Kobushi Factory to disband on March 30th 2020 (Last SG March 4th)

[Sohee]

Honestly kinda in shock right now but uh.
http://helloproject.com/news/11547/

Last live will be March 30th, 2020 at Tokyo Dome City Hall.
Last single will be released on March 4th.

I'm sure someone will translate everything literally eventually, but summary is:

Spoiler: show

Early 2019 Hirose consulted with the staff about leaving H!P and after many, many talks and discussions with everyone they have come to this conclusion.
Hirose, Nomura, Hamaura will continue with their showbiz activities (I assume within UF).
Inoue will stay in H!P.
Wada will retire from showbiz.

Hirose had intended to retire from showbiz all together when she graduated H!P but because of the acapella and all her love towards music and her own singing has grown a lot. Thus, she wants to become a solo singer and has already gone ahead and applied and gotten accepted to a music university starting in April this year.

Nomura says she wanna focus on acting of some sort.

Hamaura implies that she wants to study and widen her horizons but keep on being "in front of everyone" so she will stay available "little by little" and hopes she can use what she has learned in H!P to get to work more with acting and modelling.

Wada basically says it's all 5 of Kobushi or nothing for her, so she will retire.

Inoue says she wanna keep dancing and singing etc in front of everyone so she'll keep doing it while supporting everyone.

New single info:

Kobushi Factory 8th single "Seishun no Hana / Start Line" (青春の花/スタートライン), Release is 3/4

Limited Edition A (DVD : Seishun no Hana Music Video + Other Ver.)
Limited Edition B (DVD : Start Line Music Video + 4 A capella Videos)
Normal A : Seishun no Hana Trading card
Normal B : Start Line Trading card

http://www.helloproject.com/release/detail/EPCE-7584/

[Nayoko-Kihara]

*Accidental repeated info. Feel free to delete this.

[Sohee]

(new post cause I don't wanna spam in the top post)


i can't really comprehend this
goddamnit

[Nayoko-Kihara]

Seriously. They've just started really coming into their own. This is so upsetting.

[teth]

It’s interesting that groups created after Tsunku quit as producer are breaking up in order...

Country Girls
Kobushi

And also kinda fulfilling the theory that most contracts are for about 5 years (Kobushi formed in Jan 2015)

[Zunu]

They had a good run and it sounds like they're getting out on their own terms.

I'm shocked...but not....surprised?

Sakurako

[JonCC]

It's hard to come back from losing three members to scandals in just a few months. It's never been the same since.
Had they added new members quickly to compensate they might have found new momentum, but sadly they didn't. We can be happy they lasted this long after that.

Interesting to see what Inoue Rei will do within H!P. Hope it's the core of a new group, or transfer to another one.

[Amped]

At least, it sounds like Hirose, Nomura, and Hamaura will probably stay with Upfront for their solo activities. Inoue Rei will stay a soloist for H!P. With the exception of Wada Sakurako, Hamaura says none of them won't disappear in front of their fans when they start solo activities.

news reports
https://www.sanspo.com/geino/news/20200 ... 32-n1.html
https://mdpr.jp/music/detail/1931074
https://popnroll.tv/articles/6189
https://natalie.mu/music/news/362486
https://www.oricon.co.jp/news/2152803/full/

Reactions

Airi
https://twitter.com/airimania/status/12 ... 0250387456

Mano
https://twitter.com/erina_mano/status/1 ... 1288034306

https://twitter.com/kikkawa_you/status/ ... 7977398273

https://twitter.com/aoi_punclo/status/1 ... 1142032386

[Celedam]

And also kinda fulfilling the theory that most contracts are for about 5 years (Kobushi formed in Jan 2015)

Four to five years, with some flexibility built in to allow for the scheduling of debuts and graduations.

In this case, after reading Sohee's summary, I think their contracts came up for renewal in late 2018* or early 2019 and that's when the trouble began. Up-Front somehow got all of them to renew, but no one was happy with the way things were going through 2019.

* Why late 2018? Because even though the group was announced in January 2015, the members must have been selected months before that. Selected and signed in late 2014, renewed in late 2018, if we go by my theory of a four-year contract.

I also think disbanding the group in March is more about the fiscal year (and all of the administrative processes associated with that) than about their contracts. Their agreements to continue with solo activities is how they will finish the contracts they already renewed; Up-Front wouldn't renew their contracts just to do those activities.

I'm shocked...but not....surprised?

This. They've obviously been struggling for a while.

[Shabranikuduu]

Oh no. I can't believe this is happening. I'm glad Ayaka got into a university, she sounded really upset when she wasn't able to straight after high school.