This is the first Ayu song in maybe 10 years that I’ve been so obsessed with! It has that magic Ayu spark. I don’t know how else to describe it! But the melody got stuck in my head right away (something that always happened with her older music), and I’ve pretty much listened to it on repeat for 4 days. : ) I’m just so happy to hear great quality music from her again after so long. It’s exciting to see what else she might have up her sleeve this year!

old school good style.. love it!

This. It's bizarre how long it's continued.

I thought mixing on this song was not quite as heinous as it had been for like Party Queen / A ONE / LOVE again... but she's also probably not had many songs that were as busy as Dreamed a Dream. Perhaps the sheer amount of aural things happening in this track is being mixed up with another issue that had been far worse before? For example, there's really weird loudness problems with Last minute that make it a little hard to listen to in its current state but this song only really has that kind of "mushed together" problem due to the way the arrangement is. I'd say the "mushed together" can be seen even in older songs like evolution when the guitars/synths/percussion all meet.

Dreamed a Dream didn't manage to chart within the top 20. I think it could have with a few more days but oh well, what's done is done. Number 20 sold 5,411 units. DaD is probably sitting somewhere in the top 30.

It's at #19 on the Billboard Japan Top Download Songs Charts!

She's #22 on Oricon weekly singles downloads charts selling 5,121 copies. Not bad! And this billboard info is even better!

It makes me wonder if Ayu is having final say and just literally cannot hear the issues with the mixes very well. If that’s the case she really needs someone she trusts to make that decision.

This is the type of arrangement she should’ve gone with:

^wow, so awesome!!!

I've never thought of it like that but that makes sense. Although I really like the song, I noticed it sounds a bit loud and I couldn't put my finger on why (knows nothing about the technical side of music) but now that everyone has pointed out the mixing, I can definitely hear it.

Even if she is the boss still there are a lot of people involved and more knowledgeable than her about these kind of technical issue so I don’t know what to think about it ? are they lazy ? when Koji morimoto was responsible of the mixing we didn't have these kind of concern.
I don’t particularly have an issue with this song but it’s seems that mixing issues is a redondant things since some times.

Koji Morimoto I believe is still in charge of mixing lately. It was Naoki Yamada though for a good amount of CD's mixes but Koji is usually always doing live mixing for Ayu.

It’s strange then ? I don’t think he would deliberately lower the quality of his work could it be a budget issue then ?

He seems to share the job with Naoki lately, but for a while Koji Morimoto was absent for albums like A ONE and LOVE again but then they split sixxxxxx.

Party Queen I think also suffered from being mixed by so many different people that the sound was a bit inconsistent.

However for Dreamed a Dream, I feel like the song is handled better than most of the "worst" mixes from the 2012-2015 era. It's also been a long time since we had a song like this as well aside from maybe We are the QUEENS but even that was quite some time ago!

I’m not an expert at all but the only album I’ve a problem with is party queen which is a shame because I really like it. Some songs are well produce like shake it, the jazzy songs for exemple but reminds me, call, letter and some others make me cringes...in these songs her voice is so badly mixed with the music it was a big downfall after love songs ...

Oh yeah, this is the Ayu I need in my life. Sounds like something from her best days! The teetering towards chaos in the chorus, the extravagance, the too-muchness of it all. I like how my ear can’t keep up, demanding several listens, and that it sounds like something from the early 00s with regard to the mix. Perfect.

Wow this is so good :love:love:love:love

The first song I remember listening to thinking the mixing was worse than before is Talkin' 2 myself, where it sounds like a "wall of noise" during the chorus. But I think one of her worst song in terms of mixing is Tell all. I love that song, but it doesn't sound like it went through compression before being released. It's really rough around the edges in other ways too though. Another song that I can remember off the top of my head that has issues is Mirrorcle world.

If I had to make a guess as to what the issue might be... I think it could maybe a be a money, time and scheduling issue? Something changed entirely in the way ayu released music after (miss) understood, going from a regular pre-set schedule every year with 3 singles and an album to random releases, as well as a greater focus on live performances. The industry was and is under pressure making less money, people started listening to LQ digital tracks instead of CD... I'm sure they'd made some difficult priorities. Also Ayu seems to sometimes make last minute changes, which might be more difficult to handle when there's no regular release schedule anymore.
Mixing takes a lot of time, especially when you have many elements in a song like in most Ayu tracks.


If you'd like to hear another example of sub par mixing, head of to my instagram where I posted a rock mix of Dreamed a Dream... :headache

talkin' 2 myself was the first time Yuta started composing for Ayu, so that could be it as well. Prior to that, he only ever worked with Ayu as part of H/\L. Also H/\L at that time was still active with members like Mayuko in there. I think H/\L as we know them dissolved in like 2009-2010?

I agree. It really started after (miss)understood. It wasn't too bad in talkin' 2 myself and I'm still able to ignore it here. But even though I loved Mirror and was so excited for Mirrorcle World, I always found it way too noisy and I barely listen to it. It annoys the hell out of me. Same goes for Tell All. What really bothers me with those two as well as now with Dreamed a Dream: They could have been so damn great. They have exactly the kind of J-Pop sound I usually fall for. But they are all so noisy I avoid listening to them. It's a shame.