AVEX Concert

Here are more pictures from the annual AVEX Stockholder Concert that took place last Sunday at Saitama Super Arena (さいたまスーパーアリーナ) just north of Tokyo. AVEX Group (エイベックス) is a Japanese record giant and its shareholder-only concert was a star studded event, featuring several internationally known J pop artists.

After more than a decade, Namie Amuro (安室奈美恵), the girl who is credited with starting the contemporary Japanese fashion as we know today can still rock the stage

The humble looking Japanese diva Kumi Koda (倖田來未) performed gracefully while shedding some tears, no doubt reflecting on her “rotten womb” comment scandal from earlier this year

AVEX mega popular artist Ai Otsuka (大塚愛) looks cute no matter what she’s wearing, even in this pajama inspired outfit

Former Morning Musume Maki Goto (後藤真希) made her first official appearance as an AVEX Nation artist

Ethnic Tibetan alan (アラン, or 阿兰) was discovered recently when AVEX held an audition in China and was quickly signed to the label

Kumi Koda Is Back

Just like I expected all along, the princess of Japan’s dirty pop Kumi Koda kicked off her national concert tour yesterday pretty much as originally planned at Ekoba Arena in Fukuroi, Shizuoka Prefecture (about 2.5 hr southwest of Tokyo). It has been about two and a half months since her off the cuff “rotten womb” radio show comment that landed her in hot water which ended in cancellation of all work related activities and self exile.

Before the show Kumi once again apologized and bowed to the fans. She then exclaimed, “I will give my best!”

According to reports, since the scandal blew up in the beginning of this past February Kumi had been hiding in hotels. And recently Japanese tabloid FLASH sighted the j-pop diva resurfacing, sporting huge sunglasses with her trademark brightly colored hair surrounded by several AVEX staff members while being discreetly shuttled around.

The 25 year old Miss Kumi Koda had reportedly wanted to delay the start of her national tour. But due to several complications decided to stick to the original schedule. The concert tour covers 8 locations and consists of 16 shows in total. The ones in the beginning such as Shizuoka, Kobe and Fukuoka have been completely sold out a long time ago before the rotten womb scandal took place and tickets for her performance in Tokyo which went on sale on the 15th of last month were also gone in an instant.

Although her advertising activities with major companies like Kirin, P&G Japan and Japanese cosmetic Kose are still on halt, I’m sure everything will be back to normal by early summer and you’ll start to see Kumi pimping all kinds of products everywhere you go again.

Things are looking good for Kumi Koda. Her latest DVD “Kumi Koda Live Tour 2007 ~Black Cherry~ Special Final in Tokyo Dome” that was released on the 31st of last month shot up to the No. 1 position for music DVD. As a matter of fact, this is the 4th consecutive number one ranking she’s received for her DVD, beginning with “secret ~First Class Limited Live~” in September of 2005.

Kumi is on track to surpass Hikaru Utada’s sales record of 6 consecutive No. 1 DVD 

This really shows you in Japan it doesn’t matter what kind of trouble you get yourself into,  a tearful apology followed by a short hiatus goes a long way!