Crystal Kay to release her second single of 2024, “Love Myself” on 22 November

Crystal Kay is FINALLY releasing a new song. Kay will be releasing a single “Love Myself” on 22nd November. It’s being tagged as a celebration of the 25th year of her career, which is some bullshit. Because one thing Universal and LDH has not been doing this year, is celebrating a bitch.
How ridiculous is it that on the year of the 25th anniversary of Kay’s career, that she will have only released two singles? We got “That Girl” back in January — which had no music video, no televised live performances, no remix featuring Verbal, no nothing. And I can see “Love Myself” getting the exact same treatment.

Where on earth is the Best album? The self covers album?

“Can’t Be Stopped” and “Think of U” are both singles which were originally released in November. So, why did her team not have her pull a Hikaru Utada, and release a re-recorded version of one of these songs? Or have her release re-recorded versions of three of her singles throughout the year, on the anniversary of their original release dates, and then drop a Best album self covers (‘I Sing: Me’) in November? This would also get around any issues in regards to Sony blocking the use of her original recordings, if this is even something which they’re doing. A re-recording of “Kirakuni” woulda been an easy way to get it on streaming globally. Nobody cares about Kay’s new shit, so why not push the old shit? Which would make sense narratively, because THIS IS THE YEAR OF HER 25th ANNIVERSARY.

And for Airi Suzuki to have released a cover of “Koi ni Ochitara” back in March, produced by Taku Takahashi of M-Flo AND to have performed it on The First Take, a channel Kay is yet to appear on!?

Girl. Fire the whole management and marketing team.

The cover art for this single is gorgeous. Kay is stunning. So it makes zero sense to me that in the midst of her not releasing music, that she’s not been put forward for any kind of modelling gigs for magazines or clothing brands. I’ve said it a million times and I’ll say it again. Why is she not a face for a global Japanese brand like Uniqlo? And why is Universal and LDH not having Kay shoot music videos as a means to not only promote her music, but how photogenic and model ready she is?

Girl. Beat up the whole management and marketing team.

“Love Myself” is written by Misako Sakazume, who wrote what still remains as one of Kay’s most popular and commercially successful songs, “Koi ni Ochitara”, in addition to the Call Me Miss… album cut—and an album highlight, which really shoulda been a single—“Namida ga Afuretemo”. Sakazume also wrote “Shiawase tte.” aka “Nando Demo (Part 2)” and “Lovin’ You”, the latter of which has really grown on me over the years. It was definitely a case of the right choice of song for a single, but the wrong timing and nowhere near enough promo. A whole J-drama tie-in and the shit still made not a single wave!?

“Love Myself” is more than likely going to be a ballad, which I think would be a great choice given how close it’s releasing to Christmas. But there is no J-drama tie-in to help it. And given how Kay’s team are so off with her releases, this probably won’t be the typical Winter ballad that it should be. And there will probably be no music video for it either.

Foolishness.

I’m all for Kay giving us a self love, self empowerment song. But “Love Myself” is gonna have to contend with “I’m Beautiful”, which was my favourite song on her 2018 album Shine. It really got me through a point a few years ago when I was feeling really down on myself. Kay co-wrote the song herself. And with her growing up Black in Japan, and probably experiencing racism, feeling othered and being made to feel that she was not beautiful, it really did hit different and feel like a personal mantra she’s had to tell herself over the years. I think “I’m Beautiful” would have made a great single which could have meant a lot to many people. “Love Myself” sounds like it’s going to be in the same vein, but only 36 people are going to end up hearing it, which is a real shame.

“Love Myself” releases digitally across all streaming platforms on 22 November, 2024.