Welcome to Hollywood, Travis Japan!

Yesterday, March 27, 2022, Travis Japan took third place at the Orange County World of Dance Championship series in Anaheim, California, with a fantastic performance that crammed 60 years of Johnny’s & Associates dance history into just a few minutes. I haven’t seen anything to confirm or deny whether they’ll be advancing to the finals but whether or not they do it’s still a great result!

No official video has been released (yet?) but it looks like many, many Travis Japan fans turned out for the competition and there’s a ton of fan footage of the performance. Travis Japan starts off with a Japonica Style Takizawa Kabuki-esque piece set to taiko style drumming which then morphs into a contemporary Johnny’s pop stage performance. It’s really very fun!

Over the (many) years I’ve been following idols, one topic of conversation that has repeatedly come up in my circles is: which idols are actually technically good, world class singers and dancers? The fandom wank generated on this topic could (and has) filled dozens of forums threads and spurring intra-fandom bickering across numerous social media platforms. The objective truth can be hard for fans to accept—as hard to accept as the raw mic feed from a live stage performance.

When it comes right down to it, idols are not expected to be world class singers and dancers and that’s okay. As long as they deliver good performances and fans are happy, then they’re fulfilling their duty. Johnny’s & Associates has always had good idol dance units, starting with the Four Leaves in the 1970s through Snow Man today but have also equally been known for the rather idiosyncratic dancing of groups like SMAP.

K-Pop units tended to have a higher level of skill--or at least coordination--on average, although that has been less and less true in recent years as Jpop groups have risen to the challenge. SM Entertainment, for example, is known for producing good dance units like SHINee. Other groups like Astro and Seventeen are also known for their dancing. You’ll often hear Kai, Taemin, Hoshi, Rocky, and so on singled out as excellent dancers--and they are!   

But when it comes down to it, the worlds of idol performance and… competitive dance performance are different. They take different skill sets. I haven’t seen the video uploaded anywhere but in the October 13, 2013 episode of A.B.C-Z’s program ABChanZoo, the members performed with a rhythmic gymnastics team and got absolutely smoked. And A.B.C-Z were the top acrobatic idol group! 

(Singing is similar with Kpop groups in the past tending to have a higher average level of skill than Jpop groups although with the quick adoption of live pitch correction and other production tricks in the Kpop industry, that has become much, much less true. The names still mentioned as powerhouse vocals tend to be from the older generations.)

Which is where Travis Japan comes in.

Travis Japan were a trainee unit originally formed by American choreographer Travis Payne (known for his work with Michael Jackson) for the 2012 production of PLAYZONE. They’ve gone through a few different iterations in their 10 year history before settling on the current seven-member line up but in that time have honed their dance skills to become the elite Johnny’s back dance unit. 

They may not have debuted with a single on the charts but they’ve had a nationwide hall tour, performed on nationally broadcast music shows like Music Station, and have their own popular YouTube channel where they do new choreography to classic Johnny’s & Associates songs. 

And in an era when the “music charts” and “album sales” are becoming less and less relevant to how people enjoy music and performance, is it really necessary to “debut”? Can Travis Japan pave their own way? 

They’ve started on this new journey by trying their luck in Los Angeles. As one of my favorite of their songs goes: 夢のHollywood! (“Hollywood of dreams”!) 

By doing so, they’ll be following in the footsteps of the original Johnny’s (primarily a vocal group) who got as far as recording some cracking English-language demos in the 1960s before having to return back to Japan and Shonentai, who tried their luck in America back in the 1980s. 

What sets Travis Japan apart from other idols going to America is that Travis Japan aren’t here to play the pop charts. They’re here to test their skills and talent against other professionals--and they’re off to a great start!