Ayu need more advertising, promotion, lives, CM, etc. The single sounds good, but need a very good promotion, not enough with a few trucks around shibuya and one-two lives. Time ago avex and ayu stopped making good publicity. The numbers do not surprise me unfortunately :(

Thing is that even these numbers are VERY GOOD for a solo artist's singles, haha.

No update for today's chart?

I just checked Kuu's sales, because their sales are always kind of similar.. She is in the same boat, last single sold 26 k. So no wonder, Ayu is not able to sell as much as before..

Not yet for today for some reason, probably later.

There'a an oricon article of ayu back on Music Station and Tamori lol

http://www.oricon.co.jp/news/2032449...ef_id=headline

it's basically a resume of their conversation... if anyone is interested I can translate! it's lovely how this is tagged "head news" when it's really something trivial. Ayu does still matter in japan musical landscape, somehow. lol

Oricon still didn't update their charts page '-'

Oricon made a statement about the daily and weekly updates on Holidays...

It basically says that from December 27 to January 5 they won't be updating the daily charts. On January 6 they will display daily rankings of Dec. 27 to 31. And on January 7 they will display daily rankings of Jan. 01 to 05.

The Week of December 23 to 29 will be updated only on January 6.

^Thanks for the info :)

Top three? NOT A CHANCE. And then...

:thud

:no

Oh dear... Here comes the guessing game...

onegai! that would be lovely Im so interested with their first talk after 3 years lol

there you go honey :)

ayu, smiling at tamori's blessing: for the first time in 2 years, her first performance at Msute (music station) after the engagement

Engaged to a 10-years younger american, the singer Hamasaki ayumi (35) performed on the 27th at the custom end-of-year program of TV ASAHI "music station super live 2013". In receiving chairman Tamori's blessing Hamasaki answered "Thank you very much", looking very glad with a smile on her whole face.

Missing from Msute since September 2011- two years and 3 months- Hamasaki expressed her great joy : "It's been a very long time. I'm happy that I could meet Tamorisan after all this time."
Tamori said:"This year has become a commemoration year, hasn't it?" and she answered: "Because of this year being the 15th anniversary year I made the tour setlist from songs chosen by the fans,it was something fresh and funny." and looking back to this whole year she made the V sign with both hands and stuck out her tongue.

Hamasaki performed a medley of "Feel the love" "evolution" and "SURREAL". It was her first performance after her engagement and the hall's audience was fascinated.

(photo) filled with happiness! hamasaki ayumi, who appeared for the first time on a TV program after the announcement of her engagement.


ps. should I make a thread for this? I don't know how it works :s

No idea, but thanks for the translation~ :heart

you're welcome :) as english is not my native language I hope it's comprehensible haha XD

So, I'm reading the single is doing just normally. I hope it keeps being steady enough.

Just for curiosity I bring the pop divas latest singles and its final numbers. By the way aiko and Namie Amuro are releasing their newest single on the same date (01/29). have I forgot anyone?

Mizuki Nana: 81,568 (Vitalization)

aiko: 60,351 (Loveletter / 4gatsu no Ame)

Kana Nishino: 38,483 (Sayonara)

Utada Hikaru: 33,058 (Sakura Nagashi)

Namie Amuro: 31,543 (Big Boys Cry / Beautiful)

miwa: 29,562 (Faraway / Kiss You)

AI: 26,177 (VOICE)

Koda Kumi: 25,953 (Dreaming Now!)

Kyary Pamyu Pamyu: 24,977 (Mottai Night Land)

ayaka: 15,216 (Beautiful / Chiisana Ashiato)

Otsuka Ai: 10,276 (Re: Name)

Mika Nakashima: 10,036 (Boku ga Shinou to Omotta no Wa)

Miliyah Kato: 7,009 (Lonely Hearts)

BoA: 6,982 (Message / Call My Name)

I'm sure Ayu will supass 35k copies. But we'll find out soon..

Yeah, ayu may reach 40k in the long run :)

ps: i added other names to the list ^^

Surprised that Namie was outsold by Kana.

I think too.

I checked out AKB48 solo acts and none of them was able to outsell Mizuki Nana (Atsuko Maeda had the most succesfull single, "Time Machine Nante Iranai", wich sold 78,834 copies). The other girls don't have a number in common, some of them sell around 20~30k or 50k.

Wow, sales for female soloists are low

I think fans of solo acts may prefer to get albums? But sales ARE low.. The era of the idol groups continue..

Nanami is helped immensely by the seiyuu fanbase.

Solo males are low too.

And to be honest there are only a few male solo acts that had a real peak in Japanese 21st century Music Industry.

The only names that came to my mind are Gackt, Hyde, Masaharu Fukuyama, Ken Hirai and T.M. Revolution.

T.M. Revolution sold a lot with his latest collaboration singles with Nana Mizuki, both of them outsold 100k copies (one of them nearly reached 200k).

Masaharu latest single was able to sell 144,789 copies and debuted at #1 on Oricon. I think his next studio album will be highly antecipated since his last one was released in 2009.

Ken Hirai's last single sold 39,318 copies in total. I don't think he's gonna have higher numbers than that.

Gackt last single sold something around 15k.

T.M. Revo and Masaharu are the only ones I'd consider to still have some impact in Japanese music industry.

Male soloists are almost nonexistent outside of the ones that branch off from groups or the small handful we already know of.

yeah i'm not considering the "spin-offs" hahaha ^^ (I edited my post and put some names...)

what about Takahashi Minami's "Jane Doe"? I remember it outsold Maeda's 2013 single.

Sorry but I really don't know much about AKB48 solo acts :(

Well, I do lol

First week sales of the solo singles in 2013...

Itano Tomomi - 44,630
Maeda Atsuko - 60,687
Kasai Tomomi - 18,550
Takahashi Minami - 85,493
Watanabe Mayu - 67,329
Kashiwagi Yuki - 65,736
Iwasa Misaki - 18,929
Kuramochi Asuka - 31,424

So yeah, AKB solo acts do well in general (Iwasa Misaki does enka, so low sales are expected, and Kasai does crappy music, so... yeah). They don't have the stellar sales AKB has, but their singles aren't usually tied to gimmicks, so that's reasonable.

To be honest, I was hoping Ayu would do better. She's Ayumi Freaking Hamasaki, the Empress of Pop, and this is what she gets?
I guess the lack of promotion really pays. Morning Musume learnt that the hard way, after years in the dark, they realized they needed to go out and do everything they could if they wanted to be noticed.

Ayu doesn't even look interested in this release, tbh. I don't why she wouldn't sing it at Kouhaku, that would have been some great promo and she gives us INSPIRE... oh, well.

^

Could you get the final numbers of this list? We were comparing them by the final numbers not the debut week =) I know it will be higher, but I would really like to see it please.

wow I didn't know Kuramochi Asuka did so well :thud

and poor Kasai :weep

Oh, well.

First week + total (or what I can find lol)

Itano Tomomi - 44,630 - 55,121
Maeda Atsuko - 60,687 - 78,834
Kasai Tomomi - 18,550 - 23,31
Takahashi Minami - 85,493 - 103,066
Watanabe Mayu - 67,329 - 81,752
Kashiwagi Yuki - 65,736 - 76,220
Iwasa Misaki - 18,929 - 29,825
Kuramochi Asuka - 31,424 - 35,285

Take these with a grain of salt. Stage48 + wikipedia + generasia are good for other stuff, but sales... dunno lol

Still, those sound pretty reasonable.

And again, here's hoping that Ayu does better...

I've never heard about that Takahashi Minami '-' Atsuko Maeda is the only name I can say I'd know. And maybe Tomomi Itano (I kind of like her single "Dear J")

ACID BLACK CHERRY is a band or is a soloist?
Anyway, his sales are good, i guess.

oh he's a solo singer, forgot about him.

OT: Dear J is a lovely single. Thumbs up! Maybe you've heard about takahashi minami as takamina, it's how she gets called usually.... she's a pretty famous
first-generation member. Really funny and sweet if you ask me! go takamina!

Anyway the sales will be up on oricon around these days right? Hopefully waiting for good numbers. With MSSL going on, kouhaku, CDL... she has done some "promotion" at least. Better than nothing, maybe it helped!

I really hope her sales weren't that bad these few days

We'll only get to know the numbers by Jan. 6 for the first week and Jan. 7 for the second one..

I dreamt she was #5 for the first week and #2 for the second week :3 let's hope it won't drop a lot.

Acid Black Cherry is the solo project of Janne Da Arc's vocalist yasu, so yes he's a soloist. He's pretty good if you like somewhat harder rock music, so if you don't know him, check him out! ;)

On the next few days oricon should be updating the rankings... I'm super curious >_<

1st Week
Position: #5
Official Sales: 30,385
Official Total Sales: 30,385

------------------------------------------------------------------
Just what I expected =)) Btw TV promo held up the sales on the first week, if it wasn't for MSSL it wouldn't have cross 30k on its first week, let's hope Kouhaku and CDL did the same for the second week too.

soon we gonna know the daily positions =))

#1 hey! say! jump! - 162,993
#2 momoiro - 36,774
#3 flower - 36,243
#4 yuzu - 33,866
#5 ayu - 30,385

it was a really poor week... (HSJ! numbers were also low, people thought they would sell like 250k)

Not bad at all ! =)

Thanks brener !

thank you! wow looking at those they are all group right? Yuzu is a group too?

30k for a solo is really good, happy for Ayu ;)

Yes Yuzu is a very popular band !
So she's the only solo artist in the top 5, well done !

Yes, very good! Ayu proves that she´s real star and always will be on top. Congratulations for success! :)

I would expect her in the top 3 at least. so this is her lowest rank since Vogue #4 :)

Really hope it can pass 45k.

I know that because of circumstances this is actually doing quite well but still I can't help but feel disapponted. I mean the chart position isn't low but she's AYUMI HAMASAKI 'kay, not some unknown girl. In the long run this cannot surpass 50k I think. the only other ayu's single which sold 40k in the long run is poker face, and it is her debut single... I don't know. ;_; sorry I don't mean to rant or whine but this makes me really sad... I wonder what can be done to bring her to shine again

^She is an unknown artist nowadays.. Think that even people on streets recognize 2 or 3 people out of 30 most popular akb members after all (I saw that on tv)

the charts in last 3 years are terrible. They're very bad. I don't understand how did the Japaneses like the music.
I'm so sorry but I must say that They loved the young,cute, handsome bands/groups nowadays, they supposed them although the songs were just normal quality (the meaning and the beat). The "loved"-songs are nothing special and not deep !
On the other hand, the talent artists are getting "unknown" day by day. They are forgotten although they did very well. I think Jpop nowadays is always worse than last decade.
I wonder if they listened to music by eyes or ears.

^ thsi is going on in whole world not just in Japan. More and more talented artists are getting pushed back by popstars of the year, most of who will be forgotten in next few years cuz people will just get borred of them and stick to new ones. It's just a sad reality of today's music world.

If you want to succeed these days, quit being yourself and making music and start giving people the crap that everyone else is doing. Aparently she tried this with this single but i guess the lack of face-plastered-all-over-japan aproach is what's making it unnoticed. I preffere her doing her own thing like she always did. Tho more promotion and her name on places wouldn't hurt for sure.

you're right, sadly this is the truth. I did think many times how I prefer some of her songs from love again, party queen (yeah heard me right, party queen), love songs more than some of her oldest songs which sold millions. The problem is that when she decided to do her own thing most people just forgot about her. Still her music is very good imo. I've heard many times people lamenting the fact that the quality of her music has gone down, and I respect their opinion as music is subjective.... but I think she's very good even today if we talk about her music. So the problem of her not selling anymore is not her lyrics getting "less deep" nor her music being "worst", but the fact that she lacks promo and who knows what else... and I think this can be confirmed easily by looking at charts. I love akb48, I like namie, I'm not too concerned with boy bands and JE idols but I think we will all agree that they're not on top because of the profoundity of their lyrics or the exceptional quality of their music. I'd take the entire rock'n roll circus album over those all the time.

YAY for getting to 30k! It did well considering the usual lack of promotion, all numbers on top 5, except for HSJ obviously, are pretty even :)

I wish she would promote more, she clearly still has the potential to sell well (not as well as before, obviously, but for today's standards), she only needs promotion :(

Reading these posts filled with angst over her sales makes me wonder if some of her fans listen her only because she used to sell 500k wth every album back in the day. It's a stupid reason to listen soneone. Sales and chart positions shouldn't matter at all. It's the music that matters the most. Hell, if she reached only Top 20, I would still listen the single because I like the songs. :D

I look at it as when the first weekend box office numbers are reported. A movie that may not have gotten the top position for its opening weekend but is declared the #1 movie of its genre/target audience. So Ayu may not be #1 overall but for that week, she was the #1 female solo artist. She still matters to me though I do dream of her dominating the charts again.

I agree with you for what concerns charts and sales, I know they don't matter. But the reason we are writing post filled with angst is not because we listen to her only for how much she sells: ayu is for me a very important presence in my life and to me is insulting to think that I could listen to her "only" for her number of sales! It's just a normal thing I think, that when you really care about someone you want them to be winning in everything they do, especially when you know they deserve it. I'd still listen to her even if she sold 1000 copies, really. I don't know if I explained myself well, anyway I do agree with you, it's the music that matters, it's just that sometimes I wish for her to be recognized like she deserves. Even though probably she doesn't want to be recognized in that way anymore, thus lack of promo/appearences and so on..

There is still hope for solo artists! it seems that AKB's peak is over
http://i488.photobucket.com/albums/r...psa0be693d.png

Talking about yearly sales, also other 48 groups have also ended their peak (Apparently)
SKE48 http://asianumbers.galeon.com/ske48.html
NMB48 http://asianumbers.galeon.com/nmb48.html

And recently debuted group HKT48 has got really low sales (200k) compared to the other 48 groups (400-600k) so maybe it's their last 48 group (at least on Japan..)

^
AKB48 didn't release a studio album this year unlike 2012. I'm sure they will rise again in 2014 since they have a new album in Jan. This group/idol trend is far from over IMO. I think it'll really start fading around 2017-2018. :(

yeah, AKB48 sales are decreasing by every release... they're last sigle was unable to sell 1M on its first day and the numbers on the second week were really under expectations..

^ Maybe because people got tired or confused because of that gigantic title? LOL

I would say the position doesn't matter, but I do like to see my favorite artists selling well, because obviously that's good for them.

For me it doesn't matter at all if the artists are in or out of top 5/10/20/30/etc for me to like them or not, one of my all time top favorite artists is constantly out of top 20 in oricon and I don't care about that, but still I'm always hoping for them to sell well, because sales are important for an artist to keep active, so I always hope they can do well in that sense. I couldn't care less about the position in the rankings, but the numbers do matter in a way... That's how I see it.

She pretty much out sold all these women

Namie Amuro: 31,543 (Big Boys Cry / Beautiful)

miwa: 29,562 (Faraway / Kiss You)

AI: 26,177 (VOICE)

Koda Kumi: 25,953 (Dreaming Now!)

Kyary Pamyu Pamyu: 24,977 (Mottai Night Land)

ayaka: 15,216 (Beautiful / Chiisana Ashiato)

Otsuka Ai: 10,276 (Re: Name)

Mika Nakashima: 10,036 (Boku ga Shinou to Omotta no Wa)

Miliyah Kato: 7,009 (Lonely Hearts)

BoA: 6,982 (Message / Call My Name)


Namie amuro just 1k under but she's gunna for sure surpass it, and Hikaru Utada has 33k which Ayu will surely pass

Kana is at 38k which i'm thinking ayu will pass in the long run but thats not so sure fire,

either way 30k in first week when all these other female artist who are considered the leaders are getting sales figures under that

I think ayu is doing really well! :) especially for being out of the single game for 3 years!!

^^ I hope this kicks off the start of more and more singles from ayu! (and promoooo)

^

ayu sold 30k on her first week, those numbers are final numbers, not the first week ones, we should compare 30k with the first week numbers.

Kana sold 22k with Sayonara on its debut week.

Nice sales! Just as I thought, it's a single that's just selling normally. Good.

You know, this sounds so strange to me, 'cause I have the total opposite approach to music: I can rarely love a song, without loving the singer. I'm the type who grows attached to maybe few singers, but will follow them forever. I can't get all the "jumping to another, more popular singer badwagon" at all, lol.

Sales are good, not just ok, neither great.
Position is "bad" having her last 25 singles at #1.

But about these two things, I think like pimienta said. I "care" about sales, because it's good for the artist to keep active and make more music; I "don't care" about position because in the end it doesn't mean nothing.
For me, only yearly ranking have a bit more meaning because it's like a compilation of all charts in just one :yes

Singles First week numbers of main solo female acts (decrescent order):

Mizuki Nana: 61,648 (Vitalization)

aiko: 43,682 (Loveletter / 4gatsu no Ame)

ayu: 30,385 (Feel the love / Merry-go-round)

Namie Amuro: 23,113 (Big Boys Cry / Beautiful)

Kana Nishino: 22,820 (Sayonara)

miwa: 22,479 (Faraway / Kiss You)

Koda Kumi: 21,135 (Dreaming Now!)

Utada Hikaru: 20,681 (Sakura Nagashi)

Kyary Pamyu Pamyu: 14,813 (Mottai Night Land)

Superfly: 11,042 (Force)

ayaka: 9,508 (Beautiful / Chiisana Ashiato)

Otsuka Ai: 9,364 (Re: Name)

Mika Nakashima: 7,082 (Boku ga Shinou to Omotta no Wa)

AI: 6,527 (VOICE)

BoA: 5,800 (Message / Call My Name)

Miliyah Kato: 4,725 (Lonely Hearts)

^Thanks for doing this, it's so interesting!! I can't believe Ayu already outsold Kana!! She was like the new queen 2 years ago :D that speaks a lot of Ayu's longevity

But NMB48 and SKE48 sales decreased too, and they released their respective studio albums. Even if AKB48 released an album on 2013 that's +1 million copies at most, then 2013 is still worse than 2012 and 2011!

That's just physical though. A lot of those singles did very well digitally. Example: Sakura Nagashi sold 350k digitally and is certified platinum. While Feel the Love/Merry-go-round didn't even chart digitally. I also know KPP and Kana are strong digital sellers but couldn't find official numbers.

^ Where do you check your digital charts? It might not have done as well as others, but saying it didn't chart (digitally) is wrong.

Can you really compare the theme of Evangelion to a single that had almost no promo/tie-ups? That movie's BDs sold 400,000+ copies.

yuupp! exactly thats what i meant with Ayu's first week sales she managed to almost out sell the full run of other singles! :P

The only artists with higher sales are Nana Mizuki and aiko. Nana has a lot of popularity because she is always doing something for animes, and aiko is loved by many japanese people (according to Oricon, XD).

I was checking Recochoku and i didn't see Feel the love or Merry go-round in the top 10.
I only saw the PV for Feel the love at No.8.

Amuro fans, Love Story is back in the digital charts in the top 10.

Here's the chaku-uta and recochoku's digital singles where she isn't in the top 10 weekly; but the iTunes Japan chart shows her highest ranking at #36 for a day before falling back down. I said 'didn't chart' as in the top 20, because below that (and hitting #36 for a single day is way below that) it's kind of useless to even mention when Japan already has a very weak digital market, below #20 and the sales aren't even significant enough to mention.

It isn't that it 'didn't do as well as others', it's that it 'didn't do' at all.

I was just responding to his/her comparison in the first place with the idea that a lot of the artists he/she mentioned are stronger digital sellers (not only hikaru) who have far outsold Ayu's new single with digital copies, who's digital chart placement is basically irrelevant.

Not to say that it matters, but we should be realistic if we're gonna compare that way.

lots of great solo acts are overshadowed by bubble gum pop idol groups.... the trend is the trend style is timeless. they will fade eventually.

#5... Hmm... Yep, I was prepared - we already know HSJ and Yuzu, and I was right about Flower and Momoclo... The young ones sure are dominating the competition...

For Ayu streak lovers: :headache

But I don't care anymore. I'm still disgusted with Oricon charts overall with too much dominance of AKB48/related and Johnny's groups all year long... :eviltongu

Agreed :yes

Do you realize? The four artists ahead of Ayu are GROUPS, not soloists - Ayu's the top soloist here :P

So thus ends the streak. What did it end at? 24?

25 ^^ since Free & Easy

Oricon numbers are out ^^ From now on daily updates are back :)

and well, she kinda dropped more than what I was expecting on the second week... I was hopping for top 10 at least :~ it might sell around 2~3k this week.

1st Week


2nd Week

The 2nd day for week 2 is such a huge drop! But i kinda love how it went up to top20 on the 5th! LOL Her sales figures has always been like this recently.

yeah, it had a huge jump on saturday ^^

why the huge jump on the 5th? :O

well, it was mainly caused by the fall of others haha

Yea, I do agree on that... And i also think, it is quite fun to see all those rankings, and how ayu fare against all those competitors... Haha...

Anyhow, I think that those rankings might also help ayu in some ways, in terms of promoting and marketing herself... I rmb that I was attracted to ayu is during her A Best era, where the TV will keep showing her ads, and in a very damn cool way... Like first saying "3 more days" etc... Then after like when A Best album starting to cool down, there is even an ads thanking the fans, and stating that this album got first in various countries...

Slowly, I started growing interest and research on ayu, and has been her fans since today... ^^

Well, she didn't do so bad for a single she doesn't really care about.
I'm sure if she had been to some music shows and all, the single would have sold easily 50k in the first week and the second week would have been smoother.

But oh, well... that didn't happen.

I really don't understand why she neglects her music career so much these days. Doesn't she like to go out and perform? Yeah, she might be over that, doing whatever she wants and releasing when she wants and bla bla bla... but still, I can't help but imagine her being angry at her rank because something with her name on it didn't sell what it used to.

Anyway, let's hope Pray (or whatever the next release is) does better. If she wants.

The album they're releasing now would have made up for that. If they had released it a month before their numbers would have been pretty consistent with 2011 and 2012. What's 150k copies when we're talking about MILLIONS?

The sister groups are just a way to keep local fanbases. HKT has only released 2 singles and their debut one broke some records for girl groups with those 200k. In a couple of years they'll be in the 350/400k range with the others.

Still, you cannot compare a group like AKB to any other.
If Ayumi wants to go to Music Station by bus, she only needs to pay 10 bucks.
If AKB wants to go to Music Station by bus, they have to pay 200.
They need to sell in this range (and even so, the producer is always saying that he loses money whenever they have a big concert lol) or else they're not profitable.

i think Ayu might have just accepted the fact that she won't sell as much as she used to. I mean eventually every legend falls down to the average level when it comes to sales. It's a cimmon thing in the industry. Yeah you can get back up like Namie did, but it's temporary as well. Tho i'd love to see what would happen if Ayu had so much promo going on like Namie does.

Ayu said in like 2004? that her era was over so yeah, I think she's over it lol. She just loves making music, not selling a butt load or being the 'trendy' thing.

As long as she is happy I'm happy too. It doesn't seem like there's any pressure on her from avex regarding the sales, so it's ok.

2nd Week

7th Day
Position: #32


2nd Week
Position: #16
Official Sales: 4,704
Official Total Sales: 35,089

I feel like she doesn't want it anymore
I'd rather she became the producer/manager or the member of avex board
better than not paying attention to the career and status and image and the number of her haters just keep going up

whoa 35K is quite good i guess? hopefully she'll do better for the next release. Thanks for the info, brener :)

yeah, I thought it would sell between 2 and 3k, so 4k is awesome!

Pretty good 2nd week numbers. Hopefully the single will get close to 40k in the end.

I'm afraid it will stop charting at 39,999 lol

35K for the single and soloist these days is really good!

yep, it's also in duty's lyrics:


Everyone is convinced
that that "thing" they're searching
for is in the future.
But how many people have realized
that "it" is actually in the past?
I can't even guess.

I saw the end of an era
with my own eyes.
But I didn't want to know
that it's my turn next.

If, after simplifying it
a bit more, you think that "it"
merely connects and arranges memories,
then wouldn't everyone
already have "it?"
I want you to realize that.

I saw the end of an era
with my own eyes.
And in truth, I actually
do know that it's my turn next.

You'll find me, won't you?
I'm betting that
you'll find me.

I saw the end of an era
with my own eyes.
But I didn't want to know
that it's my turn next.

yes ayu, we will find you. WHO CARES. I'll be forever supporting this girl, really.

I'd love to see how she'd do with promo too, but I'm afraid that too much promo going on would have the opposite effect. Given that she is currently "hated" in Japan, or rather, that she has a bad reputation, maybe seeing her all over the place would reinforce the negative feelings about her. It's not that people simply forgot about her and they have to be reminded: they do remember her too well and chose to hate her for the moment being XD if you see the various comments on every news regarding her they know practically everything about her, even the position of her latest album/single or their figures. I guess that because the trend has become to bash her nowadays, everyone follows this trend without really knowing the reason: basically "namie is trendy, let's love her!!" "ayu is old stuff, let's hate her" XD they'd justify everything wrong namie (but also many popular artists) do and praise very highly their successes, but still bash ayu even when she does nothing wrong and playing indifferent when she achieves something. Idk if I explained myself well..

Second week was better than I expected, yay!

Hoping it can reach 40k in the next few weeks :)

This is SO true!
Actually, it's pretty flattering for Ayu. I'm not even mad or anything, 'cause she's always on everybody's mouth and she's the yardstick for everything and everyone. Not everyone can drop in sales with the legend status like her.
Anyway, I'm happy the second week was fine enough. This single seems steady.

Exactly, what kills is indifference and they are FAR from being indifferent. Plus I have this belief that who takes his/her precious time to comment so vehemently are probably, most of the time, haters, for people who still love and support her probably are busier listening to her music rather than bashing her on the internet. She STILL sold 35k copies, this means that there are 35.000 people inside and outside Japan who think this is valuable enough to be acquired, plus many people who probably download illegally and so on. So yeah, she's far from over imo.
Haters are only jealous, probably.
At the end of the day, they're the ones who sit at their PCs writing words of hate towards people who don't even recognise their existence,
while ayu can laugh it off in her jacuzzi. See my point~

edit: while doing naughty things with her smexy americajin toyboy

actually taht has crossed my mind as well. i think it might turn into an other "she's desperate" theory and would give her bad feedback. I kinda see that pattern here as well what's on the wave lets love them and well what's old lets give em bad time... so yeah at this point i guess this is a better approach, still tho i don't think a few more live performances and few more promo posters around the country would hurt her badly.