I'd heard about this song in the months before I saw this unit Hamaiku（ハマいく）perform it on the 74th edition of the Kohaku Utagassen almost a month ago. But just to give some background, it appears that "Uta Con"（うたコン）isn't the only NHK music program that has undergone a few regenerations like "Doctor Who". There has been a late-night Saturday music show called "Venue 101" which has been kicking around since the spring of 2022 which took over from the 2016 "Shibuya Note"（シブヤノオト）which itself had inherited the reins from the 2007 "Music Japan" and the 1993 "Pop Jam".
From what I've seen of the episode synopses on the show's J-Wiki article, "Venue 101" looks at and invites over the currently hip singers and bands. The hosts are droll comedian/TV personality Ryuichi Hamaie（濱家隆一）of the Yoshimoto Kogyo comedy duo Kamaitachi（かまいたち）and Erika Ikuta（生田絵梨花）who used to be part of aidoru group Nogizaka 46（乃木坂46）.
Well, it was decided that a few months into "Venue 101", Hamaie and Ikuta just had to come up with a song of their own for the show. Smashing their family names together to form the duo Hamaiku, a cute little ditty titled "Beat de Tohi" was released as a digital single in October 2022. Created by musician meiyo, it's got a few genres mixing it up in there but for the most part, it's the disco that I hear. Basically, it's kawaii and cornball at the same which makes for an ironic contrast with the hipper stuff from the show's guests.
The tohi in "Beat de Tohi" is something that I have no idea about (scalp, escape?) but meiyo's lyrics pretty much define what the official concept for "Venue 101" has been and that is to make listening to music more fun. But in the past several months, what's amped up the song's profile considerably is the choreography attached to "Beat de Tohi", beginning with Hamaiku themselves and then spreading onto other groups, celeb or non-celeb.
I like the ANA video, hmm maybe JAL should do one, too!
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