as the last performance of the night. I thoroughly enjoyed this special performance by Kuwata Keisuke 桑田佳祐 and his friends. Not only did I enjoy their charity song Jidai Okure no Rock'n'Roll Band (時代遅れのRock `n`Roll Band), I also liked their covered performance of Yozora no Hoshi (夜空の星) paying tribute to Kayama Yuzo (see #8 above).
That's it!
Some Closing thoughts.
(1) This year I clearly enjoyed the second half more than the first half. During the first half, too many Korean style boys and girls groups.
(2) Hashimoto's performance as Kouhaku host wasn't bad at all. This morning, I read some Yahoo news article saying that the most impressive thing about Hashimoto was her laugh. Now I think about it, she did have a distinctive laugh. And that's cute also.
Hope 2023 will bring you joy and laughter.
Hi, Larry. Thanks again for providing your opinions through Part 2. I'll be giving my own thoughts shortly, but just wanted to inform you that the policy of no longer assigning captains began possibly with the 2021 or 2020 edition and yup, I agree that it's time to really let go of the competition part officially. The competition aspect died long ago and maybe the name of the show should even be changed into something like "Kohaku Uta Matsuri" but perhaps that might be a step too far for NHK.
ReplyDeleteKouhaku Uta Matsuri would be a great name.
DeleteAnd it would be pretty accurate considering how the show is now.
DeleteThe contest aspect is so inconsequential that no one would bother messing with it but it's also something so integral to the show that people will notice.
DeleteI do like the idea of keeping it just to keep the folks involved invested enough in it at the very least.
Point taken on trying to keep some aspect of the contest alive. And no matter what happens going forward, I think that there will still be the final count just before "Auld Lang Syne".
DeleteHowever, I think a lot of the parts of the old contest have been taken away such as the assigning of the captains, the mid-show count, the banner presentation and even the old blazers for the participants that it's almost becoming academic that the "Gassen" has become the "Matsuri".
Oh, also to address some of your other observations:
ReplyDelete1) There's a major highway right by Disney in Urayasu, so that Misia could have been fairly quickly transported back to Shibuya in time for her final number. I'm also assuming that the highway was fairly empty by that point.
2) Ariyoshi was actually a part of the comic duo Saruganseki back in the 1990s, and he and his partner actually put out a hit single which was the song that he and Dacho Club performed on the show.
Thanks for the info. Indeed, Google map says it’s a 25 min drive from Disney to Shibuya 😆
DeleteNo problems, Larry. I never drove a car in Japan so I never got to test the highway myself.
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