Amuro Namie officially retired from the entertainment industry yesterday (September 16, 2018). Despite so, there’s already been talks of an NHK Red-White Songfest appearance.
According to some news reports, Arashi’s Matsumoto Jun and actress Ayase Haruka are expected to host the New Year Eve show. The one band confirmed to be performing is Suchmos, a 6-piece rock band who played NHK’s theme song for the World Cup, Volt-age.
Other names that were heard through the grapevine are 5-piece band Mrs. Green Apple, 7-member Generations by Exile, singer-songwriter Aimyon, ani-song artiste LiSA, and Yonezu Kenshi. Dreams Come True and Da Pump are also expected to perform at the program with the former providing the theme song for NHK’s day-time drama Manpuku and the latter whose music U.S.A. is currently a big hit.
However, a record company staff brought up the point that despite the grand list of performers, there doesn’t seem to be any particular highlights, which is giving NHK staff a headache.
Here, the one name that was mentioned was Amuro Namie who just retired. As fans and the rest of us are still feeling the lingering reverberations of the songstresses’ last live performance, it is rumored that NHK has plans to have her return for just one night.
NHK has great relations with Amuro with the queen of pop granting the station special interviews. Even her last year’s Red-White Songfest performance thought to not happen actually did happen. Under such circumstances, it is said that NHK is currently sounding out the singer to see if a one night performance is possible. Even if she won’t be able to perform live at NHK Hall, they are planning a possible live feed from a remote island off the shores of Okinawa. In the event that her performance doesn’t come to fruition, the channel is expected to run a special feature of Amuro.
As the last Red-White Songfest of the Heisei era, there is probably no one more suitable than Amuro to light up the annual event. And if that does happen, we can expect viewership to break new heights.
