''E-Side'' is the debut English-language EP (second overall) by Japanese duo

Yoasobi Yoasobi is a Japanese pop duo formed in 2019. It consists of musician and record producer Ayase (music producer), Ayase and singer-songwriter Lilas Ikuta, under the moniker Ikura. With the slogan "novel into music", the duo originally released Y ...

. It was released on November 12, 2021, through

Sony Music Entertainment Japan , often abbreviated as SMEJ or simply SME, and also known as Sony Music Japan for short (stylized as ''SonyMusic''), is a Japanese music arm for Sony. Founded in 1968 as CBS/Sony, SMEJ is directly owned by Sony, Sony Group Corporation and is ...

. The EP consists of eight tracks from the duo's songs in the

English language English is a West Germanic language that developed in early medieval England and has since become a English as a lingua franca, global lingua franca. The namesake of the language is the Angles (tribe), Angles, one of the Germanic peoples th ...

, including their previous-release singles " Into the Night", "

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", "

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", and "

Blue Blue is one of the three primary colours in the RYB color model, RYB colour model (traditional colour theory), as well as in the RGB color model, RGB (additive) colour model. It lies between Violet (color), violet and cyan on the optical spe ...

". Konnie Aoki is in charge of translating all tracks into English. Commercially, ''E-Side'' debuted at number 19 on the

Oricon Combined Albums Chart The is a record chart released weekly by Oricon, a major provider of information on the Japanese music industry. First published on December 24, 2018, it ranks the top fifty albums through an album-equivalent unit, equivalent unit system based on ...

and number nine on the ''Billboard Japan'' Hot Albums.

Background

Yoasobi released their first English-language song, titled " Into the Night" on July 2, 2021, which was translated from the duo's "Yoru ni Kakeru" by Konnie Aoki. It was peaked at number 44 on the

Oricon Combined Singles Chart The is a record chart released weekly by Oricon, a major provider of information on the Japanese music industry. First published on December 24, 2018, it ranks the top fifty singles in Japan based on an album-equivalent unit system factoring phys ...

, and number two on the Digital Singles Chart. Later, they also released "

" from "Sangenshoku" on July 16, "

" from "Kaibutsu" on July 30, and "

" from "Gunjō" on October 29, the same day as ''E-Side'' announcement. All tracks debuted on the Oricon Digital Singles Chart at number ten, eleven, and thirteen, respectively. The duo revealed on their radio show, ' that the EP title ''E-Side'' was decided by

Nippon Broadcasting System , or JOLF, is a Japanese radio station based in Yurakucho, Chiyoda ward, Tokyo, headquartered near the Tokyo Imperial Palace. It is also the main company of the Nippon Broadcasting Group. Nippon Broadcasting System is a subsidiary of Fu ...

. According to Ayase in a ''

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'' interview, the meanings of the songs had not been changed in the EP and that Yoasobi was trying to appeal to overseas fans. In a ''

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'' interview in February 2022, Yoasobi said that they take into consideration the sound structure to choose the songs to make an English version. They said that the songs they chose should not interfere with the original and should still be able to be understood in English.

Release and promotion

Yoasobi announced their first English-language EP, titled ''E-Side'' on October 29, 2021, the same day as "Blue" release, alongside its track listing, and cover artwork, scheduled for release on November 12 to

digital music Digital audio is a representation of sound recorded in, or converted into, digital form. In digital audio, the sound wave of the audio signal is typically encoded as numerical samples in a continuous sequence. For example, in CD audio, samp ...

and

streaming Streaming media refers to multimedia delivered through a network for playback using a media player. Media is transferred in a ''stream'' of packets from a server to a client and is rendered in real-time; this contrasts with file downl ...

platforms only, as part of "Yoasobi Nice to Meet You Countdown" to announce the duo's new information every Friday for ten weeks until their one-off concert Nice to Meet You. The cover artwork of ''E-Side'' depicts a red pixel art on the bottom of the gray background with darker gray pixels and places the duo's slogan "Novel into Music" below the EP's title, designed by Mina Sakurai. The EP contains four previous-release English songs, and four new English-translated songs: " Haven't" from "Tabun", "

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" from "Yasashii Suisei, " Encore", and " Tracing a Dream" from "Ano Yume o Nazotte". The duo uploaded the EP's snippets as the " crossfade movie" on November 7. The full song of "Comet", and "Tracing a Dream" were played for the first time at their radio show ''Yoasobi's All Night Nippon X'' on November 10, due to asking fans via Twitter poll. The accompanying music videos of the all new tracks were premiered alongside the EP release since midnight JST. LED billboards for advertising the EP were also placed in

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Commercial performance

In Japan, ''E-Side'' entered the

at number 19 and debuted atop the Digital Albums Chart, selling 3,305 units. The EP entered ''Billboard Japan'' Hot Albums at number nine. It opened with 2,847 digital sales, charting number two on the Download Albums, behind only

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's '' An Evening with Silk Sonic'', which debuted atop with 2,891 digital sales.

Track listing

Notes * All tracks are noted as "English version" in some music streaming services.

Credits and personnel

Credits adapted from the official website. * Ayase – songwriter, producer * Ikura – vocals * Konnie Aoki – English translation

Charts

Weekly charts

Year-end charts

Sales

Release history

References

{{Yoasobi 2021 EPs Albums produced by Ayase (music producer) English-language Japanese albums Sony Music Entertainment Japan EPs Yoasobi EPs