Single AKB48 42nd [Kuchibiru ni Be My Baby] 15/12/09

I also remember times when this board went ballistic after they first time beat Arashi sales.
I swear grass was greener back in 2010 in AKB fandom land.

 

It's more than obvious many out there and on this site actually do want to see AKB fail.

There's a kind of sadistic joy people get from seeing people suffer,

However, there are also a rather big portion that simply want AKB to do better, this is why we keep seeing constant discussion on "what should AKB do from this point on?", "how to better focus on next gen?", etc etc.

 

Just hours after it became clear on 12/15 that Kuchibiru ni Be My Baby broke the first week million streak that had existed since Everyday Kachuusha (2011), management acted and added the AKB-only handshake event on 4/24. With that, it was already clear that the overall million streak would continue. Just the first week million streak (2011 - 2015) was lost. I quote.

With the 12/27 daily sales being 60.795 copies, the 4/24 AKB-only handshake event brought the number of sales management that had expected from that handshake event in order to reach the million. But considering that the whole 3rd week (12/29) added 71.000 copies of sales to a total of roughly 1.002.000 copies sold, you can see how AKB48 almost did not not make the million in time for the Japan Record Award (12/30) and the NHK Kouhaku (12/31).

So, after all that drama, I think it is quite clear that management escaped embarassmet by only a hair's breadth. Still the old problems still exist, nothing has been solved. The AKB next generation that is supposed to take over from their senpais was never a high priority for management. Instead of management placing them in senbatsu, we currently face an exodus of the AKB48 new generation that continues unabated. With the AKB-only handshake event, management only managed to patch up some of the symptoms, but didn't adress the problems at all in the following 43rd single. Besides management keeping their prized kennin members in AKB senbatsu for the 43rd single, they even added graduates. I am personally happy about seeing them again, but this simply does nothing to adress the problem in the long term.

The long term problem is that the AKB new generation can't fill the shoes of the old generation, at least not at the rate that is necessary to keep up the million streak, because management just doesn't bother with them. Let's face it, a graduation from among the current top handshake ticket sellers would hurt management so they put off their graduations, but the n-th graduation from the AKB48 new generation does not hurt them one bit.

At this point, I really wonder how many copies AKB48 would sell without sister groups propping up AKB48's singles. If you took away the kennins from management, if you took away all the sister group members from handshake events and look at the number an AKB-only single would sell, management's total failure in the transition from the AKB old generation to the AKB new generation would be quite obvious, I fear.

But I guess as long as the nominal number of 1.000.000 still stands, management considers their designs to be successful. And it's true, it's hard to argue against success. But that doesn't mean that any and all criticism should simply be discounted. End of rant.

 

Multi format sales. It's still the only 48g single to sell multiple times its physical sales in a digital format. IIRC it's also like the 4th or 5th highest selling multiformat single in Japan ever

Sent from my SM-N920T using Tapatalk

 

CDTV 1/1


if the video does not show watch the video here

EDIT Backup thanks to @IXS48

 

Where was Takamina in the CDTV performance?

 

Love Yui performing.... so energetic =]
question: was that a kiss between sae and Yukirin??sooo cute

 

I quote myself from the 43rd single thread: "They interviewed Takamina before AKB48's performance on Kouhaku today, and she confirmed that said TV performance would be her last one as an AKB48 member."

 

Lol at mayuyu and sasshi fouling up their entrance for 365 I really like those two as a pairing! They play well off each other

 

hello...
Who is the one next to Harukyan in the watering-plant scene in Team K MV? She looks so young...

 

That would be Ichikawa Manami.

 

AKB48's 42nd Single (4th Week Sales)
Week 4: 8,440 (1,010,518) (4th)

 

it is good for a nearly-miss-million single, isn't it?
The sales look as if there are more hs events?

 

B-side is alright.
I'm not particularly a fan of the A-Side though.

 

Any oricon reports yet praising that the million streak is still alive? lol

 

Yes, last week

EDIT: I think, I vaguely remember there was... Yeah, I'm sure there was

 

I noticed that this single is the best selling second and third week for any AKB single this year (and I believe of all time as well?) I know the third week received a lot of sales from the newly announced handshake event but the second week selling 20,000 is still impressive.

 

I mean is anyone really surprised that it's selling this way? 365nichi is now ranking on DAM Karaoke (#32 last time I checked)

But honestly it's actually doing pretty terribly for a NHK asadora song.

 

on the bright side: it's doing really well on Recochoku~~I haven't seen it drop from the Top 5 in awhile and it's been over a month since it's release date, right.

 

Second week wasn't impressive but a slight improvement over recent releases and third week was because of the extra events, like mentioned above.

I don't know how popularity of a song translates to Oricon sales because I don't see other artists with big hits making that much of an impression on Oricon charts.