Chapter 1049: As for Akina, it's better to be a mentor!

After entering July, the audition advertisements for *Voice of Japan* spread out. Inserts in newspapers and magazines, bulletin boards at schools, posters in KTVs and nightclubs, and there were also promotions during the gaps in Nippon TV's programs~

The hand holding the golden microphone, just this image alone, made people know that this was an activity to select singers.

"It's really attractive~" Akina at Shanyingyuan sighed while holding a promotional page. "Blind selection based only on singing, and if selected, you can team up with popular singers... and finally sign with Tree Friend and get Naoki-san's songs..."

She turned to Naoki Nagayama, her eyes shining.

"Naoki-san, how about I participate too?!"

"..." Naoki Nagayama ate breakfast as usual and looked at his wife. "If Akina participates, she should be a mentor..."

"Eh??" Akina was a bit secretly happy. "Mentor? Me? Will my qualifications be too shallow?"

"After all, it's a program, so it still needs some gimmicks and explosive points. I think it's very good for Akina's first program after returning to be this music program... Diva Akina!"

"Diva? That's too much... I'll blush~"

Tsk... clearly she was laughing very happily~

Akina and Naoki Nagayama had discussed her future music career, which was planned to lean toward being a singer and not an idol anymore... That is, releasing records and holding concerts, but not participating in so many announcements and variety shows.

However, *Voice of Japan* was after all under the name of finding potential singers, so Akina's participation wasn't in the capacity of an idol.

"However, the first season should be steady..." Naoki Nagayama said. "The mentors chosen for the first season are Kenji Sawada, Takuro Yoshida, Miyuki Nakajima, and Hideki Saijo..."

These singers who had been struggling in the music scene for five to ten years, some were idol singers and some were singer-songwriters, all of them could be considered famous.

Actually, Naoki Nagayama had even thought about inviting Momoe Yamaguchi, which would definitely cause a sensation... But after thinking about it, he decided against it. It was a happy family, no need to drag her back into the mud of the entertainment industry.

"This season is to build the brand of *Voice of Japan*. The next season can use mentors with more topicality, such as Yutaka Ozaki, Seiko Matsuda... to make the program even more popular."

Naoki Nagayama said to Akina,

"That time will be about when the baby is born. If Akina wants to participate then, you can be a mentor! Lead a battle team according to your own style..."

"Mm~~~ my own style... hehehehehehehahaha~... wuwuwuwu~"

It seemed she had thought of some strange place, and Akina went from the secret laughter just now to being a bit rampant...

Making Naoki Nagayama have to cover his wife's mouth in Akina's puzzled gaze. The young pregnant woman who was about to give birth had no steady appearance at all!

"Akina, be restrained!" Naoki Nagayama let go in Akina's puzzled gaze. "Don't laugh so evilly!"

"..."

Then Naoki Nagayama suffered the attack of Akina's two-finger zen and small fists, making someone have to beg for mercy...

"Sumimasen~"

"... Hmph~" After Akina finished her revenge, she continued to imagine the scene of herself being a mentor. "After I choose the team members, I'll have them all wear hip-hop kimonos, and then dance together on stage!"

"..."

The plan for Akina's song *Passion* had already been prepared, and even the hip-hop style performance clothes had been made. If it weren't for the pregnancy

Naoki Nagayama also looked at the early makeup photos and found them very interesting. The thick gold chains and Japanese kimonos... the clash of the two cultures had a very strong impact and was eye-catching...

If it popped up on "Sound of Neon," it might actually become a huge trend!

"Akina, you should register the 'Hip-Hop Kimono' brand... and use it as a trendy clothing brand in the future..."

"Good idea! I'll do it right away!"

Akina nodded with a smile. She already liked designing clothes and even had a design studio. Adding a trendy clothing brand wasn't impossible, and she had even talked about buying a garment factory before~

After finishing breakfast at home, Naoki Nagayama drove out.

Since the beginning of July, his schedule had been very fixed.

He would leisurely eat breakfast at home in the morning, go out, stop by the Tree Friend Building to check on program preparations and film editing progress...

Then he would go to the milk tea shop near the building to teach Hezi how to make new milk tea products...

And then usually in the afternoon, he would come back to take a walk with Akina, walk the dog, and pet the cat...

Anyway, the day felt very fulfilling!

"Naoki-san, good morning~"

Yukika Suzuki greeted Naoki Nagayama full of energy.

"Yukika-chan, good morning too~" Naoki Nagayama nodded, but it was a bit strange not to see Xing Jiahua. "Did Hua-chan take the day off?"

"No." Yukika Suzuki shook her head. "Hua-chan took the postman to the third-floor conference room..."

"? A postman?"

"Yes!" Yukika Suzuki explained, "Demos have been arriving one after another for the past two days. This morning, there were two big boxes, so Hua-chan just took the postman straight to the third floor..."

A work group was specifically set up on the third floor for "Sound of Neon," responsible for the earliest auditions, which meant choosing directly from the demos... Of course, it was impossible for the mentors to do blind auditions from the start; otherwise, with so many participants from all over Neon, it would take half a month just to listen to them all...

During the blind audition stage of the recorded program, about fifty or sixty contestants would be enough.

"I see..." Naoki Nagayama nodded. "I'll go take a look..."

"Yes~"

When Naoki Nagayama arrived on the third floor, he heard faint singing as soon as he stepped out of the elevator... After all, this wasn't a soundproof room, so there would definitely be sound if they were listening to music.

Pushing open the "Sound of Neon" workspace, the noisy sounds instantly flooded his ears.

In the seven or eight workstations, there was an employee sitting at each one. Everyone had a player at their desk, and they were inserting demo tapes one by one, playing them, listening for a while, and then taking them out. Sometimes it took ten seconds, sometimes half a minute, to decide the fate of the applicant...

Wearing headphones was impossible; it hadn't reached the point where they needed to block out other noise to listen specifically.

After the initial screening, there would be a higher-level screening by team leaders or music producers, and finally, a person at the music director level would select the contestants suitable for recording the program, then call them to Tokyo for recording.

"Naoki-san?"

Xing Jiahua came out of the temporary storage room next door with a postman pushing a small cart. Seeing Naoki Nagayama, she hurriedly greeted him.

"Good morning!"

"Naoki-san, good morning!" "Naoki-san is here~" "Ohayou~" "..."

Then the people who were listening to tapes also paused one after another to greet him. Even the postman said "Good morning" in this atmosphere... Sure enough, Neon's group culture was reflected in every subtle detail~

"Mm, good morning~ There have been many demos during this period, thank you all for your hard work~"

Naoki Nagayama smiled and greeted everyone. He was already at ease now.

"Hua-chan, are there a lot of tapes delivered today?"

"Yes, quite a few came in on the day the promotion went out. Now the tapes mailed from other places should have arrived too..." Xing Jiahua pointed to the postman, Kaisei Noda. "Noda-san said the Ikebukuro post office said they are still arriving constantly."

"Sorry for the trouble to the post office~" Naoki Nagayama nodded slightly to the postman to express his apology.

"Not at all, this is the duty of the post office~"

Anyway, the post office charges for both mailing and delivery, and an entertainment company like Tree Friend is a big client. The fan letters and packages for various artists are already numerous... A long-term partnership had already been established~

Xing Jiahua took the postman out, and Naoki Nagayama walked around the workspace...

The first wave of tapes sent in could be described as varied, colorful, and diverse...

The styles of songs the contestants sang were different; some were soft folk songs, while others were heavy metal rock... the kind that sounded like ghosts wailing...

Some were just there to join in the fun, recording strange raps, or things like telephone answering machine beeps, electrical buzzing, or silent recordings...

If you heard them in the dead of night, you might even think of the telephone ringtone from "Ring"...

Naoki Nagayama walked into the storage room to take a look. Several cardboard boxes were already piled up against the wall, and perhaps the entire storage room would be full in the future.

"These tapes... if recycled, they could also make a lot of money..."

He was just thinking about it... These demos all had names, addresses, and contact information written on them. Although they didn't need to be returned, they had to be specially processed before being destroyed.

When walking out of the workspace, Naoki Nagayama happened to run into the producer, Kazuhisa Fujiwara, who had just rushed back from outside.

"Naoki-san?"

"Fujiwara-san, just got back from outside?" Naoki Nagayama greeted him with a smile. Naturally, he had met producer Kazuhisa Fujiwara in the past two days.

"Yes, just got back from Nippon TV..." Kazuhisa Fujiwara was a trendy middle-aged man with semi-long hair, looking very artistic. "There are some problems with the renovation of the studio over there..."

"Oh? What's the problem with the studio?"

"It's the style of the lights on the stage floor... the ones that light up after the mentor turns around..." Kazuhisa Fujiwara explained a little. "They are all small problems, already coordinated..."

"Oh, that's good~" Naoki Nagayama didn't ask much about such small matters. "Fujiwara-san, in the early stages of the 'Sound of Neon' program, there are many complicated things, and there are demos to be screened... You have to work hard!"

"Not at all, it is my honor to participate in this program!"

Kazuhisa Fujiwara's expression was sincere. When Otomo Yoshimura talked to him about the "Sound of Neon" plan and invited him to be the producer, it was like a pie falling from the sky.

He was absolutely convinced that this program would be a hit music talent show.

"The new equipment purchased from the United States should arrive in these few days. Please also take care of the debugging..."

"Yes, I have already invited the top tuner in the industry..."

Lighting, stage design, sound effects... Naoki Nagayama gave "Sound of Neon" a very high budget this time, determined to produce a high-quality program. Even the musical equipment was newly purchased from the United States.

After chatting in the hallway for a while, Naoki Nagayama took the elevator back to his office. He thought about the subsequent production and promotion of "Sound of Neon" and felt relieved only after feeling there were no problems.

He took a demo from the basket on his desk and started listening...

This was already a high-quality tape after two rounds of screening. For the first season of "Sound of Neon," he was also one of the final checkpoints for whether a contestant could be admitted. Every day, the work group would send tapes to his office.

About an hour or two later, it was almost noon. After listening to the demos in the basket and not finding any singing that particularly moved him, Naoki Nagayama walked out of the Tree Friend Building again and headed toward the milk tea shop...

"Eh? Seems like I forgot something?"

Naoki Nagayama, who was almost at the milk tea shop, suddenly remembered something.

"Ah, I didn't go to the editing room to check the movie progress today... Forget it, I'll check tomorrow!"

He walked into the milk tea shop and smiled at Hezi and Junshui Shijing:

"Hezi, let's learn happily again!"

"..."

Yasushi Akimoto of TBS had been in high spirits during this time.

After jumping out of Fuji TV to TBS, his reality show had achieved very good ratings, ranking among the top variety shows on Neon TV, and there was a trend of continuing to rise...

After broadcasting a few more episodes, he might be able to catch up with the popularity of "Twilight Meow Meow"...

It's just a pity that "fightingpeople" is not a music show, but a comedy variety show. In this era, there is no internet platform to keep the topicality of comedy variety shows as a hot headline.

So apart from advertising, there is no subsequent revenue like records or peripherals. Otherwise, this program would definitely be more popular with TV stations and various talent agencies in the entertainment industry.

However, a few days ago, Nippon TV suddenly released news that it would cooperate with Tree Friend to produce a music talent show—"Sound of Neon."

After seeing the promotion of "Sound of Neon" and seeing terms like "mentor," "choice," "team up," etc., Yasushi Akimoto was very familiar with these terms. They were all things Naoki Nagayama had talked to them about when improving "Twilight Meow Meow"...

So, in fact, this "Sound of Neon" was entirely Naoki Nagayama's handiwork!

"Naoki-san, oh Naoki-san... why do you add another layer every time I'm about to step out of your shadow..."

Yasushi Akimoto was a bit miserable, but couldn't say anything.

Because Naoki Nagayama had mentioned most of the content of "Sound of Neon," it just had an extra "blind audition turn around."

"Why couldn't I think of taking these out separately to make a talent show at that time?!"

"Sigh... what a miscalculation!"

After feeling sorry for himself for a while, Yasushi Akimoto cheered himself up again.

"Fortunately, this time 'Sound of Neon' and 'fightingpeople' are on different tracks, and there is no similar competition..."

But after all, it's a variety show, and it's about competing for the audience's attention~

"Then next, let's see which one the audience likes! Naoki-san, I won't lose!"

Yasushi Akimoto thought for a while, picked up the phone, and dialed the program's assistant director:

"Otani-san... for the recording of the next few episodes, I want to add a few special guests!"

"Please help me contact... Toshihiko Tahara, Fumiya Fujii... and Yukiko Okada, Kyoko Koizumi..."

He wanted to invite the hottest male and female idols of the moment to film, letting the program's topicality reach another level in a short time.

"Uh..." Assistant director Kaito Otani was surprised. "Akimoto-san, these people are all very busy. As for the schedule..."

"Please be sure to invite them..." Yasushi Akimoto said, "I will ask station manager Kotaro Ogata to come forward to coordinate... Besides, with our current popularity, it is also a rare opportunity for them..."

Kaito Otani was silent for a while and agreed:

"... Yes, I will try my best!"

"Thank you for your trouble!"