STOP THE PRESSES! BOOBIES ON NHK COUNTDOWN SPECIAL!!!
Well, I’m back in Japan, and I’m disappointed to let you know that instead of sitting in front of the TV last night and watching NHK’s New Year’s Eve music show “Kohaku,” I went drinking in Shibuya. Boy, did I miss out:
The image above is a screen capture from DJ Ozma’s peformance on the show. Apparently during the part of his act where everyone takes of their clothing, the women stripped down to a bare-breasted state (or some sort of fake painted-on breast shirt). What a disappointment that I was unable to record this shocking moment of Japanese television history!
For more information on this event, and pictures, check out these blog:
Banana Hole (uncensored pictures)
Lost in Ube (censored pictures)
[Thanks to Ken Y-N for e-mailing me about this!]
Update: CNN/Reuters has picked up this story:
TOKYO, Japan (Reuters) — A troupe of dancers in skin-colored body suits had Japanese national broadcaster NHK apologizing to viewers of its New Year’s Eve music special for what seemed to be a full-scale Janet Jackson-style wardrobe malfunction.
The dancers, who all appeared to be topless and wore skimpy bikini-style bottoms and feathered headdresses, covered the stage during a performance by singer DJ OZMA, prompting about 250 viewers to phone in and complain.
“The dancers were wearing body suits, but we apologize for any misunderstanding,” a presenter announced towards the end of the 57th annual “Red and White Song Contest”.
“I guess it looked a bit too real,” local media quoted the singer as telling reporters after the show, which regularly tops viewer ratings on New Year’s Eve in Japan.
Update 2: Here’s the video, folks!
[Thanks to Daniel for letting me know about the video file so I could upload it to google video!!]
Update 3: The following censored video is from a rebroadcast of the show (Thanks to Lost in Ube):
Numerous versions of the uncensored video remain on YouTube, but I’m sure NHK is trying their best to remove them all. I’m guessing that the popularity of this story will make sure that the video will be continually re-uploaded for days…
Update 4: Is Google News trying to tell us something by placing this image next to the headlines for the DJ Ozma story?
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Yea, the girls (and guys too!) were all wearing body suits. After a short time, one of the MC’s said they had been receiving a lot of calls/faxes from people who didn’t know what was going on so NHK had to announce that the boobies were not real. I can imagine this will be a big issue for the next week, and people will use it as an excuse not to pay the NHK reception fees for the next year. How this managed to get passed the decision makers is beyond me.
There’s even a message on NHK’s site now…
shit. Imposiple.
Ha, finally it pays to be a boring old git staying in front of the telly on New Year’s Eve!
I wonder if we’ll see more gaijins willing to pay the license fee now?
A recording of the event can be found here:
http://www.sendspace.com/file/zsvlos
body suits my fuckin ASS. if those weren’t titties, then i’m going to stop looking at pr0n
Look at the pics a little closer. It’s obvious they’re wearing body suits – you can see the seams running along the arms and the “wrinkle” of the suit around the neck. As for the breasts, it looks like they’re just painted on.
Yup, Ken’s right… I guess that means no more pr0n for you, because those were body suits
No more q0rn? YEAH! I can get some sleep now! NO MORE PR0N! NO MORE PRON!
It seems noahT needs to find a different hobby, which shouldn’t be too severe if it was japanese pr0n he watched.
Argh, I should’ve watched Kohaku last night. I used to watch it all the time when I was a kid… until SPEED disbanded. Since then, I stopped, and six years had passed. *sob8
Your video is linked on the Drudge Report.
We subscribe through Comcast here in the US to TV Japan which mostly carries NKH films. As always we digitally record the Red Vs White New Years music challenge. The video image over here was not mosaic and it was not apparent in the video that it was body suits (in the resulting web images, once stopped you can see, but on video it is not apparent).
If NHK knew about this it is sad for them. Much like Janet Jackson and that other nobody who had to pull a skin stunt on TV to compensate for poor music ability, DJ Ozuma resorts to the same thing. Sadly, NHK went along. It shoes that the children have taken over the studio.
Especially now when Japanese music has a chance to break into the American market as a quality alternative (Yoshida Brothers music is featured on the Wii commercials here), this stunt will set Japanese music back to the “bubblegum pop” days.
Its especially bad because the show highlighted some good new talent and saw a return of Dreams Come True with her excellent vocals. Oh well.
Why was there so much English in a Japanese new years show? I understand that some words “migrate” from culture to culture, but the number seemed rather high.
Dude..it’s LOST in Ube. Not Lose in Ube. Thanks for the link anyway though.
Anyway, apparently rebroadcasts (in California I heard and probably tonight in Hawaii) have been censored.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xLdR5VGGTtQ
Sorry about that, I’ve corrected the link title! Thanks for the new info, I’ll add it into the post!
Not a problem. The Hawaii broadcast of the Kohaku is starting right about now so I wonder what they’ll do.
I was watching most of the Kohaku live but actually turned the channel to the Nagata K-1 fight so I missed this initially. Thank god I was taping it!
Gunner:
English sounds “cool.” It’s hard to find a Japanese pop song that doesn’t contain English words…
ha ha ! Serves NHK right for sucking so bad. and even if those are fake boobs, those are some nice bodies. Go Ozma!
so is a realistic painting or drawing or other form of depiction of nudity ok to show to kids? it is obscenity, plain and simple. doesn’t matter if it *isn’t real* — if it is made to depict such things realistically, it is obscene.
This is a rehash of a Korean pop song from about 1998, “Run to You” by DJ Doc.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Boj_teWuczs
No so-called bodysuits in their video, just a lot of micro-minis and lots of bouncin’. Great song!
Not too surprising but KIKU in Honolulu completely clipped out DJ OZMA’s performance.
As for whether or not NHK knew this was going to happen, according to one of the numerous articles which appeared on Yahoo Japan New Years morning, NHK said they didn’t know about the body suit stunt since in the final dress rehearsal a few hours before the televised performance, the dancers appeared in bikini outfits (and so the producers thought that was how the performance would go off). Knowing how NHK prefers to err on the side of conservatism on programs like Kouhaku, this explanation doesn’t sound too far fetched. Of course, they probably should have known to expect something when they invited him.
OZMA more than likely pulled a fast one and the realistic body suits ended up catching many off guard since from afar (at NHK Hall) and on standard def TV, it would have been easy to mistake it as real (on the high def still captures I saw, it was easy to tell they were body suits). So I guess Yukie Nakama’s surprised reaction was authentic since it probably looked real from where she was standing. I bet the old folks in the hall had some priceless looks on their face.
The most hilarious thing about this is where nudity is expected in Japan (like on some tv shows, in some daily magazines and manga, public sento’s, onsen, etc), most nihonjin wouldn’t care but since this was Kouhaku on NHK, the nudity even if fake was just unacceptable resulting in a greater knee jerk reaction by some viewers.
NHK’s conservatism doesn’t always mean they shy away from real nudity either as they’ve had documentaries and other programs which included some. There was a documentary about an artist and it had a mother and her daughter both totally naked who were painted and wrapped in paper to create the artwork the artist wanted, another with the usual onsen visits with plenty of naked men walking around oblivious to the camera crew. I also remember one of the “educational” drama’s NHK aired last summer about one young school boy’s insecurity with his penis size and how the show had so many implied references including one scene where a small group of boys are standing in a circle comparing and another scene after swimming class where he is day dreaming it grew large so he proudly stood on a desk and dropped his shorts (including a brief shot of part of his bare ass) so a few of his classmates (which included one shirtless girl) could take a gander at it. So it is not like Japanese are prudes when it comes to this stuff but when it happens (even if it turns out to be fake) where it isn’t supposed to like Kouhaku, all hell breaks loose. Too funny (but this kind of dichotomy is what makes Japan daily life enjoyable at times).
I would have thought that having Saburo Kitajima pop out at the end would kind of cushion the blow…he was the one criticizing Ozma before the Kohaku and he didn’t seem all that surprised by what happened. DJ Oppai is right though: Raunch and titillation are expected on the regular channels but not dear ol NHK which may be why ratings having been dropping for the Kohaku.
Personally, I was more offended by Nakai’s outfits throughout the night.
I thought it was funny… NHK was the wrong choice of broadcasters to do it on, but it was pretty funny.
I was ROFL hehe. I apreciate that kind of effort X)
Lmao who ever said they are wearing body suits needs to get out of the house. Go to a stripclub and get a few lap dances then you will know what real titties are.
Great show I wish there was anything on worth watching last night. 500 channels and nothing on.
Keep up the good work
Well, obviously see-through body suits-might as well be topless…
No amount of Japanese small boobs could make up for sitting through this bad song.
I like your explanation on Google video. As if wearing body suits magically makes it not obscene.
I guess you wouldn’t mind your mother topless bouncing around with a clown because that wouldn’t be “obscene”. Right? You should have no problem with that.
So sad they had to butcher DJ Doc’s “Run to You.” I so prefer the original to this re-hashed unoriginal inspiration. The whole performance should get a boobie prize with the words tacky print in bold.
Whoa, Vegas is alive and well in Japan…
This song is just horrible, the dancing is moronic, the guy flying overhead makes no sense, and what the hell is going on with the dancers dropping their bikini bottoms to show their “package”? This is a psychological nightmare. And the bodysuits that may have been worn do what, exactly?
層化と朝鮮人の仕業
Rick R:
Please look at this high resolution photo and tell me they are not body suits:
http://www.japanprobe.com/2007/01/bbb/11676034784583afc.jpg
By the way, their “packages” are mushrooms. Think of it in the way westerners think of little leaves covering up naked people.
Body Suits!
http://www.sankei.co.jp/culture/enterme/061231/ent061231001-1.jpg
They are indeed bodysuits. I couldn’t figure out why the DJ Ozma video was bumping the Saddam Hussein execution off the front page of YouTube, particularly as it was such an awful song. I clicked off long before the boobies made their appearance.
I saw it live, but by the end I figured out it wasn’t real. What a country.
@ ed: why are naked human bodies, real or depicted, obscene?
your comment, like so many other prudish comments in this forum, baffle me.
i can appreciate a need to censor vulgar nudity and explicit sexuality, but this video was hardly either of those. it was simply a happy, crappy japanese dance video with an artful emphasis of the naked body.
Haha, that picture of al-Sadr is priceless.