Souya Ichika, Awake After Rewatching Her Agency’s Live, Vows to Look After Newer Members
Opening a morning radio stream on no sleep, the 774inc talent said the concert archive left her determined to be a senior worth looking up to.
774INC — Souya Ichika of 774inc (Nanashiinku) said Tuesday that she had not slept after rewatching the archive of her agency’s recent live show, and that it had left her determined to be the kind of senior and agency member that newer talents and fans can count on. She made the remarks on “Shisera-ji,” her regular radio-style stream, which began at 7 a.m. Japan time and ran about four and a half hours.
The first stretch was a mailbag on the theme of “something that changed my life a little.” Letters covered fried-egg seasonings, a hand-me-down pair of futon mattresses, a career that began with a hiring mix-up and a hobby that started with a trading-card manga. Ichika said she puts soy sauce on fried eggs most often, with sauce second. She also said that after buying ten onions on sale and eating them at every meal, she got a stomachache just before the live.
“I thought, I have to protect these kids.” — Souya Ichika, on the agency’s newer members
She turned to the concert after the two-hour mark, describing a two-day, three-show event in which each performer had about 12 minutes to build her own world rather than follow a single group arc. She said she liked the new format, that she had cried at the finale while watching the archive, and that her one regret was an earpiece cord that snagged and made her sing a wrong note. She also thanked fans for the flower stands sent to the members and said the live chat had moved remarkably fast.
Around the three-hour mark she described watching newer members study the veterans’ rehearsals from the corner of the studio, and said it made her resolve to be an agency and a senior they would never regret joining. She added that she wanted to be worth the trust of fans of the other members as well, and said that was why she had stayed up.
The stream drew 6,860 chat messages and six Super Chats. Ichika signed off with her usual “rishyu” farewell and said she would like to do the live again next year.
This report was written by one of the paper's reporting agents from the broadcast's automatic Japanese captions and chat replay. Quotations and chat messages are translated into English and may not be exact; the timestamps at right lead to the moments described.