Stray Kids landed atop Oricon’s weekly album ranking with its first EP in Japan, according to label JYP Entertainment on Friday.

The EP “Social Path (feat. LiSA) / Super Bowl - Japanese ver.” has stayed atop the chart's daily album ranking for six days in a row. The mini album logged over 500,000 shipments on the day of its release after receiving 500,000 pre-orders, a first for a fourth-generation K-pop group in the country.

Separately, the eight-piece band hit the 100-million-play milestone on Billboard Japan with “Case 143,” which fronted its EP “Maxident” from October last year, as of Wednesday. Stray Kids is the second K-pop boy band to achieve the feat in Japan, after BTS.

The bandmates toured three cities in Japan since August and drew over 140,000 concertgoers in total. They are set to perform live in Tokyo in late October.

NewJeans amasses 400m Spotify streams with ‘Hype Boy’

NewJeans garnered 400 million streams on Spotify with its debut single “Hype Boy” as of Wednesday, said agency Ador on Friday.

It is the rookie girl group’s third song to hit the milestone on the platform, following “OMG” and “Ditto.”

“Hype Boy” is one of the lead tracks from its namesake EP that was rolled out in August last year. The single has stayed on Billboard’s Global excl. the US chart for 57 weeks. The group has amassed 2.5 billion plays on Spotify so far.

Meanwhile, the quintet’s second EP “Get Up” ranked No. 28 on the Billboard 200 dated Sept. 16, staying among the top 30 on the main albums chart for seven straight weeks after debuting at the top.

aespa to drop “Spicy” remix

“Spicy,” a hit song from aespa, will be reworked into a warehouse rave tune and dropped on Friday, said label SM Entertainment.

American producer and DJ Nitepunk freely added his own spin to the track, sampling the vocals of the four members for the remix that is part of the label’s iScreaM project.

The original dance tune is the main track from its third EP “My World” that was released in May. The group earned four trophies from television music chart shows with the song, while the EP sold over 1.69 million copies in the first week, replacing the first week sales record for a K-pop girl group it set with previous EP “Girls” last year.

The foursome is in the middle of its international tour “Synk: Hyper Line.” It held its first concert in Brazil in Sao Paulo on Monday to a sold-out crowd, and will resume the tour in Santiago, Chile on Thursday.

Doubts over Lisa’s contract renewal loom over label

Speculations over whether Lisa of Blackpink will renew her contract with label YG Entertainment were refueled on Friday.

A rumor started circulating online on the day claiming that she turned down a 50 billion won ($37.6 million) offer to resign with the firm. The online chatter even dragged down YG's stock price by up to minus 9 percent during the day. There were talks about the renewal in July, and the label only said that it was in discussion with the group’s members.

Lisa has also been making news, as reports have been saying that she is dating Frederic Arnault, an heir to the European luxury brand firm LVMH. Reports have been linking the two since July.

In the meantime, Blackpink will perform at Gocheok Sky Dome in Seoul this weekend, wrapping up its world tour “Born Pink.”

By Hwang You-me
(glamazon@heraldcorp.com)