Talking to the Producer of COLORFUUUL | Japan's First All-Foreign Male Idol Group

Hey all! Some of you may remember a while back I did a blog post about Guyjin48; a male idol group made up solely of foreigners living in Japan. I've been following them since then, but understandably since they were just getting started things were a bit quiet on their end for a while. Just recently though they unveiled that they have now changed their name to COLORFUUUL and are getting ready to release their first single, "Rock'n Roll Guy" (which is a total jam by the way). Plus just a side note that I was pretty happy about myself: that blog post I wrote has actually been featured on the group's new website.

 
As you can imagine, I'm very keen to support this project so expect to see quite a few posts about them as things start to unfold. I also did a reaction video about them just last week (My first ever YouTube video -- yikes!) so check that out below if you're interested.

Recently I was in contact with the owner/producer/possibly overlord of COLORFUUUL, James Collins and I was lucky enough to be able to ask him a few questions about the group:


DIG: What initially gave you the idea to start an idol group? 

JC: Well when I first moved to Japan 5 years ago I was looking for any way possible to study Japanese. I was teaching English so even though I was living in Japan I was using my native language English most of the day. I decided to check out Japanese music so I could listen and practice Japanese in my free time. That’s when I first came across Japanese idol groups and I immediately thought how interesting it would be to have a group of all foreigners doing the same thing! Of course at first I didn’t know that I would actually go through with the idea 4 years later, but for some reason I kept thinking about it, asked a ton of people what they thought of the idea, and even presented a speech about it in my Japanese language school I started attending a year later. Finally one day I thought that if I were to actually make this happen it would be now or never so I published my first ad looking for members in December of 2016. 

DIG: Why the name change? (Not that I don't love the new name!) 

JC: There of course was a large audience that really liked the name Guyjin48, but at the same time there were people who weren’t happy with it. After teaming up with Shinnosuke to create the music and speaking with other people in the industry I realized that Japanese people also might see the name in a negative light as well. Although it makes for a great pun and there are still a lot of people out there who really like it, I thought it best to just go ahead and change it as to not create an issue. That and I really think the name COLORFUUUL suits our group very well!

COLORFUUUL IN SHIBUYA (JAY / JON)

 
DIG: What was it like scouting for members? Was it difficult to find them? 

JC: Scouting was definitely pretty difficult but I got lucky with finding a lot of the members. 2 of the members I came in contact with through the ads I was putting out on facebook and craigslist. 3 of the members were introduced to me through friends, and 1 member I actually scouted at an event a friend was performing at. I think around the summer of 2017 I was having difficulty finding people who might be interested in the project so I made hundreds of flyers and went out to places that are heavily populated with foreigners like Shin Okubo and tried handing them out but that didn’t really go anywhere. After that I was able to do a couple of interviews and the articles really helped get people looking at the project again. Shortly after my first help wanted ads in January of 2017 I had gotten a lot of media attention and that helped a lot with finding people but once that died down there was a period of a few months where it was very difficult. Overall it has been one of the many great challenges of getting a group like this off the ground. It has been an incredible learning experience so far!

COLORFUUUL IN SHIBUYA (RILEY / CARL) 

DIG: What is the main goal for the group right now? 

JC: The main goal right now is to spread the word as much as we can, get our dances made, create our stage routine, and then start doing live performances! The album will be on sale shortly as well so hopefully people will be interested in picking up a copy. All of the money we make on the album will go directly to getting the guys on stage for the first time. So yeah the main goal right now is to spread the word and try and get as many people as excited as possible!

COLORFUUUL IN SHIBUYA (SAM / OU) 

DIG: Do you have any funny or interesting stories about the group so far that you can share with us? 

JC: Well we have had a lot of funny and interesting experiences as a group so far but I think what happened at the first day of recording was particularly memorable! So our first day in the recording studio was back in September of 2017. Other than our band man Jay, it was the first time any of us had stepped into a studio for a recording session before, so naturally we were all pretty nervous. We had no idea what to expect, and a lot of the members were really worried about their performance despite the incredible efforts they put into preparing for that day. So Riley went first, then Carl, then Sam, and then Jay. They all did really well despite being so nervous. I really had no idea that it was going to be going so smoothly so I was really relieved. The next person to perform was Ou, and he had been the most nervous out of everyone from the beginning. He spent the entire time leading up to his turn practicing his lines in another room and you could tell he was really stressed out. So when he stepped into the recording booth his nerves got to him, his face turned red, and he was having a really difficult time doing his part. I think it was just at the point where he was about to give up when everyone stood up and started chanting his name and clapping. After a few seconds you could see him light up again and he was able to shake off the nerves from all the energy in the room. He ended up singing his part no problem after that. It was a huge triumph for Ou as well as the group and is definitely one of our most memorable moments so far.

Rock'n Roll Guy Promotional Video

All of the members sound so cute! I'm even more excited for their first single to be released now. Personally I'd like to ask a few questions about Sam in particular (*dreamy sigh*) but I think I'll have to save that for another time.

At the moment I think I'm most interested in Sam and Ou but what about you? Let me know in the comments who your favourite member of COLORFUUUL is so far and why. And by the way, yesterday we hit 10,000 views. Thank you so much!


COLORFUUUL Links:
Website
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