Search - Minimoni :: Minimoni Songs V.2

Minimoni shifts from kiddie songs to infectious teen pop

Brian Camp | Bronx, NY | 09/14/2008

(4 out of 5 stars)

"Minimoni was a Hello! Project spin-off group that featured the three shortest members of Morning Musume ('mini'-moni, get it?), Mari Yaguchi, Nozomi "Nono" Tsuji, and Ai "Aibon" Kago, who were joined by Mika Todd, a half-Japanese American girl from Hawaii who was in an affiliated group called Coconuts Musume. For their first couple of years (2000-2002), Minimoni wore cute orange plaid outfits in different variations and performed kiddie songs. By the time this album came out in 2004, Mari Yaguchi had left the group and been replaced by Ai Takahashi, another member of Morning Musume, although both are heard on this album. The girls were a little older now (late teens), so they focused more on straight teen pop rather than kiddie songs and the results are quite enjoyable. They also moved away from the kiddie costumes into more fashionable hiphop-styled streetwear, as seen in concert performances and promotional videos and photos. Aibon, Nono and Ai-chan are three of the most delightful performers from Morning Musume and their voices are easy to distinguish while listening. I'm a big fan and I love listening to them. Aibon and Nono, in particular, brought an unrestrained comic imagination and aggressive youthful energy to almost everything they did together. I like the funkier sound of these songs, which are a little wilder and more freewheeling and something of a change of pace from the usual Hello! Project fare.



Track 2, "Crazy About You," is probably the most famous Minimoni song among American fans and arguably the most serious, opening with a declaration of love voiced in English by Mika and breaking out into the most overtly hiphop-inspired piece in the album. Track 3, "Wassup Enryo Ga," is a fun and playful number that opens with an English-language sportscast describing the four girls' exploits on the baseball field: "It's a beautiful day at Hello Project Stadium." Two of the subsequent songs were originally sung by larger Hello! Project shuffle units in 2003 and it's nice to hear them redone by a smaller group with such distinctive voices. "Kowarenai Ai ga Hoshii no" (I Want an Unbreakable Love) deftly mixes Latin rhythms, R&B-style vocals and raps delivered by Nono and Mika, while "Be All Right!," described as "a Ska-style Pop song" on Wikipedia, is a loud, aggressively positive upbeat number.



Track 9, "Gyutto Dakishimete (Forever)," is a nice slower piece with some beautiful harmonizing by the girls. Track 12, "Rock `n' Roll Kenchoushozaichi Oboechaina Series," has a driving old-school rock `n' roll beat and the girls' vocalizing on it takes me back to the great pop music of my youth. Six of the album's 13 songs were originally singles. (Three additional cuts, the opening and closing plus an "Interlude," are simply short remixes employing bits from some of Minimoni's earliest hits.)



After track 10, some of the older, pre-Takahashi kiddie-oriented songs are included, one of which, "Genki Jirushi no Oomori Song" (Track 15), features backup by four of the Hello! Project Kids (all of whom would grow up to form into two teen pop groups themselves). I especially like "Okashi Tsukutte Okkasui!" (Track 13), a fast-paced sing-song number with a bouncy rhythm track. Track 14 is a catchy song from the animated Hamtaro movie in which the four girls performed as animated hamsters.



Mika Todd left Japan not long after this album was released, bringing Minimoni to a close. Aibon and Nono then graduated from Morning Musume and formed their own duo, called "W," which released two albums, six singles, and ten music videos before Aibon was suspended from Hello! Project in February 2006 after being caught with a cigarette in her hand by a tabloid photographer. (Horrors!) A year later Nono got pregnant, got married and had her baby, taking a leave from Hello! Project that continues as of this writing. Thus did the curtain come down on the performing careers of two of the most fun-loving entertainers I've ever encountered in pop music. Hello! Project has not been the same since. Thankfully, Ai Takahashi is still in Morning Musume and is now the group leader. I'm submitting this review to Amazon on Ai-chan's 22nd birthday, September 14, 2008.

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