So sad she' not in TOP10 anymore...:( But at least it has long chart life. :P

^

It's a faraway dream... and I usually post here ^^ (who are you?)

Yeah! We kept it private! :)

I wonder if NEXT LEVEL can keep charting until her next single release! Maybe that single can boost the sales even more?

Desculpa xD Não foi por mal sr Impact

-

If Next Level can be on charts until 2nd leg of At09, I'm pretty sure the sales will rise... But, it will not outsell Trick^^

That's such a shame, it's a far more superior album!

QFT. oh well. maybe ayu will outsell her next album :P

^ I hope so! If her next single is slammin' and her album is released first, she could have a chance.

I won't be surprised if that happens lol

what about the 26th week? Is it still charting?

Yeah, I wanna know, too. (I should just search for it myself, but I'm kinda lazy right now. XD)

Well the top 50 yearly is still isn't updated so we still can't know.

Aa. True. >_<'

26th Week:

*,377,336 ***,462 NEXT LEVEL / 浜崎あゆみ 09/03/25

Wow it's selling!!!

Yay for 26th week!!! I hope it reaches at least 380k, tough it's clear that soon it will be out of charts... But congratulations for its long chartlife!!~

Wow it charted more than I am... =DD
The sales are incomparable but in chart life NEXT LEVEL is of the cake takers.

So just one more week and it charted as long as Duty (27 weeks)!! Although NL is my least-favourite album of ayu, I'm hoping it stays another week on chart.

NL is almost gone from the chart. its almost finish...

I'm happy it had such a long run!!

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO DON'T PASS DUTY!!!!!!~----*ahem* I mean--Wow, still charting! ^_^'

KING OF POP....330k.....
Hope it won't surpass NL, or the ranking of NL will fall down again:(

Oh my God, I will really lol if the happens. D:

^

me too ToT

341K already.

i think NL will be surpassed by MJ

*1 1,240,455 *40,385 All the BEST！ 1999-2009 / 嵐 09/08/19
*2 1,239,333 ***,640 SUPERMARKET FANTASY / Mr.Children 08/12/10
*3 *,979,794 **3,398 塩、コショウ / GReeeeN 09/06/10
*4 *,827,735 **1,028 EXILE BALLAD BEST / EXILE 08/12/03 累計1,771,636
*5 *,659,266 ***,920 DO YOU DREAMS COME TRUE？ / DREAMS COME TRUE 09/03/21
*6 *,484,859 ***,*** レミオベスト / レミオロメン 09/03/09
*7 *,439,991 **7,470 CALLING / コブクロ 09/08/05
*8 *,423,746 **3,364 残響 / 福山雅治 09/06/30
*9 *,422,513 ***,789 My song Your song / いきものがかり 08/12/24
10 *,391,094 ***,*** TRICK / 倖田來未 09/01/28
11 *,377,336 ***,462 NEXT LEVEL / 浜崎あゆみ 09/03/25
12 *,358,359 *44,795 Box Emotions / Superfly 09/09/02
13 *,341,957 **6,469 KING OF POP -JAPAN EDITION / Michael Jackson 08/09/24 累計380,302

If she released something new, it could bost sales a little... maybe enough for surpass TRICK because it seems that Superfly and MJ are going to surpass NL
I hope NL make top 15 at least

LOLZ!



And wow! its still charting! O_O"

Its been a long time since it charted like this, (m)u is the last album to chart almost 20+ weeks.

I bet it with pass Duty's chart life ;)

Wow, who would have known it would last this long... Hopefully NL can still chart for a while :)

I'm so happy it's a very good album I'm a little disappointed by the sales but at the end it has done a very very good job !

Moreover do you agree it had a very bad marketting plan?

^ Yes, it had half-***ed marketing. >_<' Like, there was promotion...kinda. -_- Just, they promoted it in the wrong ways, if that makes sense. I don't really know how to explain, but it's like they were going in the right direction, but then something went wrong and they gave up. D:

And oh my God, MJ will pass it AND it will pass Duty!? Kill me now!!~ :cry

^ it's not like it's passing Duty in sales lol, it's not that big of a deal
but even if it did i wouldn't care since i dislike Duty a lot :P but yeah, not happening

@Ayu_Ready
I agree... No big promotion at all, no magazines, no TV performances, no big posters in Shibuya etc... I mean... S/S had a bigger promotion!! More TV appearances and magazines!!! and NEXT LEVEL... NOTHING! .... maybe it would have been different with more promotion... I feel like japanese people can't feel the new songs cause they havn't been promoted at all...

Well, Rule/Sparkle did have decent promotion, what with the movie and then the car ad. But the car ad was bleh, and they focused more on Rule than they did Rule/Sparkle, let alone NEXT LEVEL. And then that's pretty much it, lol. :S Proper promotion really is the key to sales, especially in Japan. It feels like avex lately is experimenting with their marketing techniques by using Ayu. >_> Either that, or they just assumed that random, crappy promos would still have Ayumi Hamasaki sell well. If that's the case, boy, were they wrong. ;_;

She always focus on the song with the safer topic/video... The most controverse stuff is almost always left behind on promotion^^

^ Sorry, I was a little vague with that. What I meant was, they treated Rule as if it were completely separate from the single and the album. It left the other songs alienated, so its promotion was pointless.

Yes it's for all of that I'm proud of Ayu, without any promotion she sells 380k... who can do better XD

Maybe the a-nation tv show could bost the sales? I hope ^^ (and if it bost kuu sales i'd be proud too :D)

^ I don't know about that! She only sang one song off NEXT LEVEL right? And it's a single at that.

Yeah. a-nation won't likely boost her album sales at all, lol. If it does, she'll be lucky.

The lack of TV appearances/mag covers really killed the sales of NL. One TV appearance singing Rule (pple just bought the single and not the album anyway) and like 3-4 magazines covers. When Avex really want to promote an album they will go all out. This time, it's like their strategy was "gee, maybe we will just not promote it so much to see what the absolute minimum number an Ayu album can sell"!!

And even this way, she got number 1 in united world chart. Sales are low but it's still in top 15 in oricon yearly (i think it's at 11? or 12, don't remember) GUILTY with better sales (+500k) end at 17. She's doing great with downloads (that ranking posted here chaku uta or something like that xD)
I think she's doing great, just hope next single&album will have more promotion.

Still think that not overpromoting is a good thing for her...

^^ :yes
Hopefully avex won't be a buttface next year and give Ayu some proper promotion. :mad But yeah, not TOO much. D:

I wonder how she'll do with better promotion, I hope NL can chart longer than Duty. :)

lol the 8-song broadcast on a-nation 09 was avex's reward for Ayu!

Can anyone tell me how many members (exactly) TA has? *offtopic a bit, sorry*

^ definitely less than tvxq's fanclub if that's what you're getting at.

I don't really get all this complaining about the promo. Ayu's name is big enough that people will know she has an album out, that's not the issue. Ever think that maybe people just don't like the material? Or they're just not interested enough to buy it? Word of mouth is one of the best forms of promo... that's how A Song for XX sold in the first place.

She might be a big name but it doesn't mean that people besides her fans or maybe some casual listeners check if she is releasing an album.

I think that more outdoors promotion would help not the TV/mags.
The album had a potential to at least sell 400,000-450,000 imo concerning the lack of big outdoors promo and the changing ayu style in the album (more up beat than depresive, deep, dark songs). This type of album was just new. You can compare it to LOVEppears because of the dance<>electro pop thingy but really, it's nothing similar to it (or any of her albums). If at all it might have been like a LOVEppears lite and so are the sales lite.

@Mitkki No, that's not what I'm getting at.

Based on your logic Sunrise should've sold way more than it did, but it didn't because it didn't appeal to people's interests. Reviews for Sunrise are flooded with 1 star ratings on amazon jp just like how NEXT LEVEL's top 3 ratings are of 1 star vs GUILTY's 5 star ratings.
You can promote something as much as you like but it's only going to sell to some point due to many other factors. Obviously promo will help sales but it only significantly boosts sales when an artist hasn't broken-through yet and clearly this is not the case. I wouldn't call NEXT LEVEL trucks parading around shibuya and stands being set up outside major record stores light promo anyway since that's where the sales come from.
(and LOVEppears >>>>>>>>>>>> NEXT LEVEL by FAR)

Sunrise ~LOVE is ALL~ just did as its tie-ined drama did.
Average.
And it's not like Sunrise had huge outdoors promo.
And we know how TV/Magazine promotion of just few (5-6) help. (They don't) not to get up sales anyway and for most they don't.
Sunrise wasn't a hit alright but it still did average, like ayu's status as of late.
As I said if she won't come with a hit (not just a song that most would agree that is great) but a real hit, and avex would manage her promotion and all correctly, she will be able to rise up again.
While she keeps being on the "doing what my hardcore fans like" side it won't happen. At the end of the day TA's fans numbers keep rising slowly but if she relies on satisfying them rather then "smash" the public (And trying to "smash" both) then yeah, average numbers will stay with the normal decreases.

For me - LOVEppears>>>>>>>Every album exists on the world lol.

I agree 100% with ayumisrael.
Also, I really don't see why you needed to bring up THSK... LOL.

If there is something I'm pretty sure, is that ayu is not trying to please TA Members with her music, usually when she releases some reused stuff, it appeals to the general public (summer/winter singles)
-
Japanese people are pretty tired of Ayu, over promoting her like she was doing back at her peak would just kill her image for good. She is having some time away from the spotlights (compared to how much she promoted before) and even if this may affect her sales by people not knowing she is releasing, it also prevents her from getting even older to Japanese eyes (considering people over there talks about her like she had a 60 years non-stop career with 3 studio albums a year).
-
And also, she didn't had any song that catch the general public interest (maybe Days, I wish I had a friend living on Japan to ask how big the song was), but for sure not a smash hit like Seasons-M-Dearest-Voyage. And that's normal considering Voyage is only 7 years old (Namie for example needed almost 11 years between her biggest and final big hit from the 90s, Can You Celebrate and her first BIG hit from the 00s, New Look), once your image gets tired, you need to wait until a new generation discovers you... So, she is doing average, thanks God she is not selling 20k per single and 100k per album (as it would be expected)... It's pretty much like Madonna between 1992 and 2000 xD

That makes a lot of sense, I guess we don't have anything to worry about really considering almost every artists has lags in their career. :)

I don't know why either but even ayu did. :dead2
I guess I was just getting tired of reading fangirls' proclamations about how they have the biggest fanclub membership in avex/asia/the world/the universe/whatever.

I agree with everything you said.
Though for trying to satisfy general public or fans, you could be right,
I still myself which of them for 100% but to me it looked like more for the hardcore fans for the reason that her singles first weeks revolved around the same t2m-S/S MW/D/G/R/S so it's like all of the fans are hurrying to get them (and as we know TA has more than 70,000 people).
So that's why I mainly thought it would be for the fans that them all buy it.
But you might be right and she tried to satisfy the general public.
I'm unsure about it.

With the rest of what you wrote 100% agree.

Well I think it's pretty obvious I have the biggest fanclub in the entire of Asia. ;)

That's true, even though it got nothing with my question obviously.

^ lol my bad, seeing your avatar/sig gave me the sensation of being at soompi or something.

Well... IMO she was discovering herself as an artist doing whatever she from ASFXX to I am..., from Rainbow to (miss)understood she started trying new things and experiement more, even with the singles, here she already knew what she liked to do... The sales decreased a lot and she started to try to please general public again, so, we got very safe summer singles and winter singles based mostly on old hits (but even so, she kept experiementing with the other singles and album tracks). Finally, on Next Level, she started to follow the trend, so she "eletropoped" herself and released a winter ballad on the mold of koda kumi ones (Days), but even so, she still IMO kept the Ayu feeling to everything.

So... IMO right now she is trying to get the general public again by following the trend without killing her own personality on her music (after all, this is what make her interesting on the first place)

Even if this is only a opinion... the number of ayu videos uploaded and comented by japanese people on youtube is increasing (and not only old ones, a-nation'09 videos were uploaded by japanese... and a lot of the comments are on japanese). She seens to be gaining more attention as a performer since At08

I agree with you about Loveappears. But for the other statement, I would actually say that she isn't doing what many hardcore fans like. I mean, most of her hardcore fans are likely to have joined TA during her ultra popular era (albums 1-4). We really don't know if TAs numbers have remained stable, increased, or decreased. The hardcore fans though are more likely to stick around through anything, even if they too miss the days when she released stuff like Seasons. :)

I know it probably seems weird to people to say what you said when Ayu's sales still are pretty good compared to other female artists and she still shows up on several polls but in general I agree as well. I do think she less and less is bringing in casual buyers but then occasionally will have some success with songs like Days. The feeling I've always gotten from being in Japan is that people either don't like her/are tired of her or that they really like her old material and image, but not the current one etc etc.


Your general concept I agree with, but there are some details that I disagree with. I would say Namie's comeback single was actually Baby Don't Cry and you totally left out Never End - that single sold a very impressive amount in 2000. But the biggest difference I see in the case of Ayumi and Namie is that when Namie had her major success in the 90s, she was younger than Ayumi was when she had hers. Which means that at the rate Ayu is going, her "revival" might not come until she is in her late 30s - which in Japan would be considered way to old.

Or Avex isn't being as hardcore about deleting videos left and right as they have been in the past. :)

And I agree with the first point totally and it is part of the reason why I didn't really like Next Level that much.

^Yeah, but the videos usually had coments on english, and the japanese coments were always on old videos... But my impression that she is gaining some popularity (what doesn't mean she will become the God of jpop on her next album or anything like that, just that she seens to be slowly rising) are the reprise od pcdl and at08 broadcasts, the show with performances from all her tours, the number of dates on at09, her a-nation'09 show being totally broadcasted, that poll where she was 3rd as the star people wanted to she the concerts more, etc. Usually when those artists popularity rise, it's not all of a sudden, their numbers starts getting better and better (Namie for example was gaining atention since Girl Talk).

About Next Level... I can see why some people dislike it for being an album were she follows the trend, but oh well... she is a popstar, and popstars need to sell xD Those who keep famous for a long time will always need to release more personal and more generic stuff in order to keep original and fresh (what makes them stand out), but also to make them gain interest from new fans (so they don't end like Seiko Matusa :P)

^ I'm sure there are tons of artists that wish they could have ended up like Seiko Matsuda. She is really the only famous female artist that is still around and doing relatively well after such a long time. And I agree popstars need to sell, but then by following the trend, you'd think Next Level would have sold better. :) Yet an album that totally doesn't follow any current music industry trends is going to end up being the best selling original album of the year.

As for your reasons to demonstrate her rising popularity, I really wouldn't count the broadcasts of tour related things as an indicator. Those were all aired on very specialized channels that show several other artists concerts as well, yet I wouldn't say that it means their popularity is on the rise too. :)

^Well, as far as I know, they usually don't reprise cdls...
and about Seiko... I watched a recent concert of hers, and the audience was formed basically of people over their 40s watching an almost 50 years old woman acting like a Momusu... I really hopes this doesn't happen to Ayu :P

About Next Level, I said she tried to catch the attention of new fans, not that she could do it with that album... Still, Days had a very good reception and is a very generic track, so, it's not like this is not working at all ;)

--
Choose ur weapons Sunshine Slayer, we are going to duel until one of us is dead, right know!

jk xD

^ I really didn't think we were disagreeing that much. lol :)

But yeah of course I don't want Ayu to end up like Seiko in terms of what you mentioned, but honestly as a female artist in Japan that is way better than what most of them get. (which is nothing)

As for the re-airings, they are just like any other network - they need to fill their time up with something. :) Almost always the stuff that they broadcast they do so more than once. I've even seen them re-air concerts as far back as the 80s!

Wow you guys made really good points... but I was just wondering - is the longevity of NEXT LEVEL also indicative to how the Japanese in general are like, "Bleh, another Ayu release" when the album was first released - which explains the really low sales, but as time goes by, perhaps through word-of-mouth or other factors, people start to warm up to the album, and then purchase it?

NEXT LEVEL's chart life is catching up to Duty, and it has surpassed many of her older albums like GUILTY, Secret and RAINBOW, so...

This or maybe her average sales turn out being good this year because of the economic crisis...

I would also say the fact that the sales are generally low this year (at least lower than during the previous couple of years) helped NEXT LEVEL stay longer on the charts.

The majority of Ayu's albums didn't have amazing chart lives due to the fact the sales of other releases were stronger than now.

I definitely think a lot of people are slowly but surely warming up to NEXT LEVEL. I mean, I know I really had to get used to the whole album before liking it much at all. And many other people have said the same. So hopefully this will keep NEXT LEVEL on the charts for a while longer.

27th Week
Position: Still Unknown
Sales: 536
Total Sales: 377,872

Now it has the same chart life like Duty. =D

^It sold more than 2 weeks ago ^^
i think it's probably because a-nation on wowow? but s/s don't went up...
Maybe it could reach 380k just 3/4 weeks

Did oricon counts those sales down top 300 by the end of the year? I mean, she maybe sell about 2k-3k more in total when it stop charting (don't be in top300), so, does these sales (2k-3k) count in the year chart?

And thank you a lot ayumisrael ^^

well from what I know , the Oricon year starts & will end around the 2nd week of Dec ?

Because Mr.Children's SUPERMARKET FANTASY was released last Dec on the 12th so yeah & Oricon counted the album in their 2009 yearly album chart & not 2008

Wow same chart life as Duty! Woo~

nope.. they never count sales out from top 300....

Yay for the 27th week increase!!

yeah =D moreover sales rise ! anation effect?

Ooooohh, please reach at least 380!!!! Go go go!!

top 50 albums of '09

*1 1,276,486 *36,031 All the BEST！ 1999-2009 / 嵐 09/08/19
*2 1,240,165 ***,832 SUPERMARKET FANTASY / Mr.Children 08/12/10
*3 *,983,759 **3,965 塩、コショウ / GReeeeN 09/06/10
*4 *,829,072 **1,337 EXILE BALLAD BEST / EXILE 08/12/03 累計1,772,973
*5 *,660,632 **1,366 DO YOU DREAMS COME TRUE？ / DREAMS COME TRUE 09/03/21
*6 *,485,401 ***,542 レミオベスト / レミオロメン 09/03/09
*7 *,446,844 **6,853 CALLING / コブクロ 09/08/05
*8 *,427,458 **3,712 残響 / 福山雅治 09/06/30
*9 *,423,876 **1,363 My song Your song / いきものがかり 08/12/24
10 *,396,943 *38,584 Box Emotions / Superfly 09/09/02
11 *,391,094 ***,*** TRICK / 倖田來未 09/01/28
12 *,377,872 ***,536 NEXT LEVEL / 浜崎あゆみ 09/03/25
13 *,348,902 **6,945 KING OF POP -JAPAN EDITION / Michael Jackson 08/09/24 累計387,247
14 *,348,013 348,013 ayaka's History 2006-2009 / 絢香 09/09/23
15 *,339,907 **3,724 Ring / 加藤ミリヤ 09/07/08
16 *,326,940 ***,641 アルトコロニーの定理 / RADWIMPS 09/03/11

I think by next week , NEXT LEVEL might be pushed down to #13 depending on how much ayaka's History 2006-2009 will sell next week

I hope it charts for just one more week haha

^ Me too! I want something about this album to be special! It deserves at least that!

I want it to chart until at least it reaches 380k :)

Tal, 26th week position was #287

Thank you, I have updated it. ^^

thanks for the information~

It's still charting, HAHA.

It amazes me, has it out charted Duty yet?

if it charts this week again, it will

if you stop at the same position charts stopped some years ago... Duty was in charts for way longer. When Duty was released, the ranking only was 1-100, now its 1-300, so you can't compare it, because actually Duty was in the top 300 for a way longer time than NEXT LEVEL, likely over a year, we just did not SEE it in the charts, because the lists were not released. Too see which album outcharted the other one, we have to look at how long they stayed in the top 100

^ That's actually a good point, but if we're counting how long an album stayed in VISIBLE charts.

but if you are counting in visible charts the result you get means nothing, because if an album stayed in the top 300 a week longer than another album stayed in the top 100 that doesnt mean anything

Parade pisser!

Yes, my HONEY.

lol. He is totally right though. :) I didn't realize Oricon only used to show the Top 100. So yeah, in that case you can't compare their chart runs at all.

oh man lol... that sucks, but at least it has outrun her albums which had Oricon Top 300. Which year did that start btw?

^2003, if I'm not mistaken.
Still, I think we need to start looking at Ayu's successes now (in the last year or two) as not only sales, but chart life.
Overall sales are down, and so is chart life...it's nice to see that her sales are still true to standard.

I know he is right xD
But still, Next Level is having a good chart life

Well NEXT LEVEL still have a better chart life than Secret and GUILTY so it's great. XD

#287!? I hope the up coming 4 shows keep the album selling for the month of October.

Aaaaaa, getting close to the edge! D: But I've been happy with the sales and chart life for a month now, so it won't be the end of the world if it finally falls off... Just wish it would make it to 380. >.<

And HA! Duty still rules all!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! MWAHAHAH!~ :evillaugh

well yea i agree abt not being able to compare. But over time, we do see the falling in CD sales and its even harder to sustain the chart life of an album. So whether or not NEXT LEVEL beats it, to even reach the visible chartlife of Duty is really very good already...considering its a original studio album..

:roflmao

Yeah at least we still have that much lol.