Zenmarket Haul - AKB48, Morning Musume, Momoiro Clover Z, MOMOLAND & m.o.v.e

After writing that title, I realised it was almost artists that start with the letter M! So I got another CD haul from Zenmarket last month and got some great new additions to my J-Pop collection. Last year I did get a large number of albums from Zenmarket but never ended up posting them on here. Maybe I'll do my CD collection posts later on this year and add them to that. 

This order I focused mainly on AKB48 releases as there was a number of singles I was interested in collecting. Then there was also some harder to find albums that I have been searching for that I managed to find selling on Yahoo Auctions which is the platform I use to buy all my CD's from in Japan. Here are all the items I received in this order from Zenmarket! 

Starting off with the large collection of AKB48 singles I brought from this one seller. They were selling a set of 20 singles for 400JPY. Absolutely insane and all of them were brand new and unopened. So I couldn't say no to this deal as it contained quite a few singles I had been wanting. Sustainable was the main one I have been looking for as I really enjoy this song and it feels like a true AKB48 song to me. There was one song on Negaigoto no mochigusare that I like from hearing the JKT48 version of it. I had originally brought this CD last year but sadly it got cancelled by Zenmarket due to issues with the seller. So it was nice to finally receive one. All of the below singles are the theater or shop editions which are usually the ones I collect.

After that massive lot of singles, I brought even more AKB48 singles! I had been wanting to get Ponytail to shushu for a while now as I love the Majijo Teppen Blues song. It's so dramatic and amazing to listen to and the part with Takahashi Minami is my favourite. Also brought a set that had some random singles in it mainly because I was looking for the Heavy Rotation CD which is the one in the case. A big thank you to Zemarket for helping with this specific item as they helped out with this a request I had regarding this item. Super helpful and great communication with everything! These were also all new sealed singles which are super easy to find with AKB48 as fans often bulk buy the CD's and rarely open them.

Zenmarket Haul - Found New Treasures!

I went into 2024 with the intention of not purchasing any Japanese releases this year due to shipping costs. This was until I was having a bad week and thought bugger it, I'm doing it! Luckily the Japanese Yen was a good rate so I got some bargains and didn't lose out too much on conversion between the currencies. For this order, I focused on getting releases that were exclusive to Japan and not available on any streaming services. The service I used was Zenmarket of course and it was a simple process. Shipping wasn't too bad with the final cost of shipping it here being around $45 and I received it within two weeks. Everything was packed perfectly with lots of bubble wrap and no damages! In total, I ordered 25 CDs which is a good number and it was about $240 for all of this including all the fees and shipping within Japan.

Starting off with the main reason I placed this order which was these albums from m.o.v.e! I have been addicted to these albums for a while now and unfortunately they are hard to listen to here in Australia. The group isn't on Spotify nor does Australian iTunes have these specific releases. It has the singles but not the albums! So I was always listening to them on YouTube until I got sick of that and needed the physical CDs. These were various levels of difficult to get with their first album being the easiest and their third having barely any listings. So excited to have these in my collection and they sound amazing! In clockwise order from the left side, the albums I got from m.o.v.e where electrock, worlds of the mind and Operation Overload 7.

This was kind of an impulse buy as I love one particular song on this dream world album which is King & Queen. dream music is always difficult to come across and I thought I'd get the physical one as I enjoy the songs on this one. It was a pain to find as the title is so vague and I had to go through so many listings of other things to find this. Thank heavens the cover is red otherwise I wouldn't see the listings. Originally I wanted just the standard CD version but couldn't find one as all the listings were for the limited one. I wasn't too sure if the box was big or not however it is a decent size and you get lots of fun inclusions. There was even a calendar that I didn't know about!

Zenmarket Haul - 48Group, MAX, Orange Caramel & More!

My package arrived from Japan which means all my new CD's are here!!! I was so excited to finally receive this after ordering everything back in early December. This is the first I've used the surface mail option and honestly it wasn't that bad. I was worried that the package would be damaged but it was in great condition! As were the CD's which are all pictured here looking wonderful!

Usually when I place Zenmarket orders, I use the DHL method that is about 2 to 4 business days but with the disruptions in shipping methods due to the pandemic, that option wasn't available for a good price. So I went with surface mail instead which was still rather pricey. Shipping from Japan is quite tricky right now and be prepared to fork out some money to get your items. I love using Zenmarket to buy my CD's and their shipping calculator is useful to get an estimate on your shipping costs. I took some photos of the packaging from my order and it was pretty good! Plenty of bubble wrap to hold the items in place and only one item was broken. However I think that case could've been broken previously as the CD is in not the best condition. Easy fix though and all the items had a substantial amount of packaging! The two large K-Pop albums were placed at the bottom and I cannot believe the couriers found the perfect box for them to fit!

Giant Zenmarket Haul - AFTERSCHOOL & Pungdeng-E

After a few months break from Zenmarket, another haul has appeared at my mailbox and this one is the largest yet! Recently I came across this amazing listing of 20 AFTERSCHOOL albums and I was just amazed at it. The set featured a variety of Japanese singles and albums from the group along with some Korean albums. The main thing that attracted me to this set was the fact the seller was including the full set of Heaven Mu-Mo singles. I've never seen the actual full box set available so I just had to get it because of that. Here's a picture of all the CD's I received plus the one Pungdeng-E single I have been searching for a long time for.

Some of the singles and albums I got had photocards which is rare to see sellers include them for used CD's. I was quite happy to see a number of Lizzy ones included as she is the only member of the group I'm interested in collecting photocards for. I will be posting reviews and more photos of all these CD's eventually. So in my order, I received the following singles & albums:

• Bang! - CD+DVD Type A
• Bang! - CD+DVD Type B
• Bang! - CD Only
• Diva - CD+DVD Type A
• Diva - CD+DVD Type B
• Lady Luck/Dilly Dally - CD+DVD (MV Edition)
• Lady Luck/Dilly Dally - CD+DVD (Live Edition)
• Lady Luck/Dilly Dally - CD Only
• Rambling Girls/Because Of You - CD+DVD (Because Edition)
• Rambling Girls/Because Of You - CD Only
• PLAYGIRLZ - CD+DVD (MV Edition)
• PLAYGIRLZ - CD Only
• Shh - CD+DVD Edition
• Heaven - CD+DVD Edition
• Heaven - CD Only
• Heaven - Mu-Mo 8CD Set
• Dress To Kill - CD+DVD+Photobook(Japan Version)
• Virgin - CD+Photobook (Korean Album)
• Happy Pledis - The First Single Hazel Eyes - CD+Photobook (Korean Single)
• Cheot Sarang 첫사랑 (First Love) - The 6th Maxi Single - CD+Photobook (Korean Single)
• Pungdeng-E - Japan 1st Single 側にいて (Stay) - Type B CD Only

First I'll talk about the Pungdeng-E single before we get into all the AFTERSCHOOL ones. I had been searching for this CD for a long time. I have their 1st Japanese Album Ppi Ppi Ppa Ppa ピピパパ but never saw the single available anywhere online. It seems it's one of those fun releases that you can only get at selected times at certain physical stores in Japan. Those types of releases frustrate me as they are always nearly impossible to get hold of. Luckily I found the Type B version of the single on Zenmarket for quite cheap so I brought it. Haven't had a chance to listen to it yet, but I'm excited to hear some more Japanese tracks from the group.

Japan 1st Single 側にいて (Stay)

Now onto the AFTERSCHOOL CD's and there's a lot of them. Most of the CD's were ones I had on my J-Pop wishlist so it was great to be able to cross so many off at once. I did get a few doubles as I already own the CD Only editions of Heaven, Bang! and Lady Luck/Dilly Dally as well as the CD+DVD+Photobook of Dress To Kill. I'll sell the doubles as I need to space in collection and it would be nice for another fan to have them for their collection. And I'd like to thank the seller for keeping the original plastic sleeves on the CD's. I absolutely love when CD's come with the high quality plastic sleeves and it's always great if the original promo stickers are still on them too. All the non-cardboard sleeve editions included the OBI's so big shout out to the seller for having those because I love those!

With the photocards, I only got doubles of one luckily! I already have the group photocard from Diva so that was the only one. I've always been a fan of the design of AFTERSCHOOL's Japanese photocards as they are always high quality and never those awful selfie style ones I don't like. It annoys me that the Heaven cards are slightly smaller than the rest, what's up with that? I shall have to do a photocard post eventually as I've got quite a few now considering I don't focus on collecting them.

AFTERSCHOOL Photocards

The set I brought came with all three versions of AFTERSCHOOL's debut Japanese single Bang! I already had the CD version but the seller included a unopened one. I opened the single to see if there was a photocard but there wasn't sadly so the CD mustn't be First Press. I got an E-Young photocard with the set, I seem to get her card quite a lot. The CD+DVD editions come with the cardboard sleeve which is nice. Most of the singles and albums I received have this sleeve if they are the CD+DVD edition.

CD+DVD MV Edition, CD+DVD Live Edition & CD Only of Bang!

Onto Diva which is the group's second Japanese single. I already own the CD Only version so with the addition of these two CD+DVD editions, I have the complete set now! Lovely plastic sleeves with the original promotional sticker on the CD's. Got two photocards with these CD's, the group one which I already own and E-Young's once again.

Zenmarket Haul - E-girls Albums

My recent order from Zenmarket has officially taken the crown of being my favourite thing ordered online. I recently won an auction on Zenmarket for a set that contained three E-girls albums but not just any albums. The albums were the 2CD+3DVD+Photobook versions of some albums I had been wanting for years. So firstly, here are the three albums I received in the set: E.G Time, E.G. Smile- E-girls Best- and E.G. Crazy.

E.G. Crazy, E.G. Smile E-girls Best & E.G. Time

Now I had been after these versions of the albums for years but never brought them as they are quite expensive brand new. The E.G. Crazy version is 6980JPY which is about $100AUD for me. The albums I received are about around the 6000JPY mark so quite pricey as well. So how I ended up with this set was that I was scrolling through Zenmarket one day and came across a listing for all three of these albums for a starting price of 2000JPY. I was the first bidder and the auction ended up having 8 bids. It was the first time I had bidded against other people so that was nerve wracking. And to make it more difficult, I was also in the outback at the time and luckily near somewhere that I could connect to mobile data to bid. So it was an adventure to get these but I'm over the moon to finally have them and the final auction price was 3350JPY (without fees and shipping). I had recently won some credit from Zenmarket so it was exciting to spend the credit on something that was the whole reason I started using Zenmarket for in the first place.

Back covers of the albums

Side view of the albums

I'll quickly go through the albums I received and will be posting more detailed reviews of the albums in the future. First off, here is the E.G. Crazy 2CD+3DVD+Photobook version. I already owned this album digitally but wanted this version for my collection. It comes with the 2CD's which are the album and 3DVD's. The first DVD is the music videos and the other two are concert DVD's. This album was the largest of the three and came with the original plastic wrapping.

Zenmarket Haul - KARA & E-girls

Another one of my orders arrived yesterday. Like the last one, the tracking was acting weird so I wasn't expecting it at all. More on that later, so here's the singles I got in my Zenmarket order! I got five Japanese singles from KARA and 3 singles from E-girls.

My Zenmarket order!

I was super happy with this order as it had quite a few items in it that I wanted for my collection. The order was made up of two orders, the KARA one and the E-girls one. The order was consolidated into one package which is a feature you can do with Zenmarket. I have written a review of Zenmarket and it's services here if you would like to know more about the service. The singles and which versions they are I received are as follows:

• E-girls - Go! Go! Let's Go! (CD Only)
• E-girls - Pink Champagne (CD Only)
• E-girls - E.G. Summer RIDER (CD Only)
• KARA - Jumping (CD+DVD Version)
• KARA - Jet Coaster Love (CD Only First Press Version)
• KARA - Speed Up/Girls Power (CD+DVD Version B)
• KARA - Bye Bye Happy Days! (CD+DVD Version A)
• KARA - Thank You Summer Love (CD Only First Press Version)

The KARA set was an amazing deal! It had a variety of versions of the singles and I was excited to see that the CD Only versions were the First Press Versions! I wasn't sure when I saw the listings and was hoping they were those versions as you get the bonus track. So that was a surprise when I opened them up. The other ones are CD+DVD versions which are always fun to collect. Now I can add these to my KARA single collection which is only Mamma Mia so far. I wanting to collect the entire collection of their singles which is going to take a while haha.

Front covers

Back covers

Zenmarket Review - J-Pop Paradise!

As an avid J-Pop fan, I'm always on the lookout for singles and albums to add to my collection. It can be difficult to track down older or more expensive titles online, but recently I've discovered a new service to purchase CD's from. For about the past year, I've been looking into using a shopping service in Japan to purchase CD's from and found there was quite a few available. During my research, I came across Zenmarket who helps you purchase items from Japan from a variety of sources. Have to say that Zenmarket is by far the best J-Pop online store I have ever used. Thought I'd write a review about my experience with the service and explain how Zenmarket works. You can check out Zenmarket for yourself here!

First here are the items I purchased from Zenmarket as I will reference this order in my review. I was absolutely over the moon to find this set and still can't believe how much of a good deal it was! The set I purchased was 12 E-girls singles and 8 Flower singles for 617JPY (about $7.40AUD and fees and shipping not included). That is such a good deal because normally it costs me about $13AUD or $15 per single when I purchase them from my normal online stores. You may notice in the photo that the singles do not have jewel cases. The seller had just removed the jewel cases as some people do for easy storage. I'll explain later what I ended up doing with the singles in regards to the jewel cases.

My Zenmarket order!

What is Zenmarket?
Zenmarket is an online shopping service that allows customers to purchase items from Japanese online stores. Most retailers in Japan do not allow international customers to purchase directly from their stores or use auction/second hand sites (such as Yahoo Auctions). Zenmarket helps international customers solve this problem by allowing them to purchase from a variety of online stores and bid on live auctions through their site. It is available worldwide and uses a variety of shipping methods at affordable prices.

The main reason I used Zenmarket was for J-Pop singles and albums. I was finding it difficult to find items I wanted online at a reasonable price or even at all as some had gone out of print. So after researching a few different shopping services such as Buyee, I settled on using Zenmarket because of their easy to use website, low prices and range of products.

Searching For Items
First you need to decide on what item you would like to buy on Zenmarket. I wasn't really after a particular item at first, I just looked a variety of CD's I was interested in and was amazed at how good the prices were in the Yahoo Auctions section. I nearly fell off my chair at all the items that were available, some I thought weren't even available anymore! I'm going to focus on buying J-Pop CD's in this review as that is what I'm the most experienced with in regards to Zenmarket and other online stores. When searching for items, it's best to think about the particular group or CD you are after. For example, I search for the following terms when looking for items for my collection:

• E-Girls single or E-Girls album. I typed in E-Girls E.G. Crazy for listings of just that one album.
• KARA single
• KARA single set
• Crayon Pop ラリルレ
• Orange Caramel CD
• MOMOLAND Best

I found sometimes if I searched for singles, it would not work if I typed in the word singles. It worked better when I used the word single. The Crayon Pop search example shows that more listings will appear if you use the Japanese title of the song rather than the title RaRiRuRe. I like how you can search by a number of terms such as price, buyout price and time. Sometimes when I'm bored, I like to scroll through all the listings on Zenmarket to see what interesting items people are selling.

Example of the listings for 'E-Girls single'

The descriptions vary on listings as that is up to the seller themselves, but I found out enough information about items I was interested in by what was written in the description. Listings display the current price and buyout price, so you can see what it is currently going for price wise. The time left on the auction and other information such as product and payment details are listed. Zenmarket will inform you on the listing page if you are unable to purchase from particular sellers, so keep an eye out for that. You also add listings and shops to your watchlist which is handy when you are keeping track of multiple items.