Fantôme (album)

Fantôme is the sixth Japanese studio album (ninth overall) by Japanese-American singer-songwriter Hikaru Utada. Although Utada announced an indefinite hiatus from the public eye in August 2010, she continued writing and composing material with her father, Utada Teruzane, and long-term collaborator, Miyake Akira. Musically, Fantôme contains a collection of tracks that utilizes acoustic and stripped-down instrumentations, alongside influences of pop, electronic, and R&B music. The lyrical content delves into themes of grief, sadness, love, and death—mostly influenced by the death of her mother, her second marriage, and the birth of her son in 2015.

Commercially, Fantôme experienced success in Japan, reaching number one on the weekly Oricon Albums Chart with sales of over 253,000 units, becoming her eighth consecutive number-one album in the country. It additionally topped the US World Albums chart and has sold over a million copies worldwide. It won various awards, including Album of the Year at the Japan Record Awards and the Grand Prix prize at the CD Shop Awards. The singles "Sakura Nagashi", "Hanataba o Kimi ni", and "Manatsu no Tōriame" were released prior to the album's announcement, while "Michi" and "Nijikan Dake no Vacance" were dropped shortly before its release.