Yes yes yes!! It's definitely one of the best songs in her discography for me.

Yay! My copy of LOVE again arrived! (I think the seller knows me now because I keep buying Ayu albums from him. Normally it takes a month for Japanese CDs to arrive, but he's been sending the Ayu albums faster and faster. It hasn't even been a week since I ordered LOVE again. ^o^) Anyways, I dig this album a lot. Song 4 u is still one of my all-time fave Ayu songs. And wow! If task'n'bass was made into a full song, it'd be in my top 10 fave Ayu songs. Also, snowy kiss... amazing. Another favorite.

The only thing is I remember people saying it was dumb that they tacked on You & Me at the end and I agree. I think it's a cute song, but it doesn't really fit with the rest of the songs (imo). And I've been laughing at the fact that Ayu actually sings "oh lunch time" (booklet confirmed it for me). I love you, Ayu, but no... lol.

Love Songs cd+dvd first press came with a slip case. Didn't it? The cover coloring is so similar to Love Again that I always confuse the 2. Anyways, did it have different covers under the slipcase like A Best? How many different covers were there? I think I saw pictures of one in a selling thread here at AHS but I can't recall.

The moment I heard the children in kiss o' kill I was in LOVE.

2

^ Thank you
Does anyone have pictures of both that they can share?

I can get them from the old Love songs threads.

We made a bit of a big deal about it since we had no idea we would get different covers.

Actually, M(A)DE IN JAPAN has a sleeve too so...



Second ver. is edited textless.

^the first thing my eyes were drawn too in the second ver was those super duper shiny legs. :D

First one is real pretty tho. Thanks truehappiness. You are a fountain of info were ayu is concern. Love you.

thank you truehappiness for sharing the photos! i honestly prefer that cover over the one with her hair in pigtails tbh. I WISH WE HAVE A PROPER SCAN OR SOMETHING OF IT SO I CAN PUT IT AS MY ITUNES COVER

Japaneseprincess scanned theirs before they stopped doing scans. I dunno if it's a good enough scan but here it is!

I love everything about Love Songs. The regular covers were cute imo

It's actually my favorite cover of hers, or at least one of them. xD I have the one where she's smiling and even though she's done so many shots like that since then I remember thinking it was just so freaking pretty when it was first released. It's an album I fall back to time and time again. Though I can't say I've really listened to anything else but MIJ in recent days but I'm sure at some point I'll go back to LS like I always freaking do. (Sending Mail is my musical spirit animal.)

What do you consider "later part"? A lot of her best material comes from MY STORY to NEXT LEVEL for me. After Love songs, not really.

What's "grab-baggy"?

I liked Colours when it was released, then I HATED it after the PVs and concert. But now I really love Colours a lot. It's a top 5 album for me.* It's so light and fresh and fun and modern. It's really easy to listen to at any time.

Ayu's music is great, but a lot of it is so heavy, it is almost a drag to listen to. Colours is like a great collection of easy songs with a wide variety of sound.

*Top 5 is probably something like Secret, Love songs, MY STORY, Colours and NEXT LEVEL. Secret and Love songs are always in my top 5, the other 3 may vary. You may notice that I prefer her "fresher" albums. :P

That's exactly like I feel about her. I really love some of her discography to death, but because of its heaviness I can't always listen to it. I mean, yes, she does have lighter and fun stuff as well, but mostly I dislike those. *cough*You & Me, Feel the love*cough* *cough*Thank You,Sweet season*cough*
She's just not (as) good at those imo. Though there are some exceptions. Also she does too much ballad and midtempos for my liking generally anyway.
I'm naturally tending to some melancholy at times, so listening to heavier stuff doesn't help and I need somethign different. If her discography would be a bit more balanced, I'd probably be a bigger fan. But it's alright as it is, I appreciate her.^^
(and btw. that's probably the reason I love Kuu so much - she has heavier songs here and there, but overall she's an upbeat and cheering artist + I love her voice)

Yes! I agree so much. I love music appropriate for a melancholic mood. Kinda laid back and a bit nostalgic, like an autumn or spring breeze feeling (if we're on the same page).

And Kumi does have a lot of nice, easy music (I love her too). Songs like Someday, I'll be there, With your smile, On Your Side, 逢いたくて, Everyday, anytime, etc. come to mind. <3

Edit: Except I love Feel the love and Sweet Season and such haha.

I always loved Colours because it was a departure for her across the whole album except maybe two tracks. Worked well too aside from PVs which were... strange, lol.

And also a 'grab bag' album IMO is one that has a little of everything with little to no flow between segments. Colours and Rock'n'Roll Circus had this pretty badly.

Really? RnR Circus feels very cohesive to me; I have no problem with the flow. Colours as well.

(miss)understood is the most jarring to me. It's like they couldn't decide which direction to take the album so they just dumped everything on it. The interlude placement does nothing to help it for me. :P

I can't get an emotional grasp on I am... either. There's so much different stuff going on that when I think "I am..." I don't think of anything. Same for (m)u.

(m)u had a lot of tracks from Sweetbox, so it was hard to slot stuff in there, however I thought it worked fine. I thought flow was fine for Rock'n'Roll Circus too but Colours had issues IMO.

Personally for me, it's like an aural orgasm to listen to I am..., (m)u, Secret, and so on... just so much there to digest.

I thought I was the only one who didn't think of m(u) and I am... as such masterpieces :laugh Also agree with you on RnRC, it had different styles but still felt like a whole piece of work for me.

While I do like I am... I think that I like (miss)understood more.

(m)u has a certain uniqueness to it. It's fierce and is really probably Ayu's finest from before 2010.