Ayu''s vocal style.. changing?
 

Weird..

I was watching CDL05-06 earlier today and the performance of evolution came on and it sounded awkward to me, but it was because Ayu wasn't singing in that high-nasally voice that she usually uses for the song.. same goes for flower garden.

Is Ayu trying to change her live-vocals so that the 'cute-highpitched-nasally' image that people thought of her voice as goes away?

I like the new ayu's voice, but it doesn't really fit songs like evolution.. :\

yeah...she has use her deep voice...i like it
and YES! sometime it wasn't fit her old song

her old song is composed based on her vocal at that time so now she changed her voice, it doesn't fit anymore. i like her new vocal style better, sometimes listening back to her old song, i really can't stand her high-pitched voice. but songs like HONEY would sounds really good if she sang it that way.

She has been slowly changing how she performs the old songs for a few years now, this is nothing new. Ayu sings in a deeper voice and from her abdomen now a lot better than she did when she recorded those songs originally.

Yes, she has been changing, she probably wasen't very comfortable singing in her old ways. At least she seems to be in more control of her voice now, although it's hardly as cute. I don't think that her old songs were "fitted" for HER own voice, but just for some idol voice in general. Without the help of computers, she woulden't ever had reached the high notes in f. e.x fly high.

Definitely, it's changed A LOT from when she was just starting out. These days she's more in control like Petit has said, and she seems to be past those days with the "cute" voice. I guess that comes when you've been in the business long enough, since I think Koshi Inaba's voice has gone through a change throughout B'z's 18 years in music, just to name another example.

yeah ayu's voice getting deeper and deeper.

ya i think Ayu has sang alot deeper, but sometimes too deep, it just doesnt sound right...

I think it's become softer... I like this vocal style though. The Pride live made me feel cheated by the recorded version..

Ahhh... I see wotchu mean, but i'm really okay with her currently vocal!

Me too...Love her voice now

I think her singing voice now is much better than it was before. Yet I have to admit, her "nasal" voice was also very cute/raw/unique. :yes

Yeah, I definately thing it's better now. I was just listening to the acoustic orchestra version of A Song for XX and realized how much her voice has changed. She has better tone, more expression, etc now than when she first started out.

totally agree with you. :yes she has gotten so much more better than her debut.

She's not changing her voice, she simply can't sing like she used to.

Maybe it's the alcohol and cigarettes :D Anyway, I like her voice now. It's fuller, richer and deeper. It fills out the songs more. I started noticing a difference when Free & Easy came out a few years ago.

I like ayu's deep voice now .. but then sometimes it disturbs me when she just stay constantly at a deep voice, espcially for the beginning part of Greatful Days and is this LOVE? ...

Yes.

her voice simply just reached its puberty. if you noticed, right after her voyage era, her voice isn't controlled really well, and shes stuck in between her low voice and her cutesty high pitched voice. take the countdown live 2003 for example, her voice keeps skipping, which is a sign of puberty for your voice.

:\

Really?

I think that she'd be able to hit those notes, but she might be in danger of failing at doing so.. :\ [as with any performance from anyone]

:[

I agree

yeah.me myself
when i'm singing ayu's songs
for oldies ones...i even prefer my vocals...hahhahahahha

no.....actually ayu's voice now is really really good oredi and really match her everchanging style !!!!!!!!!!

see......if she sings mature-ly.i wanna die of excitement coz it sounds so great for me..............................................

She had the flu in countdown live 2002-2003...

Her voice changed dramatically from the release of I am... to Free&Easy. It became evident in Voyage, especially.

Not only that, she's grown up from being 20 to being 27. Your voice IS going to change.

ME TOO!!!! SAME WITH "BOLD & DELICIOUS"!!! Her vocals are GORGEOUS now! It's much richer and deeper. I LOVE IT! I've been loving her performances lately too, her "Startin'" one's sound great and her "Born To Be..." performances are AWESOME. LOVING IT! I'm glad to see her voice mature especially from watching her SUPER high pitched "evolution" vocals to now.

Yeah; I guess her voice has greatly changed over the years.. perhaps it's because I am.. was like 4 years ago? :p Time passes by so fast.. sooner or later, (miss)understood will be 'four years ago' as well! :o

Well that happens with people who draw too: they start drawing bad and later start to draw excellent and they just can't draw badly anymore :laugh That's still called "a change" even so.


I personally think her voice has improved big time.

-She now controls her vibrato much better, different from the A BEST/RAINBOW/A BALLADS time
-She has a softer, maturer and cleaner voice different from her high-pitched scream aloud from A Song for XX/LOVEppears
-She can sing songs that portrays leading and attitude better: Bold & Delicious compared to AUDIENCE (Please I'm not comparing both songs, just the attitude she has. In AUDIENCE she's supposed to be leading the audience to clap and shout but it doesn't sound like she's doing that if you don't watch the performances or read the lyrics, while Bold & Delicious portrays it better).
-She still can do that quick-rap sort of thing that became quite unique to her songs (evolution, Fly high) well (Ladies Night).

She still has some problems with chorus and some elements she adds like all those hey hey, wow wow wow, yeah yeah stuff. She could have some improvement on those but almost all of her verses have been vocally flawless lately imho (Liar, (miss)understood, Will, Pride, walking proud, is this LOVE?). Overall I prefer her newest vocals over her older, though i think each vocals suit the period she sang them.

What I meant with "change" is that she changed her voice on purpose. Which I doubt:


I think her voice has better in the Duty/I am... days.

that's what I think too. It doesn't sound as great now, like she isn't trying to sing the song to make it more enjoyable, she's just singing it deep so it's easier for her voice. but i'm fine with it :D

:\ If she can still talk high pitched [but we rarely see her do that], she can probably sing that way too.. I think it was shortly after the coming of MY STORY that Ayu sort of stopped using it all together xD

High pitched Ayu makes me think:

'Ayu Coooookie tiiiiiiiiiiiiime~!'

I really don't think that she is unable to use that high pitched voice anymore, but rather she is just holding it back. :o Eh, we'll never know anyway XD

which live are you talking about?

Well her voice has matured alot... her older songs don't have the quality in voice as her newer songs do... plus I'm sure it's hard to go back to that nasily voice after you have been training to get better...

When you work on your handwriting you don't suddenly go back to the chicken-scratch it once was... and it's harder to make it look like chicken-scratch...

Ayu would probably hurt her voice if she sang like she used to... But some older songs do sound odd with her new voice... I think she should do a remix album of her older song with a newer, more modern arrangement and with her new voice :yes

The handwriting thing is so true. I worked so hard on it, I couldn't get my writing to look ugly no matter how hard I tried yesterday. In this case it turned out pretty bad, since I was supposed to forge someone's handwriting.

I wouldn't want to see the beauty of her older songs broken by her "updated" voice though. Maybe it'd be just too weird. Some of the old songs she performs live already sound rather odd for me.

I agree.. when she sang Endless sorrow in CDL 05-06, it's just so awkward.. I dunno but she tried to lower the key of the verse... but it sounds like mumbling instead. It's ok to single LOVE~Destiny~ in a mature way (at least I didn't find it as annoying as Endless sorrrow), but I still prefer she using her old way to sing that song.

It's good to see artists tryin' to improve the voice, and using different methods to sing their older songs.. But somehow I think ayu should make a balance of old and new voices. Her deeper voice doesn't really fit some of the old songs.. >.<

While, I love her new voice and stlye of singing, the cutesy voice was just too perfect for her older songs. I'm a little sad to see it go. :(

well...maybe she's just getting old

I agree. When I first got into ayu, I was not partial to her earilier works, her voice sounded too high and squeaky. Even now, after I've learned to respect her earilier works, I prefer her older, deeper and softer voice.

i think she's always looking for a new attribute to add to her voice...

lol; I think Ayu's one of the few artists who have older songs that are drastically different from her present works [not to insult the new stuff at all!] but its just really different, yanno?

I think that you can tell when she's trying when her voice is all nasally and stuff. I wonder if she's totally just breaking away from singing like that since in the beginning she started out like that cause she was a 'kawaii jpop star<3' and now she's this mature woman.. Ayu still looks the same as she did back then though :D [without makeup]