Despite really liking them, I’d never considered Stereo Japan/Tokyo as being likely to include on this site, their general sound being too in the club and not enough in the pit to feel like a good fit here, but “Run” is just all over the place and loaded with fun stuff.
Plus, the video reminds one of “Ganbare!!”, and there ain’t a damn thing wrong with that.
HOWEVER, in trying to get some info, I was looking through the comments on the video, and … I’m really confused. They are/not breaking up? There’s some bizarre marathon+sales condition on the group’s continuation? I’ve never seen such a high ratio of dislikes to likes on idol video.
Literally, all I know about Stereo XXXXXXXX is that there was Stereo Tokyo and Stereo Osaka and together they Voltroned into Stereo Japan, but then that split and Stereo Osaka morphed into Edge Dub Monkeyz or something like that, and Stereo Tokyo is still going under the Stereo Japan brand (along with Stereo Fukuoka) and stereo stereo stereo.
So help me out, pretty please. And even if you can’t, cool song, you guys!
IMMEDIATE UPDATE: See the very first comment on this post. I do believe that most questions are now answered! Also, see Stereo Fukuoka.
Stereo Tokyo mentioned that if they sold more than 10,000 copies of their new single, they would disband, and they would also disband if they couldn’t complete the marathon. Fans could take the place of the members in the marathon by buying more CDs, and those fans were called on the official Twitter feed as “otaku”, which drew the ire of a bunch of anime-nerd 2ch idiots who’d never heard of the group before, who began sending all kinds of abuse to the official Twitter account and to the members.
The event was fun for the people who followed Stereo Tokyo, who’ve always been very open about their ridiculous selling techniques (their debut single had a special bottle of champagne for anyone who would buy one million copies, for example), but the people who had just heard of them through the marathon were outraged. Of course, I’m sure if they disbanded, the members would just be moved to Stereo Fukuoka and start performing as STEREO JAPAN, so it’s fairly low-risk. The only really bad thing was that one of the members was injured, which is why I really hope people will stop forcing the marathon thing on idols, but in the end it’s just a typical OTT Stereo Tokyo event that happened to catch the attention of the wrong people.
Wow, that was extremely fast and loaded with detail — thank you! Can I just say that I actually love that they called the fans otaku AND that some self-described otaku lost their marbles over it? Fans are the worst best thing in the world.