Ayumi Hamasaki’s classic album “A BEST” has turned 15 years old, the anniversary addition will be hitting store shelves today.  “A BEST” was a phenomenon in the J-pop scene, largely fueled by a forced rivalry with Utada Hikaru that broke global sales records. The album remains as Ayumi’s best selling work and is the 6th highest selling album in Japan.

Ayumi’s team has created a special promotional interactive website where fans can share their memories of her via twitter. Once your twitter account is connected your tweet is added to a giant collage of other fans messages, re-creating the A BEST cover. Many fans reminisced on how they discovered Ayumi, their favorite songs, and how much of a impact her music has had on their lives.

The website is available in both English and Japanese, check it out by clicking here!  What are some of your memories of Ayu?

On Tuesday, March 22nd, the nation-wide final “High school girl beauty pageant 2015 – 2016” was held in Tokyo to decide “Japan’s cutest high school student.” Among all of the girls, third year high school student from Aichi prefecture, Riko Nagai, or “Rikopin” (18) took the title in the grand prix.

More on the contest after the jump!

It was announced that NEWS will serve as the main personality for this year’s “24 Hour TV~39~Love Saves the Earth~” program to broadcast in summer. The announcement was made during NTV’s “Jinsei ga kawaru 1-funkan no fukaihanashi” 2 hour special aired on March 28. Towards the end of the program broadcast, member Kato was interviewed by Kuroyanagi Tetsuko, as he announced that NEWS will be this year’s main personality.

The theme for “24-hour TV” this year is “Love~ this is my way of life~“. This is the second time for NEWS to serve as the main personality since 2009. Each of the members, Koyama Keiichiro, Masuda Takahisa, Kato Shigeaki, and Tegoshi Yuya will have on-location challenge in accordance to the theme.

(via Oricon)

Perfume’s newest album, Cosmic Explorer, is slated for release early next month, on April 6th. Up until recently, promotions for the album had been a bit quiet but just 9 days before the big day, things have gotten more rowdy. On their newly created Instagram account, prfm_official (the first post was uploaded around 19 hours ago), the trio made 129 posts that comes together to form a 3×43-post-big promotional picture.

Oscar nominated movie ‘Room’ will have its premiere in Japan in April. Both leads Brie Larson and Jacob Tremblay have been promoting the movie for the last week. For the official preview showing at Tokyo on 21st March, they have been accompanied by actress Miho Kanno. Jacob has even chosen his favourite Japanese tune and upped to his Instagram account.

We’re back with this week’s edition of Oricon Flashback. This is where we look back on what topped Oricon this week 5, 10, 15, and 20 years ago. Think of it as a way to reminisce and learn about the past of Japanese music.

This week’s episode was a special one consisting of highlights from the show’s Special Fes, which was held on March 10 – 11. The performers were Koda Kumi, Leo Ieiri, Nogizaka46, Keyakizak46, Sukima Switch, BURNOUT SYNDROMES, Shout it Out, JUJU, flumpool, Kato Miliyah, BLUE ENCOUNT, T.M. Revolution, Goodbye holiday, Akairo no Glitter, T/ssue, Fishlife, Macaroni Enpitsu, and PURPLE HUMPTY.

This week’s guests were Sandaime J Soul Brothers, SKE48, and Creephyp.

Sandaime J Soul Brothers – Feel So Alive

SKE48 – Chicken LINE

Creephyp – Hakka