Kago Ai vs. Friday

[tsukinobyouin]

So Kago has another photobook coming out on 8/26. The official title seems to actually be "Kinyoubi" (aka Friday), but CD Japan is listing it as Kago Ai vs. Friday, probably because of this promotional image:







Here's the actual cover:





I take it from these two images this will be another "semi-nude" book, but I'm still hunting around for more info.

[Special Needs Tricycle]

Hopefully she loses this time around too.

[Ap2000]

[quote name='Special Needs Tricycle' post='67413' date='Aug 17 2009, 01:07 AM']Hopefully she loses more clothes this time around.[/quote]



Fully agreed.

[Kago]

I used to love Kago to death, but the more time goes on and she makes stupid decision after stupid promotional attention whoring decision, I cannot stand her.



I thought she had "moved on and grown up, teehee!!"

[fpd]

[quote name='Pi Kago' post='67425' date='Aug 16 2009, 11:08 PM']I used to love Kago to death, but the more time goes on and she makes stupid decision after stupid promotional attention whoring decision, I cannot stand her.



I thought she had "moved on and grown up, teehee!!"[/quote]

Pretty much.



I liked her a lot more before she "grew up"

[ayaya chan]

here's a preview from sanspo







the whole no bra thing is a bit too much for me

[eri]

Her head is too big for her body. Sexy fail. Her sluttying up doesn't strike me as odd anymore. It is how Disney stars do it in America, after all.

[tsukinobyouin]

[quote name='ayaya chan' post='67435' date='Aug 17 2009, 01:03 AM']the whole no bra thing is a bit too much for me[/quote]



I'd actually be okay with the no bra thing if it was more of a classy-sexy picture. Intead it's a shitty boxing robe over whatever random pair of panties she was wearing that day and she's standing in front of what looks like a hotel room window.

[Pi Mako]

Whee, more slutty pictures.



The frilly panties disturb me more than the lack of bra in that "boxing" picture...

[JPope]

[quote name='mEri' post='67438' date='Aug 17 2009, 02:57 AM']Her head is too big for her body. Sexy fail. Her sluttying up doesn't strike me as odd anymore. It is how Disney stars do it in America, after all.[/quote]

This is how I see it, too. It's not like Kago is still a 13 year old girl, after all, and I just sort of expect a certain number of chicks to carry on like she is. The law of percentages practically dictated that at least one member of MM would go this route.

[Special Needs Tricycle]

I think the fact that we've all seen her grown up makes this like 10 times as creepy. Plus she basically looks exactly the same.



Imagine early Minimoni Kago in those frumpy panties and boxing robe thing and see if it doesn't make you want to throw up/pray for forgiveness.

[Melon]

[JPope]

[quote name='Special Needs Tricycle' post='67454' date='Aug 17 2009, 11:15 AM']I think the fact that we've all seen her grown up makes this like 10 times as creepy. Plus she basically looks exactly the same.[/quote]

I think it's the second sentence that is really driving the "disturbing and creepy" reactions. We all saw Maki Goto grow up, and while there was definitely a backlash against her slutting out, it paled in comparison to the acceptance of it. Kago is a 21 year old woman. I can understand how some people would find her new image to be pathetic or desperate or whatever, but I just don't see it as particularly creepy or disturbing. It's pretty ordinary these days as far as I'm concerned.

[Special Needs Tricycle]

Thing is that Maki never really had the childish, cutesy character that Kago ALWAYS had, and it was a gradual move into things like Some Boys, whereas Kago left H!P still in huge sparkly dresses and pigtails and is now selling photobooks of herself barely covered is what's jarring.



That, and a lot of us still have the image of her being in Minimoni and doing things like binging on desserts with Tsuji and punching Mari in the crotch and gigling afterwards. <img src='http://mm-bbs.org/public/style_emoticon ... #>/sad.gif' class='bbc_emoticon' alt=':(' />

[tsukinobyouin]

[quote name='JPope' post='67464' date='Aug 17 2009, 02:36 PM']I can understand how some people would find her new image to be pathetic or desperate or whatever [...][/quote]



This seems to be the general concensus at this board (judging by the reactions to this and the previous PB thread), rather than the thought of the PBs being "creepy" (though I can see where Trike is coming from).



I think a lot of it has to do with the style and production too. I see her PBs as trashy rather than sexy. Yes, she's 21 and should be able to be sexy now. Hell, if she wants to be nude that's okay too - but nude and sexy can be done tastefully. Not that I expect an super artsy nude book out of her, but something about the way these few previews and the majority of shots from her last book were done are very off-putting. They look like her boyfriend shot them in his basement / a hotel or something. They kind of make you feel like a peeping tom looking at them - like these are photos that leaked by accident or she was forced to do them by a sleezy manager. Obviously neither of those are true, but the PB makes them come across that way rather than "here's grown up bombshell Kago showing off her stuff" ala Goto Maki. Maki's transition to sexy was also more uniform - she started puting out sexier songs to go with her sexy look. Kago put out...a very aiko-ish single. It's like she (or her management) can't decide what kind of "adult" she's looking to be.

[BeForJess]

AWKWARD.



I feel wrong looking at her in pictures like that.... And I'm a girl, I'm not even getting all lusty. It just feels weird.



I guess I am just echoing what's already been said - it's weird because she always acted so young, and it isn't being done in a particularly tasteful way. I think she is selling herself short by producing material like this. If anything, making a pb like this while trying to recover from scandal after scandal that has tarnished the old innocent image she used to have, is going to make it worse - makes me think maybe those scandals are the kind of image she wants for herself. <img src='http://mm-bbs.org/public/style_emoticon ... #>/sad.gif' class='bbc_emoticon' alt=':(' />

[Ap2000]

[quote name='Special Needs Tricycle' post='67465' date='Aug 17 2009, 09:01 PM']Thing is that Maki never really had the childish, cutesy character that Kago ALWAYS had, and it was a gradual move into things like Some Boys, whereas Kago left H!P still in huge sparkly dresses and pigtails and is now selling photobooks of herself barely covered is what's jarring.



That, and a lot of us still have the image of her being in Minimoni and doing things like binging on desserts with Tsuji and punching Mari in the crotch and gigling afterwards. <img src='http://mm-bbs.org/public/style_emoticon ... #>/sad.gif' class='bbc_emoticon' alt=':(' />[/quote]



You do realize that the last stuff W (and thus Kago in H!P) has done was late 2005 and back then she was 16 ?

It's been more than 4 years since that happened and I sure as hell can I say that at 16 I wasn't the exact same person I was at 20 or 21.



As for the (not needed) Maki comparison:

Contrary to her, Kago didn't have several years to grow up from a teenager to an adult while being in the industry.

[Special Needs Tricycle]

She still never made the gradual transition that Maki did. It was like, in W, scandal, goes into hiding, scandal again, comes out dressed like a grandma and pretends to not be a child, and now she's naked. It has nothing to do with age.

[Ap2000]

[quote name='Special Needs Tricycle' post='67476' date='Aug 18 2009, 01:20 AM']It has nothing to do with age.[/quote]



I was trying to point out that 4 years have passed, not wether she's 21 or 22 or whatever now.

[EmEl]

Is the title of the photobook supposed to be a reference to the magazine that published the story that started the scandal? If that's the case, I just think it's a silly title that is merely shows how poorly attention-grabbing this all is.

[tsukinobyouin]

[quote name='EmEl' post='67489' date='Aug 17 2009, 11:03 PM']Is the title of the photobook supposed to be a reference to the magazine that published the story that started the scandal? If that's the case, I just think it's a silly title that is merely shows how poorly attention-grabbing this all is.[/quote]



I believe so? The official title "Kinyoubi" is a little more subtle and on it's own could have been just another one of those random words PB's tend to choose as titles, but the "Kago Ai VS Friday" logo on the image with the "I am so angsty and hardcore" shot implies pretty heavily that she's "battling" the magazine that published her scandals. By going punk rock and wearing minimal clothing.

[JPope]

I still can't believe that no one has thought to put her in a rock band yet. She could get away with anything if she were fronting a good rock band.

[alita87]

I'm in the sad part of the wota crowd that would get anything of hers just because she's Kago, but I also genuinely liked her last photobook. Yes some of the photos were creepy/trashy but some were also very well done. She has got a nice body, it's just putting the body together with the Kago we all knew years ago that is hard.



The Marionette and making of dvds from the last photobook were also done really well. The making of especially showed how much fun she was having running around with a trusted cameraman in Okinawa that the softcore porn type shots of the photobook didn't show.



I definitely like the promo pic and hope there are several like it in the photobook rather than just the awkward boxing robe shot. Now that shot would've been great had they put her in a male dress shirt or a full length bathrobe I think. <img src='http://mm-bbs.org/public/style_emoticon ... umbsup.gif' class='bbc_emoticon' alt=':(' />

[eri]

[quote name='JPope' post='67497' date='Aug 17 2009, 09:36 PM']I still can't believe that no one has thought to put her in a rock band yet. She could get away with anything if she were fronting a good rock band.[/quote]



What self-respecting rock band will choose to be fronted by someone who shilled kids pop songs for a living?



Well whatever - Kago is needs to do a soft porn movie and seal her fate.

[Pucchi-Mo]

[quote name='Ap2000' post='67483' date='Aug 17 2009, 09:15 PM'][quote name='Special Needs Tricycle' post='67476' date='Aug 18 2009, 01:20 AM']It has nothing to do with age.[/quote]



I was trying to point out that 4 years have passed, not whether she's 21 or 22 or whatever now.

[/quote]

Even if 4 years have passed, the whole reason she's out of H!P is that her immediate actions were the exact opposite of the personality that Mini Moni, W and the industry had her portray. So the change wasn't really something over a long period of time.



So to recap... September 7, 2005. W is still cute and no one suspects a thing

early 2006, New W single you guys! oh how cute, right around Kago's Bday.



SURPRISE IT'S FRIDAY:

TRAIN WRECK AND HASN'T LOOKED BACK OR LEARNED SINCE.



It's more that she was cute and then in 2006, she announced to her fans that she's trashy, and hasn't changed since. The real transition for fans is the period between Ms. Love Tantei and the 1st FRIDAY story. About 6 months, but not really because they probably still made appearances and everything seemed fine to everyone.



We never again saw the Kago we knew before the scandal. Her career just continued down that path.

Slapping "underage smokers and barebackers" for Avex aside.





Oh and about the PB, the promotion image was actually interesting and somewhat a respectable fashion-like theme. She had edge -maybe it wouldn't be taken seriously, but it wouldn't have hurt anything.



So what do they decide... scrap that and make her look like a 10 year old playing naughty dress up? <img src='http://mm-bbs.org/public/style_emoticon ... cepalm.gif' class='bbc_emoticon' alt=':(' />

[Special Needs Tricycle]

Thanks, Pumo.

[jochin]

OHH I didn't feel like commenting at first, but I just realized that you can see the outline of her titties on the cover. Haha.

[Pucchi-Mo]

[quote name='jochin' post='67516' date='Aug 18 2009, 02:53 PM']OHH I didn't feel like commenting at first, but I just realized that you can see the outline of her titties on the cover. Haha.[/quote]

Wow. LCD monitors make it look like a holographic trading card. <img src='http://mm-bbs.org/public/style_emoticon ... tongue.png' class='bbc_emoticon' alt='' />



I couldn't see it until I leaned left. Neat trick.

[JPope]

[quote name='mEri' post='67509' date='Aug 18 2009, 01:17 PM'][quote name='JPope' post='67497' date='Aug 17 2009, 09:36 PM']I still can't believe that no one has thought to put her in a rock band yet. She could get away with anything if she were fronting a good rock band.[/quote]



What self-respecting rock band will choose to be fronted by someone who shilled kids pop songs for a living?

[/quote]

One that's interested in instant publicity? You might have noticed that she's hasn't "shilled kids pop songs" in quite a while now. You might have also noticed that what press she has garnered recently has been of a controversial nature, including underaged smoking and trysts with older men. Nope, no rock band would be interested in hitching their wagon to that.

[Pi Mako]

[quote name='JPope' post='67518' date='Aug 18 2009, 03:24 PM'][quote name='mEri' post='67509' date='Aug 18 2009, 01:17 PM'][quote name='JPope' post='67497' date='Aug 17 2009, 09:36 PM']I still can't believe that no one has thought to put her in a rock band yet. She could get away with anything if she were fronting a good rock band.[/quote]



What self-respecting rock band will choose to be fronted by someone who shilled kids pop songs for a living?

[/quote]

One that's interested in instant publicity? You might have noticed that she's hasn't "shilled kids pop songs" in quite a while now. You might have also noticed that what press she has garnered recently has been of a controversial nature, including underaged smoking and trysts with older men. Nope, no rock band would be interested in hitching their wagon to that.

[/quote]



I can't imagine Kago singing rock songs with that high pitched girly voice of hers. She tried to sound sort of badass in Shabondama and just sounded silly.