Rei Kuromiya 黒宮れい

robert wagner

New Member
Mar 8, 2021
9
21
You know I have been reading the haters comments about her. The one thing I can say that most of you cant was I seen her in concert back in beginning of '19 when I was visiting my brother and his family in Seoul. (Brother married Japanese woman and lives in Japan but was working in Seoul) My niece is a huge fan. I did not even know what U15, gravure on JR Idol even was at the time. To give my bro and sis in law some free time alone I volunteered to take my 13 year old niece to see 2 Japanese girl rock bands. All she could talk about on the way there was Rei this and Rei that. I have been to many concerts Woodstock in 99 and several others. I was expecting to be bored and on my phone playing golf. Brats opened the concert for some other female band Broke by the Scream I think. The one thing about musicians I can tell you is its not as much about the voice as it is the personality and presence on the stage. This girl has it. She captured my attention by her on stage magic and persona. By far Brats was better to me. At the time I had never even seen a picture of her. Where we were in the crowd I could see she was cute but there are millions of cute girls in the world. My niece and daughters are 3 of them. What got my attention was first off she was rocking. This wasn't pop she was doing it was rock and roll or modern rock is what better describes it. She was awesome on stage even though I have no earthly idea what she was saying in the songs. No clue on what the song was about, it was her and her bands style that I found interesting. (There was a lot of parents chaperoning their kids mainly fathers though.) To the haters I ask did you get your current job by just showing up or did all the previous jobs and experience help you? Go hate elsewhere.

(Side note) Now fast foreword 6 months to June 2019. My brother and his family are in the US visiting mom and spending a few weeks here. When my niece comes up to me and asks me with this face that is hard for me to say no too. Can you please please please take me to see BTS this weekend? So me and her dad pay ungodly amount for 2 tickets to BTS. Her and I drove 200 miles one way to see them. I didn't even stand up. 50,000 girls screaming and I sat in my seat playing golf the whole concert. A lot of girls being chaperoned there also, funny thing it was mainly moms. Dads didn't go.. Kind of ironic isn't that?
 

st1402

Member
May 3, 2011
53
36
You know I have been reading the haters comments about her. The one thing I can say that most of you cant was I seen her in concert back in beginning of '19 when I was visiting my brother and his family in Seoul. (Brother married Japanese woman and lives in Japan but was working in Seoul) My niece is a huge fan. I did not even know what U15, gravure on JR Idol even was at the time. To give my bro and sis in law some free time alone I volunteered to take my 13 year old niece to see 2 Japanese girl rock bands. All she could talk about on the way there was Rei this and Rei that. I have been to many concerts Woodstock in 99 and several others. I was expecting to be bored and on my phone playing golf. Brats opened the concert for some other female band Broke by the Scream I think. The one thing about musicians I can tell you is its not as much about the voice as it is the personality and presence on the stage. This girl has it. She captured my attention by her on stage magic and persona. By far Brats was better to me. At the time I had never even seen a picture of her. Where we were in the crowd I could see she was cute but there are millions of cute girls in the world. My niece and daughters are 3 of them. What got my attention was first off she was rocking. This wasn't pop she was doing it was rock and roll or modern rock is what better describes it. She was awesome on stage even though I have no earthly idea what she was saying in the songs. No clue on what the song was about, it was her and her bands style that I found interesting. (There was a lot of parents chaperoning their kids mainly fathers though.) To the haters I ask did you get your current job by just showing up or did all the previous jobs and experience help you? Go hate elsewhere.

(Side note) Now fast foreword 6 months to June 2019. My brother and his family are in the US visiting mom and spending a few weeks here. When my niece comes up to me and asks me with this face that is hard for me to say no too. Can you please please please take me to see BTS this weekend? So me and her dad pay ungodly amount for 2 tickets to BTS. Her and I drove 200 miles one way to see them. I didn't even stand up. 50,000 girls screaming and I sat in my seat playing golf the whole concert. A lot of girls being chaperoned there also, funny thing it was mainly moms. Dads didn't go.. Kind of ironic isn't that?
There is literally zero irony here, a band of girls where 2 of the members are former gravure idols, one of them arguably the most famous and most popular that the business ever produced, has more men than women in the audience, the only surprise would have been if it was mostly women, the girls happen to be talented musicians, but lets be honest, if it wasn't for the gravure career prior to their musical career, I doubt nearly as many people would know about them.
 

robert wagner

New Member
Mar 8, 2021
9
21
There is literally zero irony here, a band of girls where 2 of the members are former gravure idols, one of them arguably the most famous and most popular that the business ever produced, has more men than women in the audience, the only surprise would have been if it was mostly women, the girls happen to be talented musicians, but lets be honest, if it wasn't for the gravure career prior to their musical career, I doubt nearly as many people would know about them.
Yes they are talented and yes they probably got a lot of their fan base from being an idol. Yet as I said we all got our jobs now from our work at previous jobs. Just like solo artist like 80's artist Peter Gabriel and Phil Collins who both probably would never of had a solo career if they were not lead singers in the band Genesis. Justin Timberlake, Brittany Spears and Christina Aguilera all might not of ever got their start if they were not in the Mickey Mouse Club on Disney Channel. Yet you don't see people talking about their start in a negative way. So she used to be an idol and it might help her launch a career in the music industry. Everyone would do the same if they could also.

And there is some irony there. A bunch of moms hanging out and acting like teenagers over a K-Pop band and no one thinks anything about it. If a bunch of men were hanging with their boys acting like teenagers over a late teens all girl rock band where 2 are ex idols in the same way I guarantee people would look at it totally difference. Brats had a bunch of teenage girls being chaperoned by their fathers (uncle). BTS had maybe 10% men out of 50,000 people. If Brats had only 10% women at their concert I am pretty sure that some news station would have done a nasty one sided report. I actually counted 200 people I could see and there was only 17 men. Just so I could put words to what I was seeing.
 

Death Metal

Burning Knuckle
Jan 9, 2007
641
966
There is literally zero irony here, a band of girls where 2 of the members are former gravure idols, one of them arguably the most famous and most popular that the business ever produced, has more men than women in the audience, the only surprise would have been if it was mostly women, the girls happen to be talented musicians, but lets be honest, if it wasn't for the gravure career prior to their musical career, I doubt nearly as many people would know about them.
On top of what Robert said above, you have to realize that the genre of music that they play has historically been a slightly more masculine-oriented one. Rock concerts are often more populated by men than women, though not by a very huge margin, but noticeably so. Of course, it also may depend on the band (never been to a Bon Jovi concern, but I assume it's mostly women, despite his typical musical genre being rock), but I'm just saying in general. Also, who doesn't want to see cute girls rocking it out? The incentives are many.
 
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Negan

Active Member
Oct 9, 2019
137
236
Her Gravure day's might be long gone, I personally think Rei is looking fantastic lately. Rei actually looks healthy and happy. Wish the best for her.

Great to see Brats are about to launch some new music too.


 

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st1402

Member
May 3, 2011
53
36
What I find most interesting about her right now, is how in all her interviews she always makes clear that she's the happiest she's ever been and that all she's been through helped her be happy with herself, without requiring anything or anyone else to make it so, it's great to see how she's turned out, some people seem to think that she's a wild girl because of the tattoos and such, but she's actually very mature and level-headed.
 

zakurabu

The Idolmaster
Aug 25, 2015
236
265
She was a peak loli at 8 and a peak jailbait around 13 or so. Modern Rei = meh. Maybe if she returns to gravure she can impress someone.
 

zakurabu

The Idolmaster
Aug 25, 2015
236
265
It really does suck that she stopped doing gravure. She could have been huge like Ai Shinozaki or Tomoe Yamanaka. No need at all to go into JAV like some people are saying. Of course she's free to do what she likes but her voice just isn't that good. She's a naturally beautiful woman and it sucks that she ruined her image with the tacky mascara mid-2000s emo look. I hope she's successful but I have a feeling if the band plateaus she'll either marry and retire completely or go back to doing gravure.

I can't really get a reading on her. She has stated multiple times she didn't mind doing gravure and junior idol work; she had fun and enjoyed it. Even when asked if she hated it she said she didn't. But in her book she writes about how she's "selling her youth" and that made her want to get out of the idol industry. So which is it Rei?

That's something that I always appreciated about teh Yamanaka sisters. They were fully aware of the fact they're selling videos and photos of their bodies because they are beautiful and they enjoyed the work. Once Tomoe felt like she was done, she retired. No complaining about how its made her feel bad years later.

If is especially the case when Rei admits that she went into modeling and gravure of her own choice (wanted to be on TV) and was supported by her parents, but never forced by them.

Could you share Rei's book with us if you have access? Do you have it in English or just Japanese?
 

Immergeil

Very Old Member
Aug 10, 2014
465
696
It really does suck that she stopped doing gravure. She could have been huge like Ai Shinozaki or Tomoe Yamanaka.
Tomoe was not big and neither would Rei have been, I mean this as in being able to make a living entirely on modeling - both had a niche audience.
 

crxlam

Member
Sep 1, 2013
39
57
Is this really her?