JYP Entertainment created an all Japanese girl band "NiziU" in collaboration with Sony Music Entertainment through Hulu Japan's reality show "Nizi Project."
The group easily topped the charts with the release of their first digital single "Make you happy" on June 30, including the Oricon's single daily chart and the Oricon's weekly ranking, Allkpop wrote.
The other tracks included on the E.P., "Baby I'm a Star," "Boom Boom Boom" and "Beyond the Rainbow"- each sat on No. 2,3 and 4 on Line Music's now hot 100 charts.
As a group managed by a Korean Agency and a Japanese Agency, netizens are starting to weigh-in whether the newcomer "NiziU" belongs to the K-pop groups or the J-pop.
Kpop vs. Jpop
According to the Global Times, after the pre-debut E.P. of the girl band "Make You Happy," some Chinese netizens commented that although the NiziU members sing in Japanese language, they look no different from a K-pop girl band.
Besides, NiziU was tagged as the Japanese TWICE because the group was produced using the same production method of JYP Entertainment's TWICE.
And while TWICE members were chosen through the show "Sixteen," which was aired on Mnet, the members of NiziU were selected through the "Nizi Project" aired on the Japanese channel NihonTV.
"Be it their clothing, makeup, or music style, they all make me feel like I'm
watching a performance by a South Korean girl band. If you didn't tell me that this was a Japanese group, I would have been sure they were another Twice," one netizen wrote on Sina Weibo [via Global Times].
According To The Expert
In an exclusive interview of Global Times to a music industry analyst named Fan Zhihui, he said pop music is converging all over the world and that the two kinds of pop music can learn from each other.
According To K-pop Die Hards [Via Allkpop]
"Would you call this group Kpop group? They sing in Japanese and promote in Japan. Even their members are all Japanese."
"I bet in a few years the Japanese people will say Kpop copied Jpop if we continue down this way."
