Newcomers’ Glossary

AKB48: Japanese all-girl song-and-dance organization which performs mostly at its own theater at the historic, converted Don Quijote Hotel in the Akihabara electronics district of Tokyo; hence, A-K-B. The “48″ designates the ideal membership total, usually three teams — A, K and B — of 16 members each.

Akimoto, Yasushi: Brilliant composer and founder of AKB48 in 2006. Akimoto is a quiet, behind-the-scenes force in the Japanese pop scene but his work is now globally recognized. He did visit Los Angeles in person with an AKB48 “all-star” ambassadors team for Anime Expo 2010.

Anime Expo: The nation’s largest anime convention, now housed in the Los Angeles Convention Center for the last three years. Significant here because AX has boldly invited Morning Musume (their first-ever U.S. appearance and concert) in 2009, and doubled down with AKB48 in 2010!

Berryz Kobo: Currently a seven-member song-and-dance group established as a “junior group” to Morning Musume in 2004. This band has incorporated a number of ballads into its repertoire, and their dances are less athletic, but more intricate, than, say, Morning Musume or °C-ute.

°C-ute: Currently five members, °C-ute started as eight in 2005, right after Berryz, and features a much more physical dynamic with extreme athleticism.

Elder Club: Group of former Morning Musume members and other singers who have had a relationship with Hello! Project over the years. Immensely popular with older fans who knew the performers since the debut of Morning Musume in 1997, the Elder Club was disbanded in 2009 at a gigantic concert at Yokohama Arena.

Hello! Project: Umbrella company for Morning Musume and other all-girl Japanese song-and-dance groups, including Berryz Kobo, °C-ute and now S/mileage. H!P is, in turn, part of Japanese music conglomerate Up-Front Artists, or UFA.

Hello! Project Eggs: Training group for Hello! Project singers who start as backdancers and work their way up. Eggs can be seen at all major Hello! Project joint shows and often have their own beginners’ concerts and “live” appearances just as the other Hello! Project groups do.

Hello! Project Kids: Predecessor to the Eggs, and origin for both Berryz Kobo in 2004 and °C-ute in 2005. When it was evident that Morning Musume’s membership would change often, the Kids were formed, then the Eggs, in order to audition new talent and create new groups and “shuffles” of existing members.

Morning Musume: Trade name for an all-female song-and-dance troupe established in 1997, with most members starting in their early teens and working into their early 20s before “graduating,” or retiring into life as “normal girls.”

NMB48: Another spinoff of Tokyo’s AKB48 and Nagoya’s SKE48, this one based in Osaka. NMB48’s introduction to both SKE48 and AKB48 audiences was unique, with an artificially created sense of rivalry.

Otaku: Literally, rough translation, means”geek,” and is often used as a pejorative term for fans of idol-music groups. Most “otakus” are male, but girls count themselves in as members from time to time.

Radicalpatriot: This is an old moniker from my days as a journalist covering elements of the American far-right movement, vis-a-vis Ruby Ridge, the Branch Davidians in Waco and the Oklahoma City bombing. If any of those topics are alien to you, look ‘em up, then live and learn. In the summer of 2006, my eyes were opened to Japanese idol music after listening to Morning  Musume’s “Say Yeah!” on the Internet and I’ve never looked back. I went ahead and continued using “Radicalpatriot,” alter changed to “Radicalipton” and eventually just “Rad,” which I still use because it’s just easy to remember. However, YankeeOtaku is now the proper nickname!

SCANDAL band: This quartet of Osaka schoolgirls has the tenacity of, say, the Beatles and brings tremendous energy to a completely live show in which they, not digital tracks, dominate the sound. Their only known trek to the U.S. was as a member of the Japan Nite 2008 tour, and they were clearly the most exciting, original and best overall band despite their age (late teens). Strong, heavy-metal bent. A tremendous musical treasure, not to be confused with Patti Smythe’s band of the same name in the U.S.

SKE48: Spinoff group of AKB48 headquartered in Nagoya. This group is still pretty raw, trying to establish its own personality just as AKB48′s Teams A, B and K have in Tokyo. One very bright spot: Jurina Matsui, 13, who broke in  two years ago at age 11 and was immediately iunvited to be in an “all-star” song with AKB48 heavyweights like Atsulo and Takahashi in the JCB Hall show, December 2008.

S/mileage: Quartet of former Hello! Project Eggs that debuted in early 2009. Music is lively and dance more resembles °C-ute’s style than that of either Morning Musume or Berryz Kobo.

Tsunku: One of the single most influential pop-music composers in the modern era, on a par with Lennon, McCartney and anyone else, with a touch of Bach and Beethoven thrown in. There’s also a tinge of Ellington and Basie in there, too, and hundreds of songs for all of Hello! Project’s stunning dance ensembles is proof of the firepower this guy has. Inventor of Morning Musume, among other things.

Wota: Somewhat interchangeable with “otaku,” but the term “wota” is often used in context as an idol-music fan with an almost unnatural obsession with the idols, a “lost soul” who often uses idols as surrogate girlfriends, including photo collections and albums, photobooks and other ancillary merchandise available online and at many of these concerts. And they wonder why the birth rate is down in Japan!