Arashi -- Five

By Japanese Station via Wikimedia Commons

In the last few days, one of the commenters informed me that Arashi（嵐）was going to have their final concert at Tokyo Dome on May 30th...which they did, and I'm sure it was a whopper with plenty of cheering and weeping fans.

My somewhat befuddled response was: Wait! They were still together?!

OK, my apologies to Arashi fans everywhere, but I'd thought that the group disbanded back in 2021 with a fair bit of pomp and circumstance including a final performance on the Kohaku Utagassen. But as it turns out, I misinterpreted the announcement from Arashi back then. Back then, the guys had actually opted for a hiatus and not a permanent breakup. Well, the permanent breakup was sealed last night. I had a regular Wednesday night student at my final school who was a huge Masaki Aiba fan. I can only imagine the lengths she went to secure a ticket and get all glammed up for the final concert.

When it comes to some of the (former) Johnny's Entertainment groups over the years, I had placed descriptors on them. The Tanokin Trio（たのきんトリオ）of Masahiko Kondo（近藤真彦）, Toshihiko Tahara（田原俊彦）and Yoshio Nomura（野村義男）from the 1980s were the cheeky high schoolers while Hikaru Genji（光GENJI ）was all about the roller skates. SMAP was a group I saw as being the Voltron of the Johnny's mountain (each member with their own distinct personality and characteristics joining together to become this entertainment colossus in Japan) 

But Arashi was the group that followed SMAP at the peak, and I saw them as being the quintet of good buddies who loved to hang out together not only at work but also during their precious free time. And that's the vibe I got from their final single "Five" which came out in March. It's an upbeat and satisfying coda to their 59-strong list of singles. It sounds...for the lack of a better term...just all-so-very Arashi and the music video, which seems to have been partly filmed in 1970s Kodak memories colour filters with some Beatles-esque silliness thrown in, shows Ohno and the guys looking rested and ready for the next step forward in their professional and personal lives while riding a bus that looks to have been inspired by the Partridge Family.

"Five" was created by songwriters HIKARI and Tomoki Ishizuka（石塚知生）. It has hit No. 1 on Oricon Streaming. All my good wishes go to Satoshi Ohno（大野智）, Sho Sakurai（櫻井翔）, Masaki Aiba（相葉雅紀）, Kazunari Ninomiya（二宮和也）and Jun Matsumoto（松本潤）, especially to leader Ohno who I hope will be able to catch tons of fish and make those art gallery-fresh paintings now. However, I am wondering whether Arashi can be tempted to make one more trip to the NHK Shibuya stage on New Year's Eve. 

Meanwhile, you can get really nostalgic by looking at the article I wrote for Arashi's debut single "A-RA-SHI" back in 2013.