One of the most anticipated upcoming drama series’ is WOWOW’s “Karera wo Mirebawakaru Koto“.

Stepping into the lead roles is legendary 80s singer Miho Nakayama and former AKB48 ace Yuko Oshima. Rounding out the cast is the acclaimed actress Tae Kimura.

The plot follows Momoko Uchida (Miho Nakayama), a manga writer who lives in an extremely boujee Tokyo apartment. She’s currently on her 2nd marriage, and has a son attending university.

With a new year, and a new decade, comes change! Towards the end of 2019, I started thinking of how to improve the site, and also how to expand its reach. One of these ways is utilize technology that we have at our disposal, but aren’t taking advantage of. An example of this utilization of technology would be the creation of the Arama! Japan podcast. Posting the podcast on Spotify and Apple Music, led to the next logical step: creating playlists!

The era-ending posts “Staff Selections: 2010s Decade End” and “Staff Selections: 2019 Year End” have now been turned into playlists on the aforementioned streaming platforms! There will be more playlists in the future! Check them out below!

Ever since debuting in the industry, Koki has been a brand ambassador for the Italian luxury jewelry company BVLGARI. Koki will be starting off the new decade continuing this relationship!

For a brand new photo shoot with Marie Claire China, Koki teamed up with former EXO member Kris Wu. Naturally, both of them are wearing BVLGARI! This isn’t the first time both Koki and Kris have worked together on the same project. In 2019 Koki made her acting debut starring in Kris’ MV for his single “Eternal Love” released back in November, 2019.

Back in November we reported that popular rock quartet Mr.Children would be performing the theme song for the latest film in the Doraemon series: “Eiga Doraemon Nobita no Shin Kyouryuu”. Now it’s been announced that the group will be providing a second track for the movie, and that both of these songs will be released as a Double A-side single on March 4th.

The new song, titled “Kimi to Kasaneta Monologue”, has been described as a heartwarming ballad meant to contrast the bright, adventurous tenor of its pair (“Birthday”). Both of these tracks were recorded in London’s RAK Studios with engineer Steve Fitzmorris, known for his work with U2 and Sting, and mastered by Scott Hull of Studio Masterdisk in New York.

You’ll find previews of the two songs, along with the single’s track list below.

Late last year we reported that mixture rock band King Gnu would be releasing a new album titled “CEREMONY” on January 15th. Just a week shy of its street date, the group have published the PV for the record’s lead track “Teenager Forever” to their YouTube channel.

This video, directed by PERIMETRON’s OSRIN, is composed of a collection of the members’ personal videos which have been cut together. It shows singer and keyboardist Satoru Iguchi vacationing in the Philippines, guitarist and vocalist Daiki Tsuneta doing the same in Russia, bassist Kazuki Arai gifting a car to his mother, and drummer Yuu Seki enjoying his honeymoon in Guam.

You’ll find this documentary-style music video, as well as the digest for “CEREMONY” right after the jump.

Folk/pop duo Yuzu recently announced that they will be releasing a new studio album titled “YUZUTOWN” on March 4th. This will be the pair’s 15th longplay together, and their first since April 2018’s “BIG YELL”.

“YUZUTOWN” will include the group’s previously released tracks “Koen Doori”, “Muscat”, “Maboroshi”, “SEIMEI”, and “GreenGreen”, plus nine new songs – among them a self-cover of “Natsu Hayate”, which member Yujin Kitagawa wrote for idol group Arashi, and three chiptune interludes composed by TeddyLoid – for a total of 14. Notably, the version of “SEIMEI” on the record will be a new arrangement from industry veterans Masataka Matsutoya and Koichi Tsutaya.

You’ll find a teaser movie, along with the cover and track list for “YUZUTOWN” below.

As we’ve reported previously, alternative rock band Halo at Yojohan will be releasing their second major-label album “ANATOMIES” on January 29th. Though they’ve already released a PV for “Naraku“, they have now uploaded another music video for the first of the record’s two lead tracks: “Innocent Pray”.

This clip, directed by Kazuaki Kimura, sees the quartet performing the song in a modern, well-lit space as each member ascends a stone staircase. Of note, this track was produced by Yoshiaki Dewa, who also worked with the group on last year’s “Living Dead Swimmer”.

You’ll find the full PV for this uplifting number below.

This week, Official HIGE DANdism topped the Combined Single chart with their single “Pretender”, with 34,788 points in its 36th week.

Katori Shingo topped the Combined Album chart with his debut solo album “20200101”, with 30,478 points in its second week.

Mariya Takeuchi topped the Single chart with her single “Inochi no Uta”, selling 6,875 copies in its second week.

Shingo also topped the Album chart with “20200101”, selling 27,661 copies in its second week.

Suda Masaki retook the top spot on the Digital Single chart with his digital single “Machigai Sagashi”, selling 46,680 copies in its 34th week, and topping the chart for the fifth non-consecutive week .

BiS topped the Digital Album chart with their new album “LOOKiE”, selling 8,012 copies in its first week.

Official HIGE DANdism also topped the Streaming chart for the 33rd consecutive week with their song “Pretender”, with 4,334,302 streams in its 36th week.