Welcome to Wota Wonderings! We are a group of english-speaking Japanese music bloggers brought together once a month to answer questions posed by johpan. We strive to be creative and entertaining, and we may even shed a bit of new light on interesting musical and cultural topics. Any questions about how we work should be directed to johpan. Don’t forget to check out the other posts from this month at the bottom of this post. Enjoy!
lol uncreative D:^
It seems like many animes and TV dramas have had some sort of tie in to music that we like. This month, this is what Wota Wonderings is all about.
The most notable one that I can think of right now is Buono!, and H!P Act featuring Suzuki Airi, Tsugunaga Momoko and Natsuyaki Miyabi.
When Buono! first started, I was wary of the group. I didn’t know anything about Berryz Koubou and I knew next to nothing about C-ute. Heck, back then I knew hardly anything about Morning Musume, let alone the rest of H!P. But when Shugo Chara started, I grew to like the two songs used for the opening and ending, especially Kokoro no Tamago.
Because of Buono!, I got into Shugo Chara and the entire first season, anxiously anticipating hearing the new endings and openings as they came out. Now, Buono! doesn’t do the openings for Shugo Chara, but they still do the endings. Unfortunately, their music has also been getting worse, in my opinion. co no mi chi, their newest single, is my absolute least favourite Buono! song. To the point where I refuse to listen to it. I haven’t watched the second season of Shugo Chara! because I haven’t gotten around to it yet, but not because of Buono!’s lack of participation. I still really like Buono!’s music and Shugo Chara Egg!’s two singles. I’m just hoping that co no mi chi was the lowest point they get in their career.
Another group that got me into a TV series was no3b from AKB48, featuring Team A members Takahashi Minami, Kojima Haruna and Minegishi Minami.
no3b’s first single, Relax! was the opening song for the drama which starred the three girls, Mendol. Because of a mixture of the plot, wanting to get into AKB48 itself and the previews for the opening song, I decided to watch Mendol, and am currently watching it still (I never finished it in the first place).
Their songs are catchy and I think both the a-side and b-side from Relax! are in my 25 most played on iTunes. Also, the group succeeded in getting me into AKB48, and I’m currently absorbing AKB knowledge like it’s nobody’s business.
The group never became uninvolved with the drama, fortunately, as they were the leads and it was only 12 episodes long, so every episode I got to watch, I heard Relax! at the beginning and Oogoe Diamond at the end, two of my favourite AKB recorded songs.
Now, no3b is releasing a 2nd single, called Tane, for an anime called ‘Tetsuwan Birdy DECODE: 02″ which looks pretty interesting and I’m actually thinking of watching it as I’m writing this down.
Here’s no3b’s 2nd single, Tane:
