Keeping track of new music, media and industry news.

Minami Minegishi, the 20-year-old member of 88-strong Japanese girl group AKB48 has released a video in which she apologises for being caught leaving her boyfriends house and breaking the group’s ‘Bushido’ code of sexual celibacy. The drastic haircut, she explained, was performed as an act of contrition. In contrast to the J-pop clan’s celebrated celibacy, their lyrics include lines such as “I want to take off my school uniform, I want to misbehave, you can do whatever you like, I want to experience adult pleasure”. Considering some of the members are as young as 13, perhaps the current outrage is somewhat misdirected?