[Koda Kumi] The 197th Thread - Hits for Driving

[Gustavopc]

Setlist and outfits look amazing!! These lives at USJ always seem sooo mich fun Thanks for the pics and info!

[abestfah]

The Setlist seems to be boring to me, it is like mini DNA tour.

[Corvina]

More pics:







And Kuu shared this comment of a fan from her last post asking about the name of the new dancers (the most liked comment on the post btw.):



And Kuu is like : " I wonder why.... *big laugh*
Those dancers were the members of Sesame Street today!"

Even though she did use two new female dancers today within those 8. She is such a tease sometimes!

[lovethatkuu&ayu]

I've had a feeling that she was planning on an arena tour for awhile now. Just some hints from the DNA tour oddly enough LOL.

I'm really curious about the studio work she did. If we get an actual physical summer single, I'll be over the moon!

[KarenPang]

Kuu & her dancers took The Flying Dinosaur yesterday in Universal Studios Japan







https://www.instagram.com/p/Bv8WHt8Apq4/

My sister was brave to try out The Flying Dinosaur when both of us went USJ 2 years ago . I was too chicken to try it & it's easy to see why as the ride will spin you around 360 degrees which was x_x

Kuu also went to Minions Park within USJ





https://twitter.com/KODAKUMINET/stat...83978479804417

[Chibi-Chan]

Kuu sent flowers to Ayu today

Spoiler:

hochladen

[kaled kalil]

She did it yesterday as well.

The setlist for the live was pretty okay. This is the first time that I don't care about footage of the concert, since most of the USJ Lives had at least one underperformed song., which is not the case for this one.

The look as pretty cool, tho.

---

Talking about not paying too much attention to the ballad section, I feel like I do this for most of her recent concerts, honestly. The last time I didn't look away during a long ballad section was with Dejavu Tour, which every song had something happening, with costume changes, the hologram effect and all.

WOML Tour was pretty good as well, but since there is the lovely Sometimes Dreams Come True a.k.a. bathroom break, it's not as good as the one from Dejavu.

And for the BSC Tour being good and energetic, I agree! The stage is so interesting but underused, I mean it's a freaking jukebox.

[KarenPang]

More photos from Sat's KODA KUMI SPECIAL LIVE 2019 at UNIVERSAL STUDIOS JAPAN

Spoiler:

https://www.instagram.com/p/Bv_E0RaAKl6/

Spoiler:

https://www.instagram.com/p/Bv_HwkNgm1T/

Spoiler:

https://www.instagram.com/p/Bv_Lev6gc3x/

Kuu's outfits were from Balmain & Victoria's Secret and the Sesame Street characters backed Kuu up when Lady Go!! was performed

[Corvina]

Sagan Tosu announced today, that Kuu is going to be at the home match against Gamba Osaka May 11!

https://www.sagan-tosu.net/news/p/3801/

They celebrate Women's Day on that day with special jerseys and events about women and Kuu will give a kick-in performance before the match.

Sagan was faster than her official site or FC with the info, but should be up there soon as well.

[KarenPang]

Kuu also took the Jurassic Park Ride last Sat in USJ

https://www.instagram.com/p/BwBOKu9gsbd/
https://twitter.com/KODAKUMINET/stat...58197748248576

Kuu basically took the rides in USJ that I don't dare to try them myself haha :p

[Corvina]

Kuu shared with everyone, that Misono and Nosuke came to see her live and spend time with her at USJ.
She says USJ always is a place for her to gather with her family (she regularly goes with her husband and son as well).



She also says, that laughter is the best medicine.
It surely is... At least he's strong enough to go to a theme park.

Ah, yeah and she also mentioned in one of the posts, that she surely is going to do another USJ live next year.

Also adding to the topic of her dancers - for WOML Tour, which was her last arena tour, she had 12 dancers. For The Artist she had 10.
Now with the new female dancers she should have 10 as well.

[wednesday]

My heart goes out to Nosuke and misono. They seem like they are happy and strong, though!

[lovethatkuu&ayu]

It was nice to see both Nosuke and Misono be able to enjoy themselves for just a little bit. At least he still is able to venture out and live his life.

[Corvina]

Kuu is part of that new 270 Yen plan for AWA, where you can listen to unlimited Kuu songs, get pre-sale tickets for concerts, make limited playlists, getting special goods presents and voice messages from Kuu and listen to live recordings:

https://info.awa.fm/artist_plan/60df887d16e73bf51229/

Info through her FC.

[lovethatkuu&ayu]

It's interesting how Avex hasn't given up on streaming. The Japanese still seem to be quite invested in physical products. That said, the industry is slowing down quite a bit, and I wonder if Avex sees something we don't.

[Corvina]

Originally Posted by lovethatkuu&ayu

It's interesting how Avex hasn't given up on streaming. The Japanese still seem to be quite invested in physical products. That said, the industry is slowing down quite a bit, and I wonder if Avex sees something we don't.

Hm?
Streaming is the biggest growing market in Japan.
It indeed had a very slow and late start there, but it catched up quickly - Oricon reported, that within a year streaming overtook digital sales in total numbers back in 2018.
I've showed the numbers in the "What's on your mind"-thread, quoting myself:

In the same article Oricon also released statistics of how the current Japanese music market looks like.



Streaming had a bad (and late) start in Japan but within just a year now it overtook digital downloads in total numbers from 2017 to 2018.
It's going to be interesting to see the further developement.

But it is true, that physical sales are still the top priority and it even grew a bit again last year.

[pedronekoi]

Yeah, as Corvina said streaming here became really huge. And of course AWA wants to take the lead as Spotify is growing really fast here. I think that's a great way to get the fans to sign up for their plans.

[lovethatkuu&ayu]

Thanks for the information. I wasn't aware that streaming services had finally started to gain traction in Japan. It will be quite interesting to see how the Japanese industry looks in a few more years. Physical sales in the U.S. collapsed rather quickly when streaming took off after 2014.

[Corvina]

Originally Posted by pedronekoi

Yeah, as Corvina said streaming here became really huge. And of course AWA wants to take the lead as Spotify is growing really fast here. I think that's a great way to get the fans to sign up for their plans.

Do you have any more info on Spotify?
Cause afaik Spotify is not playing a big role in Japan.
Oricon and Billboard Japan are both not counting Spotify for their streaming charts.
Last info I had was Line Music, Apple Music and AWA being the three biggest streaming services (and amazon, but it's part of Prime and not a streaming only service).

[pedronekoi]

What I know is only based on talking to people. One year ago nobody knew what Spotify was and now everyone is talking about it, using it, sharing on Instagram etc. I'm the kind of people that likes to sneak into people's phone to while they listening to something on the subway and I often see people using Spotify. They've made a few collaborations with Japanese artists to create playlists and stuff like that, so I think it's growing. Maybe the thing that made it popular was the partnership with Instagram, in which you can share the music on your Instagram stories. Also you can listen to Spotify for free (with limitations and ads) so it's a good deal in the end.