Welcome to our second installment of Reader’s Best! If you haven’t already, please check out Luna’s Top Ten in our inaugural post. Today we are featuring Melly’s picks, not just because they have fantastic taste, but also because they were the second person to complete the survey. We try to keep it simple around here. Let’s go, Melly!
Oomori Seiko
When You Have Things to Say But Don’t Know What to Say
I’m sure by now you’ve seen the disturbing news about Oomori Seiko; if you haven’t, just search her name on your network of choice. I was late to the story myself, but after seeing why so many mutuals were expressing basically the full emotional gamut late last night, all I could do was log back off.
It’s fitting that I was listening to Comeback Kid’s “False Idols Fall” on my way home, just a few hours prior. If recent years have proven anything to us, it’s that the people we laud — idolize — the most are too often the least worth of acclaim. Continue reading
A ZOC n’ Roll Debut Album
A wonderful problem to have is walking in front of a luxurious buffet and not knowing which thing to eat first because it’s all so good – that’s the experience of trying to write about the new ZOC album from Seiko Oomori and her juvenile delinquent girl gang.
There Is a New ZOC Single with Two Chances to Like It
Well this turned out remarkably well, didn’t it? ZOC is … actually, I have no idea how to preface this. If you know ZOC, you know about all of the ZOC stuff most likely, and if you don’t know ZOC you may wonder why we like to talk about them. I find them an interesting between-the-lines act, as one would probably expect from a subversion-minded Oomori Seiko-led idol unit on a major label during this particular era, but it may well be the Seiko fact that keeps the whole thing from hilariously unraveling, as to say that one is a thing and then to be it are two very different things.
Anyway! New single, double A-side(?), out today but a couple of days’ existence for the two MVs in support, and as the title implies your own personal satisfaction mileage may vary depending on your a) taste and b) relationship toward the ZOC thing:
AZOCalypse Now!
BREAKING NEWS: Across the nation of Japan and around the entire world, people are coming down with terminal cases of “not being able to mind their business”.
What the FOC is Going On With ZOC?
Come Tell Me More about This ZOC Single
ZOC! So as part of the make-idol-more-manageable-for-Maniac process, I don’t have an eagle-eyed notification system from Twitter anymore, choosing instead to rely on deliberate searching and whatever YouTube deigns to tell me about. This is funny because, right after I’d officially scheduled everything on Saturday, I was heading out the door with a good feeling about having covered just about all that there was to cover, and boom, YouTube note about ZOC!
They have a single out on Oct. 9, and the title track is offered up for our viewing and listening pleasure:
Gotta work in those Namahamu to Yakiudon gang signs
It’s the Flip Side of ZOC
First, disclosure: ZOC’s official Twitter gave me a full-on heart attack the other day when I was idly just trying to clear out the notifications and I saw … a blog post from Seiko without context! DUN DUN DUUUUUNNNNN. But naw, it was nothing, no graduation announcement or a “that was fun, what next” or anything, just words of praise and encouragement from the boss behind it all. Yes, the legend herself is still part of the group she founded.
And on that note, given that their first single released yesterday, it only made sense for ZOC to release an MV for the B-side!
ZOC Is Here to ZOC Your Socks Off
For almost any idol group that debuted last year, during a great-enough-to-be-noteworthy glut of new projects, to stand out after the fact was going to require unique efforts and angles. Some of them, like we saw from Toricago the other day, are all in on creative updates on familiar tropes. Others looked to up any of a series of antes — to be more something than thei r peers — while others did enough to catch the eye and now face a long road ahead.
Arguably the greatest move that anything in idol could have done last year, then, would be to be in fact the creative side project of a modern musical legend who would lend credence, gravitas and much-needed artistic credibility to the whole in addition to that all-important name recognition. Yes, of course I speak of ZOC, who may have had the most enthusiastically received debut I’ve ever seen despite being more notable for instant member drama than anything they did musically. Basically, it was super idol.
A few months in, though, ZOC has been active and working and stable, and now with a single on the way next week, it was time to really show us what they have to offer. The MV for “family name” tells the tale:
All right! Continue reading
ZOC Feels Too Good to Be True
As if 2018 hasn’t already been absolutely lousy with great idol debuts, along comes every idol’s greatest champion, Oomori Seiko, with a unit of her own. Like, when this was announced, I thought, oh neat it’ll be cool if she stands in as producer and writes some tracks — I didn’t expect that she’d don the skirt herself and step right the hell up as leader.
Given the quality of this pre-debut teaser, I’m guessing that she just didn’t want to feel left out:
And this is just the intro! There’s precious little info about where this project is heading (even Natalie.mu is stripped down to the basics of them debuting tonight). That means speculation — the stupider the better! — so I’m going to go out on a wild-ass limb and say that it’s time to go all-in because: Continue reading
