Ayumi Hamasaki -- Evolution

Another one of those Ayumi Hamasaki（浜崎あゆみ）songs that had me going "Oh yeah! I remember this one." With Hamasaki all over the pop culture spectrum at the time, "Evolution", like many of her other hits, had that refrain which refused to go away on television. No surprise since it was used for a Kose cosmetics commercial and it hit No. 1 a few weeks after its release in January 2001 as her 20th single, so I probably got to hear it a lot on the countdown shows.

According to the Wikipedia article on "Evolution", apparently the critics didn't particularly like her way of delivering the lyrics (those were provided by Hamasaki herself with the melody provided under her pen name of crea). I don't really mind it myself (kudos on that rapid-fire patter) and I think that having her go into a more rock mode added a fresher angle after hearing so many ballads from her.

"Evolution" became the No. 7 single of the year selling around 950,000 copies in Japan, and was placed onto Hamasaki's 4th studio album "I am..." released in January 2002. It also hit the top spot on the album charts and became the 2nd-ranked album of that year. On the top albums in Oricon history, "I am..." has placed in at No. 57.