Crystal Kay to release a new single “That Girl”, produced by ☆Taku Takahashi of M-Flo

An illustration of Crystal, wearing white frame shades, pearls and a giant gold earring with the words ‘Crystal Kay’. She has pink eyes and love hearts for pupils and is holding a champagne glass in her left hand.

KFC ain’t even turned on the fryers to cook the Christmas chicken bucket orders yet and we’ve gotten a Christmas Day announcement of a new single from Crystal Kay.

Crystal Kay’s first single for 2024 is titled “That Girl” and is produced by ☆Taku Takahashi of M-Flo.

This is great news for M-Flo and Crystal Kay fans alike, as Crystal Kay and M-Flo are such a big part of one another’s histories. Crystal’s first M-Flo affiliated release was “Ex-Boyfriend” for her second studio album 637 -Always and Forever- back in 2001, which featured Verbal. And from that moment on Crystal Kay and M-Flo would continue to work together in different capacities, whether it was Crystal working with M-Flo as a unit or just one of the members.

Crystal last worked with Verbal in 2009 on BoA’s song “Universe”, which the trio had performed live together on a couple of occasions. And she last worked with ☆Taku Takahashi in the same year for her song “Over and Over”, which was a new recording for her best album Best of Crystal Kay. I still play “Over and Over” to this day. It just gets better with time. Such a great song, which shoulda been a single.

The quality of Crystal Kay’s singles over the past couple of years has been a little all over the place. So my expectations for “That Girl” aren’t exactly high. But I’m just stoked that she and ☆Taku Takahashi have worked together again and actually putting the shit out.

According to Billboard Japan, “That Girl” will have a Jersey Beat flavour to it, so I am definitely intrigued. ☆Taku Takahashi producing a Jersey Beat joint makes complete sense given his style and it also makes sense for Crystal too. So hopefully “That Girl” will mark the start of Crystal finding her way back to fun, sounds that work best for her and say more about who she actually is as an artist. Dance and club music really suits Crystal, but her forays into it fell right off after Vivid.

At time of posting, there is no mention of “That Girl” having any sort of tie-in. Tie-ins can be really key to the success of a single and is certainly something Crystal Kay needs. BADLY. It’s been a while since she’s had a proper single release as part of a tie-in. I don’t know what that Start Again EP and Amazon Prime Video J-drama tie-in was, but it was barely promoted. The vibe I got was that Japan doesn’t go up for J-dramas on streaming services the way they do those that air on TV (Japanese networks y’all). Even if they feature Kyoko Fukada.

And will “That Girl” get televised performances on the likes of Music Station and Count Down TV? Because it won’t have a chance to hit unless it does. And we haven’t seen Crystal perform a new single on those shows in a long-ass time.

Girl. Fire the whole management and marketing team.

Crystal Kay hasn’t made big news since her stint on Masked Singer Japan. And she’s done a bunch of things since then. So hopefully her reuniting with ☆Taku Takahashi of M-Flo gets some people outside of her fanbase talking and creates news. Because Crystal Kay and M-Flo was a whole moment and one that many still hold dear.

2024 will also mark Crystal Kay’s 25th anniversary in the music game, but her team probably won’t do shit for that. So let us all bow our heads over a KFC bucket and pray that this new song good.

“That Girl” releases on January 29th, 2024.


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