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^^
I think she was the first celebrity I saw getting whacked upside the head on HEY! HEY! HEY!, on one of their many clip shows.

Ebichu's new TV show, Robosan:



To paraphrase someone on a recent Jpop podcast, "Ebichu is all about chaos!"

Incidentally, they just did an interview with Konno Asami in connection with the show (couldn't find any video of it yet).

^^ Speaking of oldies...I kinda miss Rina Aiuchi. I guess stylistically she was somewhat in the shadow of Hamasaki Ayumi, and there was no real chance of her surviving the 00's, but it was still a shock that she decided to completely retire and leave her music career behind. Tbh I preferred her voice to many other singers of her genre.







Moving into the modern era, Eimi from Dempagumi.inc seems to me like a combination of Rina Aiuchi and former AKB member Rina Nakanishi.






Speaking of resemblances, Nemu reminds me of Kanana. The blonde Moga's look-alike is too obvious to even mention. And Risa strongly reminds me of someone as well but I can't think of who it is.

Real question. Is there anyone nowadays who compares to Ayumi Hamasaki in her prime? Who's the current Queen of Jpop? Has it just fallen to idols over the last few years?

Kyary Pamyu Pamyu is

Or maybe Shoko Nakagawa.

But she only does themes these days, so maybe not.

The K-pop and idol booms pretty much wiped out the female soloists.

I just did an unscientific check at Jpop Central (since a lot of the former JPM diva-crazy fans seem to have settled in there). The two most recently active threads are for Hikki and Namie.
And in general, the focus is on similar oldies. But Nishino Kana and Wakeshima Kanon also show up in the first 10 threads -- they are, if not recent, at least less unrecent, I guess.
All in all, though, it does like the Jpop diva world has fallen on somewhat hard times.

KPP doesn't compare with Ayu in her prime...maybe she compares with the Rina Aiuchi level. Shokotan sadly hasn't had a hit in years, and even in her best she never got higher than Koharu levels. And although she's popular with certain otaku, Kanon Wakeshima has never had mainstream popularity.

I'd concur with Namie as a runner up and maybe toss Nana Mizuki into the ring. But tbh I don't think any one person dominates the field anything like Ayumi did. Hell, she had an album that sold over 4 million copies. And another one that sold almost 3 million. And a couple more that sold over 2 million. And five million-selling singles. And 25 #1 singles in a row. She wasn't the KPP or the Kana Nishino of her day. She was the AKB48 of her day.

But wait! We're forgetting the One True Diva of the contemporary world:

^

"As Seen On David Letterman ™ "