Ray – BE:FIRST’s honest talk! The members show their unexpected true faces? (english translation)

This one features all the members of BE:FIRST deciding what they'd all be "FIRST" at. It's a lot of fun. 

Lol, poor LEO. I didn't translate RYOKI's individual Ray interview, but in his description of LEO he calls him "the type whose charm comes out when you tease him", and you can really see that he hit the nail on the head. ^^;

Original article: https://ray-web.jp/193475

Ray – BE:FIRST’s honest talk! The members show their unexpected true faces?

Q: If you were to call yourself “FIRST” at something, what would it be?

LEO: Yes! I wonder what “FIRST” I would be (excited).

JUNON & RYOKI: Wouldn’t you be “Lame FIRST”?

LEO: Oi! (laughs)

RYOKI: In a good way.

SHUNTO: What do you mean ‘lame in a good way’!? (laughs)

RYUHEI: I’ve got it! “Passion FIRST”!

SOTA: That’s it! He’s good at putting the things people want to say into words. That’s why, he’s lame in a good way. (laughs)*
(*As in, LEO says things people aren’t usually willing or able to express out loud, so he says lots of corny, but passionate things.)

LEO: Stop it! (laughs) Let’s go on to the next person. Uh, how about RYOKI? All together now! “Detonator FIRST”!* …hey, only I said something!
(*I think what he means here is RYOKI adds the “explosive” moments to their performances)

RYOKI: What’s that supposed to be? (laughs)

MANATO: Wouldn’t RYOKI be “Binge eating FIRST”?

LEO: That’s it!

RYOKI: Recently, I’ve been holding back. But honestly, I wanna eat!

SOTA: Since RYOKI can eat without getting fat, he’d be “Gastroptosis FIRST”. No, maybe something like “Capacity FIRST”. His stomach has a high capacity.

LEO: Let’s not restrict it to his stomach, he has a high capacity for lots of things. Including knowledge.

JUNON: He’s good at developing a knack for things too, so it’d be good to write it in hiragana as “Youryou FIRST”*, wouldn’t it? (laughs)
(*both 容量 “capacity” and 要領 “knack” can be read as “youryou”)

SOTA: While we’re on the topic of JUNON, how about “Seems to not be enjoying life FIRST”?

JUNON: Wait a minute! That’s not right! (laughs)

SHUNTO: No, it’d be “Always looking sleepy FIRST”.

RYUHEI: That’s calming though, so I’d say “Calming FIRST”.

RYOKI: Isn’t it “Different tension FIRST”? Because the rise and fall of his energy level is pretty drastic. (laughs)

JUNON: That’s SHUNTO.

LEO: There’ve been lots of suggestions, but I think “calming” gives off the best feeling. But he can be annoying when he gets loud!

JUNON: It’s because my switch gets turned on after 6pm.

LEO: Since he gets livelier at night, what about “Nocturnal FIRST”?

SHUNTO: JUNON-kun’s tension level is low in the morning, isn’t it?

LEO: Well, what about RYUHEI…!?

JUNON: Youth, youth!

LEO: How about “Fresh FIRST”!?

RYOKI: Ehh, what’s “Fresh”!? (laughs)

SOTA: What about “Sweet tooth FIRST”?

ALL: Ah~!!

LEO: Earlier, RYUHEI let me drink his customized matcha Frappuccino, but it was so sweet! I hit my limit right away.

JUNON: Even though everyone was eating a meal after a live, RYUHEI was the only one eating pudding, ice cream and cream puffs.

RYUHEI: I was tasting and comparing them. Coffee jelly and mandarin jelly, pudding and chocolate pudding, cream puffs and…what was it? Uh…

LEO: You, how many middle school dreams are you gonna fulfill!?

RYOKI: He is fulfilling them, isn’t he. (laughs)

RYUHEI: Yeah definitely, I do eat an astonishing amount of sweets. Sometimes I worry about it.

MANATO: Don’t worry, you’re still only 15.

LEO: What would SHUNTO be? “Different tension FIRST”!?

SHUNTO: That was said before.

JUNON: When he gets hungry, his tension level becomes zero.

SOTA: Once food is in front of him, it immediately goes up.

JUNON: I know! When I see that look on his face, I get happy too. But once he’s done eating, it quickly goes down. (laughs)

SOTA: Right, once we’re done eating and we’re on the way back to rehearsal, he lets out a sigh like “Haa~”.

MANATO: Since he eats fast, the time he’s happy is short.

SOTA: MANATO is “My pace FIRST”. Well, because he’s super my pace.*
(*Someone who does things at their own pace or their own way, often disregarding others)

RYUHEI: No, he’s ultra, or even hyper my pace!

SHUNTO: MANATO is the type of guy that when he says “I’ll come later”, he’ll definitely never come. (laughs) If he said “If I can, I’ll come” I’d understand that there’d be a high probability he wouldn’t show, but when you say “I’ll come later”, doesn’t that mean he’s coming? But MANATO doesn’t come. And he loves his home.

MANATO: Yeah, I love my home.

RYUHEI: He’ll often say “I have to do laundry, so I’m going home”.

JUNON: Even though he lives alone, he’ll say he has a curfew. But that curfew time seems to be different every time. (laughs)

SHUNTO: SOTA-kun would be “Puzzling love of cleanliness FIRST”.

LEO: Yeah. When it comes to his area, he’s really fastidious.

RYOKI: It’s not anytime, anywhere though, the unevenness of it is really amazing, sometimes it’s like “Ehh, it’s okay over there!” (laughs).

LEO: When I went to SOTA’s place, he made me change into loungewear he’d prepared by the entranceway and my cell phone was even disinfected.

SOTA: My way of looking at it is “My home FIRST”. I definitely don’t want my area to get dirty.

LEO: What about other peoples’ homes?

SOTA: I don’t worry about that at all (laughs).

Ray - [BE:FIRST] SOTA Interview – What has changed since debuting? (english translation)

This is from a series of short interviews the website Ray is doing with the members of BE:FIRST looking at how they've changed since their debut. SOTA is my favourite and his answers are pretty straightforward, so I wanted to give translating his a shot. These are a nice length and they're fun to read so I might do one or two more.

Here's the original article: https://ray-web.jp/186514

[BE:FIRST] SOTA Interview – What has changed since debuting?

Q: How has your impression of each member changed since you first met?

SHUNTO
I thought he was shy, but recently it’s like he talks without taking the team into consideration. At first, I was shocked by how fast he ate. Recently, he’ll arbitrarily report things like “I’m eating a hamburger today!” (lol).

MANATO
Even though I thought “he’s a well-behaved kid” at first, when we were in a room together during the training camp, that character collapsed to the point where I was like “Can he not see me!?” (lol) In reality, he’s a cheerful and mischievous guy.

RYUHEI
I think he’s changed the most. He was conscious of everyone in the group being older than him, but he’s started to take advantage of that. He’s become able to ask clearly when there’s something he’s not good at or that he doesn’t understand.

JUNON
I thought “He’s good at singing. He’s tall.” at first. He was the last one I talked to, but he’s reliable like a big brother, so being with him is calming.

RYOKI
He was wearing shoes that I wanted, and I liked the lock screen image on his phone, so I thought our tastes would match well, and that hasn’t changed to this day.

LEO
He seemed very caring and helpful, like a big brother in charge of a nursery school, and I realized that he was a person that always had other people around him. That dependable side of him hasn’t changed. While we weren’t able to meet up we became closer by exchanging messages on LINE (lol).

Q: If you had to analyze your own character?

SOTA: I’m “The AB Type” (*as in the stereotypical personality associated with the AB blood type). I can’t calm down. I’m always just thinking about things like dance and music, to the point where it’s like there’s always someone dancing in my head.

Q: If you were an animal?

SOTA: I’d be a bear. Because I like Winnie the Pooh (lol).

Q: What’s changed the most since before your debut?

SOTA: Since my life isn’t centered around dance anymore, the frame of things I want to do has widened. Before, I was just thinking about dance, but now that I’m in this circle called “music”, I’ve become able to do various things.

Q: Of all the new things you’ve encountered recently, which one is your favourite?

SOTA: After obsessing about it and searching around a lot, I found a double bed. Even if I stretch out both arms there’s extra room, and it’s good for sleeping both comfortably and snugly, so it’s the best!

Q: What is your secret for getting along with someone when meeting them for the first time?

SOTA: If you look at the person’s profile from up to like 2 or 3 years before to kind of figure out whether you want to get to know more about them or not, then you can start with something like asking them questions about their self. Since the way I look on the outside might lead people to imagine a lot of negative things, I try to act as cheerful as possible.