@orkxxv I don't think Elvarth ever said they weren't popular before KnY though, lol. He's just pointing out the statistics that show all of these artists' most successful songs are the ones they did for KnY.
The guy who said "unpopular artists" I kind of agree with though. It's obviously a bit of an exaggeration - any artist signed under a major label and in the music industry is "popular." But when I think of "popular" I'm thinking YOSAOBI, Ado, King Gnu, Vaundy, Lisa, Eve, Hikaru Utada etc. - huge sales, streaming, and charting figures. You say MY FIRST STORY is well known in Japan, but their discography is lacking the stats to back that up. Their last charting song was from 3 years ago (it is their biggest song though and has done well); their albums have abysmally low first week sales, and none of their songs or albums are certified.
Yes, HYDE's band was extremely popular, but their last studio album was over a decade ago, their last charting song, similarly to MY FIRST STORY, was 3 years ago, and they have no presence on Spotify. HYDE himself similarly has no presence on Spotify, his solo stuff did well 20 years ago, but in current day he hasn't charted a single in 4 years, with his biggest song on there being Red Swan, the AOT Opening. At the very least, these are artists who don't have recent success. Like Man with a Mission x Milet's Kizuna no Kiseki has already out-streamed and out-viewed each of these artists' biggest songs in less than a year on both Spotify and Youtube respectively - and this is the lowest performing opening from KnY.
Don't get me wrong, this isn't an attack on either artist, I'm just looking at this objectively based on the data. I'm VERY excited for this opening and to see what these artists do, especially given the song title and what the song's about. (Also people who've gone to see the movie already have been raving about it). I think some people are just wondering why ufotable isn't picking up the giants in the industry. To me it's pretty common sense: take the biggest anime in recent history and pair it with one of the biggest artists in recent history = Instant #1 and the biggest song of the year (or decade). It's clear to me that what they're trying to do is use KnY to bolster the popularity of these artists. Ufotable seems to have some deal with Sony Music JP, as all openings and endings have exclusively used artists signed under that label. Although oddly enough, MY FIRST STORY isn't signed under Sony Music, so this is the first time a non-Sony artist is doing an opening, but it is with HYDE who is a Sony Music artist so that might be why they were invited to be on it. |