Interviewer: As of the 9th single Keyakizaka46 has entered into a senbatsu system for the first time. What were your thoughts on the day it was announced?

Uemura: When we were told it would be 17 people the 2nd gens seemed to think “It’s the 17 1st gen members,” but I thought it would include 2nd gens. Or rather, I didn’t think I’d make it in and was hanging my head the whole time… Us 1st gens have always been together since the group formed, so now, ever since Tokyo Dome ended, with it being more common for only the senbatsu members to be doing things, I have these indescribable feelings. It’s become normal for all 26 of us to only be together every two weeks, and I wonder if this is how Nogizaka46-san feels too…

Harada: On the day the senbatsu was announced we were all called together for a meeting. It was just after “Keyaki Republic 2019” ended and I’d just come back, so I thought it’d be a talk about what we’d be doing heading into summer, but I figured out what was going on when I saw the “KeyaKake” staff and cameras. We had formation announcements up through the 4th single, “Fuyouwaon”, but the moment they announced it would be 17 people I was overcome with a nervous feeling completely unlike back then. I had just come back, so I really didn’t think I would make it into senbatsu. But the pain of knowing we wouldn’t all be able to make the title song together anymore was even stronger. Because we all went through it together, the hard and painful things also became memories and the feelings from that time come back to me every time I watch the MVs or we perform the songs live… I honestly felt troubled about not being able to share that sort of feeling of deep emotional attachment to the song with everyone anymore.

Interviewer: So you were doing the national tour while you had those kinds of anxieties…

Harada: If I hadn’t made senbatsu I think I might have fallen apart emotionally. Especially because during the tour this year there were a lot of songs where a number of 1st and 2nd gens would get on stage and perform together and I would get sentimental thinking, “Going forward it won’t be like this anymore, will it?” But the girls who didn’t make it into senbatsu would liven up the atmosphere in the dressing room like always and Fuuchan taught me in detail about the new choreo in the songs… They each must be feeling so many things, but they never showed it, so over the course of the tour and Tokyo Dome my respect for the other members went up again.

Uemura: Up until now I had always been in the same environment and situation as the other members when they were feelings down, so I would notice and I could call out to them without thinking about it, but ever since the senbatsu announcement it feels hard. In July we had rehearsals for the tour almost every day so it was honestly heart-breaking to see members feeling depressed. I was anxious about whether we could pull off the tour if the mood stayed that way, but it was like we just naturally changed into “tour mode” once it actually started.

Harada: During rehearsals I saw Oze-chan crying and I started sobbing too…

Uemura: Everyone cried that time. The 2nd gens were bawling too. I asked Oze and she said she was crying because the group atmosphere was weird.

Harada: We felt bad too. We were making these members, who we’d been working so hard together with all this time, feel sad but we couldn’t call out to them, and we were conflicted as to whether not calling out to them was really the kinder option or not, and the tears wouldn’t stop coming. But then we all gathered in the dressing room and talked, and the atmosphere improved after that.

Uemura: From my point of view it seemed like Oze felt fulfilled by the activities she was doing, so I didn’t notice. She’s working as a radio personality and she was one of the members appearing in commercials. But the circumstances suddenly changed.

Interviewer: Do you still feel a sense of confusion?

Uemura: Rather than confusion, I get this feeling of “there’s so few of us” when just the senbatsu members do things. There’s only 12 1st gens, so the dressing room is quiet.

Harada: The 2nd gens also stay quiet out of consideration. Without girls like Fuuchan and Mon-chan around it gets so quiet and feels lonely.

Uemura: Fuuchan and Suzumoto were always getting excited and then me and Risa would join in. It was like that.

Harada: Before we’d all play Werewolf and such. We were so loud. (laughs)

Uemura: Next time let’s try asking everyone to play a game.

Harada: Yeah, let’s do it. It’s better when the dressing room has a fun atmosphere.

Interviewer: Okay, in the spirit of “Kataru Nara Mirai wo…”, how about telling us your ambitions for the 9th single period.

Harada: Hono-chan said this on our show, but I want to do our activities without regrets while enjoying the present. I happened to be chosen for senbatsu and I don’t know if I’ll make senbatsu for the 10th single so I want to fully relish the things I can only experience during this period.

Uemura: I think about the graduated members sometimes and I have regrets about how I should have done things back then, so I want to at least make the time I have with the current members something I won’t have any regrets about.

Harada: Whether it’s making songs, filming TV shows, or going on photo shoots for magazines, my feelings of appreciation for being able to be in those spaces have gotten stronger. So I need to enjoy it.

Interviewer: Once a bit more time passes this 9th single period will become a memory as well.

Harada: If everything up until the Tokyo Dome concerts was chapter one, then I guess the Keyakizaka from this point on is chapter two. I wonder if the current me can make the group one that’ll make all the fans who have loved and supported us thus far think, “The new Keyakizaka46 is great too.”

Uemura: I’d like to seriously think about, in my own way, the meaning in being chosen for senbatsu even though I’m not outstanding at anything in particular, and I hope to become someone indispensable to Keyakizaka46.