[6/19] Berryz Kobo 32nd single: Golden Chinatown / Sayonara Usotsuki no Watashi

[koregaboku]

I mean Sayonara Usotsuki is easily better than Asian Celebration and WANT! but is dragged down by the sub-par quality of Golden Chinatown... but still not anywhere near the level of all the other H!P groups.

[Sohee]

Maybe the success is rubbing off from other H!P groups.

I'm convinced this is it. Which definitely isn't a bad thing, it's how it works.

[Rm88]

I love Chinatown (and for all I care Usotsuki doesn't exist), but yeah, I wouldn't be surprised if H!P becoming more popular as a whole is what made this single so... out-of-nowhere-successful

[wotakubrandon]

I like how when y'all don't like a song you look for reasons outside of it being good as to why it's successful.

[Sohee]

I love Sayonara usotsuki no watashi and as a song Golden Chinatown isn't awful but just barely okay.
But.
Uh. It's being MORE successful than their singles usually are, even if not by much and while yes they do events, I doubt that's all there is. H!P as a whole IS getting more fans lately and Cute and MM are popular + Momochi. It'd be kinda silly to think that doesn't matter at all?

[Rm88]

I like how when y'all don't like a song you look for reasons outside of it being good as to why it's successful.

Man, I'm listening to Chinatown right now and it's my favorite Berryz song since cha cha SING, but I don't think it's farfetched to think H!P becoming more popular as a whole can improve everyone's numbers. Of course it wouldn't be such a Berryz-success if people didn't like the song in the first place.

[wotakubrandon]

These backhanded compliments. My favorite Berryz song in a year and just barely okay?

Of course H!P doing well will have a positive effect on the sales numbers but if S/mileage new single does well people wouldn't have said it was because H!P as whole is more popular.

[koregaboku]

H!P being more popular would be helpful but it's also helpful that UF* took a lengthy promotional step by having their Yattaruchan campaign all over the Osaka/Kansai area.

If Adam&Eve/Kanashiki Heaven does really well we could probably contribute it partially to C-ute having steadily rising sales (with Kono Machi being an outlier). But C-ute has also been getting a bunch of buzz because of Budokan.

These outside factors is something Berryz lack. Yeah they got the Budokan announcement but they haven't really done anything about it yet nor did Chinatown/Sayonara get a huge promotional campaign. And yes while good songs help, it's not the end all of sales. Hell, each of us could probably name an artist or two (or more) that we think have fantastic songs yet are constantly on the edge of being dropped by their label, or have been dropped completely. Berryz get name dropped by association for being in H!P along with Momochi always being on TV and having Berryz written in tiny letters above or below her name are the only thing we as fans can think of as giving Berryz more exposure and as a result better sales.

[DadaPaPa]

We already saw with Michishige and Platinum Era that having a member being always on TV doesn't do much for the group she's in... Momochi and Michishige are seen as tarentos rather than Idols. And the major part of the audience of the shows she's in can't really be considered "potential wotas".

Besides, simply by seeing "Berryz工房" I hardly imagine anybody unfamiliar with H!P seeing a connection to MM or C-ute or that something like Hello!Project even exists... Unless Momochi throws that around in every show she's in.

The reason I think this single sold better is actually because of the Budokan announcement... Not because of the little media exposure it gave them but... to be frank, what Tsunku told the fans when he went on stage was basically "Buy more Berryz singles!"...

[claneksi]

I always thought MM and Berryz as two of the most known names of H!P by general public, followed by S/mileage, and then C-ute as the least known.