I've been watching some of my Netflix list before the plan changes and the prices go up and I couldn't help but notice some names of Jpop groups in this documentaries series. I haven't listened to Jpop in a while as I'm not a big fan anymore but I heard maybe one or two talk about these groups and figured I would share it.
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When I saw that this would be released, I was not really liking the idea of it, sinde its all artists from Starto (formerly known as Johnny's) who have a few issues to being featured in a documentary. First thing is, since it's just boygroups, it will give just a very little insight of the entier JPop-genre. I mean you could've shown different acts, not just boygroups if you really want to get people to see what JPop is like. Second, since it's all just 1 company its also a lack in diversity since all these artists have a very similiar sound due to being from the same company. Third, since it's Starto, people who may not know of JPop or too little will run into the issue that in case they want to research on these artists to listen to them, they are not going to be able to listen to their music. First of all Hi Hi Jets does release a few little songs all once in a while, but they havn't officialy debuted yet, so there is not much for people to find on YT for example. KAT-TUN is just on Spotify with all their songs after 2021 and Hey!Say!Jump only has 1 single on Spotify, same for King&Prince (altho it was said that they wuld add all of King&Prince's songs to Spotify), than there is only the full discography of Kanjani8, ARASHI and Travis Japan on Spotify and the only frequently updated one is Travis Japan of all of the acts who have at least 1 single on Spotify since Travis Japan needs to be accessible for foreign fans, since Starto thinks they could gain foreign fans by making them apear in the US. Fourth Starto could've manipulated their artists to say some things or don't say some things to switch facts around to make everything look differently than it is, if its just artists of the same company, so the results of some questions could look sus probably if many acts maybe say the same or similiar things, even if they maybe wanted to say something else at the end. And lastly, if people research on the company, it will be so fucked up and scare people off who are new to JPop since of the dark history of the company.
If I would've made such a documentary I would've interviewed the following artists for a bigger diversity:
This is what I would add to be honest lol. It would give you so much more variety and a bigger insight
When I saw that this would be released, I was not really liking the idea of it, sinde its all artists from Starto (formerly known as Johnny's) who have a few issues to being featured in a documentary. First thing is, since it's just boygroups, it will give just a very little insight of the entier JPop-genre. I mean you could've shown different acts, not just boygroups if you really want to get people to see what JPop is like. Second, since it's all just 1 company its also a lack in diversity since all these artists have a very similiar sound due to being from the same company. Third, since it's Starto, people who may not know of JPop or too little will run into the issue that in case they want to research on these artists to listen to them, they are not going to be able to listen to their music. First of all Hi Hi Jets does release a few little songs all once in a while, but they havn't officialy debuted yet, so there is not much for people to find on YT for example. KAT-TUN is just on Spotify with all their songs after 2021 and Hey!Say!Jump only has 1 single on Spotify, same for King&Prince (altho it was said that they wuld add all of King&Prince's songs to Spotify), than there is only the full discography of Kanjani8, ARASHI and Travis Japan on Spotify and the only frequently updated one is Travis Japan of all of the acts who have at least 1 single on Spotify since Travis Japan needs to be accessible for foreign fans, since Starto thinks they could gain foreign fans by making them apear in the US. Fourth Starto could've manipulated their artists to say some things or don't say some things to switch facts around to make everything look differently than it is, if its just artists of the same company, so the results of some questions could look sus probably if many acts maybe say the same or similiar things, even if they maybe wanted to say something else at the end. And lastly, if people research on the company, it will be so fucked up and scare people off who are new to JPop since of the dark history of the company.
If I would've made such a documentary I would've interviewed the following artists for a bigger diversity:
- LiSA for a famous female act - since she is known by anime fans outside of Japan
- Fujii Kaze for a famous male act - since he is known worldwide after going viral
- ONE OK ROCK for a famous band - since they have a lot fans all around the world
- BE:FIRST for a famous boygroup - since they are from an quit new established company, gained a lot fame in Japan and are also known by a lot foreign JPop-fans and are also successfull outside of Japan (they literally won an Award on MTV European Music Awards in 2023 in a cathegory where they managed to beat a famous KPop act and the most popular artist of Thailand aswell as a viral filipino boygroup. Fans of TREASURE thought it will be impossible that anyone beats them, but BE:FIRST won the award instead so well TREASURE-fans had been wrong)
- AKB48 for a famous girlgroup - To show a big group that also works for many years and has a quit unique system, to show a different side of idol groups in case people only know how groups would work that don't change members that much (since it's not as common to have groups who constantly switch out members)
- w-inds. - In case you need some spot to fill for one of the oldest still existing boygroups (that is now a duo) and to have Japan's first ever found from a survival show group
- NiziU for a girlgroup from a Korean label - In case you want to cover how Korean agencies debut JPop artists these days
- BABYMETAL - In case you want to highlight a girlgroup who is not releasing pop music and cause they have a lot fans worldwide, so you can show how crazy it was when they oneday became famous outside Japan over night
- Masayuki Suzuki - In case you want to show in case you want to show a elderly person who still releases music (ok he is 68 years old and made his debut when he was 30, but still, you may need some guy who was not too young at debut and is still making music at over 60 years old)
This is what I would add to be honest lol. It would give you so much more variety and a bigger insight
I think I saw an article or two talking about the Johnny's issue, I thought about writing about it at the time but felt like I didn't know enough about the groups to truly give a good article about it.
I was a big fan of One Ok Rock, they still have so many good songs. Found them because of 5SOS.
Wow, I feel like people should be supportive of people making music at any age!, that's cool that Masayuki Suzuki made his debut in his 30's. Some are just far to young when it comes to that.
BE:FIRST has been suggested to me on Youtube a couple of times now, I'm pretty shocked had how many views they have, that's so impressive.
Yeah, it was also a bit odd at first to see them being so famous.
SKY-HI who is a famous rapper in Japan (since he debuted in 2005 with Japan's most famous CO-ED group AAA and also had a successfull solo debut in 2013) opend up his own agency in 2020 and said he was unsure if it will work out. He formed BE:FIRST in hope to show people, especially boys, that in hope they fear they can't make it in Japan, they don't need to run away to Korea thinking they should leave the country to debut and for all boys who thought they want to just give up in music. He said he thought many boys don't want to debut, since there are too many girlgroups an more girlgroup stans in Japan who make it hard for boys to get successfull plus most famous boygroups are from only a tiny hand of companies and in some of these not all artists get popular and the most groups also can't compete against very big names (like the artists from Starto). So he thought to give them a spac to fit in and feel to be themself. This is also how he named his company since BMSG is short for "Be Myself Group".
At the beginning SKY-HI was not quit sure if the company would gain a lot atraction or if it might fail and especialy people who know him thought him leaving Avex and making his own company and than scouting a boygroup would be a flop, since SKY-HI was funding everything from his savings without getting help from anyone who could've for example helped him to promote the agency, he also didn't payed into anything like getting ads or apearing on TV to promote stuff, he did non of that and also showed his survival show where he formed BE:FIRST with for free on Youtube (each episode came 1 week after being shown on Hulu and has even English subs, which is unusual for Japanese acts on YT). People quit didn't thought everything will work out and so thought this can possibly flop, cause it had barly any promotions, no help by others and so on and in SKY-HI's company had only worked 3 people back then of which it was just him and 2 staff member.
However only about a year later he revealed, that even tho he used up all his entire saving to fund the survival show (he spend 1 million $) and to buy the building for his company and renovate it (3 million $) and he had not any single money left and was close to go bankrupt cause of spending all his savings since he spend in total almost 5 million $ for everything (dude went from a millionair to a broke person in a short time for his own company) he still was able to recover extremly well from spending all that money. He published that after first having just 2 employe, he went to have 21 people in the end of 2021 working for him (of which at this time 7 had been from BE:FIRST, 3 soloists and 5 trainees, so he had 5 staff member) and he made 7 million $ profit. That's quit impressive tho
Although BE:FIRST are now one of the most famous boygroups in Japan, people hope their little brother group MAZZEL could catch on and gain a lot more popularity, since at the moment they sadly arn't as popular as BE:FIRST (my profilepicture btw is MAZZEL's Naoya). I love MAZZEL's music and so I can totaly see why many people who like their music too wish that they could get more views and streams and CD-sales. Their music is extremly well made and a style where I could see many people enjoying the music, but however the point where they might break trought is sadly not hit yet, while BE:FIRST in comparisom already got that since debut.
In case you don't now MAZZEL, I leave you some songs and hope to get your opinion on their music 
I don't stan a single group from Johnny's. I actually like Kat-Tun's music but based on the history i was told about them with one of the artists (despite me enjoying his solo music 
) makes me not want to get into them. All the bad things i heard that happened to the Johnny's group yeah no. I listen to Number_i as they broke from Johnny's and used to be part of King & Prince and I really enjoy their music. That's the only group I would care about that came from there, but that documentary has nothing on them.
I don't need to watch that to know what JPop is about. I stan a variety of groups from Rock to Rap to Vocalists etc. My obsession is the Rampage from Exile Tribe.
give me a documentary on 84 members from Exile Tribe and I'll be all over that. It's funny because i listened to EVERY SINGLE SONG and Unit from Exile Tribe and I cannot stand anyone but the Rampage. MAYBE few songs here and there from Ballistik boys etc. Though I do enjoy the Exile Groups songs from the High & Low Soundtrack.
But Yeah...i don't get why people would tune into a company that abused every single artist under them...They should have shut down a long time ago.
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