Chisato Moritaka – “非実力派宣言” review

Final verdict: 4/10 ★★☆☆☆

Of course, this album’s incredibly fun and eye-catching cover artwork was what drew me to it – and as the successor to “見て” (an excellent album, by the way), I thought, how bad could this possibly be?

The answer is plenty bad. This isn’t very pleasant to listen to whatsoever. And it’s truly a shame, because Moritaka is admittedly more than capable of delivering a good, or even great, synth-infused idol kayō album, as her earlier discography can attest. But it’s not like she flopped later down the line – in fact, 1989 saw the release of the single “17才”, which was a pretty great re-imagined version of the Saori Minami song of the same name. So Moritaka certainly hadn’t lost her spark by this point – she moreso took the wrong direction with this album.

Although this record features some pretty boppy synthpop tunes, all of it is ultimately forgettable, probably due to the fact most the songs drag for far too long and barely have any appeal to them. And while the honesty and self-awareness expressed throughout is refreshing to see in an idol album, that barely makes up for the fact that “非実力派宣言” is, for Moritaka’s standards at least, a sub-par record.

While this is far from the most terrible album I’ve ever heard, if you are getting into Chisato Moritaka’s works, you’ll probably want to avoid this one altogether. It’s a waste of time, when Moritaka has released some very, very good records that you could be devoting your energy to instead.