How did you discover AKB48?

The first time I heard about AKB48 was in a TV documentary about a bunch of portuguese guys living in Japan. I searched on Wikipedia about it but didn't catch my eye.

A few months later, I found an AKB48 thread on my football club forum. The guys explained me how things work and I started to like the group.

 

Lol i dont remember, i knew about AKB for a loooong time but they were never my style (though i did listen to a few of their songs)
Then one day, probably around the time i made this account, i decided i needed to like them because i felt like i was missing out on some kind of big party.

Though i like AKB alot, To be honest im still working on liking them as much as i would like to. I have to have a member that im obsessed with and head over heals in love with to fully enjoy any group. I have quite a few girls that i like alot but havent fallen head over heals in love with anyone yet.Unfortunately it is very rare in general that i find someone like this, ive only had like 3 in my life. But Once i do find someone im going to go from 100 to 100000 posts in this forum.
For now i will just continue watching AKBingo and other hilarious akb shows~

 

I've known them for quite a while as having been interested in jpop from before thanks to anime (tho I didn't really listen to anything besides Hamasaki Ayumi and openings) and also from several places but I've always been reluctant to get into them because I was simply uninterested in their music (I didn't even like any of their songs back then except for Everyday Kachuusa) but then one of my friends I was kpopper with changed fandoms (sorta?) and she kept telling me to get to know the group because they're great and they're gay.

So I did and here I am lol.

 

Being active in the local anime convention screen and just listening to Japanese music in general made me familiar with the name AKB48. Over time I eventually watched the PV for Heavy Rotation due to it being mentioned a lot. However, I don't feel like I really knew anything about them then. So then this year an acquaintance of mine suggested I "widen my horizons" when it comes to J-Pop so I started listening to some idol groups. Though I still kind of avoided AKB48. However I follow the girl in the previous post (@heysunny) on Twitter and she constantly Tweets about and retweets things related to the 48 family. She especially likes to tweet about a girl named Rina Kawaei or Ricchan as she calls her. So adding the fact I've been constantly bombarded with their pics in my Twitter feed and already developing an interest in the one they call Yuko Oshima, about a month ago I gave in and started listening to AKB48.

So after about a month of listening to their songs and 3 weeks of watching AKBingo, I finally ended up here.

 

I knew about akb48 when I saw the anime akb0048 so I decided to search it on YouTube and I found akb48 I loved yuko. When I found out she was graduating and announced it a day after my b day I cried also my first pv was fortune cookie

 

i know them first from gravure, back then it was only Oku, then Tomochin
so i was curious about the AKB48 and continue with watch subbed AKBingo then their songs
it happen in around 2010

 

I watched my Oshi (Wasamin) at an solo event for the first time. Decided to look her up. Found out she was part of AKB48, watched Heavy Rotation. Then several episodes of AKBingo... Here I am now.
( I am a new fan, I didn't start following AKB until spring 2014)

 

very simple... I know them because JKT48

 

I am a big anime lover so i discovered akb from akb0048 and i started to support Mayuyu because she voiced chieri

 

I've listened to Japanese music for a long time, so I had known about AKB48 for a while. I actually really hated them for a long time, mostly because I didn't like Acchan. I still don't, and I don't really watch old stuff. I am also a huge SCANDAL fan, so when Give Me Five came out, I really hated it for trying to ride on the wave of girl band popularity that SCANDAL had revived.

Then one day, my friend, who was studying abroad in Japan, talked about how insanely popular Koisuru Fortune Cookie was at the time and showed me the PV. I thought the song was pretty catchy, and the dance was funny and cute. I kept watching the PV and then all the dance cover versions. At this point, I was just really interested in the song and dance and not really AKB48 as a whole.

After a while, I decided to check out some other videos, starting with shows featuring Sasshi, since she was the center and I thought she was cute (partially influenced by that car factory scene in the KFC PV; I thought it was Sasshi until last month when I rewatched it and realized it was Yui... so I've actually liked Yui this whole time lol). I subscribed to the AKB48 YouTube channel and they uploaded the Kouhaku comment videos, and one featured Yui. I had seen her a few times before but this video really drew my attention. I started watching more videos with her... and now I'm here.

P.S. @KojiUehara19: Yay, another Boston-area member! Awesome username, too.

 

I discovered AKB when the Aimi Eguchi episode went viral around the world, I thought the idea was cool even though the end result was not that great. I thought the song was a catchy tune, I found the MV and that was it for me. I never gave it another thought.

Fast Forward to last October (2013) while on holidays in Bali I heard a song over the radio while driving and thought, well it's catchy and fun could it be kpop. At the next traffic light I quickly shazamed it and found out it was an AKB48 song, Heavy Rotation.

Back in Europe I started checking the song on Youtube and from there I discovered lots of other members on top of the 5 I saw in Ice No Kuchizuke, a complex environment and it was like every week I was discovering a new song a new member was a few clicks away.

It's really surprising as I usually would run away from pop music especially boy/girl bands. Maybe the fact I don't understand a word of the lyrics helps, the cuteness and group dancing certainly is a factor.

As far as a favorite member, as I discovered a few years of history in a few months it's still tough (I only discovered Sayanee a few weeks ago....). Yuko grew on me big time and Mayuyu kind of went slightly the other way (like her but the forced smile is irritating).

These days I'd say it's Ricchan, Sayanee and Annin for the younger ones and for the seniors I have a soft spot for Yukirin, she looks like the girl you would not notice at first but she is quite impressive in all she attempts. When I first saw Jurina on the Acchan Grad documentary I was quite stunned, mostly by her smile.

Members that puzzle me, Paruru only because most of the times I see her on video she appears bored or like she'd rather be somewhere else.

 

I acknowledged the existence of AKB around 2008-2009, when I stumbled on the Baby! Baby! Baby! PV on Youtube.
I thought the song was very dull and generic, and that there were simply tooooooooooo many girls. I was wondering how someone could actually remember all their names and notice them as individual girls. They were all the same to me, I didn't like the concept and decided to stick with MM.
Because indeed, I was a Morning Musume fan at that time.

Things remained like that until the end of 2010. Junjun, Linlin and Eri all graduated from MM (and Ai earlier, and Risa and Aika, then Reina...), and that was a huge shock. 4 young girls then arrived with the 9th gen. I liked Riho, but didn't have much interest in the others. And I felt like they were just too young overall. Even before I started getting used to the 9th gen, 10th gen arrived, with 4 other (too) young girls.
The group had completely changed in one year and I just lost all my interest in it.

Then I decided to take a fresh look at AKB. Still didn't like Baby!*3. Then I watched Iiwake Maybe and Everyday Kachuusha, in which I noticed Yukirin and Mayuyu. Thought they were cute, so I just decided to watch more videos. I've watched pretty much all the PV that were on AKB48's YT channel at that time. I got really hooked to Oogoe Diamond and started to recognize more members, searching their names and all that.
For some reason, I couldn't differentiate Mayu and Jurina at that time. I thought they were both Mayuyu.
Like in Ponytail to Shushu, I was wondering why Mayu was in the truck with Rie, and that a few seconds later she was happily walking with her bag (and got even more confused when she encountered the truck while biking. x)

Shameful.

So, I ended up watching AKBingo episodes, Majisuka Gakuen, concerts, and various AKB-related stuff.
I got really addicted and actually liked the fact that there were a lot of members. So much to discover. And I like the elections, Janken tournament, and all the stuff that makes AKB so complex and entertaining.
When Flying Get got released, I bought it, and I haven't stopped following AKB since.

Just like with MM (which I have stopped following), I don't really like when too many members join at once (e.g Draft), but when it happens, there's still so many other members that I can focus on, and I know I'll get to know the new ones eventually. I just need some time to get used to them.
If 3/4 of AKB's members graduated in the span of one year like it did with MM, I think I would lose interest too. I think things need to be done gradually.

It's been 3 years now, and my interest for AKB has not faded a bit! It has even increased quite a lot since I'm in Japan now, with my first concert yesterday and hopefully many more events to come.

 

I googled JPop groups because I am a dumb loser

 

i know it from my old forum there are some guys who used some picture of girls which is later i found they're pics of yuko & acchan and then i started to love akb48 especially mayuyu

 

I know AKB from my brother (he's Yukirin oshi), and actually i dislike Mayuyu because of her cyborg persona >.<
Then i watched AKBINGO, Majisuka Gakuen, etc. I gradually become interested on them and saw Mayuyu on another light (especially when she became a danso), i watched their PVs too and my fav song until now is Manatsu no Sounds Good! (Acchan and Mayuyu centers~!)
And then Mayuyu became my kami oshi

 

3 years ago my classmate told me to listen to AKB48 but i didnt lol and then 4 months ago the name "AKB48" just idk came across my mind? lol
Long story short:

1. I then googled them (lol googled?)
2. listened to Heavy Rotation
3. captivated by Yuko Oshima's smile and energy
4. watched one AKBINGO episode
5. captivated by Mayuyu's charm
6. decided to get to know the group more
7. started downloading their albums
8. months later, Paruru suddenly casted a spell on me (she is now my kami-oshi lol)

And now im in love AKB and i want to support AKB til the end!!

 

The first time I ever saw something about akb was a promo for their documentary "to be continued". I was at a anime convention with my brother. I was looking through the booklet they gave us and when I looked on the back cover I saw the promo. There were three girls featured on the promo. They were Maeda Atsuko, Oshima Yuko and Itano Tomomi. The one that caught my eyes was Yuko. I was like "she is so cute and beautiful". Somehow after that I totally forgot about it.

Then about a month later I was inside on a rainy day during spring break with nothing to do. I decided to look through the booklet again and saw the promo again. So I was like "why not check who this girl is". At first I couldn't pinpoint who she was cause there were so many girls. I finally found out who she was after I found the clip of her from the documentary. Then I just kept on looking for more videos on YouTube. She was so funny and energetic it made me feel happy.

What got me into the group as a whole was the show akbingo. It showed different members and their personalities were amusing. I then started to notice other members and little by little I started to learn their names. At first I liked them for their variety shows but soon found myself listening to their music. There songs are catchy and pleasant to the ears.

Well that was how I discovered akb48.
Fan since (2012-present)

 

I discovered AKB thanks to YT and my friend last year.for years the only jpop girl band I listened too was Perfume and other japanese technopop artists and I wanted to know more about jpop and listen to idol bands.My friend who's a kpop fan told me that there are many jpop idol girl groups but the most popular one is AKB48.lol I remember how I laughed so hard when I knew about the total number of members in AKB and I didn't take them seriously at first but after watching RIVER I changed my mind and I started listening to them and even sister and rival groups.Well tbh I like nogizaka46 more than AKB now

 

Watanabe Mayu's Hikaru Monotachi randomly came up on my suggested videos in youtube. After watching it, I became obsessed with Mayu. After a bit of googling, I worked out she was a part of this thing called 'AKB48' and started to watch AKBingo. It took a while before I watched any music videos where it wasn't a Mayu solo or centre. I came across the controversy (or whatever you want to call it) about the centres for UZA. I watched to MV and loved it, mostly because of the dark theme and Yuko. It was the first time I had been really interested in a member that wasn't Mayu. After that, I started to like AKB as a whole.

 

I'm a big anime fan and I got really obsessed with The Idolmaster when it started airing. I played the PSP games, downloaded all the music, watched a bunch of YouTube videos, etc. I started watching some dance covers of the songs and many of the users also danced to AKB/H!P songs. I really liked some of the songs, but I thought AKB had way too many names to learn, so I got into H!P first. Being the anime fan I am, I also watched both seasons of AKB0048 when they aired. After the second season finished airing, I decided I needed more AKB in my life, and the rest was history