The Shounen Club 8 February 2009 review

And we have a February episode with the usual Valentines Day mention.

The show opens up with the Juniors singing Love So Sweet as they get their group names or individual names on the screen. Cannot help but notice that Sanada Yuma and Nozawa Yuki are in the same outfits as Junior Boys. I think at this point it is obvious that the two are getting merged with the group in some fashion.

The theme is actually something different from the usual selection for the episode that is the closest to Valentines Day, Sweet.

Koyama Keiichiro and Nakamaru Yuichi participate in this theme medley, with each doing a song from their group individually then performing with everyone else for the final song in the medley. It has been a while since they performed in a medley so it is a nice change of pace and it always helps when the debuted Johnny's on the show are performing with the Juniors.

This is followed by a Heisei Post segment with Hey! Say! 7 with Nakamaru in the corner. I believe they were talking about mail, not sure what about other than Chinen Yuri mentioned being shy about it.

HS7 then perform a medley of their unit songs, Wonderland Train, Uruwashi no Bad Girl (a Nakajima Yuto solo), and Kawaii Kimi no Kotodamono. With HS7 it is hard to imagine performing all their unit songs from their early years now as some had a really cute image that does not really fit the unit anymore. That said there are still plenty of their unit songs that would still work and I wish they would end up on a CD at some point.

There is then an MC with the full Hey! Say! JUMP group. Though the only ones that got to talk were Yamada Ryosuke and Yaotome Hikaru.

The group then performs Memories, one of their slow tempo songs. I have always liked the song and so glad it found its way onto one of the group's albums, though it reminds me of how frustrating being a fan of the group was around this time. They had plenty of new songs they performed during 2009 and not getting a single release for any of them was beyond annoying. Especially as there did not seem to be any reason for it.

We have the return of the musical chairs game in this episode. It is as much fun as the first one and has the added bonus of having Question? members mixed in, who are fun to watch as they do not learn the dances for the songs at all and it is fun to see how they deal with that part of the game.

Speaking of Question? they are the ones up next for a talk segment. They are asked about things that that something was sweet, and it looks like they are using the other meaning of the word which is "kind". Of course sadly the only member of the group still with Johnny's is Ishigaki Daisuke now.

The group then performs Midnight Shuffle, which was the B-side to the one single they released when they collaborated with Kondo Masahiko, who originally released the song as one of his early singles.

The Junior ni Q segment is with the Kansai Juniors, and it is the same group as last month. This time the topic is something small they want to boast about. First up is Nakama Junta who talks about whisking, as like for cooking.

Fujii Ryusei is next and shows what a Ohkura Tadayoshi fanboy he is by talking about getting to get a picture taken with the Kanjani8 member.

Shigeoka Daiki is up next and he talks about his pet parakeet.

Kamiyama Tomohiro shows off how he can move his ear all by itself.

Kiriyama Akito quickly set about showing off what he was proud of, which is rising the tension level by himself.

Nakayama Yuma talks about being rewarded a lot of medals for playing baseball.

Kotaki Nozomu's answer is getting the autograph of Junta, which of course prompts some discussion as Junta is surprised he would care that much about it. And that finishes the segment.

Since A.B.C-Z had an MC with new song in the last episode it is no surprise that Kis-My-Ft2 get the same for the second episode of the month. Tamamori Yuta gets the focus of this talk segment and I guess this gives us the start of the new 3/4 split, with the old one just splitting them by age groups. But the worst of the split is nowhere in sight so I will not beat that dead horse here.

The new song is Kis-My-Calling, which is one of the few Junior-era songs of the group's that has not been on released on CD yet. It really is not the greatest song but it is fun and something more for a live performance as what makes it so fun is how energetic and goofy the guys can be in the song. But is Kis-My-LAND was released on CD I do not see why Kis-My-Calling cannot be either.

And that brings us to the end of the program and the final song. The song is a cover of a Kinki Kids song Love is ... ~Itsumo Soko ni Kimi ga Ita kara~, and like usual it is the older Juniors singing this. But we do get Question? without their instruments which is a nice change up there. And I do like how they have the small groupings during the song to mix things up a bit, which is hard when it comes to performing ballads.


So things are plugging along in 2009. There are some shakeups that will happen soon but I think looking back on things instead of experiencing them as they happened does not make it seem like it will be as chaotic as I do know what will happen eventually. But at this point I was well into Junior fandom so it is interesting for me to see what I remember being a part of it when these would be new episodes was like.