This week’s performer was Da-iCE. This week’s episode was mainly a talk guest special and featured Adachi Rika, Uchimura Teruyoshi & Seino Nana, Okazu Club, Saito Takumi, Nakama Yukie, Hashimoto Manami, Hirose Suzu & Yamazaki Kento, and Yuka.

Da-iCE – Koigokoro

Hey, Arama! Japan! It’s Friday, so it’s Open Post time! Feel free to chat with your fellow readers about whatever you like! Enjoy!

Electropop unit Perfume seems to be ready to step out of their COSMIC EXPLORER era and discover a new concept, as the group has been recently seen in two new tie-ups! The first one features their newest song, “Houseki no Ame”. This track serves as the music theme for the “All Day Kuchimoto Beauty Hen” campaing with beauty and hygiene care company Ora2 in order to promote their new “Kuchimoto Beauty” line of products. The CM, which shows the three girls spending the day out together with stylish outfits (and coupling geometric handbags!) is meant to represent women enjoying life happily day by day. It also features a drawing version of them three by British illustrator Jason Brooks. The new song, described by Nocchi, Kashiyuka and A-chan themselves, is a light, soft and fashionable song able to make a happy day out of a rainy day.

The second tie-up, called “It’s my winter”, is along clothing brand “UNIQLO”, promoting their “HEATTECH” clothing technology for winter. In this tie-in, the three members can be seen frozen in ice cubes, floating in an ethereal space emphasized by the background music. While no lyrics are sung and no credits are given, it’s likely that this melody ends up becoming a full song. The campaign’s website says that the next update will be coming soon, so maybe then something more is revealed about this track!

Check the CMs and a making movie for the Ora2 one just after the jump!

Formed in 2008,  idol unit Momoiro Clover Z (affectionately known to fans as MomoClo) have contributed music to some of the world’s most popular anime programs and films, including Dragon Ball Z: Resurrection ‘F’, Sailor Moon, and Pokemon. In 2014, they were chosen as one of the opening acts for Lady Gaga’s successful tour across Japan. Now they’re ready to take on the world’s stage on their own.

The 5-member girl group is set to come to the United States this month to embark on their 3-city Trans-America Ultra Live Tour. From November 15 to 19, making stops in Hawaii, New York, and Los Angeles, the girls will sing their hearts out to US fans for the first time since Anime Expo 2015, where they were joined on stage by Paul Stanley and Gene Simmons of KISS celebrating their hit single “Yume no Ukiyo ni Saitemina“.

ARAMA! JAPAN had the chance to talk to Momoiro Clover Z members Ayaka Sasaki and Reni Takagi ahead of their upcoming tour to find out more about their life as popular idols, get a closer look into their thoughts, how they prepared for the tour and have them answer some sillier rapid-fire questions.

Oricon has long been criticized for not including digital sales in its charts. The company has heard the criticism and took a step into the current day by introducing its own weekly digital albums chart. The chart was created in collaboration with the Recording Industry Association of Japan. It features releases from 35 different record labels, and tallies its sales from four different digital music services (iTunes, Mora, mu-mo, and Recochoku).

It remains to been to be seen if Oricon will create its own weekly digital singles chart, but it would make sense seeing as how most of the music purchases digitally are in the form of single songs.

The first edition of Oricon’s digital albums chart can be seen below! Future editions of the chart will be found in the weekly Oricon charts posts.

This week, KinKi Kids topped the Oricon single chart with their new single “Michi wa Tezukara Yume no Hana”, selling 175,503 copies in its first week.

Yumi Matsutoya topped the Oricon album chart with her new album “Uchuu Toshokan”, selling 57,077 copies in its first week.

On November 9, Negoto will release a new EP titled “Asymmetry e.p.” This is the band’s first release since their single “DESTINY”, which was released in June 2015. The EP’s title track serves as the CM song for cafe & pancakes gram, a restaurant chain. The song was produced by Nakano Masayuki of BOOM BOOM SATELLITES. “Asymmetry e.p.” also features the song “holy night”, which was produced by ROVO’s Masuko Tatsuki. “holy night” is an insert song in the movie “Mainabi presents TOKYO CITY GIRL 2016”, which opens in theaters on November 19. The song is also the song’s ending theme in the Kanto and Kansai regions.

The music video for “Asymmetry” was recently released. It focuses on two smartphones which are placed together to reveal the full image of the music video. Check it out below, along with more information on Negoto’s new EP!

Over 13 years ago, Utada Hikaru held the live-stream event “Nijudai wa IkeIke!” to celebrate her 20th birthday. Now on the anniversary of her debut date, December 9th, Utada Hikaru, now in her 30s will hold another live-stream event titled, “Sanjudai wa Hodohodo.” Utada wants to convey her appreciation to her fans in her live stream.

The event can be streamed outside of Japan and begins at 21:00 JST. Utada will be answering messages received in real time and will perform live in studio during the event. You can begin tweeting your questions to Utada with the hashtag “#30代はほどほど.”

Be sure to tune into the event!

http://www.utadahikaru.jp/hodohodo/?lang=en