Ayu ~Anything Goes~ XVI
 

Getting prepped up for the next edition of AHS' general discussion thread about anything Ayu.

Because I have an exam on Monday, so I might not visit AHS on Sunday... (well, it is Sunday already, but it's still "Saturday night")

Does anyone know why she isn't releasing singles anymore since Love songs, except Feel the love? Has she or someone else official talked about it?

I don't understand.
She already broke her #1 streak and every artist releases singles. It was cool with Party queen but now I'm just sad that we get all the new songs in big chunks. A member named Zeke(Zede?) wrote a beautiful post about it in another topic.

This is really the most amazing thing.

hmm. subpar vocals and melodramatic acting.

Arena Tour 2006 acoustic performance is an emotional masterpiece. (although her vibrato is a bit heavy at the end, which I don't mind)

she did Zutto... / Last minute / Walk tho

ugh i love this performance to death

That was a physical single release?! Oops!
I guess I'm confused because Love songs is the last album she had a proper era/cycle for. After that it's all mini-albums, no-singles, or a digital single, a random physical single here and there, or release the album in parts...
Why doesn't she do 2-3 singles before each album anymore? Has that been discussed on this forum? I'm curious to read the reasoning.

Edit: Btw totally OT but I love Finland XD I've been to Helsinki airport too many times haha. It's really my favorite airport and Finnish women are so pretty. If you're landing late in the afternoon the sun casts super long shadows from the trees all over the snowfields. It's really beautiful!

^
If I remember well she stated in interview back to the day L was released something like if it was the last single of her carrier it would be ok ! Singles are useless today we are not in 90's/00's anymore ...they don't have the same impact as before and are not promoted as well like before ! Furthermore singers in japan with long career tend to release less and less singles at some point ... Ayumi is definitly not an exception !

I wouldn't call singles useless, especially lead singles are critical for album promotion, but I understand your point and thanks for the interview excerpt :)

4Seasons : In the Majesty Japan 2013, Ayu said that :

source

sorry I coudn't find the full translated interview. It's possible that's the reason why she didn't want to release single anymore (even if we had Feel the love/merry-go-round and zutto... singles since then but she surely created the songs and decided the release date as a single thereafter).

That's weird because, if I recall correctly, she didn't even have any lyrics written when Zutto... was announced, and everything had to be done in, like, a month. That's why the single version of Last minute has really poor mixing.

I understand her reasons for not releasing singles anymore, I just wish she could really follow that line of thought. Her albums usually sound like a collection of tracks that were clearly written at different times and that's why they never "flow nicely" throughout the record--and that's a problem with Japanese pop music in general, in my honest opinion.

With an artist as diverse as Ayu, you will never get that "nice flow" which will often get interpreted as samey or boring if ever attempted IMO.

Colours maybe being the exception, IMO all of her albums since Love songs actually have a pretty nice flow sound wise

I feel the same way tbh. Rock'n'Roll Circus was a bit of a departure since she purposefully went for very different things IMO.

I hope we get some interesting PVs for MADE IN JAPAN. I don't mind if she sticks to her minimalist trend, but gawd, I would love to see her do something completely over the top like 1LOVE, Ladies Night, or fairyland.

The single and album versions of Last minute have different mixing???

I think it's a slight difference? But it is veeerrry slight.

Also, I am relistening to HOTEL Love songs and this concert had AMAZING songs in it.

Those sounded more like mastering/equalization differences to me, honestly. VERY slight. I wouldn't count them as a mix change at all.

Ayu's album flow literally hasn't been good since "Duty." That was such a short album, like, you can tell she had some idea of what the flow should be as she worked on it.

There's an art to building an "album" as opposed to just a collection of songs that's mostly become more and more lost since the turn of the millennium, not just in Jpop either. It's a global thing.

I remember that around 2010 I saw a lot of people complaining about ayu's interludes, saying they added nothing to the album but make it seem like there was more material in it (as if interludes were not actual songs...), but now I see many posts saying they want interludes back, an album with 15 tracks and such. I guess we get too used to what the current trend is and will always think of how much better it'd be if something changed :P

I myself do not feel like her interludes were that necessary for her albums, but she did have some great ones that helped building up to the next songs really well (Marionette -prelude- and montage are the first ones that come up to my mind )

I'm sorry, that's what I meant! I got confused with the terms "mixing" and "mastering." :) It's a slight difference, yes, but I can't listen to the single version of Last minute ever since A ONE was released.

Personally I've never been a fan of her interludes. Only two or three in her whole discography I actually love. The rest, I can't even remember what they sound like, and I hear her full albums a couple times a year mind you. But as long as a full-length song isn't replaced by an interlude (which I doubt is ever the case) it doesn't bother me.