Iitomo Lyrics(Japanese+Romaji)

https://www.dropbox.com/sh/kdyt6zrzuhlgq11/AADREutAsFC0ZMfWIqhlsEfYa?dl=0

Oricon(September 23)
http://www.oricon.co.jp/rank/js/d/2016-09-23/
1. *3,187 Arashi
2. *2,915 aiko
3. *2,871 Matsuda Seiko
9. **,*** Shiritsu Ebisu Chugaku

Massugu
1st - **,***
2nd - **,***
3rd - **,***
4th - **,***

Weekly result
7. 14,446 Shiritsu Ebisu Chugaku

a pain

Well, the only thing they can do now is blow everyone's minds with the next single to compensate. What I don't want is Mirei getting blamed or something.

It's ok, at least now we can see if Ebichu & Momoclo compete on the same ground this is the result :)

I believe for the next single, if they include their usual 2shot or whatever other gimick, it will be back to their usual number

Lurkette said:

So now we wait and see if they have 2-shot events for the next single, and then see if they bounce back up to the neighborhood of 50k to confirm that that was the only real issue.

I saw your earlier post on that last week, and certainly that could explain a good portion of the loss. But now that we see how pathetic the total is for the whole week, that doesn't add up anymore. I have a hard time believing incentive events could make make up for the 70% loss if were talking about getting back to 50k, or if comparing to superhero, 80% loss (55k units short!). There has got to be more to it than that.

The other thing is, why were there basically no events this time? No tv either? I must have missed the explanation for that. Did they think they would just try it and see what happens? What kind of market research is that? They should know better than that. Heads need to roll in management. It's firing time!

Invader said:

What I don't want is Mirei getting blamed or something.

There it is. Sorry, but if Ebichu is to rebound, that may be unavoidable. The fact is that before this release she was caught in a pretty bad scandal, something anathema for a proper idol. We all know there is a contingent of fans who are pissed about it. And these are the same fans that are more prone to open their wallets in a big way, its the nature of the idol market as I have observed it. I have no doubt sales were affected by this, just a question of how much. I suspect alot, even if there were incentive events this time.

Actually though from what I have been reading, many of these fans just want an apology, some kind of acknowledgement, most of them aren't out for blood. But it's the whole pretending nothing happened, the lack of explanation and apology is further pissing off the type of fans that pay the bills. I believe managements decision on how to handle this made it far worse than it would have been otherwise. It reflects badly on them, and of course on Mirei herself as well unfortunately.

Anyway, as they go into the future it will be interesting to see how this all shakes out. Number one would have been easy this time as momomofu said, too bad about how it all turned out. Let's see what happens next.

http://www.momoiroclover.net/discussion/comment/30668#Comment_30668
(and the following pages)


I don't speak Japanese, so I can't follow 2ch and don't know about the fans' reactions.
momomofu and others can say more about that, so I don't want to speculate
Judging from Lurkette's description about those willing to buy multiple copies for 2shot events and stuff it seems to me that they're not the kind oblivious to matters like these though. And they're the ones stacking up the sales count.
But I'm not sure about the Japanese Ebichu fans demographics there

I do believe though that the total lack of TV appearances had indeed a relation to the scandal (The R no Housoku cancellation being of course obvious)
Japanese media are arch conservative to the bone, and no music program can dare to ignore something like underage drinking.
The producer shrugging that off would get a decent headrubbing to be sure from the higher ranks


Btw Hakoiri Musume's management has issued an apology on behalf of Monika Suganuma and the group
http://hakoiri-musume.com/event/菅沼もにかに関する報告・お詫び/
Suganuma is still listed as a member though and will remain in the agency but seems to have been given a time-off for some "serious soul-searching"


Oh, and to make up for potentially disgruntled fans I have ordered the single and the photobook :)

I like that they stopped doing tokuten, and I hope they keep it up. I also doubt that Mirei's "scandal" had anything to do with the sales numbers (I just can't imagine a significant number of fans getting honestly upset about an 18 yo. having a drink...when I went home drunk out of my mind at that age, the worst my parents threw at me was "try not to drown in your puke, please"...and my parents are actually pretty conservative). The low single sales simply reflect the reality of the age we live in: if you're a musician, you can't expect to make significant money selling your music directly.

And, by the way, the $200,000 or so they're likely to gross on this single isn't cause for concern: that's enough revenue to allow them to keep releasing quality music.

But you can't expect to make a significant PROFIT from doing that. The direct sales are enough to keep producing music, but you have to sell your act indirectly, to make money. It can be through silly "handshake events", or other tricks Lurkette described in detail, or it can be by improving your ability to put on a show in front of a live audience, and selling tickets. So that's what it will come down to: will Ebichu follow MCZ's example, and spend their time improving the quality of their live performances, or will they go back to spending their time shaking hands and taking photos with fans.

Shaking hands to sell singles is easy. Anybody can do it, all you have to do is line up and put on a fake smile for a few hours at a time. Putting on a performance people want to see, on the other hand, is hard. But, if you're good enough to do it, you're set for a long time, and you don't have to worry about the next cheap gimmick stealing your fans. And Ebichu definitely have the talent to put on a good live show. I've heard them sing, and several of their members are spectacular. That's what they should focus on developing, not cheap tricks to sell CDs.