No No. I'm not expecting a new album EXACTLY like LOVEppears or GUILTY... I'm expecting originality like these albums. Not songs like that, not kind of music... you're saying everything wrong.
And if you think everything she does is original and perfect, that's your problem. I meant, probably you think it because you don't accept my opinion. I don't like Rock n roll not JUST because is not my genre but all. Pv's, lyrics. I'm not saying this album is a copy or something like that but I can see songs and albums MORE original.
Sorry, but I don't think everything she does, rock, dance, pop, ballad, considering my tastes or not is original. Its normal as every artist in the world.
She have similar songs.

Lol, yeah I didn't think you were addressing me but I'm kinda on a "defend those who express their honesty in Ayu's works" kick. Lol.

I disliked RnRC... And I'm not *****ing around saying how bad it is and how much she should die before she destroys her own career... I disliked it, commented my disliking on the proper thread, life goes on and I keep listening to NEXT LEVEL :P

Yeah same here - I never said she's destroying her career but it sometimes seems people with disliked opinions are grouped with the same people who do make such horrid comments like the mentioned. Lol.

:shughug
Of course we should all express our honest opinions! But perhaps we should do that in the opinion thread hahaha.

And if you look you'll see avex has been guilty of 'formula' copying with her releases before. Like back in 2002 H was released and was the only single to sell a million copies that year. In 2003 they released &, a triple A-side just like H even using the same song title (HANABI) it sold barely half as many copies as H closing the book on the whole triple a-side summer single thing. And back during pre-My story if you look at the release dates for her singles they're almost released on the exact same day/date (give or take a day or even a week) every year.

When sales began to harshly fall in the industry in general (around the early '00s), Ayu was affected (and all singers in general) in that they cut all single releases that didn't have a product tie-in (and wouldn't be in a commerical that would be spammed played on TV) or weren't a seasonal cash cow [sorry I couldn't think of a better way of putting this, like how if a song is released in the summer is has a chance of becoming that year's 'summer theme' and selling a lot of copies]. So like the only way to break the pattern of summer single and ballad is if this year summer single and winter ballad have low sales (like less than 100,000 which is the average for her single sales now).

this has got to be the thread with the most long posts :laugh

Well there's definitely a difference between being critically harsh for no apparent reason over something u dont like and being refined in your comments about your dislikes (which many would appreciate and even think twice about)

I think you got me wrong too. I don't think she's original or perfect all the time. I said the lack of that might not be the only reason why you dislike the album. I was just speculating, so I did not mean to put words in your mouth. My point was to ponder what's the reason that for some the album doesn't sound as original as the others, as well as to think what "originality" really means. I hope we're clear.

Ok, I understood.
I can't explain my thoughts so good in English sometimes, seems confusing.
Well, I'm not saying is a not original album, just because i didn't like. But there are albums more interesting and different, talking about everything -the Pv's and lyrics too-. And I'm feel disappointed. But Ayu is always trying new things. That's all...

This really just answered my concerns about Ayu's falling sales. I think if Avex gave her more time to focus on the music, the rest of the album would sound like the singles. The broad production would still exist in every song. Unfortunately, she only has like two single releases nowadays... they are almost always summer/winter releases. Maybe things will change this year? I'd like to see more single releases before the next Ayu album; furthermore, I think it would make the next album more enjoyable for everyone, even if there are some generic sounding songs.

I think that's true...well, personally, I really don't care about singles at all...

but I think her music could only benefit if more time was spent on it.

The norm in Asia to release as much crap as possible in the shortest amount of time really gets on my nerves sometimes.

That's because traditionally, idols are only supposed to be around for a few years at the most and fade away. A perfect example is Momoe Yamaguchi, she was only active from 1973-1980 (7 years and people then thought she had an usually long career) and she had 32 singles, 22 albums, was in 15 films, and stared in 9 tv dramas before she retired to become a house wife. The point was to captialize on their popularity by selling a ton of CDs and at the slightest hint of popularity waning, they would get the axe and they record company would find a new project.

But in the '90s our Namies, Ayus, and Hikkis with their seemingly infinate popularity broke that mold but still follow the basic release schedule of "as much crap in your face as possible so we (the record label) can make fast money"

Well I'm glad I answered your question in 2 posts, where its taken everyone else 13 pages and none of them were even talking about the topic anymore. :P

This is my reason:
 

The reasons why I think Ayu's sales have been falling compared to its previous generations likely might have been these reasons:

• Ayu's already 31 and a half years old, so I think older artists are kind of losing ground compared to newer, younger generations. Take a look at aiko for example also: her latest album "BABY", her first album in two years, might have gotten #1, but the fact is that the first week sales were 135,541, compared to Himitsu's 167,490, but only a #2! With the fact that Ayu's NEXT LEVEL last year sold 240,810 and her latest Rock'n'Roll Circus album sold 205,058, I think we're seeing to start her signs of aging there. Even lately younger generations have been on the surge: YUI (23 years old), born also out of Fukuoka, where Ayu was born, has six #1 singles and two #1 albums (excluding MY SHORT STORIES), and the "to Mother" single is expected to be quite a hit, mainly because of a big significance that YUI moves on to the piano, and not just playing the guitar, with the fact that she already has a four-single #1 streak, and a decent fanbase. But that's not all:
• Competition from particularly Johnny's members - particularly Arashi - has put a pressure on Ayu's sales also, and in combination, the digital revolution. More people are wanting this album through digital download to their iPod or such, and not really physically buying a single or album at a store like digitally, as we are in an age of iTunes and such. However, Arashi, along with other Johnny's groups, have a bit more fanbase, and I don't know about this yet, and this is quite unconfirmed (if anyone knows, please let me know), but most likely the reason why Arashi's sales are considered by me "inflated" is because that Johnny's groups DO NOT sell their music through iTunes or some sort, leaving fans to buy it at a store rather than going on those digital music sites.
• Finally, with the fact that we've got more artists than just Ayumi Hamasaki, such as Ai Otsuka, Kumi Koda, BoA, etc., and after those early-mid-2000s era of commercialization (all because Avex wants money but then all of a sudden came a scandal/feud that involves Ayu's producer Max Matsuura), it really went into a downward trend of sales for Ayu, as we already know it, and it's just time to move on.
• And yes, Ayumi Hamasaki has only one effective hearing ear - when she announced it at the beginning of 2008, that really shocked the entire Ayumi Hamasaki community, and at a time that Ayu's GUILTY album was being released, the factors of lower sales ongoing, and Kobukuro's strong showing with its 5296 album and its Japan Record Award win with the hit song Tsubomi, it seems that the fans are really re-thinking about the situation with Ayu.

Also, the fact is that there are also Ayumi Hamasaki fans who also like Kumi Koda or such, and even another group of Ayumi Hamasaki fans that are also taking a look at new artists, such as Sayuri Sugawara, miwa and such. (It's really an embarrassment for me to download miwa's "don't cry anymore" when I was watching Ayu doing an interview broadcasted live over the Internet! And I already miss Ayumi Hamasaki's long hair - I kind of partially like the short hair, but I just feel that I miss the long hair that she had in her commercial peak around 2002-2003 and the time when I jumped in to the Ayumi Hamasaki community in late 2006/early 2007, at a time what it would be my favorite song, JEWEL, was in full swing, and I was not even familiar that I would see an announcement that A BEST 2 would be coming at the end of February 2007!)

Overall, I think we are aware of it, that it seems that time has really passed, and we have to understand we have to cope with the current economic struggles and the different personal opinions that the Japanese, the Americans and the world have. And that includes the opinion of Ayu - it seems that it's becoming more of a lower of a priority now. It's good that she's got some promotions, but I know it was quite a bit of a disappointment when Ayu released the NEXT LEVEL album last year, but she only performed on TV only once.

And, as we know, Ayu has not taken a break from her professional career singing since the time between she was kicked out of Columbia Records around 1996 after her failure of "NOTHING FROM NOTHING" and the introduction to Avex in 1998. I think I've already have enough or some sort, but we just have to move on.

I still like Ayu, and I am still a fan of Ayu, but sure enough we've got competition, as with competition in business (Intel-NVIDIA-AMD, Sony-Panasonic-Toshiba-JVC, Honda-Toyota-GM-Ford-Chrysler, ANA-JAL-Skymark, AT&T-Verizon-Qwest). I don't know how will Ayu will cope with today's current competitive J-pop market environments...

No to everything you've said.

I think part of it is that idols are only expected to stay around for so long...
People like Ayu and Madonna have broken that mold, but even Madonna's sales have fallen greatly since her climax in sales. I think the point is that you just can't stay on the super-high-sale streak forever.
Another thing is the digital era...
She's selling less physical copies, and more and more people are downloading things illegally, just in general, so the Jpop sales market has really fallen in sales overall...

Those are just my two main beliefs, but no matter what happens, I think it will take something HUGE for Ayu to stop being popular. She still is very influential and her concerts still sell out fast. (:

Well, I must have misunderstood in my earlier post... Seems like that Ayu is part of the digital age era with all those issues today...

^ Well I think she started before the real digital age kicked in... so during her prime (Duty) era, it's not like everybody was running around with mp3 players illegally downloading volumes of her work~
I think Madonna is also affected by that... because with her recent album, sales were far lower than her previous peaks... I compare Ayu & Madonna because I feel like Ayu is the Japanese Madonna. They are both pop legends, and have been making music for a very long time!

Yea, this happend to my surprise, as well. Till this day I still don't know why Ayu didn't promote her new album with more TV performances. OK, she did other promotion stuff, like that Shibuya thing (which was also a chance for her to promote Deji Deji Diary), Yahoo! Special Interview and of course there were several music videos promoting the album. Nevertheless, I wondered, why she did appear on a music show only once for a whole album...