/jp/ - Otaku Culture

>>5469466
What a wonderful thing to do.
Spit on Airi first. :)

Superior leader. Rumored to replace brown lips soon.

Reina being sexy by baring her shoulders. Mmmm.

A reason people may like classic MM better is voice style. The first generation was composed of the runner-ups to auditions for Sharam Q, which was probably looking for a specific voice style, the mature power type. And 2nd generation probably was chosen to augment first gen's style. Hence why early singles were of a lower range, and focussed more on harmonizing together than lead singers.
Then Goto Maki came along, and she was versatile, meaning she could have a high voice of classic jpop while still low enough to still harmonize with the rest.
Then we had 4th generation, of which 3 out of 4 were extremely high range and comparatively "weak-voiced". Songs began climbing up in range and becoming more cutesy and upbeat based. Yuko actually said that she graduated because the group was going for a more energetic image and she couldn't keep up.

This is the point most people designate "the golden age". Vocally, on the "mature side" you had Abe, Iida, and Yasuda, while on the "high side" you had Kago, Tsuji, and Rika. Yaguchi, Goto, and Yossi could do both. It is a perfect mixture of both styles, and the effect is electrifying. The Peace still sends shivers down my spine.

Every single generation after that was primarily high-voice style people except Takashi and Miki, who were both like Goto in that they could do both. I haven't heard enough of Eri or Ogawa to decide what they were like at the beginning. But anyway, the songs pretty much all became high-voice styled, and lots of focus on the lead singer lineup.

At any rate, high-voice is pretty standard in jpop, so people get bored of it easily, or drawn to other groups. Early MM stuck out for not following that tradition, while the mix was just amazing musically.