[Charts & Rankings] AKB48 surpass Ayu as best selling female Japanese artist

[tokyoxjapanxfan]

They impacted the industry in the sense that every label tried to make copy cat groups because they were the only act selling records. The influx in idol groups isn't necessarily a positive thing.

Morning Musume sold well in an era when many, many acts were selling well. Idols were only one aspect of Japanese music. The charts from the 90s until maybe 2006/7 were filled with various types of music, as well as solo, bands, duos, and idol groups.

Since 2008/9, the highest selling artists each year were Arashi and AKB. And AKB's sister groups as well as JE made up the majority of the remaining top 10.

For people who enjoy a plethora of genres and artists, this is a frustrating situation. Especially because of the means by which AKB sells their music. And to be honest, many AKB fans are 30+ men with money to blow. Does that mean that all of them are? No. But many are. Middle school students and high school students don't have a lot of money to spend, and music has become one of the less important things to buy physically. Clothes, smartphones, and hair -- like western countries, have become the most important for teens. So artists that can sell millions now are very rare. Hence AKBs sales are looked at with a skeptical eye.

AKB (and idol groups in general) are only as successful as their members allow. Now that the faces of AKB have all left, holding on to known members is more valuable for their relevance. Not to mention the head shaving incident became news all over the world. Perhaps there are exceptions, but generally speaking, the members during the peak remain the well known figures. Once they leave, the interest in the group starts to fade, as does the influence of their music on the industry.


Ayu has used tactics to sell singles/albums, as have most other artists in Japan. Thats normal in Japan. However, events that specifically allow you to meet members, vote on the next members, and directly interact with the artist, along with photo books and included songs, and different members on each cover, is not the same. Particularly when done over and over again.

[Trinu]

Originally Posted by himawariii6

Not to mention, some of the lyrics are problematic: promote harassment (Getsuyoubi no Asa, Skirt wo Kirareta by Keyakizaka46) and enjo kosai (sefuku ga jama suru) and some HKT48 song basically said women should focus on pretty and that they were stupid (Einstein yori Dianna Agron)

Let's see.

Keyakizaka's:
http://sakamichidreams.com/2017/07/2...c-translation/

WHERE is it promoting harassment?
It's a song from the POV of a girl being harassed and being depressed in consequence.
Should those topics not be touched in music?

Same goes for AKB's song:
http://stage48.net/studio48/seifukug...ru_single.html

First, the enjo kosai is from the pv, and again, they are not promoting it, just showing ot happens.
The song lyrics are basically about a girl's first 'experience'.

As for HKT's...
http://stage48.net/studio48/einstein...annaagron.html

Saying those lyrics are problematic is the equivalent of
https://sortimid.deviantart.com/art/...tion-662468751

You're basically saying that girls shouldn't worry about their appearance and focus on studying.
Guess what? Some girls don't want to study and that's fine,
Some girls want to be hairdressers and make people look cute and that's fine.

I can't belie I'm arguing this in a jpop forum lol

Their a-sides are basically bubblegum pop because that's how they clicked with the gp (Heavy Rotation boom), but they have so much more:
http://stage48.net/forum/index.php?t...9/#post-891889