Fujisaki Girls Academy Student Council Executive -- Love Shitai!（恋愛したいっ！）

 

I was doing my usual custodial maintenance on "Kayo Kyoku Plus" last night and found myself in the "Love Lab"（恋愛ラボ）section. Having done so, it was still easy to track down several hilarious sequences from this 2013 anime on YouTube, and I soon discovered that I hadn't included one song onto the blog. I'd written up articles on the ending theme and one truly insane insert song but had of yet not included the opening theme.

Now in all honesty, I think out of the three songs that came out of "Love Lab", "Love Shitai!" (I Want to Fall in Love) ranks third when compared to the ending theme-with-a-difference "Best FriendS" and the undergarment-obsessed "Nete mo Samete mo Lingerie" （寝ても覚めてもランジェリー）by one of the characters' father. However since I did want to complete the set at last and "Love Shitai!" is still another cheerful tune by Fujisaki Girls Academy Student Council Executive（藤女生徒会執行部）consisting of the main cast: Manami Numakura（沼倉愛美）, Chinatsu Akasaki（赤﨑千夏）Ayane Sakura（佐倉綾音）, Inori Minase（水瀬いのり）and Yo Taichi（大地葉）.

As with "Best FriendS", "Love Shitai!" was written by ENA☆ but this time, the composition and arrangement were by y0c1e, which seems to be the standby name for Hifumi Inc.（一二三）, a Japanese music production company.

https://www.nicovideo.jp/watch/sm21940730

Taiten Kusunoki -- Nete mo Samete mo Lingerie （寝ても覚めてもランジェリー）

I remember that Dreams Come True song, the very cheerful "go for it!" in which vocalist Miwa Yoshida（吉田美和）sings of her character not liking her boyfriend's favourites, Monty Python and anything by Gerry Anderson. For me, I've had plenty of experience with both Japanese, American, Canadian and British comedy, and I'm good with all of them but I can understand someone born and raised in Japan not getting the humour of Python. In my case, though, I've watched John Cleese, Eric Idle and the rest of the gang since I was about 5. Good golly...I mean, who doesn't love THE BISHOP?!

And of course, there is the famous "The Lumberjack Song" by Michael Palin. It might be exaggerating a bit but I think even those from my generation who don't really know Monty Python would probably have heard at least an inkling of the crazy "The Lumberjack Song". It's certainly one of my signposts for the show.

Crazily enough, I got the same impression that I had for "The Lumberjack Song" when I first heard The Lingerie Song on anime "Love Lab"（恋愛ラボ）. Yup, I've enjoyed this deceptively heartfelt show which I had first assumed was another one of those nutty comedies. However, The Lingerie Song that is actually called "Nete mo Samete mo Lingerie" (Sleeping or Awake, It's Lingerie) definitely planted things on the wacky side.

It made its appearance briefly in one of the episodes through a DVD where it was discovered the father of the main character of Natsuo Maki, Masanobu Maki, was the president of the True Tree Lingerie Company. Papa Maki thought it would be neat to come up with his own campaign song for the firm and so "Nete mo Samete mo Lingerie" was born. Coming off as a proud anthem of sorts to underwear, Papa Maki as played by Taiten Kusunoki（楠大典）made the most of his minute on air, much to the dread of Natsuo and most of the Fujisaki Girls Academy Student Council Executive. Considering how much of a nutty girl Natsuo is, it says something when even she is horrified.

(instrumental version)

The Lingerie Song was actually written by Ruri Miyahara（宮原るり）and composed by Yasuhiro Misawa（三澤康広）. I can only imagine what transpired during the recording of this song at the studio. There's nothing perverted about the song from what I could glean from the lyrics. It's just President Maki and his straight-faced devotion to his product. Monty Python would salute in respect.

Fujisaki Girls Academy Student Council Executive -- Best FriendS

Basically speaking, my anime buddy and I agree on what we like to watch but there are inevitably some discrepancies. He's a huge fan of "Jojo no Kimyo na Boken"（ジョジョの奇妙な冒険...JoJo's Bizarre Adventure）; I was immediately turned off with the murder of the dog in Episode 1 and haven't been back since then. I was quite all right with the cute show with moments of hilarity, "New Game" from this year but after the first couple of episodes, he never mentioned or showed it again on the screen.

Then I also mentioned at another time about the anime "Love Lab"（恋愛ラボ）. I've been watching various excerpts of this 2013 show on YouTube and have just been having a fun time with all of the gags and parodies. Again, my friend kinda went "Meh" since he felt it was just too wacky. But then again, we've been enjoying the absolutely nuts "Kei-jo!!!!!!!" this season so I'm kinda wondering what gives. Still, I am starting to get very tempted to actually purchase the DVD set of this one.

The two stars are seiyuu Manami Numakura（沼倉愛美）and Chinatsu Akasaki（赤﨑千夏）as the short-tempered Riko and completely insane Natsuo respectively. I'm totally accustomed to seeing Numakura playing the stoic-to-cranky roles but Akasaki playing Natsuo was pretty revealing since I had been seeing her as the suffer-no-fools-gladly Nibutani from "Chūnibyō demo Koi ga Shitai!"（中二病でも恋がしたい!）. Natsuo is the type of girl that Nibutani would be more than happy to kick over a couple of mountains in frustration.

Among all of my amused viewings of the antics of the Fujisaki Girls Academy Student Council Executive known in Japanese as Fuji-jo Seitokai Shikkou-bu（藤女生徒会執行部）, I've also managed to find a perky little earworm as the ending theme for "Love Lab" called "Best FriendS" as sung by the entire executive via the seiyuu Numakura, Akasaki, Ayane Sakura（佐倉綾音）, Inori Minase（水瀬いのり）and Yo Taichi（大地葉）.

With lyrics by ENA☆ and music by Naoki Chiba（千葉"naotyu-"直樹）, it's the usual happy-go-lucky song but I think there's also a little hint of Shibuya-kei in there which pulled me in further. In any case, another temptation for me to pick up the set, if possible.

The aforementioned Sakura and Minase would get together for another popular anime and theme song the following year.