I guess it was more her controversy rather than the pregnancy cause she didnt even stop that much, there was beach mix in july and two singles in the second semester of 2012... Like even in that GQ video I saw a hateful comment throwing it back to the controversy and it's been more than 15 years. I have a cousin living in Japan since 2005 (or 2006? idk) and she said it was crazy how Kumi was all over the place right before Kingdom came out, in lots of CMs, billboards, magazines and TV appearances, and in the blink of an eye everything was gone. Like she had disappeared or erased. It made me so mad to hear that :(

I think if she hadn't made those statements, her trajectory of success would have been drawn out more, but I don't think she'd be #1 today. She probably would have seen more like Ayu's trajectory where she peaks and then has a solid 10+ years where she's still relatively toward the top of things (#1 singles, albums, videos, lots of magazines and promo, etc.). But ultimately music is typically a young person's game, since that's the audience that spends the most money on it. It would have been inevitable for her popularity to decrease.

That said, I think the public opinion of her is relatively good - she's supportive of younger and new artists, she's always on TV and does a lot of collab performances, etc. If anything, I think it's just that people don't think of her as active artist these days, or just aren't interested in her music. She's very "cool" and could pull in a younger audience, but I think it would take a more pop-forward music approach to really get more traction. I could very easily see her having a Namie-like comeback if she wasn't making music she wanted to, and instead focused only on success. But I'm much happier that she's doing what makes her happy, personally.

I will not lie , I do miss the old days when Ayu & Kuu were literally everywhere but what avex did with over promoting them do backfired to a certain extent

That also unfortunately happened to GIRL NEXT DOOR too

The last decade or so , Johnnys , AKB & LDH family trees have dominated sales wise & rarely solo acts are able to sell well

Even those who've been around for in the business even longer than Kuu such as Fukuyama Masaharu-san also face the same problem but his solo tours still sell well

As Corvina said in the previous page of the thread , the 1st round of fanclub ticket balloting for Kuu's duo angeL/monsteR tour was quite high in demand

I think if Kuu want to get more people to like her music , she would have done this a long time ago & not now

And I feel Kuu is now at a point in her life that she want to do things that she geniunely wants to do & not what avex make her want to do

Besides now with social media , it's 1 avenue that non fans get to find out about her & also her music

That happened to Kuu's cover of COMPLEX's Megumi no Hito which unexpectedly got a boost in online popularity

So something like this can happen again , you never know

I mean she looks better than ever, the people gotta give her that. Lol.

Couldn't agree more. tbh even at her peak Kuu wasn't as big of a seller as ayu, specially when it comes to singles she barely had #1's and none of them sold over 500k on Oricon, so it makes sense she wouldn't keep the high peak for years. But she did sell strong enough after the scandal, just look at how TRICK was #1 for two weeks in a row and how she managed to have #1 studio albums until W FACE, that's like than 10 years after Black Cherry which was her first #1 studio album. I guess what she lost with the scandal was an older fanbase + tie-ins that could give her more hits through the years. So it just sped things a bit up.

She was talking on the Q&A of Koda Gumi these days how much she is thinking about spending time with her son while he's still a kid and with her (maybe he wants to travel abroad for college? couldn't quite get what she meant), so she is probably doing music nowadays just cause she loves it, not to delivery hits and tire herself with promotion schedules.

Kuu will be featured on next Sat's MUSIC FAIR

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FnTZ3zoa...jpg&name=small

https://twitter.com/MUSICFAIR_Fuji/s...66659516039170
https://twitter.com/MUSICFAIR_Fuji/s...18959930851328

Kuu will perform Hello Yesterday & Nakamori Akina's TATTOO alongside with Hoshikuzu Scat

2nd Koda Gumi (Japanese) FC lottery for the tour is happening now till Wednesday.
8 concerts are sold out already or such few tickets left, chances to win tickets are close to zero (the first two in Osaka, the first two in Aichi, all 4 Tokyo dates).

Speaking of the Tokyo dates - I'm really intrigued by this new venue, Tachikawa Stage Garden.
It has a capacity between 2,500 and 3,000, opened right in the middle of the pandemic in 2020, was designed mainly for pop concerts (innovative stage design possible), is run privately and openly designed with the back wall being able to be opened, so you can actually use the space outside for people to watch a concert, too (increasing capacity with further 630 seats).
So I hope they're recording one of the Tokyo dates, even though the final is in Gunma, just because I wanna see this, lol.


Some TV performaces were announced as well.
Kuu is going to perform Wings at Buzzrhythm02 on February 3rd and Hello Yesterday and TATTOO with 星屑スキャット (a drag queen trio) on Music Fair February 4th.

Sounds so cool, indeed, but then if the tour has many more dates across different venues I guess it won't change much for this one. Maybe if she pulled out a LA residency-like concert series?

All I know is I can't wait to see how she'll perform Killer monsteR and WORK IT!, really need those to be hightlight moments with cool choreo and outfits.

Was also wondering if she'll pick fans to the stage like she used to, or if covid-19 would still be a problem. She could even apply the dual theme to it, a soft singin by your side moment in angel and a lap dance-ish moment in monster :P

A bit late but I’m quite happy with WINGS. All songs are different but nice to listen all together and the complete mini is cohesive.
I even love songs I thought I wouldn’t care like Hello Yesterday or It’s K magic.
Good job Kumi!

Still of Kuu from this week's Buzz Rhythm 02

https://ogre.natalie.mu/media/news/m...50&imdensity=1

https://natalie.mu/music/news/511362

So pretty

And another wedding inspired dress like what Kuu wore at last year's MUSIC FAIR

so pretty

They opened a pre-registration round for tickets for the public now.
But just for half of the dates.
Links here at the top:
https://rhythmzone.net/koda/news/detail.php?id=1105989

Anywhere these have been uploaded to watch?

^ This week's MUSIC FAIR hasn't aired on Fuji TV yet , until 3 hours+ later in Japan

Kuu alongside with Hoshikuzu Scat

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FoF_QL7a...jpg&name=small

https://twitter.com/KODAKUMINET/stat...50398305406976

Buzz Rhythm 02

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FoAtl60a...jpg&name=small

https://twitter.com/KODAKUMINET/stat...46192386052097

https://www.bilibili.com/video/BV17T411d7nm/

TATTOO
https://m.bilibili.com/video/BV1Ve4y1N7qK

Hello Yesterday
https://m.bilibili.com/video/BV1Q841...d0fa0c6c9095e3

Two perfect performances! :heart
I love Hello Yesterday so much, such a great song.

OMG Koda Kumi in Madrid my country Spain and I didn't know before, that she was coming with Blank Paper. Is too late because I live far from Madrid. I'm so sad ��

Any of you guys can see her? I don't know if the live was yesterday or if it's today ��

She had concerts on both saturday and sunday. Some users from the kumi discord managed to attend, I dont know if they all have accouns here tho

She looks beautiful in this white dress. :luv2

Kuu will perform at next Tue's Utacon live broadcast

https://twitter.com/nhk_musicjp/stat...99075634188291

Kuu will perform Cutie Honey & Hello Yesterday on this week's Utacon live broadcast

https://twitter.com/nhk_musicjp/stat...30621484867584