I Like Snow Man
On July 1st, Oricon released their half year rankings for 2021 and I had to admit that I smiled really big when I saw that Snow Man was sitting at the top of the total sales chart.
I don’t know if I’ve told this story on the podcast before but my first trip to Japan in May 2014 was to see A.B.C-Z in their stage play 『ABC座 2014 ジャニーズ伝説』at the Nissay Theater in Tokyo. I was completely clueless on that first trip and spent a lot of time wandering around lost with printed out maps and really honing my skills in asking for directions. So here I was ridiculously early in Roppongi and very obviously a doofy tourist, trying to keep Hibiya park on my right side knowing that eventually I’d have to run into the theater cross street, when all of a sudden I realized that to either side of me were all of these nicely dressed girls looking very deliberately like they were not, in fact, loitering outside the theater’s back entrance. Then I look ahead and see two members of Snow Man walking maybe 20 feet in front of me about to enter.
The excitement just radiating off of the girls around me was palpable. Snow. Man. SNOW MAN!
Of course, I was there for A.B.C-Z but I got it. And that moment stuck with me.
SNOW MAN!
Over the next few years I would see the then six-member group live in concert maybe half a dozen or so times when they back danced for A.B.C-Z and I would see them far more than that on my television screen in their various projects--some of which overlapped with A.B.C-Z (the goofy Tsukada Ryoichi vehicle Last Hold and accompanying theme song “Future Light”) and some which didn’t--and gradually got to know the group fairly well as A.B.C-Z’s little brother group. Iwamoto Hikaru competed alongside Tsukada (and Golden Bomber’s Darvish Kenji) in Japan’s Ultimate Ninja Warrior while Fukuzawa Tatsuya got lessons in comedy and MCing from my favorite A.B.C-Z member (and all time favorite idol) Kawai Fumito.
I would pick up the occasional Snow Man photo set at the Johnny’s Shop in Harajuku or translate a cross-talk here or there. I knew Snow Man had bad hay fever in the spring and that before he was competing in Ultimate Ninja Warrior my man Iwamoto was an OG G-Dragon fan boy.
And then as I detailed in Episode 23 Snow Man had three additional members added and they had to re-learn all of their group dynamics… and then this group that was very experienced in stage performance had to learn to play for the cameras.
When the SixTones/Snow Man double A-side double debut single was released on January 22, 2020, it was understandable that the SixTones song had a lot more hype around it. After all, SixTones’s “Imitation Rain” was written by THE Yoshiki, who was also very present in the media for promotions and while Snow Man’s “D.D.” was designed to be a showcase for the group’s dance ability, neither the MV or song were as striking or memorable as the dramatic rain soaked nightscape of “Imitation Rain”.
But, if you watched the dance practice video for “D.D.”… oh, the dance practice video revealed a group READY to take on the world. The world just needed to catch up.
And they would. 2020 would contain some bumps (including poor Miyadate coming down with Covid just days before the group was scheduled to make their first appearance on Kouhaku Utagasen necessitating the entire group having to quarantine themselves and miss the performance) but they pulled through and emerged into 2021 with the spectacular single “Grandeur”, the opening theme to the anime Black Clover, released January 20, 2021.
Don’t get me wrong. I very much enjoyed “D.D” and, especially, “Kissin’ My Lips” (which I chose as one of my favorite MVs of 2020) but something really hit just right when I saw “Grandeur.” The combination of the shonen anime Let’s Do Our Best™ lyrics and a Tommy Clint booty-shaking beat plus some of the most memorable leg work since SNSD sashayed around in their tight denims to Gee. Everything was chef kissing fingers dot jpg.
They seem to have settled into a formula that works extremely well for them. Upbeat Jpop that leans heavily into Nakata Yasutaka and Shibuya-kei combined with simple visual concepts (with one bold color overtone) that provides the perfect backdrop for Snow Man’s excellent performances.
BIG BANG SWEET!
Hello Hello (ha ha ha hello!)
YumYumYum ~Spicy Girl~
I mean just check out “Big Bang Sweet” with the pink and white and little toy soldier choreography and “Hello Hello” with the cheerful yellow and the blooming flower motif. And I have been replaying and replaying “YumYumYum ~Spicy Girl~” over and over to soak up the black and red with all of the lines and diagonals.
It’s all about the performances: the formation changes, the synchronization both among themselves and with the beat, the use of their full bodies when they dance. It’s absolutely mesmerizing. There’s this like arm twist thingy they do in “Hello Hello” that is pure happiness to watch.
When Johnny’s & Associates Vice President Takizawa Hideaki reformed Snow Man with the three additional members, he was forming a new kind of Johnny’s group, one that could compete with the surge in K-pop boy groups in both the domestic market and abroad. Not only did they have the Johnny’s standard assortment of good looks, charm, and talent in variety and acting but Takizawa threw in some things K-Pop was doing. Social media presence? Snow Man are active on YouTube and Weibo. Banging dance breaks and viral moves? Oh yes. Foreign members for that global appeal? Snow Man has half-Thai Mukai Koji and half-Venezuelan Raul. Check and check. Snow Man had even been sent to Thailand just before travel restrictions hit in early 2020 and I would bet that once touring starts up again we’ll see them make the rounds of Southeast Asia, showing off the charms of Johnny’s & Associates firsthand to the lucky fans in SEA.
But as of right now, in July 2021, Snow Man are booked and busy with commercials, variety, dramas, films, voice work, and I absolutely cannot wait for the release of “Hello Hello” on July 14th! HELLO HELLO HA HA HA HELLO!