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L'Arc en Ciel's Hyde Expresses Frustration at the State of Japan's Hit Music Charts

Japanese rock band L'Arc en Ciel's lead vocalist HYDE (Hideto Takarai) commented on September 3 regarding his dissatisfaction with the type of music currently reigning over Japan's music charts. He appeared on a Nico Nico TV live broadcast as HYDE from the band VAMPS, where he is also the lead vocalist. During the questions from fans segment he was asked what part of Japan's music scene is making him feel frustrated. HYDE replied that,

"It's annoying that the chart is nothing but anime and idol music. It's not necessarily bad or something like that, but it gives off the feeling that you don't need to work harder than other people. If foreigners look at it, I think they'll get the feeling that it's a very different, strange music chart. That's more or less the culture of Japan, but I want it to go on changing, with more blending for instance."

The voice of the internet rose up with a wide variety of opinions and reasons: some blamed the increase of voice actors' character songs and the generation gap, while others defended that a song originating in an anime or performed by an idol group doesn't mean that it can't also be high quality.

L'Arc en Ciel has many anime songs in their repertoire, however, including "Daybreak's Bells" for Gundam 00's first opening theme, "Ready Steady GO" for Fullmetal Alchemist's second opening theme, and "Honey" for recent ReLIFE's episode 4 ending theme. Their songs "Snow Drop" and "Forbidden Lover" topped Oricon charts in 1998 and their album Butterfly also ranked number one in 2012.

Source:Nijipoi