ONE N’ ONLY on Fusing J-Pop & Latin While Reaching New Heights With Their ‘Fiesta’ EP

ONE N’ ONLY, the six-member dance and vocal group from Japan, released their third EP, Fiesta, on Oct. 2. In the past, they melded J-pop and K-pop to create a “JK-pop” style, and in 2023 they established a new style, “Jatin pop,” which fused J-pop and Latin music. Their new EP Fiesta has an even freer approach, spanning all kinds of genres, including a foray into amapiano.

Billboard Japan interviewed the group, which is constantly breaking new ground as a Japanese dance and vocal group. (Note: Member NAOYA was unable to take part in the interview due to a scheduling conflict.)

You’ve made a really lively EP with Fiesta I feel like it has more aggressive songs than your past work. What have your impressions been like?

HAYATO: Well, first off, when we were creating the EP, we talked about wanting to make songs to lead our autumn tour. We wanted to make something that would get the audience hyped, like “EVOL,” turning shows into real parties. That’s why we made “Fiesta” our lead song. I think it’s an incredibly fun EP.

“EVOL” generates a lot of excitement, so it’s beloved by fans.

TETTA: Right. I think “Fiesta,” like “EVOL,” will turn up the energy levels in our shows.

HAYATO: The chorus is one you never get tired of, the song has a fast tempo, and both the lyrics and the choreography are incredibly upbeat. There’s also a part that we want all our fans to sing along with, so want to build up this song together.

TETTA: KAITA did the choreography for “Fiesta.” A lot of trial-and-error went into the chorus, too, and I think it turned out catchy and memorable. We stripped the choreography down a lot, making it easy to copy, and the dance is a lot of fun.

How many times have you worked with KAITA so far?

HAYATO: This is our fourth song, after “Hook Up,” “OPEN,” and “Last Forever.” The choreography is really catchy and easy to understand, and KAITA’s the same age as us, so he’s easy to talk to. That’s why the end result turned out so well.

REI: Ever since we established the “Jatin Pop” genre by fusing J-pop and Latin music in “EVOL” and “DOMINO,” we’ve written a lot of songs with Latin elements. “Fiesta” is especially catchy, and it has a great call-and-response section, so the audience will get amped up with us. KAITA, the choreographer, is part of RIEHATATOKYO, which has a strong hip-hop focus, so the choreography he created was really groovy. There’s a lot of depth to the rhythm, and that was combined with this Latin feel. They’re a great match. I don’t think there have been any other groups that combined Latin and Japanese elements like we have with Jatin Pop, so, just like our name, I think we’ve created a “one and only” song.

EIKU: And what’s more, it’s a blast to sing. You can really get into it, and I can just imagine everyone going crazy, carried by that Latin sound, so I’m looking forward to performing it live. Also, through our tour of all of Japan’s 47 prefectures, I’ve felt a change in how much more vocal our fans have gotten.

TETTA: Right! There’s this stronger feeling of unity, and in the audience participation parts, the crowd has gotten so much louder that it feels like they’ve all been practicing together in advance.

HAYATO: It’s so much fun sharing that feeling of excitement and energy with everyone.

KENSHIN: I think that by releasing a song like this, we’re helping create an even stronger sense of unity. I love the start of the second verse. It has this speed and this addictive quality that makes you want to listen to it over and over again. The song gets you fired up. The lyrics are also interesting, combining Japanese, English, and Portuguese.

HAYATO: The lyrics are all really easy to understand, too, so they’re easy to absorb.

KENSHIN: Yeah. Through our 47-prefecture tour from October 2023 to April 2024, we improved our live performance abilities. We were able to experience truly hands-on live shows, and we’ve grown so much.

TETTA: But we never had any down time! There were cameras filming us even while we were travelling between shows, so the only time we were truly alone was when we were asleep in our hotels. Partway through, I was like, “Where am I?” “Who am I?” (laughs) But thanks to that, I was able to focus exclusively on our shows, so I refined my vocals, and I grew more confident with each show. It was a great experience.

REI: It really was educational. Playing at small concert venues, close to the audience, I’d look at people further away and think that I needed to make it a fun show for everyone. I think the tour made me much better at performing live.

TETTA: We played several live shows in Brazil, and sometimes there would be a change of venue on the actual day of a show. Coming from experiences like that, the little problems that came up when touring in Japan were a breeze to deal with. (laughs)

KENSHIN: I became a lot more adaptable! (laughs)

That’s great to hear. Going back to the EP, “Burn it out” is a hard rock number, which is unusual for ONE ‘N ONLY. Listening to it, I could just picture you running around the stage.

HAYATO: We wrote that song precisely because we wanted to run around! We have an older song called “OPEN,” which has a strong rock feel. ONE N’ ONLY and rock go together really well. We wanted a song in our set list where we could go wild, so we picked “Burn it out.”

TETTA: I like rock in general, so singing that song is a blast. I feel like with a rock song, the way you perform live is different, so I’m looking forward to doing it live.

REI: The music for “R.U.S.H.” was written by JUNE (ONE N’ ONLY’s music producer) and HAYATO was involved in writing the lyrics. I hope listeners pick up on those creative aspects, as well.

HAYATO: I worked on the rap part. I wanted to use Japanese, too, so I picked words carefully. In JUNE’s songs, it’s pretty common for the Japanese parts to be broken down and given a more Western feel, with English mixed in, but if I was going to be taking part in the writing process, I wanted to have some clearly Japanese parts. I placed a lot of importance on the overall vibe, focusing on creating an atmosphere in which the words were clearly audible.

EIKU: I love “Too Much.” There’s some amapiano in there, so I hope people keep a close eye on our footwork. TETTA and I did the final switch-up, and I love the interplay in that part. It felt like we were jamming together, so I had a lot of fun.

HAYATO: The choreography also had some African dancing, and we’re developing and using some new steps, so I want fans to check out these latest moves, fresh from the floor.

EIKU: These new steps are like nothing I’ve ever seen when practicing the fundamentals. They’re really hard, so I’ve been watching tutorial videos and practicing.

KENSHIN: I like “ALL OUT.” We debuted this song in the final show of the 47 prefecture tour, but we wanted to make it clear in the lyrics that this was just one more step in our journey. NAOYA, HAYATO, and I wrote the lyrics to the song, and I didn’t have much previous experience with writing lyrics, so it was an incredibly fun time.

HAYATO: We wrote lyrics to accompany music from JUNE, and all of us really focused on the details. We’d show each other the lyrics we were working on while on the bus between shows, and we truly put our heart into the lyrics. Because of that, we were able to create a song with a strong message.

—This interview by Kana Yoshida first appeared on Billboard Japan