While persisting in his role as the center of innovations in the idol industry, Akimoto Yasushi is currently the comprehensive producer and lyricist for the AKB48 Group



[Born in 1958, he hails from Tokyo. He has been creating broadcast material since his high school days. He has worked on various programs, including “The Best Ten”. In 1983, he became known as the lyricist of Misora Hibari’s song “Kawa no nagare no you ni”, and since then has created hit after hit. Currently, he is the comprehensive producer of the AKB48 national idol group, as well as Nogizaka46 and Keyakizaka46.]






—-In this special edition, we are discussing the definition of “idol”. Akimoto-san, what would your definition of “idol” be?

Akimoto: I don’t really think the idol image has changed over the years. Frankly speaking, the idol and entertainment industries don’t change. Rather, I think the ones who change are the fans who consume the entertainment. On my side of things, nothing has changed.

The way I do things is, I make things that I am satisfied with. Whether they become hits or not depends on what the consumers want at that particular time. When what I think is good and what the fans think is good coincides, that’s when an idol group gets its big break. Only when the result leaves something to be desired and people make comparisons do they start to think, “Ah, I guess idols have changed”.

Aku Yuu once told me that when Walkmans came onto the scene, there was an enormous change in the industry. It used to be that music would be played in the downtown areas, and you’d discover new songs when you heard them there and thought “Ah, I like this”. However, when Walkmans became popular, it became the norm to walk around listening to your own music selections with headphones on. At that point, you’d only be listening to songs you already like. That’s when it became hard for new songs to become hits.



—-Despite hits being hard to create, we hear that you believe that conducting market research and investigating consumer needs isn’t everything. Why is that?

Akimoto: When I was writing for broadcasting in my 30s, I was creating programs based on “what the viewers who are tuning in at this time want to see”. I thought that was rather patronizing. But then one day, I realized that I am also a member of the general public. Rather than writing for people I didn’t know and wondering “Will they like this?”, I wanted to create something that I, as a member of the general public, found interesting. From that point on, I completely stopped worrying about the trends of the time and the marketing research and began creating things as I pleased.



—-In 1985, Koizumi Kyouko’s “Nantetatte Idol” first went on sale. The song’s lyrics were easily understood as a representation of the idol image of those days, wouldn’t you say?

Akimoto: When I wrote those lyrics, there was actually a rock boom going on at the time. Honda Minako had formed the Wild Cats, and other idols were following suit by advancing into the rock world as well. The impression society gave in that era was that idols in pretty dresses doing sparkling dances were thought of as really uncool. So when I wrote “Nantetatte Idol”, to me it was meant to be a kind of antithesis that was saying “Aren’t idols awesome?” I’m sure that if I had written a song that followed the trends of the era, that particular song would never have come into existence.



—-Around the same time, Onyanko Club debuted (in 1985). They were completely different from any other idol seen before, so why do you suppose they became popular with the general public?

Akimoto: The moment I started thinking “Ah, this will sell” was when an MC during a show said “Nitta Eri-chan will be absent today due to midterm exams”. Because this completely turned the idol value system on its head.

Basically, it used to be that when you thought of an idol, the impression you’d get is someone who was taking performance classes at Horikoshi Academy, that the fact they were missing regular school was even something cool about them. In other words, an idol was a person who was chosen to be special. In the 80s, that was a high point of living in the entertainment world that people longed to experience.

But then, when Yamaguchi Momoe-san retired and the Candies broke up, I guess people started thinking for the first time, “Were those high points they got to experience for so long really that great?” Until then, the entertainment business was thought of as a wonderful dream world, but now normal girls were choosing to take their midterm tests over being on TV. I thought this was a ground-breaking development. But in those days this was astonishing to the middle and high schoolers, and cries of “I’m taking tests too!” could be heard in response. It was like peeking through a chain-link fence at what schoolgirls after classes were doing.



Akimoto: Ever since I was a kid in school, I liked theater troupes. When I watched them move from their small theaters to even bigger ones, I thought “Ah, it’s amazing that you can actually see their growth”. At first, I thought about making the same kind of theater troupe, so I started looking around Harajuku and Aoyama, but I wasn’t able to find a good place to base it. As it happened, there was a good place in Akihabara. And if we’re talking about Akihabara, rather than a theater troupe, idols would be more interesting there. So in 2005, I began producing AKB48.

I wasn’t thinking about marketing to consumer needs this time either, so I met a lot of opposition from various people. But I was thinking of this simple concept: “Idols who perform at the theater every day so you can watch the process of their growth would be quite fun”. It was about this time that illegal downloading and copying was taking off, so I found myself thinking that for something to survive, live shows were definitely the way to go.

In the end, the group opened in December of 2005, and by February of the following year, the theater shows were selling out. The word of mouth happening on the internet was huge. People were saying “We found something really amazing”, and with a feeling like they’d found some sort of secret hideaway, word spread over many avenues almost immediately.

It wasn’t a ploy to make idols popular in this era, rather it was the idols who were changing the public. It’s important to introduce something when the public really wants it. I suppose it could be likened to serving up cutlet curry to a hungry baseball team just coming off of evening practice. This is what truly decides whether a group gets a big break or not. I think what filled the stomachs of the public back in the Onyanko days was the group’s amateurishness, and what satisfied the public with AKB was the feeling of sympathy toward idols who were still growing.


“Kojima Haruna’s 2/22 graduation concert. Popular members who have already graduated showed up to watch over Kojima’s graduation.”

—-What is the image of an idol that the public currently wants?

Akimoto: Honestly, I have absolutely no idea.

It’s just that, I think the public mentality of “I want to see something I’ve never seen before” is the same no matter what the era. For example, when we created Nogizaka46 to be official rivals to AKB, that was something never before seen in the idol world. And when Keyakizaka46 successfully debuted with the song “Silent Majority”, which is a song with very grave subject matter, I think it was because the public was seeing a world they’d never seen before.

Silent Majority was commissioned to be a song for a commercial. We were originally asked to produce a bright and cheerful song, but it ended up being the complete opposite. But I kept thinking that no matter what, this song is excellent. It’s like the public wanting something a little salty after eating something incredibly sweet, don’t you think?

(มีต่อ)