Kome Kome Club

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Kome Kome Club (米米CLUB, Kome Kome Kurabu^?) is a Japanese musical group which blended funk, soul and Latin musical styles. ^[1] The band was formed in 1985 by members including vocalist Tatsuya Ishii who went on to a successful solo career after the band's breakup in 1997.

The band reformed in the middle of 2007 for a series of concerts and a few new recordings including "Welcome 2" which spurred a wonderful video where the bank that depicted the members as toys (complete with UPC bar codes and one, "James" Onoda Yasuhide bursting out of his "box" Welcome 2 video on Youtube ). A combined CD/DVD release featured a parody of the "hentai" (aka "racy') videos where the two dancers (Minako and Mari, also known as "Sue Cream Sue") dance to songs of Kome Kome in various states of dress and undress (and strange costumes like animals). The difference being 20 years and this time around they are not wearing skimpy costumes like their famed "Costume Dance" videos during Kome Kome's heyday.

Members included:

Carl Smoky Ishii: Vocal
James Onoda: Vocal, Chorus
Bon: Bass
be: Guitar
Flash Kaneko: Saxophone, Keyboards, Flute
Toshi: Drums
RYO-J: Drums
Joplin Tokunoh: Guitar
Mataro: Pecussion, Chorus
Machiko: Chorus
Juliano Katsumata: Keyboards
Kohtaro: Chorus
Shinji: Chorus

SCS (Sue Cream Sue)
Minako: Vocal, Dance (younger sister of Ishiya and wife of Kaneko
Mari: Vocal, Dance, Percussion

B.H.B. (Big Horns Bee)
G.I. Gyo: Trumpet
Himarayan Shimogami: Trumpet
Kawai Wakaba: Trombone, Saxophone
Orita Nobotta: Saxophone, Flute
Fussy Kobayashi: Trumpet

Their hits include Kimi ga Iru Dake de (君がいるだけで, Kimi ga Iru Dake de^?) in 1992 which topped the Oricon chart, remained in the charts for 33 weeks, and was the top-selling J-Pop song of the 90s. ^[2] This song was written upon the marriage of Ishiya's sister Minako and the band's saxophone/keyboardist Kaneko.