Recochoku is one of Japan's major digital music distributors, and people commonly use its charts to gauge an artist's digital sales power (With some degree of variance/error due to exclusively looking at one distributor, demographic/sampling bias tied to how it's more popular among youths/keitai (cellphone) culture, not having numerical units sold, etc). Some argue that digital charts provide a more accurate landscape of which artists are popular in Japan due to the tendency to buy multiple physical copies in the idol scene. The company recently released its yearly chart which tracks sales from December 1st 2015 to November 30th 2016. Without further ado, here are the numbers (For the remaining top 100 of any chart, you'll need to visit Source 2 which is in Japanese although I make some references to it later in the post).
Top 25 Overall Artists:
- Kana Nishino
- AKB48
- back number
- Sandaime J Soul Brothers (from EXILE TRIBE)
- ONE OK ROCK
- RADWIMPS
- Namie Amuro
- Hikaru Utada
- Gen Hoshino
- Kenta Kiritani (Taro Urashima)
- SMAP
- Ketsumeishi
- AAA
- Kobukuro
- Ikimonogakari
- AI
- EXILE
- RADIO FISH
- BUMP OF CHICKEN
- Miyuki Nakajima
- Superfly
- JUJU
- DREAMS COME TRUE
- GReeeeN
- Flower
Top 25 Digital Singles:
- Kenta Kiritani (Taro Urashima) – Umi no Koe
- AKB48 – 365 Nichi no Kami Hikouki
- RADWIMPS – Zen Zen Zense (movie ver.)
- RADIO FISH – PERFECT HUMAN
- back number – Christmas Song
- Gen Hoshino – Koi
- Kana Nishino – Torisetsu
- Hikaru Utada – Hanataba wo Kimi ni
- ONE OK ROCK – Wherever you are
- Gen Hoshino – SUN
- Namie Amuro – Hero
- Kobukuro – Mirai
- Namie Amuro – Mint
- JY – Suki na Hito ga Iru Koto
- Sakura Fujiwara – Soup
- AI – Minna ga Minna Eiyuu (Full Version)
- Ketsumeishi – Tomo yo ~Kono Saki mo Zutto…
- Aoi Teshima – Ashita e no Tegami (Drama Version)
- Flower – Yasashisa de Afureru You ni
- Perfume – FLASH
- Motohiro Hata – Himawari no Yakusoku
- Miyuki Nakajima – Ito
- RADWIMPS – Nandemonaiya (movie ver.)
- back number – Heroine
- Sandaime J Soul Brothers (from EXILE TRIBE) – R.Y.U.S.E.I.
Top 10 Digital Albums:
- Hikaru Utada – Fantome
- RADWIMPS – Kimi no Na wa.
- Kana Nishino – Just LOVE
- DREAMS COME TRUE – DREAMS COME TRUE THE BEST! Watashi no Dorikamu
- back number – Chandelier
- Sandaime J Soul Brothers (from EXILE TRIBE) – THE JSB LEGACY
- Ikimonogakari – Cho Ikimonobakari ~Tennen Kinen Members’ BEST Selection~
- Gen Hoshino – YELLOW DANCER
- Various Artists – 2015-nen Yougaku Souzarai! Party Anthem Hits! 2015 Best Edition (Basically a "NOW THAT'S WHAT I CALL MUSIC" equivalent)
- Various Artists – HiGH & LOW ORIGINAL BEST ALBUM (LDH's HIGH & LOW movie soundtrack)
Top 3 Best New Artists:
- Keyakizaka46
- Piko-Taro
- Satoshi Hayashibe
Top 5 Western Songs (Found in original source; translated by ![]()
xhurlyburly):
- Shake it Off - Taylor Swift
- Call Me Maybe - Carly Rae Jepsen
- See You Again - Wiz Khalifa
- Happy - Pharrell Williams
- I Really Like You - Carly Rae Jepsen
Interesting Things to Note Based off of a Quick Glance (aka a disclaimer that I might have missed something if I'm wrong):- Most of higher charting digital singles/songs have a big tie-in that contributed to its popularity and high digital sales.
- Umi no Koe was the CM song for AU's popular ad campaign
- 365 Nichi no Kami Hikouki was the theme song of NHK asadora (Morning drama) "Asa ga Kita"
- Zen Zen Zense (Movie ver.) was the theme song of the movie "Kimi no Na wa"
- Christmas Song was the theme song of popular drama "5-Ji kara 9-ji made ~ Watashi ni Koi Shita Ikemen Sugiru Obousan"
- Koi is the theme song of popular drama "“Nigeru wa Haji da ga Yaku ni Tatsu”
- Torisetsu is the theme song of movie "Heroine Shikkaku"
- Hanataba wo Kimi ni was the theme song of popular asadora "Toto Nee-chan"
- Wherever You Are has a CM tie-in with Apple (Interesting thing to note is that this song was released about 6 years ago )
- Sun was the theme song of popular drama "Kokoro ga Pokitto ne"
- Taylor Swift and Carly Rae Jepsen are the only western acts featured on the overall sales and digital single (Shake it Off and Call Me Maybe respectively) charts. Justin Bieber and Ariana Grande also appeared on the album charts with Purpose, and Dangerous Woman and My Everything respectively.
- Kana topping the Recochoku overall sales chart is contributed to a combination of multiple (six) singles within the top 100 along with a top three selling album on Recochoku.
- Similar to Kana's situation, Sandaime J Soul Brother's position can be contributed to multiple (five) singles within the top 100 along with an album that did well on Recochoku.
- AKB48's second overall position while having only two singles within the top 100 (The other one being in the 80s) and an album in the mid 50s suggest that their overall discography (Along with the immense success of 365 Nichi no Kami Hikouki) played a role in achieving this position.
- SMAP had two of their old singles pop up in the charts. This is likely due to rumors (Which were later confirmed) of disbanding.
- Several older songs also popped up in the digital single charts. In addition to ONE OK ROCK's Wherever you are; SMAP's Orange and Sekai ni Hitotsu Dake no Hana; and Carly Rae Jepsen's Call Me Maybe, Sandaime J Soul Brother's Hanabi, JUJU's Yasashisa Afureru Youni, and Otsuka Ai's Planetarium also appeared in the digital singles chart.
- After checking the 2015 chart and not spotting Yasashisa Afureru Youni in the top 100, it's likely that Flower's popular cover of the song spurred sales for the original.
- Excluding the rival groups run by Sony (Nogizaka46 and Keyakizaka46), the only other 48G group to appear on the overall artist list is NMB48 (This was also the case in 2015).
- For those that are sad about the state of female soloists, most of the old school female soloists are within the top 100 of the overall artist chart (e.g., Ayumi Hamasaki, Koda Kumi, Mika Nakashima, Otsuka Ai, Crystal Kay). While their popularity has fallen compared to their peaks, their cumulative discography can still get some sales.
- One interesting thing to note is that Shiina Ringo did not appear on the overall artist and hasn't released new music within the past year (She was #46 last year and closely ranked with everyone except Ayu because of A BEST's chart longevity). This observation may suggest that her cumulative discography as a soloist does not sell as well as other notable female soloist, but the discreprency is made up by her releases selling more compared to her peers. However, one has to keep in mind that a significant portion of her discography was under her band Tokyo Jihen and does not count towards her own sales.
Sources
1 /
2 /
3i may or may not do a j-pop megapost later this week depending on how lazy i am meanwhile, how are your faves doing?
