MY STORY || My Love For Ayu ~ How It All Began..

sorry if there's any spelling mistakes or whatever, i can't be arsed to check it.

October 30th 2006 is when i first heard of her.
i was on Wikipedia on the page '2007 in music' when i was searching around and Ayu's Secret came up with it's release date.
i was like, who? so i clicked on her name.
then i read her intro paragraph thing on it, and was already amazed at her achievements!
at the time is was like, 27 #1's?!
so i naturally i had to check out her disccography.
i was like, taken back at how diverse her titles and covers where.
i mean, titles like 'poker face', 'kanariya' 'STEP you' and the way she had song titles in all lower case and all upper case and stuff.
so i was glued to her discography for about two hours reading through every album and single released at that time.
i didn't listen to her music straight away as it was japanese music and it would feel wierd.
but a month later (22 November '06.) i caved and listened to my first Ayu song, which was unfortunatly Beautiful Fighters, which was cute, but totally average.
then when the video was finished, BLUE BIRD showed up, so i clicked it and fell in love.
then i saw Utada's Keep Tryin' which i loved even more, so i searched her too..
then i found out about their 'rivalry' and decied to watch as many vids by them as i could to see who was my fave.
so i just searched Ayumi Hamasaki in youtube (this was before Avex deletes everything.) and first watched STEP you which i loved!
then evolution which was even better! and then NEVER EVER!
whilst i didn't think much of the Utada songs that came up..
so i found out about her 2000 award for SEASON'S lyrics and found a subbed PV which made me an official fan! x)
ironically, that day was November 29th, the release date of Secret.
so i found out and was like, 'wow. this is a sign!' so i downloaded it on AHN. and haven't posted there since. ;P
i loved Secret and it layed the foundations and stuff.
about a month later though i stopped listening to Ayu and the ocasional Utada.
then i heard A BEST 2. ;P
which brought me back to j-pop once again.
so i decided that, if i was going to get back into j-pop, i needed to like more artists;
so i went back on AHN and downloaded hundreds of songs by artists i couldn't even pronounce!
so by umm... March '07 i was a fan of around 20 j-pop artists. (can't be bothered to name..)
so i just happily listened to Ayu, Utada and the others for the next 2 months,
when i realised that i liked asian music more than western!
i decided that i should post on AHN to find out if anyone non-asian liked j-pop or if i was alone..
but then i found AHS!
i prefered it much more than AHN's annoying white layout and it weirdly, seemed a lot more friendlier palce. (:
so now i know my place here at AHS and am not ashamed / embarresed that i listen to j-pop!

so thanks AHS! <3

[~X2RADialbomber~]

Aw. What a touching story.

[Kobayashiwoof]

Aye i agree about AHS being alot more friendlier!!!

[Sakura_Genki]

What a sweet story ! It makes me reminisce about how I first found out about Ayu, which was back around the beginning of 2004, when I downloaded Because of You, SEASONS and evolution.

[namiie]

Nice story! Even though you haven't been an Ayu fan for that long, I see you all around AHS so it's awesome to have you as part of the Ayu fandom! I wish I joined AHS sooner, because this place really is friendly :3 Like if I had known AHS existed in 2002, which is when I started listening to Ayu, hehe.

And I know what you mean about being glued to her discography! Ayu is one of those rare artists whom you could listen to for hours without pressing the skip button ^_^

[Neo Daydream]

awwww cute story. wow, ur hardcore for a relatively new fan ^^

[Impracticable]

Aww. But a mistake (i geuss its not very relevant though) The realese date of Secret was November 28/29 wasnt it?

Like, officially the 29ths, went on shelves 28th, but over in my timezone that's the 27th haha

^ oops, thanks for telling me!
it was on the release date of Secret anyway. (:

[extepan]

nice to hear your story!

[v3lun420]

It's all began when I was still in high school on 1998 or so. It was because of her Depend On You being featured in an RPG game, Thousand Arms. I said to myself that this song rocks. Then when my brother won a Dreamcast by playing n competing in Winning Eleven, That was my first glimpse on Ayumi Hamasaki. I saw her for the first time in her CM, A Song For XX, she was really cool in that hood. And then I asked the game store, that luckily also sell other Japanese stuff, if they sell Ayumi related stuff. They offered me my first Ayumi clips, n the Ayumi related stuff that I bought. The disc that I bought wasnt any avex original cd, it was compilated by the store. It consisted of her latest PVs at that time that the store could get (probably). I remember It just contained Poker Face, You, For my dear, n Trust, sum CMs such as Depend On You n A Song For XX, n I also believe that the cd contained one Utada Hikaru's PV. I was still in high school in my country. The cd was sold for Rp. 27.500,00. It equals to USD 3.
Her YOU PVs made me fall in love to her even more. I loved her since. The I started to buy her CDs beginning from A Song For XX. But, first time, I collected her stuff, it was all piracy, my first 3 ayumi albums, A Song for XX, Loveppears n Duty were all pirated CDs ^^. My first original cd of Ayumi is A BEST, but it was also original cd of my country version, I bought it for Rp. 70,000 (USD 8). I wasnt really satisfied with the cover n sound's quality of my country's version, but I continued buying her I am... in my country's version at the same price. Then, since my love for ayumi keeps growing n growing, I started to collect Singapore's version of all Ayumi's Album that I had collected so far. Singapore's versions were far more better than my country's version eventhough it cost twice my country's version. I was completely satisfied with the cover n sound's quality. But when RAINBOW came out, I am so disappointed that Singapore's version wasnt yet come to my country. Since I loved her so much and I really 3x wanted to her new songs, I had no choice but to buy my country's version of RAINBOW FYI, at first time, I didnt collect her singles, becoz in my country, they didnt sell singles, and if I bought singapore's version, it cost the same as cd, in other word, they were pretty expensive for me at that time. However, to my surprise, RAINBOW was the first cd in my country's version that i wasnt really disappointed at. The cover was not as ugly as before n the sound's quailty wasnt that bad, but still I bought RAINBOW singapore's version, then I continued to buy both version until A BALLADS, which was came out right after RAINBOW. Then My fisr Ayumi single was &, off course i bought singapore's version, since my contry didnt sell singles.
Then, I moved to USA in the middle of 2003. Becoz I just moved, I didnt know how to get her album here, my friend told me that i could get them at yesasia.com, but since at that time i never had any experience buying online, i didnt quite trust online shopping, instead i tried to go Tower Records, FYE n etc but they dont have it. (For God sake they had Namie AMuro's n Utada but not Ayumi). I skipped her memorial address until y Story came out to store. I said to myself that I couldnt wait any longer. I went to yesasia and bought those cds from them, overseas version ^^. I was disappointed too becoz the cover were broken, both, could u believe it? Becoz of that I rebuy those 2 cds in Japanese version ^^ and still continue, n evern preordered evrything since My Story in Japanese version.
That's all my story, hope u guys dont get bored reading all those stuff above.

[Foxxy_Fuyumi]

wooww my austin =)
great story!!

[CREA 69]

What a great story Austin! Its remind me about how I started like Ayu. Back around 2001, when I bought A best album. All the song in that album is great. Since that, I always bought Ayu's album and her concert DVDs

[AyuHamasaki01]

Nice story!

But I think (my opinion) that if you love j-pop you don't need to be a fan of over 1000 artists! I love Japanese music and the only artists I like are: Ayu, Koda Kumi and Namie Amuro I also love the songs: CHU-LIP, Kingyo Hanabi and Planetarium of Ai Otsuka but that doesn't make a fan...

Or something like that, haha

[Kodayumi]

Wow nice experiences, its good to share all this

[YumeHamasaki]

Mine isn't that intersting. I heard my brother listening to it, i was on kawaiiradio and heard a song i liked...it was Voyage. What year was this? I think 2005...i dunno...i don't care much either. I saw some vids through jpopsuki musicvideo streams, and i liked her vid Moments. I heard more songs from my best friend and my bro. I had already like Hikki and BoA, but ayu really stuck out. I hated her voice, but i was drawn to it i guess. I eventually heard all her albums and some remixes, and fell in love with her lyrics style(i'm a songwriter to so she's just my all time fave songwriter) And i became a fan of her music. I listened to some jpop but i sitll only listen to a few jpop artists close to as much as i listen to my faves. Mika Nakashima, Namie Amuro...i listen to others a lil bit but i'm not a big japanese music fan as much as i am american. It's just less of a hassle to understand since i know english and not japanese. Plus, i'm poor so it's easier to get american music then japanese.
I listen to like 3/4 english and the rest is jpop, half of that fourth being Ayu.

the only thing i hate is when someone thinks i'm a huge jpop listener because i like maybe five artists, and then i'm labeled as an Anime freak(does that make sense? no.) bleh. I'm aiming to be a singersongwriter in the U.S. i'm not gonna spend my life in japanese music...*shrugs*

[fanmail]

aww <3 someone recommended Ayu to me and my first song was "Bold & Delicious" ... the worst intro song EVER!!! And I was like " omg .... she sounds SO WEIRD!!! =\ *DELETE*" ..... and then the album leaked -(miss)understood- and I loved it!! xD

[YumeHamasaki]

Originally Posted by fanmail

aww <3 someone recommended Ayu to me and my first song was "Bold & Delicious" ... the worst intro song EVER!!! And I was like " omg .... she sounds SO WEIRD!!! =\ *DELETE*" ..... and then the album leaked -(miss)understood- and I loved it!! xD

LOL!!! that definitely wasn't the choice they should have given you to listen to first....B&D is one of my faves songs out of the many types of songs i listen to from various artists, but still...it's one of the songs that doesn't scream "Ayu-ish" since it was diff form most of her music. At least they didnt' tell you to listen to the overrated song we all have learned to love whether it's good or not^^- M.

[fanmail]

Originally Posted by YumeHamasaki

LOL!!! that definitely wasn't the choice they should have given you to listen to first....B&D is one of my faves songs out of the many types of songs i listen to from various artists, but still...it's one of the songs that doesn't scream "Ayu-ish" since it was diff form most of her music. At least they didnt' tell you to listen to the overrated song we all have learned to love whether it's good or not^^- M.

they were quite new to Ayumi aswell xD Either way, I got to LOVE "Bold & Delicious" xD

[Sommernacht~]

nice story austin! I agree with the titles. they just catch your eye, don't they?? not as boring as many Western titles... Zzzz

well, my story isn't that spectacular ^^ I just read about Ayu in a German manga magazine about Japan's pop princess, I believe that was in the beginning of 2004 when I was 11. then, some months later, I watched the performance of her when she forgot Voyage's lyrics and I was just astonished by her being so cute ^^ then I bought RAINBOW on eBay. and since then, I've been a fan!

[Azmaria]

nice story, mine isn't that special.

I found about Ayu around the time Inuyasha started to air in mexico, but since they repeated one season again I decided to download from the internet, that was around 2003 (back then I still watched the animes without skipping the intro and ending songs) there I heared Dearest and loved it so I decided to look up in Kazaa [which I used back there to download] and found many songs of her (even though some had her name on and it was actually for example of BoA) & PVs which my first one was Real Me, then I decided to look up for some Ayu sites (and thats when I came up with AHS & Ayunite) and registered there first just to download her songs and PV then I left AHS. I got that year I got fan of Ayu also my B-Day present that was 2 week holiday to Japan (was already back then big fan of Japanese culture) and the first thing I did when I arrived (well waited one day since I arrived very late) and went to a CD store looking for Ayu CDs thats when I came up with A BALLADS and my sis with & (we both bought them) I loved her songs in A BALLADS and &. The last day in Japan I decided to buy more CDs of Ayu, thats were my sis and me bought A Song for XX, A Best, Rainbow, Ayu-mix II JPN+US/EU+Non Stop Mega mix, thats when my fanatism about Ayu really came out. And since then I get for either B-Day of Christmas present a CD of Ayu (or like in 2004 her Complete Clip Box) and in October 2005 I decided to make myself a tatoo of her My Story logo in my back (and I still don't regret having done it) and also this year my crazy idea traveling to Hong Kong just to see a concert of Ayu n_n

I only like to get the albums, and since then my sis isn't that much into Ayu, she looks up for new songs, but nothing more, she is now more into Korean Music