Shurikid wrote:
This is all pretty much true, as well. Hikki, in the end, wasn't motivated to dominate the American music industry: she essentially stated that herself. But I do think, and I accept this as my own totally personal interpolation, that part of that was that she was not comfortable with IDJ from a certain point onwards. I think everyone wrote off IDJ's failure with "Exodus" (which Hikki seemed just as adamant about as any of her Japanese work) as a very terrible, upsetting, circumstantial fluke- but a fluke nonetheless. With TITO, they seemed to tackle initial campaigning at full force: Hikki was doing the kind of promotion necessary for an up and coming artist and she seemed genuinely interested in where this development might take her. IDJ (and possibly even more so her father) was getting her into radio stations, onto Ryan Seacrest, finding her slots on whatever shows she could make. She did the Sephora gigs which were HUGELY successful; beyond anyone's expectations, I think. "Come Back to Me" was charting and people were starting to hear about her. And then it all just stopped. And when Hikki came back from being sick, it was like IDJ just didn't care. I truly do believe they gave up on her before she gave up on them- but I don't think it took her long to give up on them, either, and when business gets bad like that it's pretty hard to get anything done. Frankly, I think that with the willpower and the material, Hikki and EMI could launch a very successful campaign for her in the States, but that's a different story for a future prospective.

And honestly, all of this became totally irrelevant to me (more so than it was before) after I saw her at the "In The Flesh" concert. I realized at that point in time that my love for her music doesn't account for the level of widespread appeal it achieves. It's not that I would mind her totally reinvigorating the American music scene, but if it never happens it never happens. I just want her to be content making the music she wants to, and I want her to maintain control over her career without feeling compromised in her musical decisions. I think IDJ may have been pressuring her artistically along those lines: I think "This Is The One" may have been a partial result of that, and I think that's why it ultimately failed to make itself known. In retrospect, I don't think it really was the one: I think Hikki may have been trying to prove something, I think she realized early on she wasn't going to and I think she learned a lot from it. And I think her new worldwide deal with EMI (and the resultant break from IDJ) is partly informed by that lesson. But, again, I'm heavily interpreting my own vision of things from what I know on a strictly surface level basis of information. As such, I digress.