Posted March 9, 200619 yr Top 30 singlesTop 30 albums I've been following the Japanese charts for a while now and am deluded enough to beleive I can write something sensible on the subject. The Oricon web site is the definative source for chart information. Oricon is the organisation which compiles the Japanese charts and there is a huge amount of interesting information available on their site to anyone who has the patience to poke around and discover how it works. New charts are published each Wednesday. A few comments on items that interest me. Utada Hiraru has slipped to 5 this week (from 2 last week), with her latest "Keep Tryin'". She is planning a tour of Japan this summer and it will be interesting to see just how much support she still has after taking a year off to work the US market. Ayaka's debut single "I believe" is still holding on to a top 10 place more than a month after it's release and is shaping up to become one of the biggest hits of 2006. KOTOKO makes an all too rare chart appearance this week at 21. "Face of Fact" is an old song which has just been recycled as opening theme to the "Baldr Force Exe Resolution" video game. Nanamusica's second single "Kururi Kururi" slips to 27 this week, but the good news is a debut ablum is now scheduled for a 2006-04-26 release.
March 9, 200619 yr Thanks a lot for the rundown. It’s hard to find people who can write chart commentary so this is a great help. :D
March 11, 200619 yr Author where did el presidentes album get?? http://img374.imageshack.us/img374/8012/ep22ej.th.jpg I've not seen any reference to this other than mention of the album release on 8th Feb. They turned up on yesterday's edition of NHK's Pop Jam and turned in a performance of "Without you". [Oricon Interview]
March 15, 200619 yr Author Oricon Charts - 15th March 2006Top 30 singlesTop 30 albums Singles: According to Sony's script, chart story of the week was to be the return of Maiko Sakai to the world of popdom. If you know anything about japanese pop, you will know the name ZONE. Over a five year period, this four piece girl band established themselves as one of the most successful and popular acts in Japanese pop history. They split in April 2005. Deserted by her three former sisters-in-arms, Maiko painstakingly set about forming a new band called MARIA. Their debut single "Chiisana Uta" was released on March 8th. At the start of the week their progress looked good. The single grabbed the number 7 slot in the daily rankings. But by the time the weekend arrived it had slid to around the 20 mark and at weeks end MARIA have to be satisfied with an initial chart placing of 10. There is no doubting Maiko's personal popularity, however this band seems to have been put together with the intention of inheriting and maintaining the ZONE fan-base. Perhaps the buying public didn't learn their part of the script quite as well as Sony intended and some people may feel this initial chart showing leaves questions unanswered. Will Sacchin ever take her hat off, why does Reina jump up and down so much and is Ayuka really a natural blonde? But premature conclusions about MARIA would be unwise. They played their first live date on March 5th and most of this story is yet to unfold. If the pre-sales data is to be believed, Morning Musume, Every Little Thing and Hitomi Yaida are some of the names to be watching for in next weeks singles chart. Albums: As so often happens, Sony have been upstaged by Avex. It is Koda Kumi who provides the real chart story of the week. Her "Best ~second session~" album debuts at number 1 this week with first week sales of 983,000. That's enough plastic to start a re-cycling biusiness. These are the best first week album sales for a female artist since Utada Hikaru's "Singles Collection Vol 1" was released in March 2004. Kumi's "Best ~first things~" album, released 21st September 2005, is still in the charts after 5 months (back up to number 16 this week) with cumulative sales now approaching the 1.7 million mark (first week sales 558,916). For comparision, the total combined sales for Kumi's four previous albums (the ones that provided the raw material for last September's best of) are still a little short of 1 million. So how do you follow up a big selling best of album when there is no more old material in the can waiting to be recycled. Avex's answer to this question was inovative and some European record company executives might like to take notes. Starting 7th December last year, 12 singles were released in 12 weeks. Every one of these made the Top 10. Nine of these singles were limited editions with pressings of 50,000 copies while the other three were regular singles. Twelve hits in as many weeks gave Kumi saturation coverage on radio and television. And it's worked. Those who raised eyebrows last November when this project was announced have had their sceptisism drowned out by the sound of cash tills ringing in unision across the lenght and breadth of Japan. The twelve singles, plus an introduction and a couple of bonus tracks, have now been put together to make the "Best ~second session~" album. Koda Kumi has pulled of a real stunt and this will go a long way towards cementing her claim to be included on the A list of Japanese entertainment celebrities. If you ferret around on YouTube you will be able to find videos for 10 of the twelve singles. Here's four of them to get you started: Wind | Candy | Ima Sugu Hoshii | D.D.D Sales of the sixth Crystal Kay album "Call Me Miss" are holding up well. Three weeks after it's release it takes the number 7 slot. The album includes her most recent single "Kirakuni". Crystal commences a nationwide tour this Friday (March 17th) with a concert at Zepp Sapporo.
March 15, 200619 yr You seem to know quite a lot about the Japanese charts, and as a huge fan of Utada Hikaru, I was wondering do you think her star is waning in japan, and has taking time to try and conquer the U.S harmed her career? Also, there is a Japanese singer I know of called Shiratori Emiko: Do you have any idea if she has EVER done well, or got in japanese charts?
March 16, 200619 yr Author Emiko Shiratori started her career as a singer in 1969 and released her fist solo album in 1973. There have been a large number of albums (I counted 28) and relatively few singles. During the last 10 years, two of her singles have had chart listings. One that can comfortably be tagged as a "hit" was a single called "Melodies of Life" which made number 10 in August 2000. This song was from the "Final Fantasy IX" soundtrack and logged a chart run of 11 weeks in the Top 100 [10. 21, 18, 27, 33, 49, 45, 70, 91, 99, 100]. Another single, "Mou Ichido", released in July 2004 made number 64 and was listed for two weeks [64, 78]. It was the closing theme to TV drama series "Onna to Ai to Mystery". [CD Japan] It's comforting to know I'm not the only Hikki fan here. Everything Utada can be discussed in detail at the Utada On-line forums. Perhaps you are already a member? As far as I can see, the Utada family business is still intact and Hikki is likely to carry on writing and recording brilliant music for some time to come. Perhaps the tour and the next (Japanese) album will give us an accurate assessment of how much popular support she still has. There was a 17 month break between the "Dareka no Negai ga Kanau Koro" and "Be my last" singles and the fact that "Be my last" took the Number 1 spot in the charts so effortlessly (there really wasn't any promotion from Hikki herself prior to release) implies there are still a lot of people who count themselves as fans of Utada Hikaru.
March 16, 200619 yr It's nice to know that Shiratori has a lot of albums, but shame about not much single sucess. I actually found out about her after Melodies Of Life :wub: So have her albums done well, or have they had the same fate as her singles? I hope that Utada still has the power to sell records in Japan, I mean Exodus was a masterpiece imo, but it really didn't break her into the U.S market, but I know she is rather legendary in Japan. Maybe even at her atatus she still needs to promote herself, even though what she has done in her career is a lot of promo in itself. And same here, its cool to know im not the only Utada fan ;)
March 22, 200619 yr Author Oricon Charts - 22nd March 2006Top 30 singlesTop 30 albumsSingles: Two items you will not find in this week's charts are the 7th single and 3rd album from W. Both releases were cancelled. So perhaps it comes as a slight relief to the folks at the Hello! Project to see that the slimmed down, ten girls is quite enough version of Morning Musume are still capable of scoring a Top 10 hit. "Sexy Boy" comes into the charts at 4 this week. http://image.excite.co.jp/jp/entertainment/onpu01.gif A good week for Angela Aki who's 3rd single "Kiss me goodbye" debuts at 6. The song is featured in the Final Fantasy XII video game. Hitomi Yaida brings her distinctive vocal style back to the charts. "Go my way" is a new entry at 13 and gives Yaiko a 15th hit since her chart debut in May 2000. http://image.excite.co.jp/jp/entertainment/onpu01.gif Anime show "Fate / Stay night" scores a second chart success. Sachi Tainaka's opening theme "Disillusion" grabbed the number 12 spot in the singles chart three weeks ago (1st March). Now it is the turn of the closing theme. Jukai's "Anata ga Ita Mori" takes it's turn in the spotlight at number 16 this week. http://image.excite.co.jp/jp/entertainment/onpu01.gif Hitomi Shimatani is one of the more gifted vocalists on planet pop. Her latest single is a double A side. "Haru Machibito / Camellia" enters the chart at number 19 this week and gives Hitomi a 20th consecutive Top 30 hit. DVD music: In addition to a her new Top 20 singles placing, Hitomi Shimatani also scores two new entries in the DVD chart. It's a clue to the wide demographic spread of her fan base. While the teenage fans are scraping together Yen 1000 for the single, a small army of 30+ and 40+ fans are calmly spending ten times that amount on the new DVDs. "Visual Works 2004-2006" is collection of video clips. To be precise, it's the videos for her 14th to 21st singles, plus a number of other tracks. The "Premium Live 2005" DVD cotains footage from last November's "Heart & Symphony" concert tour. These DVDs take the numbers 9 and 11 respectively in the DVD music chart. Here are links to a few of the videos on the Visual Works DVD: Garnet Moon | Viola | Mahiru no Tsuki | Mermaid | Falco
March 23, 200619 yr Author ... and his favourite artist is utada hikaru. Oh, does that make three of us? We'll be wanting out own forum next. ;) Casting an eye down Mikey's "UK Single Release Schedule" yesterday I came across the familiar name of Polysics. Apparently "I My Me Mine" is to get a UK release on April 17th. It's so rare to see anything by a Japanese artist getting a UK release that I thought I would mention it. This song is track 03 from their Now is the time album which got it's original Japanese release 19th October last year. This eccentric formation have been working the international market for a while and have built up quite a cult following. Here are links to an alternative version of the song and a couple of classic Polysics videos from way back when: I My Me Mine (strong machine 2 version) | Black Out Fall Out | Domo Arigato Mr. Roboto I count "Black Out Fall Out" as one of my personal favourites.
March 23, 200619 yr Author Any Boredoms or Cibo Matto chart runs? CheersAs far as I can make out Boredoms have a very low profile in Japan. I can find no record of them ever having released a single. Some, but not all, of their albums have had Japanese releases. Cibo Matto have done a little better. They have actually managed to release two singles in Japan. Here, from the CDTV database is the glorious tale of the chart runs scored by "Doo-Bee" and "Hot Love".
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