Japan

On Sept. 7, RIKIMARU released his first full album, CLOWN OR CROWN. After serving as a member of boy band INTO1 through the WARPs PROJECT, it’s the first release from the solo project he launched this summer which also shares the same name. In this interview, Billboard Japan spoke to RIKIMARU in depth about the artistry his fans can expect from his solo project and album.
You’ve said that your newly launched solo project would be a “mutual sharing of philosophies between you and listeners as well as an embodiment of the reasons you create as an artist and a way to pursue your goals.” What led you to attempt this?

In the past, the images associated with my music were “freshness” and “youth.” That was fun, in its own way, but looking at myself as a person, it felt like that image didn’t truly connect to the real me. I felt like an image of “craziness” would be a closer fit. That’s why I decided to make an album whose image is more along those lines. Through my songs, I wanted to examine societal issues and interpersonal relationships, not romance. I wanted to make songs whose themes would resonate with listeners, which is why I launched the project.

You’ve released your first full album, CLOWN OR CROWN. Why did you choose that name for the album?

I had this mental image of a deaf clown and a blind king. The deaf clown is a symbol of freedom and craziness. He is totally immersed in his own world, which is why he can’t hear others. The king lives in a dark castle, and he doesn’t know what kinds of lives people outside his castle are living. The album’s themes revolves around these two people, whose outlooks on life and whose perspectives on the world are so totally different from each other. Based on that foundation, I wrote songs as stories of what I myself have seen and felt, and what I’ve heard from others.

So it’s something of a social satire.

Right. But it’s not just a deep, heavy album — it has a lot that will also resonate with listeners. The stories could be interpreted differently if taken in different ways. CLOWN OR CROWN has this deaf clown and this blind king sharing information and their own sensibilities, so I want listeners to also share their own ideas and impressions.

I’m getting the feeling that album is encouraging people to broaden their perspectives.

Right. For example, I think about 80% of what I read online is fake (laughs). The majority opinion isn’t always the truth. Sometimes the minority view is correct. And not everything you see is real. It’s up to you to determine what to accept and what to reject, and if you change your perspective, you can get insights into all kinds of different worlds. That’s one of the things I want to convey through the album.

I know exactly what you mean.

And the difference between “CLOWN” and “CROWN” is just the difference between an “L” and an “R.” In China, I’m known as “Liwan,” and in Japanese my name is “RIKIMARU.” I often hear that “When you’re just chatting, you’re ‘Liwan,’ but when you dance you’re “RIKIMARU’.” Looking at the first letters of the names I go by, it’s an “L” and an “R.” I only noticed that afterwards, but it’s an interesting coincidence.

It sounds like an album that provides people with insights into various aspects of your character. You released “TALKIN’BOUT,” a single from CLOWN OR CROWN, on July 27, before the album was released. What is the meaning behind the song?

Recently there have been a lot of people struggling with bullying or violence online. It’s also common for the people making these abusive comments to be faceless. You often don’t know who they are. Even if the people around you are saying positive, uplifting things, sometimes it just doesn’t get through. The theme of this song is that you need to turn your attention to the positive. If people want to criticize, let them criticize.

That’s a problem that’s become particularly prominent as of late. So on the album, you’re focusing on that issue.

Some of the people who criticize others online are doing it because they’re stressed. If you get in their crosshairs, it’s almost like an accident. I realize it’s easier said than done, but I think the most important thing is to not let it get to you. If you let yourself get affected by negativity, you lose sight of yourself, right? That’s what I wanted to communicate. I want listeners to make their highest priority being true to themselves.

It feels like this is a theme song for your entire solo project.

That’s true. I wanted to make it kind of a table of contents, a declaration that “I’m going to talk about things that are going on today.” That’s why I made it the first song on the album.

I heard that you’ve made numerous revisions to the song, refining it into its final form.

Until I started working on the album, my voice sounded…childish, I guess? Lacking in artistry. It felt like I was just singing. When I played it to people I knew in the music industry, they said “Your singing technique has improved, but there’s no emotion in your voice.” I didn’t feel that my voice was artistic, either, so during the recording of the song, I recorded each line, line by line, over and over again. In the past, it took me about three hours to record an entire song, including the chorus, but this time it took me five hours just to record the melody line alone.

You were really a perfectionist.

We only had ten days to record the whole album. So there were times when I’d go in to the studio a little after lunch, record all night until 10:00 the next morning, get four hours of sleep, and then go back into the studio again. I did the recording in the US, and the producer said “I’ve never had a recording session continue through the entire night before” (laughs). But everyone pulled together and contributed, making the recording a success.

You’ve also uploaded a music video for “TALKIN’BOUT” to YouTube. What are the highlights of the video?

The dancers are blindfolded, which represents the faceless people I talked about earlier. There are scenes where the dancers are approaching me from behind, or in which it looks like they’re looking at me, but they don’t truly see me. They’re just haunting me. It’s interesting seeing the reactions of people who watch the music video, reading their novel interpretations.

One of the appeals of the song is how much depth there is to explore its meaning. The choreography was done by YUMEKI, right?

YUMEKI’s been doing a lot of great work lately, and his dancing is really cool, so I asked him to choreograph the song. I want people to pay especially close attention to the dancing in the chorus and in the dance break that follows. This was a new experience for me — it was the first time I had one of my former students do my choreography. I thought it would be perfect for giving my dancing a different feel and showing a new side of me.

The lead song is “I am Riki.”

This song is in a totally different genre than my past songs. In the past, I’d danced straight through all my videos, but this music video has zero dancing. Instead, it’s like a short film of a story I created, and I did a lot of acting.

What was your story about?

When I get stressed out, I sometimes think “What am I? Who am I?” I don’t truly understand myself. When that happens, it’s like the world goes dark. I get disoriented. “Why am I here, doing what I’m doing?” My story depicted that feeling.

I’m sure that before writing the story, you’d thought about just who you were. What kind of conclusions did you arrive at?

I didn’t arrive at any conclusions (laughs). I never arrived at an understanding of who I was, or what my own ideal self would be like. But I did realize that a darker approach, like CLOWN OR CROWN, was a good fit for me. Also, I’m really fickle. Who knows, maybe when I listen to the album again later it’ll feel like a comedy (laughs). But I want to concentrate on myself as I am here and now, and I want to enjoy the moment, without thinking about the future.

All of your songs, including the two that we’ve discussed, have clearly defined themes. I’m sure there were a lot of things that you paid special attention to, and you faced a lot of challenges.

I really focused on the themes. Even if an album has an overall theme, it’s rare for each individual song to have a sense of story and to match the overall album theme. I spent about half a year thinking about that.

 As far as challenges go, the English was a challenge. With this album, I wanted for people around the world to discover me, so most of the lyrics are in English. When you sing, if your accent’s off, the emotion doesn’t come across. The nuance might change, as well. So I sang with an American, who provided input like “If you sing it this way, the singing matches the story” or “The emotion doesn’t really communicate well if you do it that way.” Making all those adjustments was difficult.

You really put your all into the album. In closing, do you have any message you’d like to share with your album listeners?

This album is like a fairytale. Each song tells a story, so I’d love it if you listened to it in the same way you’d read a storybook.

—This interview by Azusa Takahashi first appeared on Billboard Japan

Japanese pianist ‎‎ HARAMI chan spoke with Billboard Japan for its Women in Music interview series featuring female players in the country’s entertainment industry. The WIM initiative in Japan launched last year to celebrate artists, producers and executives who have made significant contributions to the music industry and empowered women through their work.
‎HARAMI chan has more than 2.18 million subscribers to her YouTube channel and over 600 million total views. Last year, she became the first female pianist to headline the historic Nippon Budokan in 15 years. Before she settled into her current career aiming to make piano music more familiar to a wider audience, her life took a series of twists and turns as she was forced to give up her childhood dream of becoming a classical pianist at one point to work as a company employee. 

‎HARAMI chan looked back at her beginnings and shared her experiences with the rigid rules and sometimes baffling traditions in Japanese classical piano competitions and more in this new interview.

Did you look up to any particular woman growing up?

‎HARAMI chan: Michiko Shimizu (impersonator/radio personality/actress). I’m not sure why, but I went through a phase when I was a kid where I’d do a kind of gag before practicing the piano. My parents still have videos of me doing this. I wanted to entertain them, and I think I was taking advantage of the fact that they weren’t getting mad at me and having some fun. Michiko Shimizu makes people smile by using the piano as entertainment.

Is there a difference between how you play now to entertain people and how you played for classical piano competitions growing up?

Competitions are a very unique, craftsman-like environment where you practice the same piece hundreds of times every day for about six months before the big day and then put all your energy into that single performance. On the other hand, something like “the melancholy ‘Anpanman March’” that made my friends laugh in school is like a gag I improvised on the spot. So I regarded the two as completely different things.

When I play the piano, I enjoy it so much that my face moves, but when I used to practice for competitions, my teacher would scold me and say, “Don’t play with your face.” But during breaks (at school), I’d play and my face would do whatever it wanted. They’re completely different genres.

How did you first get into playing the piano?

Piano was one of the things I took lessons in when I was little and I liked it. What’s more, my parents handed me a textbook to prepare for music college entrance exams when I was only in first grade and I thought, “Hey, my future is set, lucky me.” [Laughs] My thinking at the time was, it made things easier because I wouldn’t have to worry about my my career path and all I have to do is keep playing the piano.

I participated in piano competitions since then, but when I changed teachers in high school to prepare for music college entrance exams, that teacher flat out told me, “You can’t be a pianist.” Playing the piano had been my identity since I was in the first grade and it felt like all the building blocks I’d piled up were knocked over in one blow. It came as a shock, but I think I also sort of already knew. When you take part in competitions, you have many opportunities to become acutely aware of your own level. So I was shocked, but also began thinking I needed to find another strength.

You experienced a number of setbacks since and took a break from playing the piano to make a living as an office worker. Then a former coworker, now your current manager, uploaded a video of you playing the piano at the Tokyo Metropolitan City Hall on YouTube, which kicked off your career as ‎Haramichan. Did you ever consider piano as a career before that?

I never considered it. I thought it was a world where you could only make a living after winning competitions. I’m actually the type who carefully thinks things through. I want to leave as many options open as possible in life, so I got a teaching license when I went to music college. I even obtained a color coordinator certification after graduating.

When my former coworker asked to upload that first video, I just thought, “Nobody is gonna see it anyway, so why not?” I was more terrified than happy at first because I hadn’t expected so many people to see it. Besides, that performance is terrible in my opinion, so I couldn’t think about betting my life on that one video that happened to go viral.

If you didn’t immediately decide to play the piano as a career then, what encouraged you to do so?

The comments from people who watched my videos. People left notes like, “It’s nice how you look like you enjoy playing,” and “Watching your videos puts a smile on my face.” I do look really happy when I’m playing the piano the way I want, and finding out that there were people out there who accepted the way I play was a revelation. It felt like a new world had opened up to me. And that coworker who uploaded the first video said to me, “Life is a win the more you laugh,” and those words gave me courage as well.

But I set a deadline for ‎HARAMI chan’s performances back then, that I’d do it only until I ran out of savings. If I couldn’t kick off a career in music by then, I’d go back to being an office worker.

That viral video ended up being the first of your many accomplishments since then, and you now have a solid fanbase collectively called Okome-san. You say your goal is to make piano music more familiar. When did this thought begin to materialize?

There was a time, especially around junior high school, when I really disliked wearing dresses when I played in classical music competitions. I was at that rebellious age when I wanted to be defiant and performed wearing a jacket ensemble. I wouldn’t say I was dressed like a man but I got points deducted for my outfit. I understand the importance of traditional classical manners and don’t necessarily object to the point deduction. But I also felt that there are other ways to enjoy the piano besides observing tradition and competing in technical skill, so why shouldn’t I bring those things into the competition? I’ve always felt this way, so when the public accepted ‎‎HARAMI chan, I started feeling that I wanted to spread this joy even more. 

We’ve been focusing on women in this interview series. Does being a woman affect your activities in any way?

Fortunately, I’ve made it this far without having to think too much about it. Like, I’ve always split the bill with the guys around me and have never felt that I’m being treated any differently because I’m a woman. The male-to-female ratio at my music college was 90 percent women. Many continued to play the piano since taking lessons at a young age, so I guess it’s true a majority of our parents’ generation thought that “boys should learn sports and girls should learn the piano.” I mentioned my outfit earlier, but when I was little, I was happy to wear dresses, too.

The majority of acts and artists on Billboard Japan’s charts have been male for many years. Could you share your thoughts on this phenomenon?

I heard about this when I was asked to do this interview, but I don’t think it’s necessarily a negative thing. It doesn’t mean female artists are inferior, but that maybe it’s the result of fandom culture where a lot of women supported their favorite artists of the opposite sex. It might be that some women are more dedicated than others and they feel the urge to recommend their favorite artist, which leads to more streams and so on. So I don’t think female artists should feel inferior in any way.

You’re right, that could be one reason. I get the impression from speaking to you that you have the ability to see things in a multifaceted way. If you were to give advice to yourself when you were first starting out, what would you say?

I’m a cautious person, but that isn’t always a bad thing. Someone once said to me that being a worrier is also a strength, because negative thinkers can endure the negative things they imagine. If you have the flexibility to rotate the opposing sides of your thoughts, it’s harder for your mind to snap. Ever since I realized that, I’ve been practicing to think things from both sides. And I also try to be aware of proportions. If someone says something negative to me, I think about what percentage of the total that opinion might be. If 95 percent of the people say, “You shouldn’t do this,” I might want to listen to them, but what if it were only 5 percent and the rest agree with me? If I were to listen to that 5 percent, I’d be ignoring the expectations of the remaining 95 percent. If we make an effort to look at the whole picture and calmly think about proportions like that, it might make things easier.

—This interview by Rio Hirai (SOW SWEET PUBLISHING) first appeared on Billboard Japan

Billboard Japan spoke with SCANDAL for the latest installment of its Women in Music interview series featuring female players in the Japanese entertainment industry. The WIM initiative in Japan began last year to celebrate artists, producers and executives who have made significant contributions to music and inspired other women through their work.
The four-woman band is gearing up to perform at Billboard Japan’s Women In Music Vol. 1 event, set for Nov. 3 at the Hibiya Open-Air Concert Hall in Tokyo. This year marks SCANDAL’s 17th anniversary and the band has been certified the “longest-running rock band with the same musicians (female)” by the Guinness World Records. This latest interview highlights the inner-strength of the four members as they elaborate on the importance of self-reflection through their views on being labeled a “girl band,” the difficulties women face when trying to balance a music career and motherhood, and more.

You’ll be performing at the Women In Music Vol.1 show in November. How did you feel when you were asked to do it?

HARUNA: We’re all delighted to have been invited to this wonderful event this year, which is also important to us because it’s our 17th year as a band together and we’re trying for a Guinness World Record as a result. Being a woman is something we’ve always valued in our career as a band, so we think this is the perfect event for us.

RINA: Although we haven’t laid down the details of our performance yet, we hope to show where we are as a band right now including a new song we’ll be dropping next month. Also, as HARUNA said, the concept of the event links to our own sentiments, so we want to make a statement through our music while also having fun.

Can’t wait to see you perform. You mentioned that you’ve valued being a woman in your career. Could you be more specific about how this has influenced SCANDAL’s activities?

RINA: In our case, especially during a certain period about a decade ago, we were often told how we’d “gone beyond the scope of a girl band” or that we “were no longer a girl band, but a rock band.” I’m sure it was meant as a compliment, but it felt really off at the time. When we thought about why it felt that way, we realized we’d never felt girl bands were somehow better or worse than any other kind of music, and that we just really liked them as a genre. Being a girl band had only positive connotations for us, so when we were told we’d “gone beyond” it or whatever, we couldn’t take that as a compliment.

TOMOMI: I began to think around that time that it’d be nice if people could enjoy music created by women in a band in a more unbiased way.

Until I met you all, I thought that prefacing “band” with “girls” was unnecessary and that you might be resistant to being called that. So when you said you like it as a genre on its own and take pride in it, I realized my lack of awareness. What do you like about it?

TOMOMI: We’ve had opportunities to perform outside of Japan since our indie days, and used to wear matching school uniform outfits onstage back then. Because of that style, I think local audiences saw girl bands as a part of Japanese pop culture like anime and manga. When we were interviewed in the U.S., we were asked why we didn’t start a dance group as four women in music. I think part of the reason why they asked was because EDM was huge back then, so all-female rock bands must have been rare over there. Being categorized like that felt new so we took it in a positive way.

RINA: It seems rock bands have gone in and out of fashion in various countries over the years. We’ve been doing this for 17 years as the fads have come and gone, and I think we’ve been able to open doors for girls who want to play an instrument or play in a band. That’s also one of our reasons for always taking pride in our identity as a girl band.

MAMI: For us, playing in a girl band is more about living our lives in our own way, rather than liking the girl band genre and doing it for its own sake. Being in a band has been the best way for us to send messages through our songs about the things we feel in our daily lives.

You all met at a music school where you took vocal and dance lessons, and the instructors arranged for you to start playing instruments, which is how you got started as a band. There weren’t as many all-women bands back then compared to today. How did you feel at first?

RINA: It was a challenge learning how to play an instrument I’d never played before and it was hard technique-wise. But there was also joy in doing something nobody around us had ever done, and it was fun gradually becoming better at something I couldn’t do before. We were the first girl band at our music school, so that also felt special.

HARUNA: I enrolled in that school because I always loved music and wanted to get on stage to sing and dance. But I couldn’t get my big break. I was in my last year of high school at the time (of the band’s formation), so I was wondering whether I should go to college without realizing my dream or start looking for a job and didn’t want to miss that opportunity. I might have given up if I’d been on my own, but I was able to enjoy each day anew and keep at it thanks to the other three members.

Why do you think fewer women form bands compared to men in the first place?

RINA: Well, you can’t form a band alone and when you form one with only women, there will come a time when each member comes across life changes like maybe having kids at some point. Our bodies change throughout our twenties and thirties regardless, so even if you have the drive, you may run into problems regarding physical strength and time constraints. In that sense, the bar might be higher for women than for men.

TOMOMI: Yeah. If each of us had kids at different times, we’d have to suspend our activities for a number of years. So I really respect artists who continue their music career while raising children. It must be so hard.

HARUNA: When you consider that, we might have been lucky to have formed the band early. We can hit that life stage where things change after we’ve established ourselves to some extent because we started early.

RINA: There was a time when I worried about those similar problems as other women who are, say, office workers and not in music about how to balance my career and private life. I thought a lot about what it meant to have a happy and enjoyable life and that changed the way I make music.

HARUNA: Yeah. We went through a phase of writing lots of upbeat, flamboyant songs that hype up the crowd in festivals and concerts, but started wondering if that was really enough.

MAMI: After we took a good look at our own lives and future as women, that had an impact on our songwriting, which I think was a really good thing.

Do the four of you ever talk about such changes in how you feel with each other?

MAMI: It’s not like we regularly get together to discuss such things, but we do have opportunities, like now, to confirm each other’s opinions in interviews and think, “Yeah, she’s right.” We also talk about it naturally when we’re writing songs. We’ve always shared a common awareness, which is to keep playing music in this band while enjoying ourselves, staying healthy both in body and spirit, staying true, and for as long as we can.

TOMOMI: And building on this common awareness, we want to keep updating ourselves and be the latest version of who we can be, and that feeling is something we also share in our daily conversations I think.

I’m beginning to see how hard it must have been to keep going for 17 years. Why do you think SCANDAL has been able to continue for so long? What’s your secret?

MAMI: I do a lot of our songwriting, and whenever I’m stumped about something I consult with the other members and they often give me hints that fill in the lacking elements. It’s like each one of us makes up for what the others lack.

TOMOMI: Maybe the teachers who first approached the four of us had an eye for what would work. I’ve wondered, “How did they know how well we’d along?” We fit together like pieces of a puzzle.

HARUNA: And we never gave up playing our respective instruments. We’re all competitive and determined. [Laughs] Maybe that’s what the teachers saw in us.

RINA: You’re right. [Laughs] Even after 17 years, we’re still in alignment, pointing in the same direction. We went through a really long period of not being sure about where we should be headed as a band. We tried so many different things in terms of our music and performance and even what we wear onstage. Through it all, strangely enough, our feelings have been aligned as to what gets us excited or not.

TOMOMI: We did have trouble finding direction for a long time, but we eventually got past that by trying different things. I was probably struggling to become someone. I wanted to fit into some kind of mold, but once I stopped trying, things got easier. 

RINA: Also, our mantra is “communicate until it gets across.” It doesn’t matter if it’s not elegant or cool, just communicate everything we have from the stage. After we got into that mindset, we were able to get over our difficulties.

HARUNA: We also realized there are things that can only be communicated by keeping at it. I think that’s why the music we express keeps changing more and more. The things we can only do at this moment in time is precious, but in order to keep doing this for a long time, we want to do music that we can continue into our fifties without it feeling awkward.

Could you elaborate on what you mean by music you can keep doing for a long time?

RINA: BPM, tone, and lyrics. There’s a line where we can tell if it’s OK with where we are now.

HARUNA: We’d like to keep on incorporating words stemming from our own lives in the lyrics and not just about the spirit of the band. Not only what’s visible on the surface, but also the words that come out of our daily lives and inner selves. Having those things as the band’s personality will give it depth.

RINA: We’ve been running for so long that the importance of stopping for once hit home when the pandemic hit. Around that time, I realized that any way of life can be made into music. Maybe because we’ve been active since we were young, it’s hard for people to see us as mature women. Everyone still remembers their impression from when they first saw us. That’s why we’re trying to express who we are now in our words and music, and feel that we’ll be able to enjoy being in this band even more in the future by staying true to ourselves.

—This interview by Rio Hirai (SOW SWEET PUBLISHING) first appeared on Billboard Japan

Billboard‘s International Power Players annual list recognizes leaders driving the success of the music business in countries outside the United States. Universal Music Japan President and CEO Naoshi Fujikura was chosen from the music industry leaders of the world for inclusion in the list a third consecutive time, making this his fourth appearance on the list.
Billboard Japan spoke with Fujikura in recognition of his selection for the list, where he delved into Universal Music Group’s expectations for Japan and the challenges involved in creating global hits.

You were chosen for the fourth time this year in recognition of your successes, such as making King & Prince a million-seller. How has reaching a million CD sales been seen by the Universal Music Group as a whole?

Naoshi Fujikura: Here in Japan, the market is changing and digital is also a priority, but we have still been able to achieve huge success with CD sales, utilizing our unique business insights and data analysis to better understand what fans want, what the market wants and how to maximize the opportunities for each artist. For UMG as a whole, it provides renewed perspective on how dynamic the Japanese music market is, because for any artist to sell a million CDs today is a huge achievement for any project – creatively, commercially and for the company as a whole, especially when it is done in one country and in one week. 

What is UMG expecting from Universal Music Japan?

Fujikura: We’re always told, “now it’s your turn…” but that’s not something specific to Japan alone, it is a companywide goal. Our global leadership trusts us to lead and innovate here in Japan, but also encourages us to find and produce “global stars.” In the past, these were generally artists that have signed with international labels that had strong fanbases in North America, U.K. and Europe. Today, in the streaming age, there are many artists from outside the Anglosphere now claiming the top chart positions around the world – from BTS, Karol G or Bad Bunny. This is thanks to both the global reach of streaming, and the age of content sharing and discovery. Language is no longer the barrier it once was in exporting music to new markets, and that fits both with the global ambitions of the company, but also our own desire to introduce the best Japanese music and culture to new audiences worldwide. 

What is Japan’s strategy for producing a global star?

Fujikura: We’re now considering multiple different approaches. The first is to produce artists that become stars with the support of a fandom, like BTS and King & Prince. 

The second is what we call the “IP-based” approach, creating a hit linked to some form of video entertainment, whether that is Anime or another piece of Japanese culture that exposes global audiences to new sounds. For example, in recent times we had great success for RADWIMPS with Your Name, and in the last two years we’ve had Ado with One Piece Film Red and Hiromi Uehara with Blue Giant respectively. 

The third is through hits that generate a viral buzz on local, regional or even global social networks and spread further through UGC, which we have achieved with our artists Fujii Kaze and imase. Fujii Kaze’s “Shinunoga E-wa” became popular through UGC in Thailand, and from there it spread to South Asia, India, Europe, and the U.S. Imase’s “Night Dancer” was popularized by BTS’s Jungkook and Stray Kids, and now he’s well-known in Korea, rather than just in Japan.

Joe Hisashi, one of Japan’s most respected composers, is now being listened to more than ever globally, thanks to his music being featured on playlists designed to mirror audience mood and lifestyle, with themes like “Sleep” or “Focus”. These plays have helped boost awareness of his skill as a composer, and helped to drive his most recent album – A Symphonic Celebration – Music from the Studio Ghibli films of Hayao Miyazaki, (Deutsche Grammophon) to the top of the U.S. Billboard Classical Albums and Classical Crossover Albums charts in July. In this area, there is a lot of generic faceless music produced, but Joe is a prime example of where great art and music can cut through the noise and captivate new listeners. 

The number of ways that musical works can be shared with the world is steadily growing, so we expect these four approaches to evolve as fan discovery and consumption changes in the future.

The rapid penetration of global streaming services such as Spotify and Apple Music must also be an extremely significant factor. Now music from Japan can be shared everywhere, and people around the world can listen to new releases at the same time. This can generate a furor of excitement worldwide, with zero time lag.

Fujikura: Yes, but while this provides Japan with opportunities, it also provides everywhere else in the world with those same opportunities. The markets of China and India have over 1.4 billion people, and in every country, people tend to love their local artists. But what makes a superstar, a true global superstar is the ability to transcend cultural, language and geographical barriers. You can’t forget where it all begins, with the strengths of individual artists, having talented artists and great music is the still the most important factor of all. 

Right, Universal Music is a global music company, so it also has the mission of making artists in parts of the Universal Group outside Japan into hit artists in Japan, too.

Fujikura: Exactly. Until about 20 or 30 years ago, international music accounted for roughly 30% of music releases in Japan, and domestic repertoire accounted for roughly 70%, but now Japanese and Korean music account for roughly 90% or more. The idea that when an artist makes it big in the U.S, they will also become a hit artist in Japan is now 30 years out of date. The global spread of UMG’s repertoire, particularly through IP-based and UGC consumption has also proven effective for bringing international artists to Japan, and I think these approaches will continue to become more defined in the future.

The rise in streaming sales is driving ongoing, positive music market growth in Japan and worldwide. However, the rate of growth of that streaming is slowing, and new market development is starting to take place. What can you share with us about Universal Music’s future moves?

Fujikura: At UMG, we’ve always had an unrelenting dedication to discovering talented artists and bringing them to the world. Each market is uniquely different, and while streaming services got off to a slow start in Japan, there is still a lot of room for growth. As the world-leader in music based entertainment, UMG is dedicated to innovating, improving the user experience and to finding ways to attract new audiences to engage with the power of music. Also, as I mentioned at the start, in Japan we can still optimize the potential of physical product sales for our artists, and overall, I think the Japanese music market still holds great potential.

The first music I bought were vinyl records. Since then, technology has advanced (to cassettes, CDs, downloads and to streaming) and the formats used to deliver music have also changed dramatically. Today, fandom for artists has also stimulated demand for physical and collectible products, and we are now at a two-decade high in global vinyl sales once again. Technology will continue to change, and we’ll see new products, services and models created. One thing that will remain constant is that there will always be talented people out there who excite listeners. Our job is to discover these artists, help polish them, and share them with the world. Even if the ways we offer music change, we’ll continue to share the value and appeal of artists.

—This interview by Seiji Isozaki and Naoko Takashima first appeared on Billboard Japan

Rising singer/songwriter TOMOO spoke with Billboard Japan for its Women in Music interview series featuring female players in the Japanese entertainment industry. The WIM initiative in Japan began in 2022 in the same spirit as Billboard’s Women in Music that launched in 2007, honoring artists, producers and executives who have made significant contributions to the music industry and empowered women through their work.
The 28-year-old artist began playing piano from a young age and eventually found joy in writing her own lyrics and singing during junior high. After launching her music career as an independent artist, she signed to a major label in 2022. In this series inviting artists to share their views on the industry’s current landscape, TOMOO carefully articulated her thoughts on her experience during her teenage years that shaped her current view towards gender, her songwriting process and more.

I heard you used to play male roles in school theater before you began focusing on writing songs and singing.

TOMOO: Yes. I went to an all-girls’ school in junior high and high school, and played male roles in the theater club. Since there were only girls around, it was the norm for those with low voices to play the male roles. Back in elementary school, though, the ratio was three boys to one girl, so I had to be competitive to win and used to wish I were a boy. So I willingly played male parts in theater later on. I’d play different characters each time so I studied the “masculinity” of those character by extracting elements from what I’d seen before in other works and by watching a lot of anime. Aside from performing on stage, there weren’t too many opportunities to be aware of gender differences in daily life because of the all-girl environment, so it was hard for me to be a “girly” girl.

That’s interesting how playing male parts in plays helped you become aware of gender differences. Were there any women you admired as a child before entering an all-girls’ school?

I grew up watching Studio Ghibli movies and especially loved San from Princess Mononoke. I thought San was cool because she was like a sharp blade, able to keep Ashitaka in check with her harsh tone like her wolf mother, running around in the mountains and good with a knife. I also admired her emotional intensity. When I was a kid, I was taught to stand up to bullies who tried to pick on me. Maybe the reason I wasn’t the modest type was because of my admiration for San. I guess it’s like that “which comes first, the chicken or the egg” kind of thing.

I can see how that might link to your eventually choosing to play men in plays. Has that ideal changed as you’ve grown older? Do you have any images of women you admire now?

I don’t have any clear vision of the kind of person I want to be gender-wise. I do vaguely want to be someone who knows how to be themselves, who can’t easily be categorized as a woman or a man.

I heard that you decided to get into music after you came up with a song when you were trying to write a letter to a friend and thinking of what to write. It’s a really nice anecdote. Did your thoughts naturally evolve into that song?

I loved playing the piano since I was little, so I used to come up with single phrases of a song while playing melodies just for fun. But that was the first time I wrote a song for someone to hear. It also had a lot to do with the fact that it happened around the time I first came across the music of singer-songwriter Shigi. Her songs were different from the familiar J-pop music I’d heard up to that point in that she expressed her raw emotions in her songs. I was stunned to hear such a way of releasing one’s emotions. That feeling of shock encouraged me to write that letter, and the feelings I wanted to express became a song.

So you performed that song in front of someone for the first time, and that friend encouraged you to pursue a career in music. If you write songs as an outlet for your emotions like you say, how do you reconcile that with the necessity to come up with new material for work?

That happens a lot, actually. The way I do it is, after that key emotional moment, vague feelings gradually build up like drops of maple syrup being collected from a tree to become a song when it’s full. That’s one way I write songs now, and another is working off of seeds of ideas that I have saved up but not yet made into a song. I majored in psychology in university and think I’m more able to objectively analyze the subtleties of the human mind now. For example, when there’s friction in a relationship, I now have the perspective to calmly and deeply read the situation and think, “There must be a reason for this reaction,” and this also helps my songwriting.

You gained the means to express your emotions through music, and also gained the ability to observe the human mind from a psychological point of view. Do you think being a woman has any influence on your songwriting and music career?

I can’t think of any ongoing influences, but when I was just starting out, I was told that my voice was too low although I wrote good songs. They said it was hard to succeed in the J-pop mainstream with my voice, so I should try singing in a higher key. This was more than a decade ago, but I remember thinking at the time that they wouldn’t have said it to a guy and that maybe they placed importance on being cute because I’m a female singer-songwriter.

Your resonant alto voice is what sets you apart, so it’s surprising to hear you were told to change that distinctive feature. How did you react to that?

Actually, through vocal training and years of experience, my key is higher now. But at the time, I gave up trying to change things like the strength of my voice and character because I figured, ”I can’t do what I can’t do.” [Laughs] I wanted to spend more time on what I was feeling at the time rather than waste it trying to change direction like I was told. My hands were full with what I had to do and I couldn’t be bothered with that. I’ve continued to express myself in my own way, and it’s so much easier now that I have fans who are happy to accept who I am. And now there’s a whole new range of female vocalists in the J-pop music scene, so I’ve realized that trends change with the times.

You’re right, a lot of J-pop artists these days don’t reveal their faces or gender. It feels like things have changed so much in the last decade.

I know, right? Back then, I wasn’t sure where to categorize myself, and I think that person’s comment was meant as advice to help clarify where I could be filed under. The name TOMOO is gender neutral and I still get a lot of comments from people who hear my voice and assume I’m a guy. But I’m glad about that. In the music video for my song “Yoake no kimi e,” I sing wearing a jacket and pants. The director saw some videos of my live performances and took note of my manly… Well, “manly” isn’t the right word… gender-neutral way of expressing myself, and I think the music video captures what I’ve always wanted to do.

Your audience has probably changed dramatically since you made your major label debut. If you were to give advice to yourself before you were signed to a major label, what would you say?

When you have no idea what you’re doing, you may think that the words and evaluations of those who tell you to do things a certain way will have lasting effects. But it goes without saying that trends change with the times. So instead of worrying about how other people want to categorize you, you should care more about what you like and what you see. You don’t have to aim for perfection, just don’t let your eyes get clouded.

–This interview by Rio Hirai (SOW SWEET PUBLISHING) first appeared on Billboard Japan