Hikaru Utada

Utada Hikaru , who also goes by the mononym Utada , is a Japanese American singer and songwriter. After releasing the commercially unsuccessful Englishlanguage album Precious under the stage name Cubic U in 1998, she rose to prominence in 1999 with the release of her second album, First Love, which sold over eight million copies in Japan and became the best selling Japaneselanguage album of all time. She was described by Time Magazine as a Diva On Campus, a reference to her having attended Columbia University for a brief, careerbreak semester in 2000.

Utada was born in Manhattan as the only child of Teruzane, a Japanese record producer, and his wife Junko, an enka singer, performing under the stage name Keiko Fuji. She did her recordings with her mother, releasing songs under a band named U3 until 1996 when she started her first solo project, Ill be Stronger.160 The Cookin With Moses Vocal from this project was called the Cookin With Gas Vocal on the promotional release.

Source: Wikipedia