H!P Releases April 15

• C-ute – Bye Bye Bye! (Single)
• C-ute – Bye Bye Bye! (Single+DVD) (Limited Edition)
• Hello! Project – Winter 2009 HaroPro Award 09 Elder Club Graduation special concert DVD (DVD)

Three releases today, a single+ its limited version, and the long awaited Graduation DVD from the Elder Club, so let’s start!

Cute – Bye Bye Bye!, a lively song with a slight 80’s feel to it and C-ute’s 8th single (not including the indies releases), the single does not include Kanna Arihara because of an operation she had to underwent, which also caused her absence from the tour for the single (sounds all professional right?). The song is great, although it features an overload of Yajima and Airi, with some Mai, I would have liked to see more fair distribution of the lyrics, but maybe next single.

The PV for the single was a slight disappointment, the choreography was very dull and simple (the sign in the background has better choreography), the one good thing is that it will be easier for wotas to memorize the dance for the concerts. I would have liked to see some more effort, but maybe next single we will get a better PV, they are really stepping up by adding more scenes and making a real effort. I would recommend this single for all Hello! Project fans, it is a great release and I really think that they just needed a better PV with better choreography.

Winter 2009 HaroPro Award 09 Elder Club Graduation special concert DVD, this is a big release for many fans because of the quantity of people who graduated, the biggest in Hello!Project history (up to now). I wouldn’t say I am particularly excited for this release because I became a fan during the younger generations (sometime during JunJun and LinLin’s first years, more specifically November 2007), not during the golden age like many fans on the forums and fan sites.

The DVD features the Elder Club, which is almost all of Hello! Project who made it into what it is today, and their graduation from the label Hello! Project to remove the idol status they had (and to not drag them down and keep them active). The concert featured them singing a lot of the songs that are classics, such as Love Machine, Yeah! Meccha Holiday, and All For One and One For All, which was also the closing song for the concert.

I would recommend it for all of the fans of both the younger and older generations, mainly because they could see everyone together for the last time on stage, and because the classic songs many of us know and love are sung by the original generations (except Goto Maki, Kago Ai, and some few others, for obvious reasons).

It was a particularly good day of releases, next release will be of the Single V for C-ute’s new single, Bye Bye Bye, so please look forward to it.

Elder Club Graduates

Takahashi Ai (dressed as Chun Li from Street Fighter?) recieving the Hello! Project leadership from Nakazawa Yuko

Well today marks an extremely big event in Hello! Project history, as most of you knew the Elder Club was going to graduate and today was the last day they were part of H!P. Today (or tonight depending on your location) 22 members graduated from H!P in Yokohama arena, including all former Morning Musume members, Melon Kinenbi, Matsuura Aya, Maeda Yuki, Satoda Mai and others (I can’t remember them all right now).

The concert was the biggest ever, 78 members participated! This concert also brought many surprises, such as: Tsuji’s comeback to stage, the last performance of LOVE Machine, Tanpopo minus one reuniting for the last time, Pucchi Moni’s last performance, Yossi crying, etc. I haven’t seen it, but I read the summary over at H!O and from what I understand all of the graduating members read a goodbye with the three current leaders of the primary groups, Takahashi Ai (Morning Musume), Yajima Maimi (C-ute), and Shimizu Saki (Berryz Koubou) saying a response.

The concerts peak point was the giving of the H!P leadership to Takahashi Ai from Nakazawa Yuko. The concert also included a performance of “All For One and One For All!” which is the song which really means H!P to some fans because everyone sings together. Almost everyone was there, excluding some people: Goto Maki who is in AVEX, although she did send flowers, Kago Ai whose contract was terminated after the scandals, and some others. To mention it, Ishiguro Aya was there, not singing but backstage.

To recap:
- 78 members performed, 22 graduated, 56 are left as H!P members
- Tsuji made a comeback to stage
- The average age is now 15.1, down from 18
- LOVE Machine is now a retired song
- Biggest H!P concert ever
- Takahashi Ai is Hello! Project’s new leader.

This is a monumental movement (symbolically of course, they will all still be in UFA, but not under the Hello! Project label) because Hello! Project now rests on the hands of Morning Musume, Berryz Koubou, C-ute and Mano Erina.

Pics of the concert:

Matsuura’s last “Zubatto!” in Hello! Project

Yoshizawa crying, rarer than seeing Niigaki not smiling

Wait a minute, Ishiguro Aya?

Goto Maki’s flowers sent to the graduates, looks like she’ll order from a flower shop next time, and not from a funeral home.

EDIT: The Elder club won’t leave Hello! Project officially until March 31, this is only their last concert together.

UFA Restructuring

As you all know, most of the elder club is “graduating” from Hello! Project and will move on to another label (that’s what I understand), but details have been giving as to how the fanclubs will be restructured and who will be in what, well here is the list:

Hello! Project
・Morning Musume
・°C-ute
・Berryz Koubou
・Mano Erina

M-LINE
・Nakazawa Yuko
・Iida Kaori
・Abe Natsumi
・Yasuda Kei
・Yaguchi Mari
・Ishikawa Rika
・Yoshizawa Hitomi
・Konno Asami
・Ogawa Makoto
・Fujimoto Miki
・Tsuji Nozomi
・Ongaku Gatas (Noto Arisa, Sengoku Minami, Korenaga Miki, and Sawada Yuri)
・Satoda Mai

Ayaway
・Matsuura Aya

MEGA MELON CLUB
・Melon Kinenbi

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People missing from list

・Inaba Atsuko
・Maeda Yuki
・Okada Yui
・Miyoshi Erika

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These are the new fan club organisations, they could also, possibly, be a new UFA umbrella group under another name, but most likely they are just separate management agencies where they won’t be involved with Hello! Project, only time will tell. But it is interesting to see that Morning Musume, Berryz Koubou, C-ute, and Mano Erina will be all of Hello! Project after the Elder Club graduation.

The different agencies have link’s to the homepages of each club, just click the name, so if you’re confused check them out for some enlightenment.

Let’s see what happens after the Elder Club Graduates…

Source: Prinny Squad @ http://mm-bbs.org/ (for the list)