Kazuya Ninomiya looks back on the “10 years” of “Arashi’s” disappointing period of independence.

I will continue to be a member of Arashi from tomorrow.”

On October 24, Kazuya Ninomiya of Arashi made a surprise announcement of his independence. What worried not only fans but also many others was what would happen to Arashi. In his announcement, he said, “I will continue to be a member of Arashi from tomorrow onward,” and he made it clear that he would remain a member of Arashi even after his independence.

Although the group is currently on hiatus, everyone agrees that Arashi is a group that represents not only the former Johnny’s office but also Japan. However, it is a well-known fact that Arashi has experienced a period of “bad times,” a time when it took a long time for the group to become a full-fledged seller, rather than a national idol group.

There were many months when all I had to do was work on the radio and in idol magazines…

Nevertheless, their debut song “A・RA・SHI” in ’99, in which the group name is called out repeatedly at the end of the chorus, was well known by many people and sold close to one million copies in total. The press conference held in Hawaii to announce the group’s debut on a cruiser also left a vivid impression. Many may wonder, “Hasn’t it been smooth sailing ever since its debut?” However, since then, the debut song has not sold well.

However, since then, the sales of their debut song have been only a little more than one-third of the original sales. Concerts were not sold out, which is unthinkable nowadays, and the members appeared in dramas, but these did not lead to big hits.

Ninomiya once recalled on his radio program that there were many months after their debut when all he had to do was work on the radio and in idol magazines.

When all the members appeared on NHK’s “SONGS” in 1919, they each revealed that they were anxious about this unfavorable period.

Launch of the independent label “J Storm”…but single sales numbers continued to decline.

A major turning point for Arashi came in 2001, the third year of their debut. In November of that year, the independent label “J Storm” (to be renamed “Storm Labels” in January 2012) was launched. As the name “Storm = Arashi” suggests, the company, to which various groups now belong, was initially established as Arashi’s private label.

The members themselves were uneasy about moving from a major label to an indie label, and in the aforementioned “Songs,” Masaki Aiba recalls, “I thought it meant we had no prospects.

The first single after the transfer, “a Day in Our Life,” sampled the intro to Shonen-tai’s hit song “ABC” and used it as a breakbeat, with a rap part running throughout the song. The album was also sold at the low price of 500 yen without any coupling songs.

The song was also used as the theme song for the drama “Kisarazu Cat’s Eye,” and although the drama was a hit, sales of the single were flat before the transfer, and the number of copies sold actually went downhill after that.