Valentine Kiss

Mayu and friends gets two new friends

Today marks the release of AKB48 spin-off group, Watarirouka Hashiritai’s 7th single, Valentine Kiss. The song is a cover of the 1986 debut solo single by Kokusho Sayuri of Onyanko Club fame, which was (less than coincidentally) written and produced by AKB48 producer Akimoto Yasushi. For this cover, two temporary members, Komori Mika and Iwasa Misaki were added to form the seven strong “Watarirouka Hashiritai 7″.

It is hard to fail when covering such a pop classic. The original Valentine Kiss sold incredibly well for its time, with its infectiously catchy tune and sickly sweet lyrics. Fans of the original will be glad to know that Watarirouka Hashiritai 7′s rendition doesn’t stray far from the original. There’s a slight increase in tempo and the dance steps have been updated to stay relevant but is otherwise faithful to the Onyanko Club version. This is what AKB48 will look like to your children.

As expected Valentine Kiss will come in couple of limited CD+DVD versions as well as a regular CD only release. First press versions will come with tickets for a special live events on Valentine’s and White Day.

Watarirouka Hashiritai 7 also appeared in Yoyogi Park yesterday afternoon to promote the release of the new single. They performed a mini-concert of 5 songs for the first 400 customers who purchased the single during it’s pre-release in the morning.

Limited A.

Limited B.

Normal Edition.

For Valentine Kiss, the group has teamed up with 7-Eleven (thus the reason for the creation of Watarirouka 7) in a campaign to market Watarirouka themed goods aimed at young girls. Watarirouka’s uniforms have proved popular with female audiences in the past so the store is now selling a variety of Watarirouka themed clothing, stationary, toiletries and of course, chocolates at the convenience stores.

The press release claims that the group is promoting the giving of chocolate during Valentine’s Day. But instead of imagining some susceptible lolita-rouka dressed up in AKB48-themed clothing giving out chocolates, the more likely scenario is that the chocolates will prove a bigger hit to the creepy wota fanbase. There are also alarm clocks that wake you up to the voice of one of the members, go figure.

7-Eleven also decorated seven Mitsubishi MiEV “eco” hybrid cars with the image of the girls, that are being displayed outside stores scattered around Tokyo. Henry recently dropped by Ikebukuro, where he took a video of the Watanabe Mayu car here.

This is of course not the first time AKB48 have teamed up with 7-Eleven.

Images by Generasia.