The following album, Distance, was released in early 2001 and spawned Utada's biggest hit singles-' Addicted to You', ' Wait & See (Risk)' and ' Can You Keep a Secret?'-which became million-sellers. First Love eventually became the country's best-selling album of all time. Backed by the success of singles ' Automatic', ' Time Will Tell', and ' Movin' On Without You', the album sold two million copies in its first week in Japan, topped the Oricon charts for six non-consecutive weeks and went on to sell six million more throughout the rest of 1999. In the following year, heavily influenced by R&B and dance-pop, a Japanese-language debut First Love was released and became an immediate success. Under the stage name Cubic U, she released an English-language debut album Precious in early 1998, but it was a commercial failure.
Eventually, a recording contract with Toshiba-EMI was signed. Born in the United States to Japanese parents, record producer Teruzane Utada and enka singer Keiko Fuji, Utada began to write music and lyrics at an early age and often traveled to Tokyo as a result of her father's job.
Hikaru Utada ( 宇多田 ヒカル, Utada Hikaru, born January 19, 1983), who is also known by the mononym Utada, is a Japanese-American pop singer, songwriter and producer.