“Japan is paying attention to the futures of Tohoshinki and JYJ, the leaders of K-pop in Japan.” “We look forward to the good sense decision of representatives from the national networks.”
Group JYJ, currently undergoing a legal battle with SM Entertainment, has been unable to appear in music programs despite being singers due to the broadcasting channels’ fear of upsetting a large management company. Japanese fans have also been showing intense interest to such a course of events as well. A couple in their forties claiming to be fans of JYJ and Tohoshinki wrote an e-mail to Hankyorek, stating “Japanese fans are uploading Hankyorek’s articles on various blogs and are being read immediately.” Japanese fans are uploading Hankyorek articles, translated into Japanese by Korean fans, on their blogs and twitter accounts.
Many of the Japanese fans were surprised by the serious nature of the current situation. On one Japanese blog, many comments such as “I didn’t know it was so serious” and “will there ever be a time when JYJ can sing freely in this situation?” appeared. There were also comments missing the days when Tohoshinki consisted of five members, stating “regardless of the legal battle between the management company, Tohoshinki members parting from each other hurts my heart.”
Sadness over JYJ’s inability to work in Japan has always been amplified. JYJ had signed on with AVEX, the Japanese management company that had been in charge of Tohoshinki, and worked in Japan, starring in dramas and participating in other activities, but last September, AVEX revealed “we will stop our activities as the three members’ management for the sake of corporate ethics and compliance with laws and regulations,” stopping JYJ’s activities in Japan, their biggest foreign market. In Japan, there are 200,000 Tohoshinki fans that joined AVEX, many of which are JYJ fans. One Japanese citizen living in Korea stated, “in Japan, more fans are concerned about JYJ first solving their relationship with AVEX and with SME second.”
There’s been intense interest in JYJ because Tohoshinki’s activities (activities which occurred when Tohoshinki consisted of five members) are responsible for the K-Pop craze in Japan. Tohoshinki’s 29th single “Break Out,” released January, 2009, sold 256,000 copies in its first week and Tohohsinki became the first foreign artist to sell over 200,000 albums in its first week of release. In 2009, according to Oricon’s analysis of the year’s sales figures, Tohoshinki ranked third with 6.8 billion yen, following Arashi and Exile.
During an interview with Hankyorek last September, Yakimoto Yasushi, a Japanese showbiz representative stated, “the current Kpop craze is largely due to Tohoshinki’s success. More people are interested in Korean singers and Korean girl groups have become popular because of Tohoshinki.”
Original article : hani.co.kr
Translation. withjyj (@_withjyj)
No comments:
Post a Comment