Johnny's grab bag - no, this entire entry is not just an excuse to use my Hina shaving icon!

[guingel]

So, I hope everyone downloaded Wilson Pickett. :D Except I know you didn't because I can see my download count! ::deep sigh:: No, it's ok. XD I'm terrible about taking music recommendations. But I chose Wilson Pickett cos I think his music is just good, fun stuff that anyone can enjoy, even if he doesn't become your favorite artist. I'm not uploading the Clash or the Ramones or anything because I know that people won't necessarily like it. Actually, I might upload some Clash someday. But you don't have to download it.

Anyway! I'm listening to Recomen with Shige guesting, as translated by enshinge (also, look at the number of that entry! neat!). (She does a good job, but I still really miss ttthhbbbtt's translations!) Yoko isn't there, which is sadditude, but Shige and Hina hosting a show together is a bit like a dream for me. XD Especially because they have two of my favorite speaking voices in Johnny's. Also especially because they're two of my favorite Johnny's. But yeah. Shige has a very sexy voice, and Hina. . . I could just listen to him talk forever. It's funny to replace Yoko with Shige, though, now that I think of it. Shige is more of a Hina fill-in - not that they're similar, but they play the same role, y'know? Shige's more tsukkomi. Anyway, I adore Recomen. One of my favorite JE productions. Yoko and Hina are amazing!

edit: Dude. Just listened to a little more of it and I felt compelled to comment again on how amazing it is having Shige and Hina talking to each other. It's like earporn. Major earporn.

I've also been watching the MMA Rowing Specials, as subbed by taijiproject, who kind of remains one of my favorite people in fandom, and have been greatly enjoying having my emotions toyed with. XD Here are my thoughts, roughly as said in a comment to the subber:
The feeling I get, my theory, is kind of that the whole thing was extremely difficult - not just that it was difficult for the boys, but also for the producer and director and everything. Because the show they've put together feels a little raw. We can see the parts where we're being deceived or emotionally manipulated to a much greater extent than usual - and we can also see it being filmed to a much greater extent. Like, that we get to see Arashi going to buy lunch and having to borrow from an AD, or that the coach yells at them for filming. Which is all stuff I love seeing! Even, like, when we get to see the boys being called away, all the acknowledgment that they have other work to do, mentions of them coming in on their own, stuff like that.

I don't know if it's because the situation was difficult to control in a neat, television way (although MMA always goes on location) or if it was because they were unable to get a lot of really acceptable footage and had to use footage that included the director or what, but yeah. Maybe they decided to do it like that so it would seem more realistic, so we'd believe whatever they were telling us about Arashi's feelings at the time, I don't know.

But that's why I'm enjoying it so much! I'm really finding it interesting, seeing this more raw state! And of course, it's so fascinating to see the boys doing manual labor, and to see them working so hard together. Actually, the only thing I wish they'd change is that it feels the chronology of events has really been adjusted, and I'd like to know when different events actually happened relative to each other. But yeah. I don't actually know much about TV show filming, so I try to stay skeptical, but anyway. The rowing episodes have been really interesting so far and I got strangely sucked in. At first Katie and I couldn't even bring ourselves to watch them, then I ended up marathoning. Seriously, them on the bus to their training camp? Precious! I also go mad for mentions of Nino's tiny hands.

Aaaaaaaaaand I'm in love with Question? now. SO IN LOVE!! I want Akun. HOT. But they're all totally adorable. Even the ugly bassist is adorable. I have trouble saying their name with the appropriate question mark, though. XD I'm always "I was watching a clip of Question. . . Question? . . . and it was so cute!" Cos Katie and I feel compelled to pronounce it.

Also, young Yamapi needs to stop making me a huge pervert. DX He's. . . just so pretty! Ugh.

On the subject of people who make me a pervert, Young Nagase. Before he got his teeth fixed, in their first concert!! I'm still amazed that that got posted and I got to see it. Oooh, little teef. Oh, but what I wanted to say about Nagase is actually about older Nagase, and that is. . . what the hell sort of genetic material must he have?? Who are his parents? He's, like, physical perfection, and even his dimness is just incredibly endearing. I crush on him with a large crushing!

And he's not even my favorite in TOKIO. Although it really is silly for me to talk about a favorite.

Speaking of teeth (why do I feel the need for segues all the time?) I've made a list of Johnny's who have had their teeth fixed.

I think the following pretty definitely have had some work done:
Taichi (OK, he talked about it, so I feel pretty sure about this one)
Ohno
Nagase
Jun
Shige
Tegoshi
I'm also pretty sure about Maru, although my memory could be messing with me. Also, has Ohkura had anything done?

The following seem pretty obviously not to have had anything done, or if they did, they should get their money back:
Tsubasa
Hina (WOLF TEETH FTW!)
Sho
Yamapi (Cos I'm assuming if he had, he would SMILE IN PHOTOGRAPHS! YOU DID WHEN YOU WERE TINY! DO YOU WANT ME TO LUST AFTER YOU OR NOT??)
Go (right?)
Nino (He's just on the list because I love his tiny perfect teeth, and if they aren't natural, I don't want to know.)

Katie and I also made a list of people who we think come from some sort of "broken home" - generally single moms. Just gakked from interviews and tidbits:
yamapi
takki
nino
yoko
koyama
okada

I think? I could be wrong about any of those. Some of them definitely seem to have both parents, still married, like Shige or Ryo or Jun, but I didn't make a list of confirmed "traditional families". XD


I guess with that I will return to my Computer Science homework and watching Countdown 05-06 and listening to Recomen! Ahh, a productive day. I slept for much of it. I'm in the horny phase of my hormone cycle and that leads to many naps, and also a general jitteryness. XD

Comments

[kegom.livejournal.com]

I'll try to keep this short, because I just got back from a weekend seminar and I'm pretty beat.

1.) Rowing Boat Club: TOTAL AGREEMENT! ^___^ It's really interesting to see it, because it does seem a lot more unscripted than the other episodes. And a lot of Arashi's emotions also seem more real than in other episodes (and - maybe a bit too real, sometimes?). I haven't seen the episodes with the subs yet, but I remember from watching the raws that at one point I just thought "Damn, Jun, get over yourself and stop bitching!" ^^" But it's interesting and lovely to see that Arashi actually does keep together even in the "uncut" (ok, lesser cut) material and it sort of fits with the way it was conceived, because while of course there's a lot of scripted stuff in Arashi shows, I get the feeling that Ohno's spontaneous offer to form a rowing club really was unexpected for the rest of the crew...^-^

2.) The fixed-teeth-list: Actually, I have a question: Are fixed teeth a big deal in America? Because I remember the reactions to the "Yamapi has fixed teeth!" post and this in addition to you saying that you'd rather not know if Nino had his teeth fixed, I get the feeling that it's something ...not quite shameful, but definitely something one wouldn't talk about.
For me that's kind of surprising, because every child I know (including me) had braces at some point and a lot of my friends (including me!^-^) had the wisdom teeth (or, occasionally, other teeth) pulled when we were teenagers to ensure that our other teeth wouldn't grow crooked from the lack of space in there. So I don't quite understand the reason why fixed teeth would be something big enough to create such a fuss as in the community where the thing about Yamapi's teeth was posted...
(This is not a cricism of your list, btw! ^___^ This I find intersting, in the same way I would find a list about who wears glasses in JE interesting.)

3.) The "broken home" list is interesting, too! I heard about Nino's parents being divorced and I heard rumours about Takki ...having problems with his family? in some way, at least and I think I heard a rumour about Yoko coming from a single-parent household (which explains why he worked on construction sites for a while after he finished middle school). I never heard anything abuout the other three, though! That's really interesting! ^__^ Did Okada come from Tokyo? I always wondered how it came that he entered Johnny's through a TV competition - I wondered whether he perhaps came from a far-away part from Japan which kept him from applying to Johnny's beforehand in the regular way...

[guingel.livejournal.com]

1) Their emotions do seem more real! And then some times, they seem more fake - like you can see where they tried to create an arc. I think that's the problem they have - like, they want the whole thing to fit into an emotional arc, a storyline for the viewer, in a really predictable variety show way. You know, there's a formula when you do this sort of "people take on an unusual challenge" thing, but because they couldn't make everything happen neatly and were trying to be honest and film things as they really happened, it didn't fit that formula. So we get to see the reality, but then we also get to see things being more fake when they try to push that formula. IT'S SO COOL.

And yeah, Arashi really are so sweet. I'm a big Hanamaru Cafe junkie, and the host is always like, "Arashi get along so well" and sometimes the member that's on is like "Do we really?" and I think that they relate to each other differently than to their outside friends, so they don't realize it, but if you watch them and then other groups, it's really obvious that they get along really well. :D

2) No, it's not shameful at all. I mean, I had braces. So do most people. I think there is a thing where stars aren't supposed to have had physical modifications, you know? They're just supposed to be perfect. My interest, however, is just because I find it really entertaining and interesting when you see someone's perfect smile all the time, and then all of a sudden you watch an old video of them and they have adorable crooked teeth.

Although I think there is also something a little more racy about the way the Johnny's boys get their teeth fixed - it seems to often take the form of extreme dental surgery to immediately transform their smiles into perfect. Maru we saw with braces, but Ohno went from crooked to straight pretty quick, I think. So the list was actually sort of made with that in mind - although I ended up including Maru as well, it was less "Who's had dental work?" and more "Who's had massive oral surgery?"

But even then, it's not shameful or anything. Only a big deal to me because of the drastic changes in appearance. With Nino, it's because I fetish his tiny perfect teeth a lot. So i want them to be, as it were, God-made, and not man-made. XD Kinda like if someone had a huge crush on Angelina Jolie and then suddenly found out her looks were due to plastic surgery (not that they are! I have no clue) or that she has fake breasts or whatever.

Oh my god, the glasses! I think about that one a lot. XD Katie and I are always "Who do you think actually wears them, and who do you think just has cosmetic glasses, who do you think has contacts but is never photographed in glasses??" XD

I haven't seen this Yamapi has fixed teeth post. XD I'm so confused about that boy's mouth right now. Was it at the NEWS comm? I miss a lot there, because I don't have them on my friends page and with only 8 entries on a page, and my lack of strong interest in NEWS, I tend to get lazy about skipping back pages, it's a pain.

3) Yeah, I've just been hearing more about Takki because Katie loves him lots, but yeah, apparently he was quite eager to move away from home, and his dad was, if not completely absent, not a large factor in his childhood. Possibly totally gone.

See, you heard about Nino's parents, too! Good, cos I've been wondering where I heard that.

Okada is from Osaka, so yeah, I guess that's why his entrance is so intense. Where he was raised by his piano-playing mom and sister. XD I get the impression that they're all kind of geniuses - you know how Okada pushes himself really hard and ends up perfect at everything he does? I think that's a family trait.