Format Music download Genre Dance Label Avex Music Creative | Recorded 2016 Length 0:45 | |
Released 7 October 2016 (2016-10-07) | ||
"PPAP (Pen-Pineapple-Apple-Pen)" (Japanese: ペンパイナッポーアッポーペン, Hepburn: Penpainappōappōpen) is a single by Pikotaro, a fictional singer-songwriter created and portrayed by Japanese comedian Daimaou Kosaka. It was released as a music video on YouTube on 25 August 2016, and has since become a viral video. As of January 2017, the official video has been viewed over 110 million times, spawned parodies, and has been hailed as the new "Gangnam Style" by various newspapers and online media. The single itself reached number 1 on the Billboard Japan Hot 100 chart and became the shortest single to chart on the Billboard Hot 100. At the end of 2016, the songs charted at number 6 on Japan Hot 100 Year-end Chart.
Contents
Background and composition
Kosaka said in an interview that he came up with the song sitting in his house. He was listening to the tune when he picked up a pen to start writing. He thought about his background of being from Japan's biggest apple-producing region (Aomori Prefecture) as he also realized that he had an open can of pineapples on the table.
The song is written in the key of C♯ minor with a common time tempo of 136 beats per minute. Pikotaro's vocals span from F♯3 to C♯5 in the song.
Music video
The song originated as a music video released on YouTube on 25 August 2016. In the video, Pikotaro, dressed in a yellow snake/leopard animal print costume, dances around, and then sings English lyrics like "I have a pen, I have a apple. Uh, apple pen" while making the gestures of holding the named items and pushing them together. The video's expense was about 100,000 yen.
On 26 September, Pikotaro released a video on how to do the dance and the gestures. On 27 October, Pikotaro posted a "long version" of the music video.
On 17 November, Pikotaro made an appearance on the Japanese edition of Sesame Street, where he joined Elmo and Cookie Monster in singing their version of the song titled "CBCC (Cookie-Butter-Choco-Cookie)".
Release
"PPAP", alongside three other works by Pikotaro, was released to digital storefronts through Avex Music Creative on 7 October 2016. An instrumental version of the song was made available on 12 October 2016.
Viral spread
The video accumulated about 1 million hits in its first month of play. Kosaka remarked it was mostly popular among Japanese students. On 27 September 2016, Canadian pop singer Justin Bieber shared the video on Twitter, captioning it as his "favorite video on the Internet". The video has since gone viral, averaging over 1.5 million hits a day, and being touted as the new "Gangnam Style" by various newspapers and online media. It has spawned many videos from people doing their own versions. On the YouTube music video charts it reached number 1, and stayed there for three weeks in a row.
Chart performance
The song debuted at number four on the Billboard Japan Hot 100 dated 22 October 2016. The following week it climbed to number three and the week after that it peaked at number two. After dropping to number three, it topped the chart for the 14 November edition.
The song debuted on the Billboard Hot 100 in the United States at number 77, and at 45 seconds in length, became the shortest song to chart in its history. The previous shortest song was "Little Boxes" by The Womenfolk, which reached number 83 in 1964 and was 1 minute and 2 seconds in length. The fact was recognized by the Guinness World Records. The song has since reappeared twice more, at number 82 for the week of November 26, and 93 the week of December 3.