Utada Hikaru is one of Japan’s most successful artists of all time. Her debut album, First Love, is the best-selling album ever in Japan with over 7.65 million copies sold in Japan alone. She has sold over 41 million records worldwide (with over 34 million in Japan). Moreover, 3 of her albums are in the Top 10 best-selling album of all time in Japan (#1, #4, #8), making her one of the most indefinitely successful and popular singers in JPop history.
She is bilingual as she was raised in both New York and Tokyo. Utada Hikaru is also known in the west under her English language project name ‘Utada’. Originally, Utada’s music had a heavy R&B style to it, but now her music has progressed to a more pop / experimental tone. Her R&B sound was what brought her so much attention with her first release in Japan, “Automatic / time will tell”, as there were no other artists with her distinct style. Utada was married to director Kiriya Kazuaki, who directed the movie CASSHERN, but in March of 2007 they annouced that they had divorced. Currently in Japan she has album sales totaling 24 million copies, singles sales of 15.1 million copies and VHS/DVD sales estimated 3 million copies sold.
