Since we're now in Sousenkyou season for AKB it's probably a good idea to review last year's summer single lol. It's actually kind of funny that that played out this way. This single comes up for the next review right as applications for this year's Sousenkyou begin.
The title track, Labrador Retriever, seemed to really divide opinions when it was released last year. At least that's what I saw. Personally, I hated it when it first came out. It felt so blah and boring. However, when I bought the CD, I was immediately hooked on the song. It's one of those songs you need to hear in CDQ honestly. It's probably my favorite summer single after Everyday Katyusha. The music video I could do without. It's so long...and I really don't care for the bikini MVs for various reasons. And there are WAY too many girls in the summer singles. I don't see the point of having 32 girls when most won't get any recognition. I realize that it's a big deal to the girls, but it's just too many. 5/5.
Labrador Retriever MV:
The main B-side across all versions is Kyou Made no Melody, Yuko Oshima's graduation song. Personally, I'm not a huge fan of the song. It's just not my type of song. It's nice for what it is, but for me it's boring. What I do really love about it though is they brought back a lot of the graduated original Team K members to see Yuko off in the song. I thought that was a neat touch. The music video also features the returning members which is also pretty cool. It's way too long though. 3/5.
The Type A B-side is Kimi wa Kimagure. Like Labrador, I wasn't too sure about this song when I saw the video. It just seemed average. When I received the CD, it's catchiness caught me. It's not the best B-side on the single, but it's pretty good. It's very much your standard AKB song, but it's certainly high quality for that type of song. The music video is pretty enjoyable for an AKB video. The concept is really cool and I like how all the performers got a chance to be in the spotlight. 4/5.
The Type K B-side is Itoshiki Rival. While this is the best coupling song on the single, it pales in comparison to Team K's summer song last year. Sayonara Crawl's B-sides were just on another level. The trend for this single has really been not liking a song at first and then coming to like it. This song is the same case. When I saw what the concept was going to be for the video, I was expecting a dark electro track a la Uza or an Ikiru Koto type song, so of course I was disappointed when I heard the song. It's still "darker" than the rest of the single, but it's not that type of song. The melody? (I guess...the musical terminology section of my brain doesn't really exist so I'm half guessing...) sounds too bright to be that type of single and that turned me off of the song at first. Couple that with the concept of the video being what it is, I was disappointed. Again, the CDQ of the song changed my mind. It's a pretty good song for an AKB song. Like I said before, the video really doesn't seem to go with the song at all. I guess it kind of can work with the lyrics, but they attempted to make it much more dark/gritty/"cool" than the song is which doesn't help the song's case at all. 4.5/5.
The Type-B coupling track is B Garden. Not a huge fan of this song. It's the exact same concept as all of the 'Team Oshi' songs and some other stage songs. Songs like that are best left to the stage. It doesn't help that this is a very run of the mill AKB song....and Team B Oshi is so much better. The music video on the other hand is great. It's colorful and has a funny story to it. The guy standing in for Rina Ikoma is so funny. Forever going to be sad that they just cancelled her concurrency....I really liked Rina in AKB. 3/5.
The Type 4 coupling track is Heart no Dasshutsu Game. I want to like Team 4's songs. I really do. I adore Minami Minegishi and this is (well...was...now she's back to K YESSSSSS) her team so I wanted to like them, but they're too childish for me. This song is just another of the average AKB tracks. Pretty sure I heard it from them at least 20 times. The video is at least semi-interesting. I generally dislike videos that are longer than the song, but this one doesn't feel like it drags on. 3/5.
The final B-side of the single is found on the theater edition, Futari wa Dekiteru. What's interesting about this song is that it's sung by Haruna Kojima and one of the staff members, Kenji Kitagawa (yes, the same one NMB's song is named after). The song's nice, but not something I'd listen to on a regular basis. It really sounds like something SDN48 would have put out, in fact it reminds me A LOT of Kudokinagara Azabu Juuban. Haruna's voice is pretty nice, and for a staff member, Kitagawa's voice is nice too. 3.5/5.
Video clip of Futari wa Dekiteru (Low Quality)
One great thing about AKB's summer singles is that they tend to have a lot of variety. This release is nowhere near the quality of Sayonara Crawl (and I'm uncertain they can ever release something as cohesive as that single ever again), but it's still a nice release. It has a little something for everyone. 3.5/5.
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