Restarting the Old Rusty Engine
(For the 2nd Time too)


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Tuesday, November 27, 2007

About the New Girl In Town And the Future of Morning Musume...

Hello! Project has issued an announcement echoing what we all being buzzing about - Sugiura Taiyou & Nozomi's newborn baby girl Sugiura Noa. Many bloggers are absolutely pleased to know about it and here are their reactions.

Now in previous interviews, Sugiura revealed that their daughter's name will be a combination of the parents name. Funny, the name "Noa" (希空) only have half of Nono's name, Nozomi (希美) and none of the father's name Taiyou (太陽). So I thought further, and with reference to Sugiura's fame due to his role as Ultraman Cosmos, a quick search produced this -->


ULTRAMAN NOA


Image taken from this site and information in English can be found here.

So now I understand~~~~~~~!
Well.... at least I think it's like that. (^_^)v

And here's a clip of the Ultraman Noa, the last mode of Ultraman Nexus, in action.


I called Noa-chan Hello!Project's first Morning Magomusume モーニング孫娘 (Morning Granddaughter) in my previous post. Some comments from my previous post questioned that, because NOno is not the only and not the first ex-Morning Musume to have a child. As noted by Sponichi, there was 1st gen member Ishiguro Aya, 2nd gen member Ichii Sayaka, and finally 1st gen member Iida Kaori (who got married the same day as me! ^_^) who is expecting her child in January 2008. To be clear, I said that this is the first Magomusume because Nono is the first person (soon to be followed by Kaorin) to remain under the Hello!Project stable even after the birth of the child. To me, this is certainly something significant, because they are supposed to be idols. Unless they are not considered as idols after leaving Morning Musume of course...

In any case, Tsunku seems to agree, and revealed his feelings in his blog.

In his blog, he mentioned that he was very happy for Tsuji, felt as if his own granddaughter was born, and expressed his joy to see a small-sized Tsuji being a mother. (I think he still find that hard to believe, as many of us do~~ ^_^)
He said that the newborn girl is a reserve candidate for Morning Musume!

Finally, he remarked that Tsuji is a "producer" now, and hopes that she will be a reliable, perfect, kakoii and kawaii mother for the kid.

Oh... he also said he wanted to meet the baby and give it a hug. ^_^



There has been concerns and talks about the future of Morning Musume, due to the disappointing sales of their latest single "Mikan" and that Momusu's time is running out.... because Buono,C-ute and Kirari have outsold Momusu.



Current sales report
Hello! Project ArtistSingleTotal Sales to Date
℃-uteTokaikko Junjou38,085
Buono!Honto no Jibun35,281
Tsukishima KirariChance31,766
Morning MusumeMikan28,082




I don't know about you guys, but I felt that from Tsunku's statement in his blog that the baby is a upcoming candidate for Momusu, deep inside he wants Morning Musume to continue on. (at least until the kid is old enough to audition, of course). I think Momusu's time is NOT over.

But this should not be the only reason. Please stay tuned for an upcoming post.



12 comments:

Tomo said...

gah! I so would like to buy Stuff from H!P to push the sales, but I don't even have a credit card or anything like that. It's sad that the sales are dropping so hard.
I still hope everything will turn out in the end.

I still think one of the reasons why sales drop so hard is the internet-downloading boom. I mean if you consider what the sales stated before it all started like 3 or 4 years ago (sales up to 200.000 sold exemplars)...

and I agree with you jin! Momosu's time is definitly not over yet! and mikan is a great song! Maybe with dance-man coming back... *still hopes*

Anna said...

You really scared me with the title. XDD I thought it was some surprise addition for MM. O_O

Noa-chan is a star already. I'm really happy for them. ^_^ One of the best news this year for H!P.

I think he may have said that as a nice joke. I don't think he meant it seriously. How young can she debut if it's so. O_O

I remember Nono and Taiyou said that they wished to see the baby go up to junior high, I think. So how many years is that? More than 10. O____O

I knew you would post something about the Mikan sales. ^_^

Anonymous said...

I'm sure you're aware, but neither Cute nor Kirari outsold MM with their first week sales, and Buono just barely did. Mikan is bound to get more sales in the coming weeks, so it's really too soon to say that those groups have outsold MM. They might, but then again, they might not.

Midori said...

I think that the reason MM's sales have gone down is the iTunes deal, yes, it will make a lot of money, but I don't think many people (expecially wotas) would rather go out of their way to buy a single for more when they can save $10 and but the single on iTunes, as for C-ute, It's probably the growing younger idol boom and Mai's young fans who like her from Kira*Pika and other Kirarin Revolution stuff (Robbi & Keroppi too). Kirari and Buono are easy to explain, as not only H!P fans are buying their music, but also anime fans and people who heard the song playing on the anime and liked it.
I think that if Morning Musume wants to boost sales, I know a lot of fans don't want to hear this, but I think that it will work, Morning Musume themselves, and by this I don't mean only Koharu, will have to sing more songs for animes. (I probably won't like this either.)

Anonymous said...

sales are going to get lower and lower no matter how you look at it because of rippers and downloaders, it's inevitible

Anonymous said...

Sales in general have gone down, but look at Kat-tun, they sold 350K this week. You can't blame the bad sales on rippers and downloads. ONSA sold 40K or so in their first week only a few months ago. Itunes, downloads etc are not going to make over 10K a difference.

Although to compare first week sales to total sales isn't really a realistic indication of MM vs the others. They should pass Kirari and maybe Buono! ... I don't see them passing C-ute, they'd have to have a great second week, and a decent third week. MM needs reinventing. It's great to say it's a new era, but nothing has really changed in terms or image or music. It's just the same old stuff, which I love, but it won't win new fans.

Anonymous said...

There is a very important reason why the post was ended this way "But this should not be the only reason. Please stay tuned for an upcoming post."

You will not find or read this this on any other English fan site , but this one .

So I encourage everyone to stay tune .

Anonymous said...

I'm intrigued ... ;)

Gaki said...

Well right now Jin and I are nervous :)

Anonymous said...

-Haromoni@ is failing to entice viewers
-As much as I love JunJun and RinRin they didn't served no purpose and didn't even boost popularity in China
-Haromoni@ seems to be just about
MM and ONLY about them
-Wide range of MM personalities have gone
-MM heavily targeting children

Xacur said...

Sad to see those sales reports.
It would be hard to cope it if Morning Musume desapear for lack of interest. I hope it wont happen.
But what's gonna happen when Ai and Risa graduates, I would lose most of interest in momusu :(
In the other hand, I think it's something with the music.
Now I can't take the new berryz's single out of my mind and I don't even know what's its name and I don't konw the members other than Momoko and Risako, but it's not the same with Mikan, and I like every girl in the group and I watch hm@ every week.
I'd say it's a music problem.

Gaki said...

Enxiz

Haromoni is one of the top rated programs for it`s time slot and top revenue grosser for sponsor ads .

Junjun`s fan base is doubling every month. It is still a fraction of the other more experienced girls , but she is quickly growing a fan base . Growing at a much faster rate then Linlin`s by the way .


MM is the company flagship group and Haromoni is their show ,not a H!P show.

Haromoni is designed for children .MM has always had a strong demographic draw of pre-teen girls , who like MM fashion style and make up . Even the old show was designed to be for children. It`s aired in a time slot for small children to watch.

Not catering to children cuts off future recruits and concert goers . And it also takes away the parents revenue .

MM still has a lot of personalities , they are evolving and learning .Each one is different and their ways of doing things will be different from the past.

6 of the current 9 members are ranked in the top 20 in fan popularity of H!P members ,4 of the 9 are ranked in the top 10 . The others are former members and Matsuura

MM group closest rival in terms of popularity is GAM and that is only because Matsuura is one of the most popular stars in Japan. MM is the most popular female group in Japan .
MM are # 3 most searched group in Korea. They are in the top 5 in sales in Taiwan . Their visit to Taiwan caused a near riot at the airport for fans to see not only Junjun and Linlin, but MM as a whole .

All this belief that this is the end of MM is a English fan site created myth , that is not supported by the real facts in Japan or the true sales numbers . The Oricon is not the true sales totals for any group

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