Dancemania EX × Trance Paradise

Dancemania Sparkle – Best of 90s Dance Pop
Release Date: 8/3/11 ? 8/24/11
Price: 2381 yen

Update (9/23/11): Relatively slow week for CD sales in general, so Sparkle finished at #14 its fourth week out with roughly 4,800 copies sold.

For those that missed EMI’s Twitter contest, they’re doing another round with another 3 winners winning a 5,000 yen gift card. Just tweet about your favorite Dancemania memory and include the hashtag “#?????? http://emij.jp/idance/” Deadline is September 25, but again, it’s only open to Japanese residents.

In other Dancemania news, Japanese radio station 81.3 FM, J-WAVE will be doing a special broadcast commemorating the 15th anniversary of Dancemania. The broadcast will be on Thursday, September 27 at 22:00 local Japan time. You may or may not be able to view the broadcast live or archived on J-WAVE’s Ustream. It looks like they’ll also spend some time on DDR, so make sure to tune in.

Update (9/14/11): After three weeks of release, Dancemania Sparkle has sold over 15,000 units. This past week, it ended up #23 on the Oricon weekly charts, selling a little over 5,100 units. So, not only is it holding steady, but it actually sold more than it did last week. It may have some legs after all.

Update (9/7/11): Dancemania Sparkle finished its second week out at #19 on the Oricon weekly charts. However, it was a relatively slow week for CD sales in general, so it only sold roughly 5,000 units. Not a bad drop, but it looks unlikely that it’ll have the same momentum that Treasure did. Treasure ended up selling over 90,000 copies, so Sparkle still has a ways to go.

Update (8/31/11): Sales charts are out and Dancemania Sparkle finished 22nd on the Oricon weekly charts, with 5,261 units sold. That’s slightly less than Dancemania Treasure did its first week out. Dancemania Treasure actually sold better in the weeks following its initial release, at one point selling over 10,000 copies in one week. It’ll be interesting to see if Sparkle will also sell better in upcoming weeks.

EMI Music Japan are currently running a contest on Twitter. Just tweet about your favorite Dancemania memory and include the hashtag “#?????? http://emij.jp/idance/” for a chance to win a 5,000 yen gift card. Deadline is September 11. I’m assuming this is only open to Japanese residents, however. ^^;

Anyway, I got my copy of the CD earlier today and gave it a few listens. It’s a decently enjoyable trip back in time, but it’s hard to deny that this terrain has been covered before, and much better at that. Treasure did a better job at representing the myriad styles of dance that have graced Dancemania over the years. Sparkle obviously chooses to focus on the mid-to-late 90s eurodance sound, which is great if you’re a child of the 90s, but it’s severely limiting. And I think the newly licensed tracks actually detract from the Dancemania feel (except “Sunny Holiday,” which can do no wrong). I would’ve much rather had some Saifam tracks instead of the euro-reggae songs. The mixing is decent enough, however, with a few fun transitions here and there to keep things interesting. Still, it’s hard for me to recommend this album except to those who really, really like 90s eurodance.

And now for some notes that will interest only me. The Japanese rights to Solid Base, T-Spoon and Mr. President songs have apparently been picked up by EMI. However, Avex still hold the rights to 2 Unlimited songs, though they’ve allowed the AATW license to lapse (which makes me wonder even more why Bus Stop are missing).

Update (8/29/11): The DDR staff gave a shout-out to Dancemania on their blog. Meanwhile, Dancemania Sparkle continues to climb the charts, reaching #8 on the Oricon daily charts as of this writing.

Update (8/26/11): For those wondering, the non-stop mix is by MST and DJ Mocchi, while the cover art is by Mega Graphics, so it really is like old times! Thanks for remembering your roots, EMI! As for sales, the album has been steadily climbing the Oricon daily charts, so far peaking at #16.

Let’s go back to the 90s! Seriously, let’s do it; the music was so much better back then. Okay, so we may not have time machines (yet), but you can still relive the deliciously cheesy dance pop of the 90s with this compilation celebrating the 15th anniversary of Dancemania. Featuring classic Eurodance artists like Me & My, Captain Jack, 2 Unlimited, E-Rotic, Smile.dk, and Aqua, it’s all the songs you’ve heard before, but mixed in a slightly different order!

EMI have released a commercial for the release, and it’s up on YouTube in glorious HD:

The album is selling pretty well at Amazon Japan at the moment. At the time of this writing it was #1 on the Pops, Soul/R&B, and Dance/Electronica charts, as well as #70 overall. Are we in the middle of a 90s dance boom? EMI seems to think so, as the booklet for Dancemania Sparkle features an ad for the upcoming Dance Dance Revolution X3 vs. Dance Dance Revolution 2nd Mix arcade game and mentions that the DDR 2nd MIX OST will be reissued this November.

01. [3:33] Dub-I-Dub / Me & My
02. [3:19] Scatman (Ski-Ba-Bop-Ba-Dop-Bop) / Scatman John
03. [2:32] Butterfly / Smile.dk
04. [2:42] Barbie Girl / Aqua
05. [3:32] Banzai (Apogeous Edit) / Misa
06. [2:33] Hero / Papaya
07. [3:22] S.O.S. (The Tiger Took My Family) / Dr. Bombay
08. [3:22] 5, 6, 7, 8 / Steps
09. [3:31] Sunny Holiday / Solid Base
10. [3:40] Sex on the Beach / T-Spoon
11. [3:35] Coco Jamboo / Mr. President
12. [3:50] Macarena (Bayside Boys Remix) / Los del Rio
13. [2:41] Tubthumping / Chumbawamba
14. [2:44] Wannabe / Spice Girls
15. [3:32] Stayin’ Alive / N-Trance
16. [3:30] Tell the World / Pandora
17. [3:10] I Don’t Want to Miss a Thing / Deja Vu feat. Tasmin
18. [3:32] New York City Boy (The Almighty Definitive Mix) / Pet Shop Boys
19. [3:07] That’s the Way (Scorccio Remix) / X-Treme
20. [2:29] Samba de Janeiro / Bellini
21. [1:57] Santa Maria / DJ Milano feat. Samantha Fox
22. [3:02] No Limit / 2 Unlimited
23. [2:32] Willy Use a Billy…Boy / E-Rotic
24. [3:10] Captain Jack / Captain Jack
25. [3:11] Fire / Scooter

Pre-order at CDJapan.