was a sub-group of the Japanese
idol girl group
A girl group is a music act featuring several female singers who generally harmonize together. The term "girl group" is also used in a narrower sense in the United States to denote the wave of American female pop music singing groups, many of who ...
Morning Musume and associated with
Hello! Project
is a Japanese musical collective consisting of all female recording artists and groups under Up-Front Promotion, a subsidiary of Up-Front Group. The name was initially used as Michiyo Heike and Morning Musume's fan club name in 1999, but has s ...
. It was formed by
Up-Front Promotion in November 1998 as Morning Musume's first sub-group. While the main group Morning Musume features predominantly upbeat songs with a fast tempo, Tanpopo featured slower tempo, sentimental and
retro-style songs.
History
The group was founded in November 1998, consisting of three Morning Musume members:
Aya Ishiguro,
Kaori Iida, and
Mari Yaguchi
is a Japanese singer, actress, and television personality. She joined the girl group Morning Musume in 1998 as a second generation member and was the leader of subgroups within Hello! Project, such as Mini-Moni, Morning Musume Sakuragumi, and ZY ...
. After the formation, the group immediately released their first single, "
Last Kiss
"Last Kiss" is a song released by Wayne Cochran in 1961 on the Gala label. It failed to do well on the charts. Cochran subsequently re-recorded his song for the King label in 1963. It was revived by J. Frank Wilson and the Cavaliers, who took ...
," which was used on the anime ''
Sorcerous Stabber Orphen
is a Japanese light novel series written by Yoshinobu Akita. It was adapted into manga, five anime television series (''Sorcerous Stabber Orphen'', ''Sorcerous Stabber Orphen 2: Revenge'', ''Sorcerous Stabber Orphen'' (2020), ...
''. The single has a "sexy" vibe that they used on their second single and first album. However, they created a fresh image when they released "
Tanpopo". This new image did not become as popular as the first image they had created.
After the release of the group's fourth single, Aya Ishiguro graduated from Morning Musume and left the group. The remaining members continued performing their songs in concerts as ''Generation 1.5'' Tanpopo.
In June 2000, Morning Musume 4th Generation members
Rika Ishikawa
, is a Japanese actress and model associated with Hello! Project and best known as a former member of the pop group Morning Musume. She was the leader of the Japanese pop idol trio v-u-den until June 2008. She has performed as a solo singer, as ...
and
Ai Kago joined Tanpopo, making the two-member group a four-member group. The style of their songs changed also when the four released "
Otome Pasta ni Kandō
is the 5th single by the Hello! Project girl group Tanpopo. It was released on July 5, 2000 under the Zetima label with the catalog number EPCE-5060. "Otome Pasta ni Kandō" is also featured on the album ''All of Tanpopo'' as the opening track. ...
." The style of this song became analogous to the songs Morning Musume had released. They also used this style on their next singles, which became popular and reached the number one spot on
Oricon
, established in 1999, is the holding company at the head of a Japanese corporate group that supplies statistics and information on music and the music industry in Japan and Western music. It started as, which was founded by Sōkō Koike in Nov ...
, and their second (and last) album.
On July 31, 2002, it was announced that Tanpopo was going to be completely reformed. Kaori Iida, Mari Yaguchi, and Ai Kago graduated from the group and were replaced by Morning Musume 5th Generation members
Asami Konno and
Risa Niigaki, with
Ayumi Shibata of
Melon Kinenbi. This newly formed group only released one single before they went on indefinite hiatus. All members except Niigaki graduated from Hello! Project as part of the Elder Club graduation concert in early 2009, rendering the group completely inactive.
Members
First generation
*
*
*
Second generation
*
*
*
*
Third generation
*
*
*
*
Legacy
In 2009, Tanpopo was revived as a
Hello! Project Shuffle Unit under the name , with the new group consisting of
Eri Kamei and
Aika Mitsui of Morning Musume,
Yurina Kumai of
Berryz Kobo, and
Chisato Okai of
Cute
Cuteness is a subjective term describing a type of attractiveness commonly associated with youth and appearance, as well as a scientific concept and analytical model in ethology, first introduced by Konrad Lorenz. Lorenz proposed the concept ...
. The sharp symbol was chosen to represent the kanji "井", which is the second character in each of the new members' surnames. The group released songs for Hello! Project's compilation albums ''Champloo 1: Happy Marriage Song Cover Shū'' and ''Petit Best 10''.
Discography
Albums
Singles
DVD
*2004-06-16 –
Appearances
Photobooks
Radio
References
External links
*
{{Authority control
Japanese girl groups
Japanese idol groups
Hello! Project groups
Japanese pop music groups