Lead - Feel The Vibes

Haven't blog here for a long time, lately I've been listening to Lead's 5th album "Feel The Vibes". I was actually looking forward to this album ever since I saw the album cover.

I think all of them has improved a lot in their vocals, because I couldn't recognize their voices sometime (especially Akira). In Track 1 The Vibes and Track 16 Feel they have guest artists Chris Gatsby and IO Hustle, no wonder I heard an unfamiliar voice but both of those songs were cool.

In this album Lead's songs has mature a lot compared to their last album, there's more of the R&B taste which you can immediately identify when listening to Track 2 Baby What Turns You On.

Track 5 Tani☆RAP is Shinya's solo rap song because I really like listening to Shinya's rapping so I really like this song. But the song reminds me of Fonk's Ohayo Sunday.

Instead of Lead singing ballad songs I prefer them singing R&B/Hip Hop songs. Somehow it just suits them more in my own opinion.

Lead - Feel The Vibes
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Yabu reminds me of Keita.F

I was browsing at some photos of Yabu on the net since I haven't seen him for a long time.
I used to thought he's cute and I still do now.
I think all members of Ya-Ya-Yah are cute too, but the only reason I think why I'm not too interested in them is because they are in JE. I think I've already said it before, I hate the clothing during lives.

Okay, back to the topic. I found so many nice pictures of Yabu and thought he truely did grow a lot the last time I saw him. More mature but he still has that hairstyle even now.
In some of the pictures Yabu suddenly remind me of Keita Furuya (Lead). I think Yabu slowly growing up looking a like Keita Furuya. I think it's the facial shape.
I used to think the young Yabu remind me of Keita Tachibana, not that they look a like but young Yabu has the shadow of Keita Tachibana.

Too bad, Yabu is JE otherwise I would definitely love him more than now.

Lead April Issue Junon

Yay! It's Lead...
My Shinya-chan and Keita-chan, they look so hot!
They don't seem like they've changed so much when wearing these casual clothing.
Although Shinya is wearing a cap, but in other photos he had a new haircut which is really short. He should leave it longer like what he had during Manatsu no Magic to Fly Away period.

w-inds. & Lead on Yahoo Live Talk

This must be the moment that all fans anticipated and crazy over it.
The dream of most fans have come true. Not only local fans are excited but all fans around Asia are also excited about it.
First time in history.
On March 8th w-inds. and Lead will be attending Yahoo Live Talk together, it is excited to see what will happen there.

w-inds. are Keita, Ryohei and Ryuichi.
They debuted in 2001, their first released album "1st Message" immediately reached 1st in the Oricon chart.
On the same year they have received the Best Newcomer Award in Japan Record Award. Afterward they kept on receiving awards and was participated in the NHK Kouhaku.
Not only w-inds. is popular in Japan but also in other Asia countries especially Taiwan.
w-inds. is probably the most popular Jpop artist in Taiwan.

Lead are Hiroki, Shinya, Keita and Akira.
They are a 4 man hip hop group, each one of them sing and dance.
In 2002 they released their first single "Manatsu no Magic" and on the same year they have received the Best Newcomer Award in Japan Record Award.
Afterward they have participated in many movies, dramas and TV shows.
They youthness, energetic performance and their cute-ness have caught every fans attentions.

wFL, what happened?

wFL used to be very popular, but what happened to them in these years?

In 2001 a new boy band which is not from JE debuted, they were w-inds. under Vision. It was probably refreshing since they hada totally different style compared to the JE boys.
With their first single "Forever Memories" they have quickly gained fame. When they released their 1st album "1st Message" it quickly topped the Oricon chart and position on first place.As they stayed in this music industry their popularity have gained a lot, people started to see their own talent and soon w-inds.was recognised by this music industry.

While Vision see that w-inds. getting more and more popular, Vision gathered more boys to create another two boy band.
In 2002 two boy band from Vision FLAME & Lead debuted. FLAME debuted before Lead did, as it was another boy band and it's under Vision, FLAME popularity grew instantly with their first single "Mune no Kodou". Later around 2002 September another boy band name Lead debuted, their first single "Manatsu no Magic". As Lead debuted during the time when
w-inds. is having their "1st Message" live tour, Lead was the opening guest for the tour. This was a great chance to promote Lead and since Lead and w-inds. is under the same company most fans are fans of w-inds. & Lead.

See that the wFL are now popular, Vision decided to use this to get more money. First of all w-inds. FLAME & Folder 5 sang a song "World Needs Love" together for the Japanese soccer tournament.After that wFL released an remix album "Buddies", but I guess the selling wasn't that great despite that the remixes aren't that great.

As the Taiwanese loves Japaneses stuff, wFL started to get recognised in Taiwan. Their popularity are amazingly big and probably the most famous Jpop artist in Taiwan.
Seeing that wFL gotten more and more famous in Taiwan, to let the fans in Taiwan see their idols the show "Factory Generation" was made."Factory Generation" is a TV show that features w-inds. FLAME and Lead once per week, it clearly films what they have been doing lately and talks.
But unfornately this show only lasted for 2 seasons because the amount of peoples uploading it online and selling it over the internet.
Vision had a big fist about the copyright and stuff. So the show was put off even though a lot of fans complained about it.

During 2004 Vision annouced that Kaneko Kyohei from FLAME is leaving the group, due to this announcement fans were assuming FLAME would be disbanded. But a new member Seigo Noguchi was replaced, even though a new member was placed in and the fanswere happy because FLAME is not disbanding, but FLAME was not how it used to be.
With Kyohei as the vocal of FLAME, since he left the main vocal has been given to Yusuke and Hisato the two twins.
After Seigo joined in, they had a FC event. While singing back the old songs, Kyohei's part was replaced by either Yusuke orHisato and the song has changed to a different feeling.
The first single of the new FLAME "Shake you down" was released during February 2005, continuing their hip hop style. After the "Shake yoy down" single FLAME has been 'going their own way'. With Yu and Seigo filming a drama "Star Light" and Yusuke as radio show host.
FLAME has became pretty dead, seeing that there's no news from FLAME many fans moved on with another group. Slowly the popularity of FLAME decreased. Even though FLAME has released a single "Hanashitakuhanai" during November 2006, a theme song for anime "Marginal Prince".
The PV has disappointed many long-a-waited FLAME fans as the PV seem poorly made. The single didn't get FLAME popularity rise again.

wFL, F was gone and now only w-inds. and Lead survived in this music industry. Lead was also starting to lose their popularity, the times they have performed live have decreased in these past 2 years. After their 4th album "4" released during July 2006, they had their 3rd tour concert "Upturn 2006 - 4".
Probably after the concert fans has slownly lose hold of what's happening to Lead. They might be on some TV shows but just reminding everyone that oversea fans won't have a chance to watch them on TV show.

So what's left is w-inds.
w-inds. is the only all time popular group, although throughout these years their popularity have been going up and down but they were never a time where there's completely no news from w-inds.
As w-inds. release a single regularly, they have kept their popularity evenly. But in 2006 there was a big change, Vision announcement that Tachibana Keita from w-inds. will go on solo. This has scared many of the fans thinking that w-inds. would probably end up in FLAME situation, with Keita leaving the group.
If the main vocal Keita left what's there left for w-inds.?
But seeing w-inds. popularity so high at that time, Vision would not risk the chance to let Keita leave the group.
Seeing the talent in Keita Vision gave a chance to Keita to create his own music world, releasing his first solo single "Michishirube" which is written by Keita. The song quickly jumped to top 10 of Oricon chart. To not let this 'Keita wave' stop, no longer after the single he released an album "KOE" including 8 new songs written by himself.
Many fans were proud of Keita seeing he has such talents to write such beautiful lyrics. Keita's style has changed a lot ever since then, he was not only a hip hop artist but truly an artist who knows how to express his feelings through music.
While Keita's on the run, w-inds. has stopped their events Ryohei & Ryuichi was not seen on TV. Right after Keita finished a whole lot of promotion and a mini live concert w-inds. was back on track.
With their popularity gaining, they had presented the 'Most popular Jpop group' in Korea.
While Keita's solo events stopped, w-inds. has gone back as a whole and released their latest single "Hanamuke".
As "Hanamuke" means goodbye or farewell, many fans had a thought that this was a sign that w-inds. will be breaking up. But as I believe in Keita's words "I will always be in w-inds." the thought of breaking is not worth thinking because it won't happen.
Even though I said w-inds. popularity throughout these years were pretty evenly, but compared to the past the numbers of lives they performed have decreased a lot.
Their were rumours that JE was trying to stop the Vision artist going on some music show but as it is a 'rumour' and there's no proof so can't confirm that. But I have been hearing a lot of bad comments about the JE manager.

So with w-inds. still surviving preparing to release their new album "Journey", Lead has gone back on track with their new single "Drive Alive" and FLAME is still settle down behind.

So will wFL appear once again on TV or anywhere esle?
Will Lead gain back their popularity or will FLAME gone back on track and start racing?

Lead PV "Drive Alive"

Finally the PV is out.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8mmdM5o-3vY

It was my first time seeing this PV and listen to the song. But in my opinion the song wasn't addictive when I first listen to it.
The PV was nothing special with makes me go "Woah!", but I guess it showed how much Lead has matured every since their last single 'Summer Madness'.

'Drive Alive' was different from other Lead's song they sang from previous, it wasn't a hip hop style but kind of soft rock type.
It was finally a time that Akira gets to sing the first chorus, which never happened before. Maybe I'm just not used to his voice, it differently sounded weird to me.
I'm very surprise that they didn't have rap included in the song, because as I'm a fan of Shinya's rapping I was looking forward for Shinya's rap.

I have to comment about their clothing.
Just looking at their style now, we can now say that Lead is truely a mature group. From their baggy hip hop style to this mature look.
Surprising I always think Keita and Shinya has the best style, not that Hiroki and Akira doesn't have a good looking style just that what they wear is kind of normal.
Shinya always look outstanding because of his hat, this may be a reason why I like him out of the four.

There's two coupling songs from this single, hope I get to listen to them sooner or later.
Hope they can continue to produce more music.

Lead New Single "Drive Alive"

ＬｅａｄＮｅｗ　Ｍａｘｉ　ＳｉｎｇｌｅＤｒｉｖｅ　Ａｌｉｖｅ２００７．３．１４　Ｏｎ Ｓａｌｅ初回盤：　ＤＶＤ付２枚組：ＰＣＣＡ－０２４２９　￥１，５７５（tax in）通常盤：　生写真１枚（全５種類／期間限定）：ＰＣＣＡ－０２４３０　￥１，２６０（tax in）１．Ｄｒｉｖｅ Ａｌｉｖｅ（日本テレビ系 「歌スタ!!」 ３月の“お題歌”） 　　２．ＧＥＴ　ＤＩＺＺＹ３．Ｌｏｖｅ＆Ｅｖｅｒｙｔｈｉｎｇ４．Ｄｒｉｖｅ Ａｌｉｖｅ－Ｉｎｓｔｒｕｍｅｎｔａｌ－初回盤に　「Ｄｒｉｖｅ Ａｌｉｖｅ」プロモーションビデオ＆メイキング映像を収録したＤＶＤ付。通常盤は期間限定でオリジナル生写真１枚（全５種類）を封入。

I can't believe that I just saw this news. Ever since Summer Madness I've lost contact with Lead.
I know they have been on some TV show cause I've seen photos, but I never actually saw the video.
Anyways, I'm looking forward to Lead's new single "Drive Alive".
The cover looks great!
I think Keita look mature a lot and Shinya always look as great as usual, epsecially when he's wearing a hat/cap.
I missed Lead so much, I used to really like them and kept update with them but now I'm completely like a newbie towards them.
I'm totally looking forward to the PV and songs!