Kumi Koda plays herself with her new merch. Namie is sat with her glass of wine somewhere cackling.

Merch is the new thing now, which has become a new revenue stream for artists. No longer is merch just a tour related thing. It's now an 'every time there is any form of new release of anything' type of thing.

Japan has always been more merch savvy and focused than the rest of the world, going above and beyond with the range of products available, even if access to much of it is usually gate-kept. Because, Japan. But as merch has become a ma-HOO-sive thing here in the West, the Japanese music industry has become a bit more aggressive with it. And Kumi Koda is one such artist riding the merch train until those wheels fall all the way off. Because falling off has become Kumi's speciality.

One particular piece of Kumi Koda merch caught my eye. When I first saw it, I thought it was designer gear. Until I caught a tweet which revealed it was official Kumi Koda merch.

Kumi Koda really went ahead and set herself up with this. She really put out merch with a slogan 'Who is da number 1??'. The 2 question marks must represent Namie Amuro and Hikaru Utada. Because everybody in the game and in these J-Pop street know that da number one ain't Kumi for shit. Namie done left Kumi her ghost to chase. Hikaru Utada done ascended. Even Ayu's legacy from her golden era ain't being touched by Kumi. And you really can't be out here with this number 1 talk when you're coming out looking like watered down Beyoncé Super Bowl 50 wannabe Lipton lemon ice tea and giving us this...

Gurl.

Kumi announced that she is touring old albums of hers in September, released a digital single a couple of weeks ago and gave us a cover of Ricky Martin's "Livin' la vida loca". All within a couple of months. And with Summer upon us, we'll probably get a Summer treble A-side or some shit too. So, there's every chance we'll get a new album by the end of the year.