About "A" Single
 

I watch browsing Ayu's discography and there's something fishy about this single.

Look at this Wiki page.

The ORICON Charts claimed that "A" is not a single but an album!
Can anyone explain this weird thing happened?

Look at this RIAJ certification.

Thanks in advance...

I don't know maybe RIAJ considered A to be an album because of the duration of the single ? :shrug

cos for a single to be over an hour long , it's very rare to happen at this day & age

anyway it doesn't really matter so much because RIAJ still certified it as Million

cause A had many songs this my opnion but it's not matter now cause the single or album had 9years now

That's really weird. Even if the time length and the tracklisting is long for a single, I would think that having instrumentals would be a clue of it not being an album since albums don't come with instrumentals.

It's also interesting that Boys & Girls isn't on that list, that also hit a million in 99 didn't it?

I understand with the length, but it is a single according to avex.

Fayray's "shiroi hana" album did.

My guess is that regardless of how a CD is marketed, when CD sales are being counted, CDs of a certain minute:second length are counted as albums, to avoid "cheating" by singles.

So, it means that "A" is the second album and GUILTY is the tenth album?!?

Im really confused... so the evolution single I had is an album? >: '

A charted as a single didn't it? And it was officially released as a single by avex. RIAJ is just a certification for numbers sold, not a classification so there's nothing to worry about. I have always thought of it as a single leading up to Loveppears and this doesn't change anything.

GUILTY is counted as her 10th overall album inclusive of Memorial address EP

A is counted as her single . You don't see a non remix album filled with so many remixes of the same song/s isn't it ?

evolution's a single , they will specify whether does she release a single or an album or not , you shouldn't be so anxious about the 'mistake' that RIAJ made , it's for their own reference anyway

uhmmm...

in the TV commercial for that single, it says that its a single with 14 tracks, like an album.

but the single is based in only 4 songs, their remixes and instrumentals, just like any other single.


if this was an album, the single "M" should be considered an album as well, because it has many songs!

so yeah...


theyre all singles! :D:D:D

Okay, I was really confused yesterday about this certification.
Oh well... :rolleyes I was now cleared about this confusing issue.

Thanks for the explaination KarenPang, SolarAngel, and SURREAL__RAINBOW :)

All these establishments have different rules though.

Avex probably has no clear-cut rules on what's an album or what's a single (maybe a high number of unique songs makes it an album), so A was a single with them. Oricon bases its charts on how the CD is marketed, so if it's marketed as a single, it charts as a single.

The RIAJ might have different rules though - if it has a certain number of tracks or a certain running time, it might have to be considered an album for certification purposes, that way it isn't competing with other singles that have less material, which would give it an edge over other singles, and that's kinda not fair really.

A is longer in tracks than ANY other Ayumi Hamasaki single, and the second longest in running time. It has 14 tracks, and a running time of 75:48 - kanariya, the only single longer, has a running time of 78 minutes. Since it was limited to 300,000 copies, it's not on that list, so I don't know if the RIAJ counted it as an album or a single. But I'd say Album is likely.

So, the RIAJ may have a clear-cut rule on their end that when they do certifications, anything longer than 13 tracks and/or 74:00 might have to be counted as an album with them, regardless of how it was marketed by the label.

Oricon DOES have a rule covering that exact rationale, such that a single cannot have more than 4 original tracks. A, as a result, passed this rule & was classified as such according to Oricon's standards. However, like Zer0 also mentioned, some artists/record companies simply choose to promote CDs with less than/exactly 4 new tracks as a mini-album/EP, & Oricon will chart it the way it's marketed (examples include Mika Nakashima's RESISTANCE & Crystal Kay's Shining).

Unfortunately I don't know RIAJ's rules, but it would appear that they have a different system that classifies A as an album. Either way, doesn't make it any less great of a CD, does it?? :P

Hi Kakki, how are you? ^_^ But thank you for helping with my point about there being different rules (I didn't really know Oricon's rules so thanks for that ^^)

Okay, I understand the A is STILL a single.
So, RIAJ has different standards on ranking than the ORICON's afterall.

yup it's :yes

in fact I never consider A to be an album to begin with , unless it's being stated as such

RIAJ also considers & as an album. It was among the winners for album of the year, along with Memorial Address and A Ballads, in the Gold Disc Awards held every year by RIAJ.

http://www.golddisc.jp/award/18/awar...um_of_the_year

Never heard of them.
I've never seen an ablum with instrumentals of tracks accompaning regular tracks so I thought it was a sort of a clear definition of what makes something an album.

I would think RIAJ, Orricon, and avex would have the same regards to makes an album but I guess not.