She's just like the ideal pop star: Okay image, okay music, okay pvs but nothing to offer as an artist or talk about something interesting in her music.

i think is all about her image
i love dance music, (even dubious quality songs like Xoxo or lelio)
but i have to say that her FEEL album is veeeeery boring!
maybe 1 or 2 songs sounds interesting,..the rest sounds like EDM for childrens.

maybe that's the formula, put only one interesting and innovative track as the main theme of your album, and the peoples gonna buy it even when the rest is crap xd

lol :D This means that those albums that doesn't sell well are full of crap ya? :yes:yes

I bet you shared this formula with ayu this year. That explains a lot. :yes

:shakehead nop, "album that doesnt sell well is because they are not proposing an attractive main theme" ... people these days are not buying new albums because the full track list, but because one or two Catchy Songs.

well...there is no "innovative or catchy main theme" in the new ayu's album, and her sells are worst than ever, so i think she ignore my theory. :no

Everything that Namie's put out in the last 5 years is more interesting or the very least better executed than what Ayu has done. She isn't afraid to reinvent herself and doesn't really half-arse anything. Starting from the Style era when she started to move into a more urban sort of sound, to her 60s/70s/80s single trio where she started to claim the 'fashion' space, to releasing Uncontrolled with English versions of her singles, to FEEL which placed her solidly in EDM with even MORE English songs.

It certainly helps that her her sound is also very on trend now and is more appealing to what you might listen to in clubs, but it's worth noting that whatever she does, she occupies the sound with such an effortless casual ease it's like she was made to do that song. This is certainly in part due to taste in selecting songs, but I also really believe that a large part of this is in her investment in producers who really make or choose songs that are suited for her. And the icing on the cake is the fact that every one of her albums sound expensive in terms of production values. I just listened to previews from her new album on YouTube and it's already sounded better, crisper, clearer than anything Ayu has put out in the last 5 years. When a frigging YouTube preview sounds better produced than A ONE on its actual CD you know something is terribly wrong.

I've always been an Ayu fan first and foremost, but honestly, Namie is in a different league. I'm not saying that Ayu needs to go and do a 180, but she needs to really sit down, think carefully about what she wants to do as a MUSICIAN, and commit to it, rather than rehashing herself ad nauseum.

On that comment regarding reinvention - yeahh......nah, not really. It depends. If you're a musician with rock roots with an emphasis on songwriting and all that, chances are you can get away with just doing the same thing visually over and over again (Mr Children), and if you're one with a POP image and fanbase then you'd feel obliged to conform to shifting tastes (Coldplay -- first album versus latest album). I don't think it's a gender thing. One of the most 'reinvented' musicians of all times, David Bowie, is very very male. And then you have someone like aiko who doesn't give a fuck and has released the same song since day 1.

js_surrealism: Wow, great post! I totally agree with every word you you've just written. Nothing to add.

I also love Ayu, but I have a feeling she is kinda lost in her music for last 5 years. Unfortunately, it doesn't seem that something is gonna change soon :-/

Trendier and radio-friendlier I totally agree...

But I'm fail on seeing any reinvention of her part since either Past>Future (2009) or Checkmate (2011). You may like Namie better (fair enough), but Ayumi takes far more risks... On the space of time Namie has been releasing pretty much only EDM and pop ballads, Ayu released electropop, jazz swing, dance-rock, barroque rock, show-tunes, EDM, Trance and some stuff I don't even know what to call like Brillante.

If any of the 2 is actually getting out of their confort zones and trying making something new out of their sound, that's Ayu. But I confess I'm really curious about genic...

With that I agree, ayu might not be consistent releasing a full up beat album with electronic, trance or swing jazz stuff, or full albums with EDM ballads like Angel or accentric stuff like BRILLANTE or Don't look back but she still does them and in some of these styles non of the other jdivas touched like ayu did. Even in songs that are her style, she sometimes get hints of these. A ONE was a case of doing what she usually does but I think that the whole idea of it was "that's it" that it might be the last time (Last minute/WARNING ya'll).

Namie is the most trendy though and have a cohesive main style for an album. Which is not bad. I love them for different reasons.

I am a die hard fan of Ayu but her music is dated and her lyrics aren`t as good as it used to be. I simply stop following her after she released Love again. I think she needs to take a break like Namie did and figure it out that working with the same people is not taking her anywhere creatively speaking and sales-wise.

totally :yes, One of my reasons is TK. Why is ayu still working with him. TK's so last week.

It's kinda funny because I feel some of Namie's TK work is her best. Dreaming I Was Dreaming, Love 2000, How To Be A Girl, and Please Smile Again. Classics.

Classics of back in the day... Even though I did enjoy love again. I wasn't a fan of his later works especially feel the love. I just feel like ayu needs new composers. Even though I would prob complain later if she does. Haha God knows i dislike her new dancers.

All of ayu's music sound the same these days... I haven't loved an ayu song for many years. Namie's music on the other hand, is hot, fresh and current. Also, when was the last time an ayu album cover was not just a close-up of her face?

I believe that some of Ayus downfall is how she kinda has lost her connection with her Japanese fans.
Videos like WARNING and albums like Party Queen is basically a big fuck you to the japanese industry and in that category; her japanese fans.
She acts like she wants to be american (which the japanese fans feel too), and that turns off a lot of her japanese fans.

Namie on the other hand keeps her image and focus on the japanese fans, even though she explores into english songs.

Utada has literally given Namie her career back. Bless her.

You say the girl who is releasing albums mostly in english with american radio-friendly inspired music isn't the one trying to be american?

This is as bad as a base of comparation as is the close up photos...

I feel that the amount of effort that went into ayu's album covers for her recent albums is reflective of the quality of the album. I found A One and Colours to be boring for the most part, and their covers, well... don't feature much except her pretty face. If you look at the covers for her older albums (and Namie's covers), you can see that the covers tell stories, through fashion and backgrounds. What stories do the covers for Colours and A One tell besides "I'm lookin' fabulous"?

I think kimmeh is somehow right. Kimmeh said Ayu is acting as if she wants to be american. It's more about Ayu's actions what pisses japanese fans off. Most things Ayu has done the last few years in her private life let a lot of japanese people think Ayu betrayed their culture. Ayu does "american" things in her private life while releasing typical japanese pop music most of the time. Namie on the contrary is the idealised japanese woman who is releasing american inspired music. So Namie is, for some japanese people, true to her cultural roots but at the same time cool because of her american sounding releases. It's somehow paradox but it's like japanese people do everything to look as european (or to be more precisely as white skinned) as they can but are at the same time proud to be japanese.
Of course there is a lot of racism behind all of this.