An Introduction to Fure Fure Danshi | Group of the Month June 2019

Hey there, idol fans! You may have noticed that the blog was pretty quiet over the month of May. It was a pretty busy month for me so I decided to take a bit of a break. You see, not only was it my birthday month but the blog also turned 2 years old as well! There are a few little things I've been working on that I'll hopefully be able to share with you all soon. But anyway, let's get on to talking about this month's featured group!

June's Group of the Month is none other than Fure Fure Danshi, a 5-member (formerly 6-member) male idol group who's aim is to support you. Their mission is to cheer on anyone who is doing their best and most of all they want to support the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games. The group made their debut in 2017 and released their first self-titled single the following year. They will be making their overseas debut at Japan Expo in Paris next month after winning this year's Tokyo Candoll -BOYS- competition.

  

The music video for "Fure Fure Danshi", the main song from the group's debut single.

Members

 

Akisawa Ibuki

Membor Colour: Green

Date of Birth: 1998.08.24

Place of Birth: Kanagawa Prefecture

• His hobbies include bike-riding and visiting secondhand clothing stores.
• His skills are breakdance and beat-boxing.
• He is Level 2 on the English Language Proficiency Test.  

Higuchi Daiki

Member Colour: Red

Date of Birth: 1997.09.22

Place of Birth: Saga Prefecture

• He is skilled at breakdancing, particularly doing headspins.
• His hobbies are using a camera and penny-boarding.
• His blood type is B.

Sanpei Kouta

Member Colour: Blue

Date of Birth: 1995.04.08

Place of Birth: Chiba Prefecture

• He enjoys watching sports and playing games.
• His special skill is calligraphy.
• His blood type is O.

Tokyo Candoll -BOYS- 2018 Entrants | Who Will We Be Seeing At This Year's Japan Expo?!

Japan Expo just recently made the announcement that the group BANZAI JAPAN were the winners of this year's Tokyo Candoll -- an annual competition for upcoming female idol groups -- and thus they would be taking the stage at this year's event, just as groups such as notall and Yuigadokuson have done in previous years. But if you're anything like me, that would've led you to wonder "What about the boys?!" I'm a little impatient when it comes to idol boys, okay?

Just last year the first ever edition of Tokyo Candoll -BOYS- was held which from the name you've probably already guessed is pretty much the same thing but for male idols. Last year's winners were the group EPIC STAR and Japan Expo was lucky enough to see a very succesful performance from them.

But you don't want to hear about last year, right? You want to know about which cute idol boys will be gracing the stage at this year's Japan Expo. The winner of Tokyo Candoll -BOYS- has not been properly announced yet but from some snooping around online I do have reason to believe that the winner is the last group on this list so if you just want to know about the winner then you can skip straight to the end. However, there were a lot of interesting groups competing this year so if you'd like to learn about some new groups along the way then let's get started! Please note though that most of these groups are indie groups who have only recently made their debut -- some don't even have a website yet -- so there likely won't be a huge heap of information about them online but I'll share what I can find.

 

TOONBOYS

TOONBOYS is a 4-piece male idol group, with the members having an average height of 180cm. They released their first single "Toon leads love" in February of this year.

Links:
Twitter
YouTube

ENVii GABRIELLA

ENVii GABRIELLA is a 3-member self-produced boy group. All of the members are gay men who previously worked as soloists in different fields. They debuted in 2017 with the single "High Heels".

Links:
Website
Twitter
Instagram
Facebook
 

FEARLESS

FEARLESS is a 4-member male idol unit under the agency MovingFactory (also responsible for competitor group MAUVE) that debuted in 2017 with the mini album "Buzzin' People". All of their releases thus far are available on iTunes and Spotify and let me just warn you, they're catchy as heck.

Links:
Twitter
Agency Website
Agency YouTube

The Number One Otaku Male Idol Group | A Brief Introduction to EPIC STAR

I’ve mentioned in a few previous posts that earlier this year, Japan Expo in France was lucky enough to see the debut overseas performance of energetic rookie male idol group, BREAK☆THROUGH”5D. At the same event, dansou (girls-dressed-as-handsome-boys) group THE HOOPERS returned to Europe for round two after their performance in London last year. But they weren’t the only idol boys to crash Japan Expo this year. 7-member (now 9-member) group EPIC STAR also put on a great performance where they enthusiastically introduced themselves to their French fans for the first time.

EPIC STAR refer to themselves as an “idol-style otaku group”. They received the privilege of performing at the large event in Paris after being declared the winners of the first ever edition of Tokyo Candoll -BOYS-, an annual competition for up and coming male idol groups. The female idol equivalent - Tokyo Candoll - has been active for 3 years and this year’s winners - notall - were also able to perform at Japan Expo.