Latest News from Japan Zone & Japan Store

New York-based R & B singer Kubota Toshinobu (42) this week married a 31-year old employee of a Norwegian company. The couple have been going out since Ms. A moved to N.Y. as a student five years ago. She is expecting a baby in December. Earlier this month, Kubota became the first Japanese artist in 24 years to record an appearance on “Soul Train.” He moved to the U.S. in 1989 and made his debut there in 1995. He has released three albums there so far. The most recent, “Time to Share” was released just last month. His biggest hit to date was the 1996 single “La La La, Love Song,” which sold over 2 million copies in Japan.

• Utada Hikaru‘s U.S. debut album “Exodus” has made the Billboard charts. It ranked at No.5 in the chart for new artists, and No.160 on the overall chart. Billboard magazine pointed out that it was unrealistic to expect even someone who is a huge star in Japan to be able to replicate that kind of success in the U.S. But it added that the talented, new York-born Utada could be an exception.

• Popular celebrity Sakashita Chiriko (28) is romantically involved with one of the staff on one of her five regular TV shows, according to the weekly magazine Friday. Already linked with comedian Tamura Atsushi (of London Boots), Yomiuri Giants baseball player Nioka Tomohiro and a company employee, it seems that the real man in her life is a beefy 25-year old cameraman on the Fuji TV show “Moshimo Tours.”

Singer songwriter Utada Hikaru (21) has been doing the rounds in the U.S. media. She made an interview appearance on CNN’s entertainment show “The Biz” on Wednesday. The show was also braodcast on the Japanese channel CNNj. The interview, in English, was conducted in a studio in New York, where Utada was born and spent her youth. Her debut U.S. album “Exodus,” which she released on the Island/Def Jam label under just her family name, went on sale on October 5. Among her comments from an interview with the Washington Post: “When I dress girlie in New York, I always feel like I look like a hooker just because I’m Asian.”

Washington Post article: “Leaving the Girl Behind”

Interview with Dan Wong, with sound files and song samples

Big things are expected for the latest album from smooth balladeer Hirai Ken. “SentimentaLovers,” his first original album in two years, is set to go on sale on November 24. It includes the biggest hit single of this year, “Me wo Tojite” (Close Your Eyes), which sold over 900,000 copies. All of Hirai’s previous three albums (“The Changing Same” – 2000; “Gaining Through Losing” – ’01; and “Life Is…” – “02) have been million sellers and the new title is expected to achieve at least the same level of sales.

• Natsukawa Rimi’s hit single “Namida SouSou” has become the fourth-longest chart entry of all time. Currently at No.78 in the Oricon charts, it has stayed in the Top 100 for 123 weeks, ranking second among female solo artists. It first went on sale in April 2001. The No. 1 long-seller is Nakajima Miyuki’s “Chijo no Hoshi,” which charted for 181 weeks.

The Takarazuka theater troupe held a sports day to celebrate its 90th anniversary, the 20th such event in its history, at Osaka Castle. The all-female troupe, which has hordes of fanatical – and mostly female – fans, last held an “undokai” in 1984. In 1998, it added a fifth sub-troupe, so this year a total of 520 current members and students at the Takarazuka school took part. Even the actresses who normally play only male parts wore skirts, a rare sight for fans. the overall event was won by the Moon Troupe, with top star Ayaki Nao taking the MVP award.

• There were a couple of press events yesterday for tear-jerking dramas featuring couples. Matsuda Seiko (photo, 42) and Funakoshi Eiichiro (44) play the parents of a child with Down Syndrome in a TV dramatisation of a true story. It airs on NTV on October 26. And Takeuchi Yuko (24), who stars alongside kabuki actor Nakamura Shido (32) in the new movie “Ima Ai ni Yukimasu,” says she was moved to tears when she read the original novel.

The official soundtrack for the hugely popular Korean soap opera “Fuyu no Sonata” (Winter Sonata) has stacked up sales of over a million albums, a first for a soundtrack. The previous best was 832,000 for the Fuji TV drama series “Long Vacation,” that starred the always popular Kimura Takuya. To be fair, the FuyuSona sales figure is actually for three separate versions of the album, the first of which has been on sale since July 2003. The series has aired several times on NHK and has made a household name of its stars Choi Ji Woo and especially Bae Yong Joon, known simply as “Yon-sama”. He is now a huge star in Japan, particularly among housewives, and has appeared in several TV commercials. He is one of the flagbearers for a Korea “boom” in music, movies and TV.

Today is Taiiku no Hi (Health/Sports Day), a national holiday
A couple of singers who had their heyday in the 90s showed that they still have plenty of fans. Amuro Namie (27) turned up in Tokyo’s trendy Shibuya area for a series of PR events yesterday. Her arrival sparked chaos in the huge crowd in front of the 109 building and forced police to cancel her 5-minute appearance after just 2 minutes. Another afternoon event was cancelled altogether. She did turn up at the local HMV to perform her new single “Girl Talk/The Speed Star,” also part of the PR tie-in with a cosmetics brand.

• Suzuki Ami (22) has kicked off her first tour in four and a half years. She will play at six college festivals, and started with Nihon University in Tokyo yesterday. “Amigo” was a big star in the late-90s but disputes with her record label and a series of court cases put her career on hold for several years. She made an official comeback in April with her first single in over three years. She is still unsigned to any record label, but Avex president Matsuura Katsuhito was seen at yesterday’s event.

Pop duo Puffy have started their second U.S. tour, kicking it off at Webster Hall in New York. About 1,000 fans turned out to see Ami and Yumi, who are also promoting a new show set to start on the Cartoon Network from November 19. “Hi Hi Puffy AmiYumi” features the pair as animated characters, and the soundtrack goes on sale on November 16. Ohnuki Ami (31) spoke to the audience in English saying it was great to be back in New York two years after their last tour. They play Los angeles and San Fransisco on Sunday and Monday. They have already slated another U.S. tour for next spring.

• meanwhile at home, we have just had the biggest typhoon in several years. Typhoon #22 dumped huge amounts of rain on Tokyo yesterday but couldn’t stop Devilman! The new live-action movie version of the popular manga and anime opened on Saturday, and 600 people came to the Toei 1 cinema in Marunouchi to see the director and cast greet the audience after the first showing.

The Tokyo District Court ordered the magazine publisher Bungeishunju to pay actress Nishida Hikaru ¥1.1 million compensation for libellous articles and advertisements. Nishida’s lawyers had sought ¥24 million, following an article which appeared in the Shukan Bunshun magazine in April 2003 suggesting that Nishida and the president of a cosmetics firm were having an affair. The magazine published photos of the two taken at the company’s shareholder meeting, and also ushed the story in its advertisements for the magazine. Married in 2002 and now living in the U.S., Nishida’s image has long been that of the typical “girl next door.”

Ditzy pop star Kahara Tomomi (photo, 30) not only spells her name differently (it used to be Kahala) but is with a new record company and back in the charts. Her latest single “Kimi ga Ireba,” with Universal Music, entered the Oricon singles chart at No.15, her 23rd chart entry. It is the first cover of a Korean song to make the charts in 21 years. Kahara has had an up and down career that peaked under the Svengali-like eye of producer Komuro Tetsuya in the mid-90s. The two also had a brief romance, and the breakup led Kahara to problems with her weight, sleeping pills and a rumored suicide attempt.

• Actress Mizuno Maki (34) is four months pregnant, a funny coincidence as she plays a pregnant woman in the latest series of the TBS police drama “Kochira Motoikegami-sho” that starts next Monday. She married LDP politician Gotoda Masazumi (35) in March.

The waning popularity of baseball’s Yomiuri Giants continues. Never having strongly contended for the Central League pennant didn’t help, but this season’s 12.2% average audience rating for night games is the lowest ever since Video Research started analyzing the figures in 1965. That year, the Giants won the Japan Series and the figure was 23.3%. In 1987, when they won the pennant race, it reached 27.1%. This year’s ratings and the team’s failure to advance to the postseason is all the more disappointing for fans as this year the team had spared no expense to put together arguably the most impressive lineup of power ever seen in Japan.

• “The Kano sisters (photo) once got ¥500,000 each just for two hours. All they had to do was talk about the movie in front of the media.” – Movie distribution company spokesperson, on how much some celebrities get paid to turn up at events such as movie premieres and brand-name store opening parties. (Shukan Post magazine)