Piko Taro proves he can be funny without even trying.
It’s pretty safe to say that “Pen-Pineapple-Apple-Pen” has been burning up the charts not because of its musical merits, but because of how hilariously weird the roughly 45-second song is. That’s totally by design, because while “PPAP” singer Piko Taro, also known as Kosaka Daimaou, has recorded an album’s worth of songs, he’s first and foremost a comedian.
The “PPAP” success story isn’t the first time Japan has fallen head over heels for a comedian’s musical side venture, though. In December of 2015, Japanese comedy duo Oriental Radio, made up of performers Atsushi Nakata and Shingo Fujimori, rebranded themselves as Radio Fish and released a song titled “Perfect Human,” which became a pop culture phenomenon for its music video that’s just bombastic enough that it’s hard to tell whether or not it’s supposed to be taken seriously.
▼ An almost perfectly even mix of awesomely cheesy and cheesily awesome.
Radio Fish and Piko Taro were both in Seoul last weekend for the 2016 Web TV Asia Awards. As the comedians/singers of “Perfect Human” and “PPAP” are now rivals in two fields, perhaps a little animosity was inevitable, as Piko Taro was photographed spitting anime-style lightning from his eyes towards Nakata.
“This is only the start of our duel to the death, in which we’ll bathe in each other’s blood,” announced Nakata while sharing the snapshot through his Instagram account.
Now, if this outright aggression is ruining your image of the perpetually cheerful Piko Taro, you’ll be happy to know that he isn’t really shooting beams of hatred from his eyes in the snapshot. In actuality, the photo was taken at just the right angle for the ceiling lights to create a lens flare right in front of the “PPAP” singer as he glancd at Nakata, who decided to run with the unintended effect. So no, there’s no gangster rap-style violent feud coming between the two musical acts Piko Taro and Radio Fish. They’re just doing what they always do: being funny, and Piko Taro’s heart is as empty of malice as his wallet is of “PPAP” cash.
Source: IT Media
Featured image: Instagram/atsushikonkata