Final Distance

"Final Distance" is a song recorded by Japanese-American singer Hikaru Utada. It was released on July 25, 2001 as the first single for their third studio album Deep River (2002). Utada wrote the song, and produced and composed it with long-time collaborators Akira Miyake, Utada's father Teruzane Utada. "Final Distance" is a re-recorded and re-arranged version of the song "Distance", originally released on Utada's 2001 album of the same name. The song was dedicated to Rena Yamashita, a six-year-old victim of the Ikeda school massacre who had written an essay about being inspired by Utada. Utada had stated that the meaning of the word "final" for the song "Final Distance" is "most important" rather than "last". Musically, "Final Distance" incorporates more instrumentation than the previous version, including violins, an acoustic piano and synthesizers. The song strips the original pop music from "Distance" and is a pop ballad song. Despite the original version being written in 2000, Utada reflected on the emotions of sorrow, pain, anger and celebration of life while recording the single version. "Final Distance" received positive reception from most music critics, who praised the re-arrangement and favored this version, although some critics felt the song was inferior to Utada's past ballad tracks. Critics have cited the track as one of Utada's career highlights. Commercially, "Final Distance" stalled at number two on the Oricon Singles Chart, making it their first single in two years to have missed the top spot. The song was also their lowest selling physical single at the time, a record that was surpassed by the 2004 single "Dareka no Negai ga Kanau Koro". An accompanying music video was shot by Utada's then-husband Kazuaki Kiriya, featuring two versions of Utada inside a Utopian-inspired city with a circus and a gothic-like orchestra. Utada performed the song on...