I expected her to be behind EXILE, YUI and Mr. Children. I don't know anything about Yumi Matsutoya but if its a 'best' album then I'm not surprised she charted higher than Ayu.

Shocked about Big Bang. :( I know a lot of people in the West like them but not how popular they are in Japan, with the way people were talking on here I assumed she'd sell much more than them though.

I don't want Ayu to turn into Taylor swift:
Date people so that you can write about them in your lyrics ><

^ lol...

Love your entire post as you aren't blind to reality but these are definitely the highlights that made me LOL! :roflmao

I call it Koda's "Kuutch" and sometimes I refer to her as "Kuutchie" in my head, lol.

Dating a divorced, younger man who has already a child born out of wedlock is nothing anyone should be ashamed of and it shouldn't be a problem at all. I don't think anyone has to stick to cultural norms just because a whole society is backward in development regarding values like liberty, individuality and the right to make your own choices in life.
And if Ayu is strong enough to refuse to accept these absolutely outdated and stupid norms I'm really proud of her and she is more my Queen than ever!

As a gay man, I have to say I can't think about many popstars who brought attention to the issue as beautifully and respectufully than Ayu did on Green and How beautiful are.

is all that official news now? I cant seem to keep up.

I don't think much credit goes to Big Bang here. Her sales figures are just really low right now. If it had sold like Five mini then she could very well have been no.2. I'll cross my fingers for a 50k total for again.

I dont understand why this album - "again" have a beautiful covers, good songs, perfect PV but sales like that @@
I cant understand what japanese think =,="

It has anything but perfect PVs... Lol. It's like one giant, confusing, boring continuation of an already stale storyline and one "simple yet pretty" PV.

all this has been messier than my phonetics exam.
Ayu drama got nothing on Uvular sounds. Ugh.

Because most of japanese fans are in denial about Ayu being a human that needs love, they just hate Maro

Reading some of the posts in this thread makes me realise just how truly loathesome some AHS forum members are. They're not even worth bothering to write a response to.

I've got a few small points to make, then I'm done here:
- 7 original songs over 2 releases in 2 months, each have been above par releases, especially the songs on again. I don't need sales to validate my opinion of Ayu's output and neither should any true music lover.
- 5 new PVs (albeit not the best, but better than nothing)
- another 3 releases in 3 months
- based on the three points above, we are being spoiled with new material from Ayu like we haven't seen for years. And the music is traditional ayu, sounds members here have been demanding for over experimental Party Queen ayu.
- for these consecutive releases, it has been said 100000000000 times before, SALES. DO. NOT. MATTER. Not to Ayu, Avex, and by extension to you. If they mattered, each release would be released at the start of the Oricon week. It would be nice if these sold more, but it is not the end of Ayu's career and it definitely should not reflect the quality of the music to you. There are a lot of external factors to consider as well, as the previous posts have covered.
- these releases are for you, the fans (including the selfish ones who truly make me ashamed to be an Ayu fan sometimes)

And the sales are not a reflection of the songs, pvs or cover. The sales are because many fans who put up with previous stunts are not putting up with one that requires turning her life and career into a big scandal to sell CDs that could have sold just based on being the queen of Jpop for 15 years but instead chose to be publicized by mimicking the stunt of 2 years ago not just in another relationship but in another series of videos and taking it even further with all the photoshoots. Although many probably saw it coming after Party Queen and it's on purpose tabloid garbage.

i just wanna say you makes TONS of sense.
:thumbsup

the bolded part... feel the same way! :love

:yes

It's not like the situation is that different over here lately...

Tony G, what you wrote is so true!!!!

It's not about being in love, she was in love with Tomoya for a long time and he was never a part of the "Hamasaki Ayumi" image.