FLOWER & Mad World (Short ver. MVs on YouTube)

[njanjayrp]

Originally Posted by Baernash

Maybe, who knows. I think she gave up on meaningful works a long time ago.


She had already PVs with similar concept. I'm not impressed with any of those. She's trying to show something meaningful but I feel like she's trying too hard and in effect we're getting very "fake" impression.

Just because it holds no meaning to you, it does not mean it has no meaning at all.

[Baernash]

Originally Posted by njanjayrp

Just because it holds no meaning to you, it does not mean it has no meaning at all.

We can always say that something has meaning even if we can't see it. I think saying that they are "emotionless" would be a better word than "meaningless". Her old works were able to makes me feel something: happiness, sadness... even made me cry. Those videos are just "emotionally fake". I like concept of "FLOWER" (kinda like "MOON" and "Don't look back") but I don't like Ayu's acting (overdramatic). "Mad World" has wasted potential (footage reminds me of "CAROLS" and "HEAVEN" or even "Angel") - there's something cheasy in it. Some people said new PVs are cheap but you can make "cheap" PV which is still cool ("Last minute").

[Andrenekoi]

Originally Posted by Baernash

We can always say that something has meaning even if we can't see it. I think saying that they are "emotionless" would be a better word than "meaningless". Her old works were able to makes me feel something: happiness, sadness... even made me cry. Those videos are just "emotionally fake". I like concept of "FLOWER" (kinda like "MOON" and "Don't look back") but I don't like Ayu's acting (overdramatic). "Mad World" has wasted potential (footage reminds me of "CAROLS" and "HEAVEN" or even "Angel") - there's something cheasy in it. Some people said new PVs are cheap but you can make "cheap" PV which is still cool ("Last minute").

You are just projecting your own dislike for the videos as they were factual aspects of it when they aren't. She is obviously trying to convey a certain idea and a certain emotion with it, so you can't say it's "meanless" or "emotionless" objective facts. You can say you don't like it though.

[Baernash]

Originally Posted by Andrenekoi

You are just projecting your own dislike for the videos as they were factual aspects of it when they aren't. She is obviously trying to convey a certain idea and a certain emotion with it, so you can't say it's "meanless" or "emotionless" objective facts. You can say you don't like it though.

A lot of people here believe that she doesn't care about how other people (even fans) see her so... why to expect that she's putting any REAL emotions (if she don't care)? She's trying to portray herself as a victim of music industry but why anyone watching it should feel sorry about her? That she has to wear a nice dress or change her hairstyle for performance? She was always free to quit but she didn't, instead she became one of the most rich and influenced people in Japanese music industry.

[4Seasons]

Originally Posted by Baernash

A lot of people here believe that she doesn't care about how other people (even fans) see her so... why to expect that she's putting any REAL emotions (if she don't care)? She's trying to portray herself as a victim of music industry but why anyone watching it should feel sorry about her? That she has to wear a nice dress or change her hairstyle for performance? She was always free to quit but she didn't, instead she became one of the most rich and influenced people in Japanese music industry.

At first I agreed with your posts, but what you said here ^ makes it pretty clear to me you think the videos are "meaningless"/"emotionless" just based on personal bias against the story she's telling.

[Andrenekoi]

Originally Posted by Baernash

A lot of people here believe that she doesn't care about how other people (even fans) see her so... why to expect that she's putting any REAL emotions (if she don't care)? She's trying to portray herself as a victim of music industry but why anyone watching it should feel sorry about her? That she has to wear a nice dress or change her hairstyle for performance? She was always free to quit but she didn't, instead she became one of the most rich and influenced people in Japanese music industry.

She is a performer. Expecting her emotions to be real everytime she is performing is like wanting an actor to really become a drug addicted in order to play a role.

Also, the most we can all agree she had and has a pretty privileged life, and that she is on a better place than almost everyone else in the world, having every little aspect of your personal life analyzed by a random of strangers with nothing better to do, being pressured to keep, by herself, the gainings and attention of the biggest music companies of the 2nd biggest music market (as she did until 2005), pressured to have a certain image, of releasing a certain number of works every year and being aware that it doesn't matter what she archieve, it will always be looked down compared of something she did almost 2 decades ago isn't really easy. Artists half her size tend to have huge emotional breakdowns they sometimes never recover from. And I'm not even going into how her body deretiorated over the years because of her job (the deafness being the most obvious part of it).

Do I think she is some poor victim of the world? Nops (but it does sell music). Do I think she had it easy? Not even close.