“Glamorous Sky” is Mika Nakashima’s 16th single overall, her 1st under the name Nana starring Mika Nakashima, and the second most successful single in her career after “Stars”. Released in 2005, it is her first rock song and it was used as one of the image songs for the film Nana (as one of the bands Black Stones’ song). The single was written by the manga’s author, Ai Yazawa, and composed by Hyde of L’Arc-en-Ciel. The second and third B-sides, “Blood” and “Isolation” were used as CM songs for Kate cosmetics. Mika Nakashima graces the cover of the single as Nana Osaki.
Mika Nakashima is a Japanese singer and actress. Five of her studio albums, one of her mini-albums and one of her compilation albums have reached number one in Japan’s Oricon album chart. She also embarked on an acting career, most notably as Nana Osaki in the live action film adaptations of Nana. She has sold over 10 million records in Japan.
This is Nakashima’s only single to debut at No.1 on the Oricon weekly charts. It stayed at No.1 in the daily charts for two entire weeks, which none of her other singles have achieved. “Glamorous Sky” sold 120,202 units for its first week, outselling the No.2 single of the week from w-inds by 72,993 units. In the second week it was also No.1, with the No.2 spot being occupied by her Nana co-star Yuna Ito and her single, “Endless Story”; the latter would eventually outsell “Glamorous Sky” in 2006 Overall, “Glamorous Sky” has sold 444,067 copies since release and has charted in the Oricon charts for 28 weeks. It managed to reach #10 in the 2005 Oricon year end charts, the highest position for a female artist on those charts that year.
Nakashima was nominated at the MTV Video Music Awards Japan as “Best Buzz Asia from Japan” for “Amazing Grace ’05”, and the “Glamorous Sky” video was nominated as “Best Female Video” and won the award for “Best Video from a Film”. The song is featured as a cover by a jrock band, Girugamesh, in the Konami music games, BEMANI for Drummania V3 and Guitarfreaks V3, as well as the iNiS rhythm game Moero! Nekketsu Rhythm Damashii Osu! Tatakae! Ouendan 2. Hyde, the composer of this track, also released a version in 2018.
