I've been busy with finals and then went on vacation; I see that "Come Back to Me" is now pretty much done on pop radio, so I think now's a good time to review Utada's US airplay history:

DEVIL INSIDE
Total Lifetime Spins: 597
Total Lifetime Audience: 2.412 Million

EASY BREEZY
Total Lifetime Spins: 247
Total Lifetime Audience: 0.290 Million

EXODUS 04
Total Lifetime Spins: 447
Total Lifetime Audience: 1.278 Million

COME BACK TO ME
Total Lifetime Spins: 9266
Total Lifetime Audience: 30.836 Million

The difference between the Exodus singles and CBTM is astounding. This is a direct result of IDJ and Utada's management team getting organized and not only taking advantage of but creating opportunities to get her name out there: splashing SIN, the Grammy interviews, the radio interviews, the TV appearances (yes!), the Ryan Seacrest performance, the meet-&-greets which led directly to her getting on Z100 (yes!). We've seen how these things can snowball into bigger and better things: she's met so many new contacts in the industry, who knows where they may lead her to? People are mentioning how they'd like to see her on Ellen, or other shows, and before that was just a pipedream; now they're closer to reality than ever!

That CBTM ultimately never did take off is a testament to the immense difficulty in becoming a superstar. You can do everything 'right'--- great talent, a major label, agressive marketing, radio-friendly produced songs--- but when you get right down to it it's all a matter of luck. Lightning struck for Utada in Japan; she's trying to get it to strike her again.

Utada's in good company: heard of Electrik Red, Trey Songz, or "LMFAO"? All are big-label acts that released singles around the same time of CBTM, and like Utada, didn't quite break out despite their best efforts. The difference though, is while their singles fizzled rather quickly, CBTM lingered on MediaBase for months while more and more curious radio stations tested the song out. Even last year's heavy hitter Lil' Wayne had a flop single come and go while CBTM continued to chug along. About 100 radio stations across the country have played CBTM, and a good number of them had put her into medium-to-high rotation.

The audience reaction apparently wasn't quite enthusiastic enough for CBTM to break through in the end, and there's a thousand possible reasons why not: perhaps listeners weren't in the mood right now for a piano-ballad, or perhaps it sounded just a bit too much like Stargate's other songs, we can go on forever and ever. But instead of fretting over things we and Utada don't have control over, let's recognize the things we did: because of Utada, IDJ, her management, and of course us, she is now a legit player on the American music scene and we all took her as far as we could take her.

Exodus, which got lost during an executive-change at IDJ at the time that later didn't know what to do with her, never had a chance. But because of everyone's determination, "Come Back to Me" did, and that's worth celebrating.

Oh, and IDJ: "Dirty Desire" next pls k thnks bye!