Wao Youka starring in a drama!


Hmm. Something about her being the wife of someone being investigated for corruption? Rikaichan and Chinese Pera-kun can only go so far. -_- I do like how they mention she was a tall and handsome otokoyaku, though. XD

Hokushou Kairi's DS poster. Sometimes I wish she'd turned out as an onnayaku instead, but then we'd miss out on pictures like that one. I briefly mistook her for Mizu (the hair, maybe?) ^^;

Normally I make a point to avoid DRM'ed music, but with legit zuka files, you don't really have a choice. Today, giveawayoftheday.com is sharing Wondershare Music Converter for free. I tried it out. It's a super simple audio converter and it gets rid of DRM. Did I mention it's free?

The catch: You have to download and install TODAY. They even have a little countdown on the page, how cute. Setup is easy - just run setup.exe, restart, run activate.exe, then start re-encoding your files.


This has been your anti-DRM PSA for today.

Honey, I'm ho-- What the hell? TIP's shut down and fans are up in arms?



Man, skip your FL for a week and fandom go splodey. At least it looks like everything's died down for now. I really dislike this elitist vs. casual fan crap. You know what you are? A Fanatic. Right? Don't try to deny it - you know you'd drop trou right then and there if your favorite seito told you to. ;) So there. Fanatics, the whole lotta ya and that's what makes this fandom fun - both the criticism and the appreciation.


Anyway, enough people have posted on this topic.


So: Footage of Touko's retirement parade thing (I'm sure there's a name for that) here. I can't believe she's already got something lined up! Sneaky, Touko. Very sneaky. 'Course we love you even more for it.

Kazune Miou has a *Dinner Show* (DS!!) in August. The poster says "Vol. 2," so do they consider her May salon concert to be a dinner show? Then just call them all dinner shows, Hankyu, so I don't have to think about otokoyaku/onnayaku semantics.

It doesn't look like she's doing anything in between - concert in Feb, concert in May, and now concert in Aug. Going the Zunko route, perhaps? Not that I mind, but it'd be nice to see her in an actual musical sometime in the future.

Nearly got run over today -- I stepped off the curb to cross the street, not even looking at the light. And here I was, thinking I'd fully adjusted to the time difference. -_-;;

Pics of the day:
Graduations should be happy things XD
http://www.daily.co.jp/gossip/takara_topics/photo/p14_0001823094.shtml

Wha? XD Skystage digest, you skimped out on the important bits!
http://www.daily.co.jp/gossip/takara_topics/photo/p15_0001823094.shtml

I took a lot of photos over the week, but this is probably my favorite:

...Though my brain's still stuck somewhere halfway. I thought I timed it right by sleeping on the plane, but feeling very sleep-drunk-woozy right now... huh. Anyway. It was a really short plane ride - only eight hours. Business class rocks. I can see why mom's friend won't even consider economy. The thought of having to fold oneself into that teeny space next time... I've been spoiled. ;_;

Overall, not a bad trip. Basically a replay of what I did last time, but I got to see Hoshigumi twice! \^.^/ And my mom even liked it. Double yay. Triple phew. She was really impressed by how disciplined the fans are and amused by the whole sienne parade during iri-de. Next time, she says, she's going to wear a hat and sunglasses, carry a big LV bag, and do sexy-walk down that street, too. ^^;; I'll just be far, far away when that happens.

Still feeling a little sick from whatever hit me. Had to totally fast the last couple of days, incidentally starting on Good Friday. (Someone's way of telling me not to skip Lent next time? Randomly, why do so many of us lapsed Catholics still keep Lent?)


Woah, nearly tipped over for a sec. Guess it's time to stop. Laters.

Puked my guts out yesterday, but here I am, about to leave for the theater. A toujitsuken-ing we will go...

The only bad part about being first in toujitsuken line is that people automatically assume you know what you're doing and come up talking a mile a minute. Thank goodness today's manager noticed and intervened, saving us from explaining our asian-but-still-gaikokujin status. He even told the ticket counter people to print out the english translation from the website for us. Awwww. Are we allowed to fangirl the managers?

Still hate Tokyo theater's sound system though. Or is it the sound system? I only know that when Elphaba's practically screaming during the last bit of "Defying Gravity" it sounds fine, but when anyone starts belting a little in Tokyo, my ears start complaining.

Anyway. Hoshigumi: awesome as expected, but I can see why you'd cry buckets during the revue because most of it really feels like a "goodbye Touko" show. ;_; Too much, maybe.

I may have made a fan out of my mom's friend. Not enough to actually fangirl Takarazuka, but maybe the next time she's in Tokyo, she'll check it out. She even bought Touko's CD. ^^;

Made it to Tokyo. Have been up for over 24 hours. Going collapsy now.

I don't think I'm cut out for standby travel. That, or my period's on its merry way. Or both! Double yay.

I'd planned everything out as far as I could, but now they tell me the airline has overbooked the flight, so a lucky number of passengers will get upgraded to business, which means *we* are out. Cue Plan B. Well, Plan B was originally going to the airport the next day and praying for seats.

So here's Plan C: fly to Kansai Airport, sightsee Osaka for an afternoon, then grab the shinkansen to Tokyo the same night to check into our hotel. And who are they going to rely on to get them through everywhere? Yours truly, of course.


AUGH. WE LEAVE TOMORROW. I LEARNED THIS TODAY. *STRESSES*

Nooooo! Kobuta01, where are you? There's only one clip up! :O

At least it's the fortune telling one?


Kimu's in danger of getting fat after retirement? XD I love that nearly everything's subtitled for emphasis, now we can just look everything up.

Getting up in the middle of the night to watch Tokyo Friend Park while sick was probably a bad idea, but dear lord, I don't regret it one bit. I've watched the Wall Crash bit ten times already, and it's still hilarious. Way to be troupe leader, Mizu. I wonder if this is representative of her leading style? XD

Kimu is...surprisingly serious. Or she shows it more here. She laughs easily, but whenever she was up, she had on a Very Serious Game Face. And she was the only one to play around with that big dinosaur drumstick. Oh, Kimu. I love you best (next to Asa).

EDIT: IT'S UP!!!

Kimu: *modestly* Yes, I have a six-pack. A big one.

I love Zunko, but she seemed a little shy as top star off the stage. I love her as an OG. She's still so friggin gorgeous and that voice. いいじゃないの幸せならば. It's not *quite* as smooth as the original (who seems to have been a real-life otokoyaku ^^;), but, mmmm, yes please. Whatever this is, it's re-airing 3/7 for anyone lucky enough to get NHK.

Christellelin on Youtube - so many clips, so little time:
I definitely agree with econn about Asa's Death looking a lot like Zunko's. I think it's the teased out purple hair.

White Christmas from her 2006 concert. Yes, it's a bit past the holidays, but when she sings it, I feel all Christmas-y again. Oh, Zunko, you can fake-forget your lines anytime, issoCUTE.

More recently, from Inori.

If you've already seen all of these, well, you can always use another dose of Zunko. :)

sumirepanther made a post way back detailing retirement dates with last-appearance-on-calendar dates. Now that we've gotten more retirement info, it's interesting to see how they match up:


Shirahane Yuri : April, retiring end of May

Aran Kei : April, retiring April
Toono Asuka : April, retiring April

Hizuki Hana : May, retiring beginning of July
Yamato Yuuga : June, retiring beginning of July

This leaves Asako, since I think most of us agree Hanagumi and Mizu are "safe" for now.

Sena Jun : December, retiring ?

My prediction: Kiriyan and Ai-chan [take over] in August.

I'm watching some random "Gaikokujin have bad manners" program on Fuji TV, and part of me is a little irked, but mostly it's just, Oh silly Japan, I have better issues to get ticked off at.

This portion of the show did make me twitch, though:
( Let's play Identify the Chuugokujin! )

Okay, time's up. Off to the last big New Year dinner. Red envelopes, ahoy!

Uhm. Who? And she's a freakin' otokoyaku? Grr, Hankyu.

Equally frustrating was logging into LJ and seeing the umpteen OMGWTFBBQNOWAI!!! posts but most of them not saying what the hell was going on . X(

Or maybe they forgot to tell us the title was Elisabeth - Women in Tights.

I was looking at my computer's sound card the other day and spent more hours than I'm willing to admit playing zuka clips and mucking around with sienne voices -- not that they aren't perfect the way they are, of course.

But imagine if sexy-as-hell Mizu!Death had sounded like this:

( Read more... )

The Mizu look-a-like in Hoshigumi? It's Makaze Suzuho!

No biggie, but it's been bugging me since the okieko footage came out. And sienne identification is... not one of my strong points, so it was nice to figure this one out. *pats self* Then again, she made it rather easy by being so very Mizu-looking:

My mom is watching QVC shopping on TV. It's some special jewelry event so they're filming in Vienna, Austria and talking about the fashion, history... and Elisabeth. Apparently she was big on lace. XD


Happy New Year, everyone.