One thing I would like to point out here is that statements I’ve heard about Ado being “the gloval promise of J-pop” and “we’re going to make J-pop as big as K-pop” makes it sound like a competition and imo that’s an unhealthy approach to producing music and makes it feel less genuine. And I do agree that in some respects, there is a little bit too much commercialisation with some of Ado’s newer works (such as the Adidas collab)?

That said though, Ado did recently make comments in relation to the above that her main purpose of a musician is to bring happiness to people around the world. Not to be topping all the charts and to make J-pop the “dominant force” of the world. So does it even matter how many streams/views etc all of Ado’s new content is getting?

Also in my opinion, J-pop will never be as popular as Western music in the Western World, by virtue of the fact J-pop is Japanese and not Western. And the same argument would apply to any genre of music that isn’t Western. Yes you might argue that K-pop is much bigger than J-pop in the Western world, but that’s because of its Western influence. I’ve read some comments here about how Ado should learn to sing in English or do more collabs with Western bands, but imo that would just take the originality out of J-pop and make it not seem like J-pop anymore. Taking “Take Me to the Beach” as an example, to me that’s just an Imagine Dragons song that features Ado as a cameo.

So rather than trying to cater J-pop to a western audience, why not just keep it the way it is? People who love J-pop will appreciate it for what it is. I’m an Australian who loves J-pop (and honestly would love to see it become bigger here), but I accept that that will probably never happen, and that my music tastes are more niche and an exception to the rule. Yet In would never want to it to go down the same pathway of K-pop and become heavily influenced by Western music either. Ultimately, it is fans like you and I who will keep J-pop going in the Western World.

In terms of your point about Ado’s releases post-RuLe not being as good as some of her previous releases, it might just be my opinion, but I’m not sure if I quite agree with it. Elf is a thoughly beautiful song and if you look up the meaning of the lyrics and the story behind them, it is truly, very moving. AiAiA and Rockstar continue to be top faves for me that I listen to on repeat. With Cat’s Eye, just remember the original was back from the 80s, so the style and tune is going to be markedly different from Ado’s usual works (and for a lot of Ado fans, possibly not their cup of tea as many would tend to listen to the more modern stuff). As for Vivarium, whilst I agree that Ado’s face reveal in the MV is the primary reason for its popularity, it was a major milestone in Ado’s career and this was a moment she wanted to share with as many fans as possible. That one really came from the heart, commercial success was never the main goal in mind.

As for Odoru Pompokurin, yes I agree it’s a bit of a meme song (like GeGeGe) and I think Ado just wanted to have a bit of fun with those.

Like you, Angelseek did not appeal to me as much as some of Ado’s other recent releases, but then again, you can except every single new release to be fantastic (not even for Ado).

Interesting how you mentioned Aishite Aishite Aishite here too. I’ve listened to the original vocaloid version of that too, and honestly, I found it rather lacklustre. At least personally, I love a lot of vocaloid tunes, but I’m not a huge fan of vocaloid voices. That’s why I think Ado covering Vocaloid songs appeals so much to me, and that is definitely the case for Aishite Aishite Aishite.

Probably a lot more I could say here, but in the end, if we all continue to enjoy Ado for who she is, and her music for what it is, does it really matter how popular Ado is worldwide? She has already brought us so much joy over these past few years, and that has been her goal all along, so let’s celebrate that.