Harajuku Girls

The Harajuku Girls are four Japanese and Japanese-American backup dancers featured in stage shows and music videos for Gwen Stefani during her solo pop/dance-record career.

The Harajuku Girls are Maya Chino ("Love"), Jennifer Kita ("Angel"), Rino Nakasone ("Music") and Mayuko Kitayama ("Baby").

The Harajuku Girls were originally hired in 2004 as backup dancers for the promotion of Gwen Stefani's debut solo album Love.

The "Harajuku Girls" continued to appear alongside Stefani, and were featured in the music videos for "What You Waiting For?

Gwen appeared on Friday Night with Jonathan Ross, and introduced the dancers as her "imaginary friends".

Before dancing with Gwen Stefani, she was a backup dancer for South Korean singer BoA.

After graduating from South High School, Jennifer moved to San Diego and studied hip-hop at Mesa College.

Rino Nakasone (stage name "Music"), born on June 11, 1979, grew up in Okinawa.

and "Hoot", Super Junior's "No Other", f(x)'s "Chu~♥", "NU ABO", "Gangsta Boy" and "Hot Summer", and BoA's "Dangerous" and "Copy & Paste".

Asian-American entertainer and comedian Margaret Cho criticized Stefani and the group for reinforcing negative ethnic stereotypes of Asian women.

[8] Nakasone responded that Stefani was inspired by Japanese fashion culture and that she felt honored to have been in the group.

[9] In an interview in the January/February 2006 edition of Blender magazine, Cho called Stefani's Harajuku Girls a minstrel show that reinforces ethnic stereotypes of Asian women.

[12][13] Eliana Dockterman from Time commented on the release of Stefani's comeback single "Baby Don't Lie" (2014), remarking that she must apologize for her "Harajuku Girls" era before fans should begin embracing her new music.