Frank Kogan

I don't know if this has something to do with Utada's own history - she was one of the first Japanese pop stars to make pop with R&B influence (which is what I'd call it rather than just "R&B" as Asian audiences called it at the time), so for quite a few years the Hikki 'brand' was equated with R&B. Particularly in contrast to the trance-pop of her sales rival Hamasaki Ayumi (Avex tunes as as recognizable as Xenomania's, and are very East Asian-sounding, with a secondary influence from Italo disco).

She can't go back to that sound, because it sounds irretrievably late 90s; and the sound that she moved toward in the 00s and that has been most artistically fruitful for her is definitely not a U.S. mainstream sort of thing. (Electronic, frequently two-steppy.)









She married the guy who directed these videos, and one sort of suspects the breakup songs on This Is The One are about their divorce, which lends stuff like "Come Back To Me" more interest (she never used to write breakup songs).