Three Quick News Items

The first one is an interesting editorial that begins talking about women’s hairstyles, and then merges into the idea of "Beauty Nationalism" which is sweeping Japan right now. Because of the influence of anime on the rest of the world, the world thinks Japan is cool and Japan must do everything to keep itself beautiful and "cool"- and it cites the success of Pokemon and Sailor Moon to blame. The writer of this editorial goes into potential downfalls of this new harmonization - we are unable at this time to post a full translation, but fans can read the article here and ask a friend or throw it into their favorite online translator to get the gist of it.

Shoko Nakagawa just announced that she is going to be releasing a second album of favorite anime song covers. She released her first one, Shokotan Cover Anime ni Koishite last May, and one of the songs on it was Otome no Policy from Sailor Moon! For this second one, she wants her fans to decide which songs she should sing and has set up a place on the web for fans to vote until August 14th. Fans who want to make suggestions should go here to vote!

And finally, Yoko Ishida has been chosen as the Japanese Guest of Honor for Anime Vegas. Yoko is best known to Sailor Moon fans for singing the end to the R-season, Otome no Policy (which Shoko just covered)! And on a historical note, Otome no Policy marked her debut in the music scene. She has come quite a long way from those days, singing songs for Ai Yori Aoshi, Texhnolyze, and more recently, This Ugly Yet Beautiful World. She will be doing a concert to promote a singles collection being released this September in Japan. If any of our readers are planning to attend this con we would love to hear how it went and to see some pictures!