How To Be A Girl
   HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

"How to Be a Girl" is the tenth single by Japanese recording artist
Namie Amuro Namie Amuro ( ; ; born September 20, 1977) is a retired Japanese singer. She rose to prominence as a Japanese idol, teen idol, and transitioned into a leading Pop music, pop artist due to her versatility across music styles and visual presentatio ...
. It was released on May 21, 1997, through
Avex Trax is a record label owned by Japanese entertainment conglomerate Avex Inc. The label was launched in September 1990, and was the first label by the Group. History Two years after Max Matsuura began a career distributing studio albums from othe ...
. It was used as the
Bristol-Myers The Bristol-Myers Squibb Company, doing business as Bristol Myers Squibb (BMS), is an American multinational pharmaceutical company. Headquartered in Princeton, New Jersey, BMS is one of the world's largest pharmaceutical companies and consiste ...
Sea Breeze A sea breeze or onshore breeze is a wind that blows in the afternoon from a large body of water toward or onto a landmass. By contrast, a land breeze or offshore breeze is a wind that blows in the night from a landmass toward or onto a large ...
commercial song, which was used for four commercials. The style of the song is similar to that of her single "
A Walk in the Park "A Walk in the Park" is the eighth single by Japanese recording artist Namie Amuro from her third studio album '' Concentration 20'' (1997). The song was released as the album's lead single on November 27, 1996, by Avex Trax. It was written, compo ...
," which has an evident
electronic Electronic may refer to: *Electronics, the science of how to control electric energy in semiconductors * ''Electronics'' (magazine), a defunct American trade journal *Electronic storage, the storage of data using an electronic device *Electronic c ...
sound in the vein of her producer
Tetsuya Komuro is a Japanese musician, songwriter and record producer. He is recognized as the most successful producer in Japanese music history and has introduced contemporary electronic dance music to the Japanese mainstream. He was also a former owner of t ...
's group
globe A globe is a spherical Earth, spherical Model#Physical model, model of Earth, of some other astronomical object, celestial body, or of the celestial sphere. Globes serve purposes similar to maps, but, unlike maps, they do not distort the surface ...
. Lyrics were even written by Marc Panther, who is another member of the group. This was the final single from her third studio album ''
Concentration 20 ''Concentration 20'' is the third studio album by Japanese singer Namie Amuro. It was released on July 24, 1997, by Avex Trax. The album's musical style is a fusion of genres including pop, dance, rock, reggae and ska. Unlike Amuro's previous eff ...
'' (1997), which was released two months later. The single is a follow-up to " Can You Celebrate?", which became her biggest hit. This single reached number one on the weekly
Oricon Singles Chart The Oricon Singles Chart is the Japanese music industry-standard Single (music), singles popularity chart issued daily, weekly, monthly and yearly by Oricon. Chart rankings are based on physical singles' sales. Until 2017, Oricon did not track down ...
for two consecutive weeks, and continued to rank for a total of eleven weeks. "How to Be a Girl" sold 772,130 copies, becoming the twenty-third best-selling single in Japan of 1997. According to Avex, this is Amuro's first number one single to not sell over a million copies.


Background and composition

Marc Panther and Komuro co-wrote the lyrics, with Panther writing the basic lyrics first and Komuro finishing them at the same time he was working on the composition. The singing sessions were conducted slowly over a period of two days. The concept was intended to be "a rock song that can be danced to."
角川書店 , formerly , is a Japanese publisher and division of Kadokawa Future Publishing based in Tokyo, Japan. It became an internal division of Kadokawa Corporation on October 1, 2013. Kadokawa publishes manga, light novels, manga anthology magazines s ...
刊「 CDでーた」1997年6月5日号「安室奈美恵 新曲『How to be a Girl』発表 '97年型ダンサブル・ロック」16Pより。


Music video

In the music video, Amuro changes her clothes in five different ways. The filming took place at Shintomichō Station on Sunday before the last train without permission. The set used was also created in one day before the shoot.
日経BP , commonly known as , is a book and magazine publisher based in Tokyo, Japan. The company was established as , a joint venture of Nihon Keizai Shimbun (Nikkei) and McGraw-Hill in 1969, and it became a wholly owned subsidiary of Nikkei in 1988. Ni ...
刊「 日経エンタテインメント!」1998年1月号「小室哲哉インタビュー 4年連続ナンバー1プロデューサー 米国移住の真相を語る」57Pより。
The choreography by
Kaba-chan , born on June 19, 1969, in Yanagawa, Fukuoka, is a transgender woman who is a Japanese tarento and choreographer. After studying dance in New York City, she returned to Japan and was a member of the musical group Dos with Taeco Nishikawa and ...
, a well-known former member of the three-member music group
dos DOS (, ) is a family of disk-based operating systems for IBM PC compatible computers. The DOS family primarily consists of IBM PC DOS and a rebranded version, Microsoft's MS-DOS, both of which were introduced in 1981. Later compatible syste ...
, was also a popular topic of interest.


Commercial performance

"How to Be a Girl" debuted at number one on the
Oricon Singles Chart The Oricon Singles Chart is the Japanese music industry-standard Single (music), singles popularity chart issued daily, weekly, monthly and yearly by Oricon. Chart rankings are based on physical singles' sales. Until 2017, Oricon did not track down ...
, with 328,560 copies sold in its first week. It stayed at number one for a second week with 162,340 copies sold. The single dropped to number four the following week, selling 88,600 copies. During its fourth week of availability the single stayed at number four with 65,660 copies sold. "How to Be a Girl" single stayed in the top ten one last week, ranking at number nine and selling 41,380 copies on its fifth week of availability. Afterwards, it dropped to number 16 on its sixth charting week and out of the top twenty entirely the following week. It charted in the top 100 for eleven weeks, selling a reported total of 772,130 copies. "How to be a Girl" ranked at number 23 on the year-end Oricon Singles Chart for 1997 and was certified million by the
RIAJ The is an industry trade group composed of Japanese corporations involved in the music industry. It was founded in 1942 as the Japan Phonogram Record Cultural Association, and adopted its current name in 1969. The RIAJ's activities include prom ...
.


Track listing

#''How to Be a Girl – Straight Run'' #''How to Be a Girl – Adult Education Mix'' #''How to Be a Girl – Instrumental''


Personnel

*
Namie Amuro Namie Amuro ( ; ; born September 20, 1977) is a retired Japanese singer. She rose to prominence as a Japanese idol, teen idol, and transitioned into a leading Pop music, pop artist due to her versatility across music styles and visual presentatio ...
– vocals


Production

* Producer – toney black


TV performances

* May 16, 1997 – ''Music Station'' * May 24, 1997 – ''PopJam'' * May 24, 1997 – ''CDTV'' * May 30, 1997 – ''Music Station'' * May 31, 1997 – ''PopJam'' * June 9, 1997 – ''Hey! Hey! Hey!'' * June 24, 1997 – ''Utaban''


Charts


Certification and sales


References

{{DEFAULTSORT:How To Be A Girl Namie Amuro songs 1997 singles Oricon Weekly number-one singles Songs written by Tetsuya Komuro 1997 songs Avex Trax singles