“The otaku are disgusting”, says underground idol…

The headline caught my eye, as I’m sure it did many other people judging by the over 1000 comments left on the original post. “As a professional it would disqualify her but as a woman it’s normal to feel like this. This is the first time I’ve ever seen such a refreshing farewell statement,” reads the overwhelmingly top voted comment with 15,000 likes. I thought I would translate it because we get such a skewed view of Japanese music culture via the English language media who when they do pick up on Japanese acts these days it tends to be stories about how an AKB48 member shaved her head to apologize for having a boyfriend or how an otaku stabbed an AKB48 member at a meet-and-greet and presents them as normal but the reality is far closer to our top commenter who is like, yeah obviously she thinks the otaku are disgusting (because they are).

The underground idol scene can be brutal and cut throat and rarely ends in a professional show business career for the idols themselves. In a crowded marketplace it can be tough to stand out and as another top commenter says, “Recently there’s been a lot of baffling underground idol performances. I’d love to know what the point is of throwing around flour and ink?” While Planck Stars are no GG Allin, certainly the performances would have been quite literally dirty, as Ms. Tanaka complains in her statement.

I hope Ms. Tanaka can get some peace of mind after her final performance and wish the best for the rest of the Planck Stars. You can check out their live performances on YouTube.

As always, I am not a professional translator and I do this purely for fun and for my own entertainment. Do not reprint or republish my work and please give the original a click if you can.

Tanaka Iroha, of the six-member underground girl group Planck Stars based in Hiroshima, will be leaving the group after a concert on September 9th (at Hiroshima PEACE CAFE), announced the groups’ official twitter on July 5th. This year in June she stated that she would be taking a break through the end of August saying that, “The performances are dirty and gross and not good for my mental health.” “At the same time, I started thinking that the otaku were disgusting and had reached the end of my rope.” However, she will not be resuming activities and she will instead be quitting.

This day it was announced, “At this time, Tanaka Iroha is currently on hiatus but after consulting with all of the other members a decision was reached, she will not be resuming activities and will instead be leaving the group.”

Tanaka herself also tweeted, “I enjoyed the time I spent with everybody after joining Planck Stars. I’m sorry things have turned out like this. It’s hard to put into words but thank you from the bottom of my heart. There’s still a little time until my final concert but for people who have the time and feel inclined, afterwards I hope you will come and say hello.”

On June 10th it was announced, “At this time, member Tanaka Iroha is taking a break from all scheduled activities with Planck Stars from today until the end of August. Unfortunately the reason is because she had come to find the performance style to be dirty and gross and not good for her mental health, at the same time she had begun to find the otaku disgusting and had reached the end of her rope, she asked to take a break in order to recover both mind and body and be able to return. She has endured until this point for the fans who regularly cheered her on and to the other members who regularly said, “I want to hurry up and quit” and “This is truly disgusting,” as a means of stress reduction. Tanaka herself was mentally exhausted from the live performances and had reached her limit. This is the result of her discussion with the other members.” 

Calling themselves, “Free spirited and wild bad girl idols”, extreme performances are their speciality. Last year in March, during the appeal for social distancing, a concert in Osaka was recorded for broadcast that showed the women diving into the audience and ink and flour being thrown around and so on, many of the audience members had also removed their shirts, it was reported.