ich1heavens reblogged your post and added:
Okay, since you reblogged me, I’m going to assume you have good knowledge about Japanese entertainment industry.
You claimed that Kpop acts could only appear in Music Station only if they’re popular with the general public in Japan—means if they have hit song. Fine.
You claimed that Tohoshinki hasn’t been popular with general public since Doushite (fact, their biggest hit is actually Share The World). Then your logic is it’s totally abnormal if they still make appearance on MS since they don’t have a hit song which general public like.
Alright. Let me give you another facts.
In 2011-mid 2012, Toho appeared on MS 5 times with songs that are not as popular/hit as Share The World/Doushite. Those songs are Keep Your Head Down, Superstar, B.U.T., Android and Still.
KYHD certified Platinum, Superstar and BUT certified gold, meanwhile Android and Still were never certified digitally by RIAJ. Apparently, Tohoshinki could appear there even without hit song liked by general public, as it’s proven through their Android and Still appearances on MS.
Now, looking through RIAJ songs certification, you can see that Catch Me, another gold certification song, couldn’t make them appear in MS.
How does it possible?two non-certified songs could bring Toho to MS, but why a gold certified song like Catch Me couldn’t?
The only plausible conclusion is that the reason why Toho couldn’t appear on MS is NOT because their songs are not popular with the public, because even without popular songs in the public, they could make appearances in MS.
You’re doing a straw man thing here to circularly prove your point.
Typically artists will be invited to perform on Music Station a week or more before the physical release date of the song (this varies a bit with the release date since MS is usually broadcast every Friday). There are some artists who are invited onto the show after the song has been released because the song went viral like Carly Rae Jepsen and “Call Me Maybe”, but how well the single sold generally doesn’t affect whether or not they perform that specific song. It determines whether they make subsequent performances following that success. It’s supposed to be promotion for the release rather than a top 10 concert.
So it makes sense to me that their appearance doesn’t necessarily line up with the actual sales figures. The momentum from their messy public break-up with JYJ/subsequent make-over as a duo/”Superstar” was what gave them the chance to be on MS again because people were interested, so they performed “ANDROID” and “Still” even though they didn’t necessarily sell as well. But their popularity still hasn’t recovered with the general public, and now they have to earn their spot on the show just like everyone else.
Or maybe it wasn’t their fault. Maybe more veteran artists released something that week even though they technically got the #1 (I’m too lazy to see who even performed/released stuff those weeks), or maybe they decided to go with someone who suddenly performed really well digitally and was making rounds on other TV shows as a “budding star”, and now they need a big hit to ‘justify’ a return. There’s not really an exact science to it and there’s definitely a lot of politicking involved behind the scenes of choosing artists that they don’t share.
Basically I think the answer is a lot more complicated and boring than the picture you’re trying to paint of Koreans being discriminated against. I do admit that I forgot about “Share The World” though; I guess it felt like cheating since it was a One Piece theme song.
