On the Return of Mikitty

As I'm sure you all know, news of Fujimoto Miki's return has surfaced on the web. According to Tokyograph, her new single is going to be of the kayokyoku genre. Wikipedia's entry on kayokyoku states it as a broadly defined type of popular music that excludes folk songs, children's songs, J-Pop, and enka...which really gives me no idea as to what this single is going to be. Tokyograph's article also stated that Horiuchi would be singing his version of the single in chanson style. I don't know if this means that Fujimoto's single will follow suit, but I would like to think that hers will be done in some other way, so as to differentiate Miki from her sempai. The only other information I've seen is that this release will be of a more mature style than Fujimoto's other work within H!P, which is both a blessing and a curse.

On the positive side, the reason I started to like Mikitty so much in the first place (and still my main reason for liking her) is her voice, and I think it would be interesting to see what she sounds like in a different musical environment. There's potential here for Miki to leave the pop idol world and become a professional vocalist, which she probably deserves more than idoldom anyway. On the other hand, I really enjoyed Miki's place within H!P, and if she doesn't jump back into the idol world, she'll probably either leave H!P altogether or end up much like other former Musume's, sitting on the shelf releasing forgettable solo work, which would be a real shame.

Of course, this is all speculation, and right now I think the best thing for her would be to stay within H!P and continue the solo work that she probably never should have left, while continuing to do GAM with Ayaya (if only to make me happy ;P). The truly sad thing about all of this is that we never got to see what kind of leader she could have been for Morning Musume (which is a discussion for a different post), but what's done is done, and there's no point worrying about the past when the future holds such wonderful prospects as the return of Mikitty. I'll be preordering this single the second it's available.

- cfb