Rinoa

Hitomi Shimatani posing in CDData 2006

Name: Hitomi Shimatani
Birthday: September 4th 1980
Hometown: Hiroshima
Star Sign: Virgo
Height: 161 cm
Blood Type: O type
Hobbies: Karaoke, shopping, movies
Record Label: avex trax
Talent Agency: PROCEED

Hitomi Shimatani is a relatively popular singer in the J-Pop scene, who has made her debut back then in 1999. Apart from being a singer, Hitomi is a popular television personality and is an actress. She has a reputation of having powerful vocals and her beauty has labelled her as being one of the most beautiful personalities in Japan. Her trademark is her long hair.

Despite the fact that she is not extremely popular and is not one of avex’s biggest source of revenue, Hitomi still manages to attract a fair amount of attention. She has her personal fanclub called Eye-Land. Hitomi’s personality is rather well mannered and she is a compliant woman to work with, according to those who have done so. Hitomi frequents many music and radio programmes, just because she an interesting person. For these reasons she has made a lot of friendships and connections with various personalities, most notably the illustrious actress Yukie Nakama and Ryoko Kuninaka.

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Caroline Lufkin

Name: Caroline Lufkin
Birthplace: Okinawa
Residence: Los Angeles

I’m sure quite a few of you have heard of Olivia Lufkin, a singer from Avex Trax. Olivia Lufkin is half Japanese and half American and has sung in a variety of styles ranging from rock to ethereal pop and alternative.

Caroline Lufkin is Olivia’s sister who currently resides in the United States and is working on releasing her first release with the company Temporary Residence Limited. Caroline moved around a lot when she was younger since her father was formerly a Marine, though was originally from Okinawa. She graduated from Berklee School of Music in Boston in 2003. Caroline writes her own material, and has a voice not unlike that of Björk. Caroline’s voice has also featured on several advertisments in the Japanese market.

“Where’s My Love” is planned to be her debut single. Produced by Sweden-born Andreas Bjorck, this track is a very soothing and has this unearthly feel to it. The song itself is rather captivating and ethereal especially with the addition of her soft voice. The background music gives you memories of those music boxes and wind chimes. One can also notice how her voice is quite similar to her sister’s, apart from sounding more delicate and less powerful. In this track I believe that Caroline has proved herself as excellent in her fragile vocal abilities as her sister as she subtly controls her singing to express the sorrow and longing in the verse. The result is a composition that swells with novelty and charm.

It has come to my attention that her debut will be on October 25th, according to her MySpace entry.

Where's My Love cover