This article's factual accuracy may be compromised due to out-of-date information. Please help update this article to reflect recent events or newly available information.(January 2011)
January 22 – Voice actressNana Mizuki reached #1 on the Oricon single charts with her single "Phantom Minds", making her the first voice actress in charting history to have a #1 single (she broke this record for the album charts in 2009 with Ultimate Diamond).[4]
January 23 – The mother of Hello! Project/Avex musician Maki Goto, Tokiko Goto, falls from her home and dies. The resulting funeral on January 28 is heavily publicised, with many Hello! Project-associated people attending the funeral.[5][6]
January 29 – R&B singer Double announces her return to musical activities, after last year going on hiatus due to illness.[7]
February 3 – One Ok Rock release their first single since their hiatus, "Kanzen Kankaku Dreamer." The band went on hiatus in May 2009 due to guitarist Alex's arrest for assault, who is now no longer a member of the band.[10][11]
February 10 – Rapper You the Rock was arrested for cannabis possession, after 2mgs of dried cannabis, along with related cannabis paraphernalia such as a pipe, were found at his home in Meguro, Tokyo.[13]
February 15 – R&B singer Shion has her trial for possession/use of the drug ketamine. She pleaded guilty, and was given a one-year sentence, suspended for three years.[14]
February 22 – Mika Nakashima's song "Always" is the first song released in 2010 to receive a digital certification. It was certified gold by the RIAJ for Chaku-Uta Full (cellphone digital downloads) for the January 2010 period.[15]
February 23 – Korean boy band Tohoshinki's first greatest hits album, Best Selection 2010, sells 413,000 copies in its first week. This gives the band their first #1 album, as well as breaking the record for the highest first week sales by a foreign group. The previous record holder was Bon Jovi's These Days in 1995, with 379,000 copies.[18]
February 24 – The 24th Japan Gold Disc Awards are held in Tokyo. Arashi wins the domestic Artist of the Year award, making them the first Johnny's boyband to win this award. Hilcrhyme wins the New Artist of the Year award.[19]
March 7 – Idol group Idoling!!! announces five new members to their line-up, after auditions were held on March 6. The new members are Kaoru Gotō (後藤郁), Yūna Itō (伊藤祐奈), Ruka Kurata (倉田瑠夏), Manami Nomoto (野元愛) and Chika Ojima (尾島知佳), all between 13 and 15 years of age. Approximately 5,000 girls auditioned for the group.[20]
March 9 – Boy band Arashi's "Troublemaker" sells 542,000 copies in its first week, making it the current #1 single of the year.[21]
March 9 – Kōichi Nakamura (中村耕一), vocalist of the 1980s rock band Jaywalk, was arrested for illegal stimulant possession. The band was put into hiatus, with their 30th anniversary releases/events cancelled and their contract with Warner Music Japan nulled.[22]
March 20 – Shonen Knife's drummer Etsuko Nakanishi retires from the band after five years, during the band's 13th Fandango concert (十三ファンダンゴ) in Osaka.[25]
March 24 – Hiro, leader of R&B group Exile, became the centre of a tax enquiry after failing to report approximately ¥300,000,000 in earnings at his entertainment production company LDH. Hiro later stated the discrepancy was unintentional.[28][29]
March 25 – Hip-hop/reggae group Spontania add singer Kaori Natori as a permanent female vocalist to their line-up. The band's first release as a three-member group was a digital single, "Now or Never," released 8 days earlier without any indication of the line-up change.[30][31]
March 29 – Soh of the band Greeeen passes his National Dentistry Examination exam, making all members of the group certified dentists. Bandmates Hide and 92 passed the exam in 2008, while Navi passed it in 2009.[32]
March 30 – Akira Akasaka, former member of Johnny's idol group Hikaru Genji, was sentenced to 18 months in prison for using illegal stimulants. His prison sentence was increased to a period of three years, however, due to his previous suspended sentence for possession of stimulants in November 2007.[33]
April
Boyband Tohoshinki went on an indefinite hiatus, followed by the announcement of a three-member subunit (made of Jejung, Junsu and Yuchun).
April 3 – Avex Management announce the hiatus of Korean boyband Tohoshinki's activities in Japan. The band's solo activities continued, with the Jejung starring drama Sunao ni Narenakute airing in mid April, and Junsu's solo debut single announced for release in May.[35][36][37]
April 16 – Japanese media begin levelling accusations against the public relations theme song for Shanghai Expo 2010, "Ėrlíngyīlíng Děng Nǐ Lái" (2010 等你来 2010 Right Here Waiting for You), as being plagiarised from a 1997 song by Mayo Okamoto, "Sono Mama no Kimi de Ite." The executive committee for the event later admitted the song had been plagiarised by the songwriter Miao Senshi (繆森氏), and Okamoto gave permission for the rights for her song to be used.[42][43]
April 17 – The music video is from Uverworld's single, "Gold," is premiered today, making it the first 3D music video released by a Japanese artist.[44][45][46]
April 20 – Kana Nishino's song "Best Friend" becomes the first song released in 2010 to receive a double platinum digital certification. The song had been downloaded over 500,000 times as a ringtone (Chaku-Uta) since its release in late February.[47]
April 27 – Kazumasa Oda's greatest hits album Jiko Best charts for its 400th week, since its release in 2002. As of 2010, no other album has charted long enough to reach this milestone.[48]
May
American pop singer Lady Gaga's album The Fame becomes one of only four Western albums since 2008 to receive a multi-platinum certification.
May 4 – The second theme songs for the anime K-On!, "Go! Go! Maniac" and "Listen!!" (performed by the fictional band Ho-kago Tea Time[broken anchor]) reached #1 and #2 respectively on Oricon's single charts. This is the first time that a release credited to anime characters has topped the singles charts.[51]
May 10 – The Brilliant Green announces at their official sit the leaving of guitarist Ryo Matsui from the band's line-up. The band plans to continue on as a duo.[54]
May 21 – Kana Nishino's "Aitakute Aitakute" reaches #1 on the RIAJ Digital Track Chart, making this Nishino's fourth consecutive #1 song on the chart. Because of this, Nishino becomes the artist with most #1 songs on the chart, as well as becoming the artist with most weeks at #1 (with seven weeks in total).[61]
May 22 – Erika Sawajiri returns to the music scene, with a performance at the fashion and music event Girls Award 2010 held at the Yoyogi National Gymnasium. She had been on hiatus for two and a half years, due to the controversy around her comments at a press conference for the film Closed Note.[62]
May 25 – Boyband Arashi's single "Monster" sells 543,000 copies in its first week, making it the biggest selling first week of a single in 2010. The single beat out the sales of the group's previous single, "Troublemaker," by only 1,000 copies.[63]
June 1 – Boyband Tohoshinki member Xiah Junsu's single "Xiah" sells 195,000 copies in its first week, becoming the biggest first week sales of the year by a solo artist.[67]
June 4 – July 13 – Visual kei metal band Versailles embark on their first world tour, with dates in South America and Europe.[68][69] The band have previously performed single concerts in the US in 2008.
June 15 – Kaela Kimura reaches #1 on Oricon's single charts with her song "Ring a Ding Dong," making this the first time she has topped the single charts since she debuted in 2004.[73]
June 19–20 – Jin Akanishi, member of the boyband KAT-TUN, performed three concerts in Los Angeles as a part of his You & Jin solo tour. This is the first solo performance by a Johnny's artist in the US. Further concerts over the United States are planned for September and October.[74] Consequently, Akanishi did not attend KAT-TUN's Asian tour.[75]
June 20 – Kaela Kimura's song "Ring a Ding Dong" is certified by the RIAJ for 1,000,000 ringtone downloads between its release date, May 26, and the end of May.[76]
June 25 – Ai Otsuka married RIP SLYME member SU.[77] The announcement of the marriage had been released on her official website on June 26.[78]
June 28 – Otonamode will play their final live with their current line-up. After this date, vocalist/guitarist Keita Takahashi will continue on as the band's lead, however with different members.[79]
Currently, there are four major charts for song popularity in Japan: Oricon singles charts, Soundscan singles charts, the BillboardJapan Hot 100 and RIAJ digital tracks. Oricon and Soundscan track sales of physical single releases, though Soundscan separates each version of the release (for example, CD+DVD and CD Only versions are tracked separately). The Japan Hot 100 tracks song popularity based on radio airplay and physical single sales data from Soundscan. The RIAJ digital chart tracks the most popular songs downloaded in their entirety from cellphones (Chaku-uta full). No chart exists that tallies PC downloads as of 2010, though the RIAJ certifies PC download releases.
"—" denotes that the song was not released in that format, or it did not chart. "TBA" denotes that the song has not been released yet in this format, at the time of writing.
↑ "Versailles World Tour 2010". Versailles-Philharmonic Quintet's MySpace Blog. February 5, 2010. Archived from the original on February 8, 2010. Retrieved February 16, 2010.
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