Arashi’s latest double A-side single “Ashita no Kioku/Crazy Moon ~Kimi wa Muteki~” was released earlier this week. “Ashita no Kioku” is the theme for Sakurai Sho’s drama “The Quiz Show” while “Crazy Moon ~Kimi wa Muteki~” is a CM song for Kose. The single is released in three versions – two limited with DVDs, and one regular with karaoke tracks – and no b-sides are included.
I was on vacation so I’m a little late with my write-up; by now, if you cared about Arashi you’ve probably heard the songs already. If you didn’t, maybe you should, because this single is amazing.
Filed under: Arashi, Hey!Say!JUMP, Johnny's Entertainment, Jpop, KAT-TUN, Kanjani8, KinKi Kids, NEWS, SMAP, TOKIO, Tackey & Tsubasa, V6
I think Johnny’s always have the best debut songs and everyone else needs to take a note with their new artists. A Johnny’s group’s discography might not always be good as a whole, but their debut songs are generally epic – cheesy, exciting, infective, which, when all put together, mean totally awesome.Unlike many other artists, who try to gain momentum with their later releases, JE debut songs always have a strong impact and often stay as one of the group’s most popular songs throughout their career.
Here’s a ranking of the best 10!… or, since I’m only considering the still active groups (aka nothing BS: Before SMAP) the best and worst. (…what, my title isn’t that deceiving.)
On just it’s first day of release, Arashi’s “Believe/Kumori Nochi, Kaisei” single sold 214,618 copies.
No, I did not type that wrong.
200,000+ copies. In a day. And only from the record stores that submit their sales daily. It’s currently the fourth best selling single of 2009 with just one day of sales.
And it’s a fairly reasonable 3 version release too – just a double A-side with great songs, great PVs, and smart tie-ins.
I knew Arashi is still extremely popular in Japan – but I could never have predicted sales of this level!
This single looks like it has the ability to overtake the tremendous success “truth/Kaze no Mukou e”. For the third year in a row, Arashi looks to have an amazingly successful year.
UPDATE: “Believe/Kumori Nochi, Kaisei” easily became the number one single with just two days of sales. Its first week sales were an astonishing 502,000 copies – easily placing it as the number one single of 2009 as well as the highest first week sales of the year.
Arashi’s first single of 2009, “Believe/Kumori Nochi, Kaisei” will be a double A-side single to be released March 4th. “Believe” is the theme to the live action Yatterman starring Sakurai Sho. “Kumori Nochi, Kaisei”, technically by “Yano Kenta starring Ohno Satoshi,” is sung by Ohno for his drama Uta no Onii-chan.
This single will come in three editions: two limited editions for each main song, and a regular edition.
Filed under: Arashi, Hey!Say!JUMP, Johnny's Entertainment, KAT-TUN, Kanjani8, NEWS, Tackey & Tsubasa
It’s that time of year again! For those who are new to this: Johnny’s releases calendars for their artists every year, but according to the school year: that is, from April of this year to March of the next. All calendars are around 2000 yen and go on sale late February or early March. (Only Arashi and groups that debuted afterwards have calendars – so for big fans of V6, Kinki, or SMAP, sorry.)
Filed under: Arashi, Hey!Say!JUMP, Johnny's Entertainment, KAT-TUN, Kanjani8, KinKi Kids, NEWS, Tackey & Tsubasa, Television, V6
Because this is the new years countdown I really care about. 
Arashi were the hosts again this year, and the Tokyo Dome stage used NEWS’ layout since they had dome concerts at the same time. Different was this this year the broadcast was split – KinKi Kids were broadcast from Osaka Dome, and Tackey and Kazukiyo Nishikiori (of Shounentai) were broadcast from the stage of the upcoming Tackey stage show.
“Beautiful Days” is Arashi’s next single, to be released on November 5th. The title song is the theme song to the drama Ryusei no Kizuna, which stars member Ninomiya Kazunari.
You’d think with three insanely successful singles this year (it looks like Arashi is in a good position to take the distinction of the top selling single of 2008) they’d take a break – but nope, now it’s Nino’s turn to have a drama, and a song contributed to his activity.
Filed under: Arashi, Johnny's Entertainment, Jpop | Tags: Kaze no Mukou e, Truth
Arashi’s next single is a double A-side, “Truth/Kaze no Mukou e.” “Truth” is the theme song to member Ohno Satoshi’s summer drama Maou, while “Kaze no Mukou e” is the theme song to the NTV broadcast of the Beijing 2008 Olympics. The single will come in three versions – two limited, each focusing on one of the A-sides with one PV, and a regular version with a B-side song. Despite Ohno’s recent scandal, it seems to in the end have no effect on his activities, and the single is going ahead as planned.
I need to move to Japan. A place where a terrific boyband acts and sings for a drama and the Olympics broadcast at the same time? Now those are olympic broadcasts with style.
When my roommate said to me that Ohno Satoshi of Arashi had a marijuana and threesome rumor, I laughed, because come on, that just sounds unbelievably ridiculous.
And it still sounds unbelievably ridiculous. From what I can gather from the little bits of information over at the Arashi community at Vox, there’s information of Ohno having participated in a threesome and that he was caught at a club smoking pot – which is bad, not only because Ohno is in a drama and the group that will be promoting the Olympics on NTV, but because pot is really, really illegal in Japan, and so the police will be investigating into this.
Filed under: Arashi, Hey!Say!JUMP, Johnny's Entertainment, Jpop, KAT-TUN, Kanjani8, KinKi Kids, NEWS, Opinion, SMAP, Tackey & Tsubasa, V6 | Tags: Oricon
So the Oricon half year charts are finally out. Out of the top 100 singles, the Johnny’s releases are:
