Utada Hikaru (宇多田ヒカル, Utada Hikaru?) Utada in a photoshoot for her latest album 'ULTRA BLUE' This image has an uncertain copyright status and is pending deletion. You can comment on the removal. Musical artist Birth name 宇多田光 (Utada Hikaru) (maiden name) 岩下光 (Iwashita Hikaru) (legal name) Also known as Hikki Born January 19, 1983 Origin New York, U.S.A. Genre/s J-Pop, R&B, Ethereal Occupation/s singer Years active 1997–Present Label/s Toshiba-EMI Universal Island Records Website http://www.toshiba-emi.co.jp/hikki/ http://www.utada.jp http://www.utada.com Utada Hikaru (宇多田ヒカル, Utada Hikaru? born January 19, 1983), also known as Utada, is an American-born Japanese J-pop star. She is one of the most popular and successful Japanese artists today, given her personality, singing, songwriting and producing abilities, lifestyle, and upbringing. Contents 1 Utada's names 2 Biography 2.1 Precious era 2.2 First Love era 2.3 Distance era 2.3.1 Rivalry 2.4 DEEP RIVER era 2.5 Pre-EXODUS era 2.6 EXODUS era 2.7 Present activities 2.8 Future plans 3 Tetris 4 Discography 4.1 Odd recordings 4.2 Others — various artists 5 Trivia 6 Awards 7 References 8 See also 9 External links 9.1 Listening 9.2 Videos Utada's names Utada's name variations have been a source of some minor confusions in the past. Her legal Japanese name is currently Hikaru Iwashita (岩下光, Iwashita Hikaru?), born Hikaru Utada (宇多田光, Utada Hikaru?). The current status of her legal US name as well as the status of her US citizenship is unclear. She debuted as Cubic U in the States, but went mostly unknown during this era in her career. When she moved from the US to Japan, she made big under her homonymic stage name Hikaru Utada (宇多田ヒカル, Utada Hikaru?), which she is still popularly known as in Japan even after her marriage. In Japan, it was known to her fans that her nickname in the US was "Hikki." However, due to her immense popularity in Japan, she became better known under this nickname in Japan than in the States. Unlike most Japanese artists, she became well known in the English speaking world under the surname-first name ordering ("Utada Hikaru"), since her name has been romanized only in that order for the Japanese domestic market. After her successes in Japan, she re-entered the US market simply as Utada. On a few rare occasions, she has been credited in full on US domestic albums as either "Hikaru Utada" or "Utada Hikaru". Utada Hikaru is also known for singing the introduction songs for the Kingdom Hearts series, 'Simple and Clean' ('Hikari') for Kingdom Hearts I and 'Sanctuary' ('Passion') for Kingdom Hearts II. Biography Utada Hikaru was born in New York City, New York to Japanese parents who both had roots in the Japanese music industry: her father, Teruzane Utada, was a producer, while her mother, Junko Utada, was an enka singer (she performed under the stage name "Keiko Fuji"). She made her first professional recording at the age of twelve, and recorded her first album, Precious, in 1996 under the pseudonym Cubic U. The album led to her career overseas. In a recent MTV interview (MTV's You Hear It First, October 2004), Utada said: "Someone in Japan heard it, at a Japanese record company, and he said, 'Oh, can't you write in Japanese? You speak Japanese.' And I didn't want to say no, so I had to try it." She is currently married to Kazuaki Kiriya, a photographer and movie director. He has directed several of her music videos, including "Final Distance", "Traveling", "Hikari", "Sakura Drops", "Deep River", "Dareka no Negai ga Kanau Koro", "You Make Me Want to Be a Man", "Be My Last", "Passion", and "Keep Tryin'". Also, "Dareka no Negai ga Kanau Koro" was played during the credits of Kiriya's directorial debut, Casshern. Precious era Cover of Cubic U's English debut album: Precious Cubic U (Utada Hikaru's pseudonym before becoming a superstar in Japan) released her debut single "Close to You". She then released her debut album "Precious", but it failed to be released in the United States. She released "Precious" in Japan on January 28, 1998 and then later re-released it on March 31, 1999. First Love era Cover of Utada's Japanese debut album: First Love She moved to Tokyo later that year and attended The American School in Japan, while continuing to record on a new contract with Toshiba/EMI. She soon made her mark on Japanese music with her successful single "Automatic / time will tell" and "Movin' on without you", soon followed by the album First Love, which sold over five million copies in a month during March and April of 1999, and placed Utada among the 100 wealthiest people in Japan. A month after "First Love" was released, "First Love" was recut as a single due to popular demand. She also broke the record of units sold on a single album in Japan; she still holds the record (in 2006). The album has sold more than ten million copies in Asia. Distance era Cover of Utada's 2nd album: Distance Eight months after First Love was released, Utada then released a single, "Addicted To You". It was the start of a new album. On April 19, 2000, Utada released her 1st single in 2000, "Wait & See ~Risk~". It reached #1 on the Oricon and sold 1,662,000 copies. A month later, she released a half single "REMIX: Fly Me To The Moon" in English and Toshiba-EMI released an animated music video for the single version of Fly Me To The Moon. "For You / Time Limit", a double A-side single, was released in late June. It was her last single in 2000. Utada returned to New York in 2000 after "For You / Time Limit" to attend Columbia University as a freshman, but took leave from it within the year to continue her activities within the Japanese music industry, as she thought that it was "easier than she expected". In 2001, Utada released another single, "Can You Keep a Secret?", on February 16, 2001. A month later she released her 2nd album, "Distance", on March 28, 2001. The video for Utada's 2001 song "Can You Keep a Secret?" received some attention as part of International Week, which coincided with the 2001 EMAs, on the American channel MTV2. That video's airplay was likely Utada's first chance at exposure in the United States. Rivalry Also, Utada Hikaru is commonly considered to be the direct rival of (also J-Pop star) Ayumi Hamasaki, which caused intense debate between fans of both artists. On March 28, 2001, Utada Hikaru and Ayumi Hamasaki came in direct competition. Utada's album Distance and Hamasaki's album A BEST were released on the same day. Distance topped the charts for the first week while A BEST was #2. The following week A BEST hit #1 and Distance dropped to #3. At the end of the year, Distance and A BEST were the top 2 highest selling albums of the year. However, on Utada's most recent TV-appearance on MUSIC STATION in December 2005, both Hamasaki and Utada appeared together and got along very well. Utada even commented that she sang some of Hamasaki's songs when she went to karaoke. On the June 16, 2006 episode of MUSIC STATION, Utada Hikaru and Ayumi Hamasaki are both scheduled to appear, marking their second public appearance together. The Hamasaki-Utada rivalry has been regarded as one of the biggest rivalries in the Japanese music industry. DEEP RIVER era Cover of Utada's 3rd album: DEEP RIVER After "Distance", Utada released the singles FINAL DISTANCE, traveling, Hikari, and SAKURA Drops / Letters for her next album, "DEEP RIVER". In May of 2002, she became sick right before the release of "DEEP RIVER". She was diagnosed with an ovarian tumor, and then underwent surgery. During this period, she had to put on hold her TV appearances and other promotional activities. In June of 2002, the album was released. While there were no TV appearances, she promoted her album in magazine and radio interviews. The Oricon count of the album was 2.35 million sold for the first week, or 1.89 million by Planet's count. Oricon reports that sales eventually surpassed 3.60 million. Shortly afterwards, in September 2002, she announced her marriage to Kazuaki Kiriya, a photographer and film director fifteen years her senior. So far she is best known in the western hemisphere for singing "Simple and Clean", the theme to the video game Kingdom Hearts and its sequel "Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories", which is an English version of her popular song "Hikari", combined with elements from another of her songs, "Uso Mitai na I Love You". She also performed a well-received duet with Foxy Brown, "Blow My Whistle", which was featured on the Rush Hour 2 soundtrack. Pre-EXODUS era Cover of Utada Hikaru SINGLE COLLECTION VOL.1 Hikki released "COLORS", a single, on January 29, 2003 and her only single in 2003. She then released a singles compilation album "Utada Hikaru SINGLE COLLECTION VOL.1" on March 31, 2004. A month later, on April 21, she released her only Japanese single in 2004, "Dareka no Negai ga Kanau Koro". It translates to "When Someone's Wish Comes True", and is also the main theme song to "Casshern", her husband's, Kazuaki Kiriya's, directorial debut. Both "COLORS" and "Dareka no Negai ga Kanau Koro" will be in Utada's 4th studio album, "ULTRA BLUE". EXODUS era Cover of Utada's 1st USA English debut album: EXODUS On October 5, 2004, Utada Hikaru released her North American debut album, "EXODUS", under the name "Utada". It was released nearly a month earlier, on September 9 in Japan, with a special booklet and housed in a cardboard slipcase. In an MTV interview, Utada said: "There really aren't any completely Asian people singing right now. For me, it's an experiment to see what people are gonna think of it". But her American debut as an Island Def Jam Music Group artist was met with indifference by the American market, perhaps due in part to poor promotion on her record label's part. Despite the failure in the international markets, this album topped the charts in Japan, though it sold less than her releases as Utada Hikaru. Also, "Devil Inside" became a club hit in the U.S. and topped the Billboard Hot Dance/Club Airplay charts. "Easy Breezy" was released as the lead single in early August 2004, followed up by the dance blockbuster "Devil Inside" a month and two weeks later. "Exodus '04" was released at the end of June 2005. The fourth single from her "EXODUS" album was released in October 2005: "You Make Me Want to Be a Man". "Devil Inside" reached the number one spot on Billboards US Dance charts. "Exodus '04" also charted. Maxi singles featuring remixes from The Scum Frog, Richard Vission, JJ Flores, and Peter Bailey were also released. Present activities Cover of Utada's 4th album: ULTRA BLUE A year after the release of EXODUS, Utada was back into the Japanese music industry with the single, "Be My Last". Three months later, she released another single, "Passion", the theme for the Japanese version of Kingdom Hearts 2. "Passion" is the Japanese version of the English song "Sanctuary," which she wrote first and appears in the English release of Kingdom Hearts 2'". On February 22, 2006, Utada released another single, "Keep Tryin'". It reached #2 on the Oricon top 200 weekly charts and #1 on the OnGen top 20 weekly online download singles. In May, Utada's record label, Toshiba/EMI, announced another single, "This Is Love". It aired on the radio on Sunday, May 7, 2006. It was released as a digital single through iTunes Japan on May 31 and other online and mobile phone music stores. There are no plans for this to become a physical single despite it success on the online medium. Utada has also completed recording of her 4th Japanese album, titled "ULTRA BLUE". The whole album aired on Japanese radio on May 29, 2006. Unlike many of her previous albums, this album contained no song that matched the title of the album. Instead, a song, BLUE was made, using Utada's new experimental tone found in Keep Tryin'. The album was finally released on June 14, 2006 for physical CDs and will be released on June 28, 2006 for digital download on iTunes and other online Japanese music stores. With physical copies alone, ULTRA BLUE sold approximately of 500,000 copies in the first week, easily topping the Oricon charts and surpassing Angela Aki with her album, Home and its 125,000 units sold. Future plans Utada Hikaru is also planning for her national tour in Japan in the summer, called "UTADA UNITED 2006," which will feature both her Japanese work and her English tracks from "EXODUS." The dates have all been announced, and ticket sales started at May 28, 2006 with the majority of venues selling out in less than 2 hours. The tour will start on July, 2006 and will end in September. Tetris Utada Hikaru's Former High Score on Endless Mode: 8229968 Utada Hikaru is also an avid player of the Nintendo game Tetris. She is currently involved with Nintendo of Japan promoting a contest [1] in which the winner will be able to challenge her to a match. She has previously appeared on TV playing Tetris against a TV-host and comedian of the show HEYx3. On June 23 2006 she made several posts on her blog [2] detailing her exploits playing Tetris DS. [3][4][5][6][7][8] She has reported that her current high score on Endless Mode is 14,825,073 (her previous high score is shown on the right). Discography See Utada Hikaru discography. Odd recordings COLORS (Godson Mix) - Used for a Toyota Wish commercial in 2004 Others — various artists Japanese Beautiful Drivin' Classic — Wish (November 6, 2003) English Unity: Official Athens 2004 Olympic Games (July 27, 2004) Def Jam's Rush Hour 2 Soundtrack (July 31, 2001) Trivia Utada Hikaru is the youngest artist to appear on MTV Unplugged so far. [9] According to Oricon, Utada is now on a record for having 5 straight #1 albums since debut in Japan. [1] She also reached #3 on Total Female Artist Album Sales. [2] Awards Years Awards 1999 -Yusen Awards- Top Award "Special Prize" -Yusen Awards- Top Award "Best New Artist" -Record Awards- Best Album (First Love) -Record Awards- Best Song (Automatic) 2000 -Golden Disc- Artist of The Year -Golden Disc- Song of The Year (Automatic, Movin' on without you, Addicted To You) -Golden Disc- Pop Album of The Year (First Love) -Golden Disc- Music Video of The Year (SINGLE CLIP COLLECTION VOL.1) -World Music Awards- Best-Selling Japanese Artist -JASRAC- Gold Award (Automatic) -JASRAC- Silver Award (time will tell) 2001 -Golden Disc- Song of The Year (Wait & See ~Risk~, For You / Time Limit) -MTV JAPAN Viewer´s Choice Video (Can You Keep A Secret?) [10] 2002 SSTV Best Art Direction Video (traveling) SSTV Best Female Video (traveling) SSTV Best Video of The Year (traveling) -Golden Disc- Song of The Year (Can You Keep A Secret?) -Golden Disc- Song of The Year (traveling) -Golden Disc- Pop Album of The Year (Distance) JASRAC Silver Award (Can You Keep A Secret?) 2003 -World Music Awards- Best-Selling Japanese Artist J-WAVE Best Female Artist SSTV Best Female Video (SAKURA Drops) MTV JAPAN Best Female Video (SAKURA Drops) -Golden Disc- Artist of The Year -Golden Disc- Song of The Year (Hikari) -Golden Disc- Song of The Year (SAKURA Drops) -Golden Disc- Song of The Year (COLORS) -Golden Disc- Rock & Pop Album of The Year (Deep River) -Golden Disc- Music Video of The Year (traveling) JASRAC Silver Award (traveling) JASRAC Silver Award -Foreign Production- (Hikari) 2004 AMD Award for Best Music Composer (UH LIVE STREAMING 20 Dai wa Ikeike!) 2005 -Golden Disc- Song of The Year (Dareka no negai ga Kanau Koro) -Golden Disc- Rock & Pop Album of The Year (Utada Hikaru SINGLE COLLECTION VOL. 1) -Golden Disc- Music Video of The Year (Utada Hikaru in Budokan 2004 'Hikaru no 5') 2006 Rank 10th HMV's Best Japanese Singer of All Time -Golden Disc- Song of the Year (Be My Last) Rank 1st- 5 Straight Albums to debut with sales in excess of 500,000 copies Rank 3rd Total Female Artist Album Sales References ^ http://www.oricon.co.jp/news/ranking/25390/ Oricon 5 straight #1 albums since debut ^ http://www.oricon.co.jp/news/ranking/23188/ Oricon Total Female Artist Album Sales See also List of best-selling music artists List of number-one dance hits (United States) List of artists who reached number one on the US Dance chart External links Hikki's Website — official Japanese Toshiba EMI site Hikki's Website — official Chinese EMI site UTADA — official U.S. Island Records/Universal Music Group site UTADA — official Japanese Island Records/Universal Music Group site U3MUSIC INC — official Utada Hikaru/Utada Message/Blog site Listening Utada Hikaru audio (click headphones to listen to individual tracks) Videos Utada Hikaru Videos Utada Hikaru Albums Japanese: First Love | Distance | DEEP RIVER | ULTRA BLUE Compilation Album: Utada Hikaru SINGLE COLLECTION VOL.1 English: Precious | EXODUS Singles Japanese: Automatic / time will tell | Movin' on without you | First Love Addicted To You | Wait & See ~Risk~ | For You / Time Limit | Can You Keep A Secret? FINAL DISTANCE | traveling | Hikari | SAKURA Drops / Letters COLORS | Dareka no Negai ga Kanau Koro | Be My Last | Passion | Keep Tryin' Digital Single: This Is Love English: Close To You REMIX: Fly Me To The Moon Easy Breezy | Devil Inside | Exodus '04 | You Make Me Want To Be A Man Digital Single: Easy Breezy | Devil Inside The Kingdom Hearts Series Theme Songs Japanese: Hikari | Passion English: Simple and Clean | Sanctuary Various Full discography | Albums | Singles Search Term: "Utada_Hikaru" Categories: 1983 births | Living people | People from New York City | Columbia University alumni | Computer and video game musicians | Japanese Americans | Japanese musicians | Japanese singers | Artists featured on MTV Unplugged | Japanese singer-songwriters | College dropouts | American dance acts | Dance/Club music artists