Chapter 10: The Final Goal!

  "A big star? I'd rather have food and clothing first." Zhou Xiao thought to herself when she heard Jing Shang mention the big star.

  But in that case, it's not necessary to say it out loud. After exchanging a few more pleasantries with Inoue, Zhou Xiao finally bid him farewell and headed towards his own little home.

  It's still going, although compared to the 30 yuan when I just went out, the 5,000 yuan in Zhou Xiao's pocket is already a huge sum of money, but Zhou Xiao, who knows that this 5,000 yuan can't be spent at all, must have a plan to make one coin into two halves.

  Zhou Xiao returned home and began to seriously consider which path to take in the future.

  No matter what the future holds, at least one ultimate goal is certain, and that is to establish AKB48.

  If he didn't exist, this girl group would have been established on December 8th, 2005, but now it's the year 2000. Establishing an idol group isn't a big deal, but establishing AKB48? That absolutely wouldn't be simple.

  Even if you have so many songs and ideas in your mind, some very important things still need to be achieved within these five years, or maybe just four years.

  The first thing needed in this case is money.

  If it's just setting up a small idol group, of course, it won't cost much money, but setting up AKB? Even the initial investment wouldn't be small.

  Not to mention anything else, just the rental of the entire 8th floor of Akiba Guild's building is a huge investment. For Akiba Guild's rental, it will definitely not be a one-year transaction, but three or five years, and the rent will certainly be calculated in "100 million" units.

  This is just the first expense, and there will be many more, such as rehearsing and recording songs, which also costs a lot of money. Renting a recording studio, hiring professional sound engineers to record, choreographing and rehearsing dances, renting training venues, planning and producing costumes, even purchasing audio equipment for the theater, microphones, and software all require a large sum of money.

  But after these flowers have gone out, what is called AKB may still be just a concept for the general public, and even the underground exit has not started yet.

  Even if it debuts, the initial period will inevitably be dominated by burning money. For example, the performance of this theater, with a daily attendance of 250 people, the ticket revenue is barely enough to maintain basic financial balance.

  In addition to money, there is another important aspect of establishing AKB, which is soft power.

  After AKB was established, in order to compete for more resources, he tried his best to pull more people onto his chariot and build AKB into an unsinkable aircraft carrier-like national idol group. The greatest innovation he made was to sign the members' management contracts with multiple companies, which, along with their parent company, almost covered the entire Japanese entertainment industry. Only in this way could Akimoto Yasushi and his AKB avoid backlash from major companies and develop better.

  For Yasushi Akimoto, this is a necessary step to take. Otherwise, he alone cannot fight the entire Japanese entertainment circle. It's worth noting that AKB48's rise to fame has grown Japan's idol culture by several orders of magnitude, but at the same time, it has also blocked the path to wealth for some others. AKB48 not only dominates various charts in Japan, but also squeezes out gravure idols, making it almost impossible for them to survive.

  But Zhou Xiao believes that if possible, Akimoto Yasushi would absolutely not choose this way. Who would be willing to let others point fingers at and make decisions for the group they created with their own hands, like a child?

  So for Zhou Xiao, if possible, this is absolutely not the choice he would make. Of course, not handing over members to various companies will make the future path very difficult, but Zhou Xiao has already had more than a decade of experience in Japan's entertainment industry creation, and he will definitely try his best to avoid doing so. Don't think it's easy, just letting rival companies not hinder one's development is already quite difficult. If these companies' resources can't be used, then Zhou Xiao must find a way to get more TV station resources for the members, otherwise AKB might just be a flash in the pan and disappear into the crowd, with no chance of becoming that monstrous group he has experienced before.

  Yasushi Akimoto has what Takashi Murakami doesn't, which is fame and actual ability. In the 80s, he single-handedly built a group that can be considered AKB48's predecessor, "The Kitten Club". He was also the planner and writer for many famous Japanese TV shows, and wrote lyrics for numerous hit songs. That's why he got enough response after posting recruitment ads.

  So, the final conclusion is that apart from money, Zhou Xiao also needs to make a big enough name for himself in these few years, at least not smaller than Akimoto Yasushi. Not only that, he needs to do more, he must have enough resources on various TV stations and even entertainment media companies, enough to let himself have a say, in order to possibly let AKB members still have enough TV station resources without being assigned to various companies.

  "Money, fame and tangible assets can't be lacking, these five years, there are really many things I want to do..." Zhou Xiao lay on the bed in the small room, lost in thought.

  It's already 2000, for Zhou Xiao, daytime is boring and nighttime is also boring. As a teenager who has just entered this circle, he doesn't even know what seniors are like to socialize with, so he can only stare blankly at the ceiling in boredom.

  "Right, let's watch TV!" Zhou Xiao suddenly remembered that since he was going to do something related to TV, how could he not watch TV? The small rented room wouldn't have a TV, and the 10-inch TV in Zhou Xiao's home was one he had picked up from the trash dump, barely able to show human figures.

  After turning on the TV, I don't know if it's because of the unclear signal or the TV itself, there are many snowflakes and interference in the picture. Zhou Xiao patted it a few times but didn't see any improvement, so he had no choice but to endure watching it like that.

  The TV dramas and cartoons shown on TV are very boring, after all, they are things from more than a decade ago. Even the once-famous TV dramas are not of much interest to Zhou Xiao now.

  After switching channels for a while, Zhou Xiao finally found something that interested him: a singing show!

  Although the performers in these singing programs, whether it's their makeup or performance, look silly to Zhou Xiao, at least the songs are good. Moreover, many of the singer groups from that time, even after more than a decade, he still knows them well. Watching the TV, seeing how young and vigorous they were back then, Zhou Xiao feels quite nostalgic.

  "Huh!?" At this time, Zhou Xiao surprisingly found a combination on TV that was very interesting to him.

  This combination is Good Morning Girls.

  "It's really... quite moving."

  Watching the girls in their prime on TV, Zhou Xiao felt a deep sense of emotion.

  In the early 1980s, Yamaguchi Momoe retired and got married, leaving behind her white microphone at Budokan and disappearing from the scene. After that, Japanese idol culture reached its peak with Matsuda Seiko, Nakamori Akina, and Koizumi Kyoko, among others, who were talented girls who decorated the flashy era with their colorful presence. However, such idols are easy to get tired of, and at a time when there was only television as a media channel, many entertainment industry professionals sensitive to the market felt that relatively simple idols would soon reach their peak. The person who actually extinguished the flame of idol culture in the bubble era was Akimoto Yasushi.

  Established in 1985 and disbanded in 1987, Yasushi Akimoto's Onyanko Club created a miracle as well as a fast food phenomenon. It was a miracle because in 1986, within one year, the Onyanko Club and related groups took first place on Japan's Oricon charts for 38 weeks out of 52! But what about afterwards? After the Onyanko Club disbanded, very few members were able to continue living in the entertainment world.

  What this combination truly left to the Japanese entertainment industry, is probably that many of these girls later became wives of various figures in the entertainment industry. Among them, the most famous are Takako Okamoto who married Yasushi Akimoto and Noriko Kato who married Takuya Kimura.

  After Yasushi Akimoto's devastating blow, the Japanese idol industry entered a stagnant period. From the 80s to the 90s, few idol groups were able to debut and even fewer achieved success. Only SPEED is truly remembered as a powerful group in history.