NEXT LEVEL album tracks now available on dwango.jp! (interludes revealed) - Ayumi Hamasaki Sekai
Ayumi Hamasaki Sekai
· Ayu's Official Site · Ayu's twitter · Ayu's YouTube · masa's translations · Misa-chan's translations ·


Go Back   Ayumi Hamasaki Sekai > Ayumi Hamasaki Forums > Ayu Music News

Notices

Reply
 
Thread Tools Display Modes
  #1  
Old 11th March 2009, 08:21 PM
SunshineSlayer's Avatar
SunshineSlayer SunshineSlayer is offline
walking proud Initiate
 
Join Date: Oct 2004
Location: Japan/USA
Posts: 7,019
At least to me though, it simply seems with this album that she is mostly just following the current trend of electro-pop music because she DOES think it will sell, not because its necessarily what she feels like she has to make because she wants to. No one here can say either way though unless they are Ayu themselves though.
Reply With Quote
  #2  
Old 11th March 2009, 09:51 PM
Zeke.'s Avatar
Zeke. Zeke. is offline
rainy day Initiate
 
Join Date: Jul 2004
Location: Manhattan, NYC
Posts: 9,723
Quote:
Originally Posted by SunshineSlayer View Post
At least to me though, it simply seems with this album that she is mostly just following the current trend of electro-pop music because she DOES think it will sell, not because its necessarily what she feels like she has to make because she wants to. No one here can say either way though unless they are Ayu themselves though.
I always though electro pop would fit Ayu well.
She's done STEP you and Ladies Night.
(don't) Leave me alone is electronic rock too.

This time she's just doing more of it. Which I'm glad.
Reply With Quote
  #3  
Old 11th March 2009, 10:17 PM
Andrenekoi's Avatar
Andrenekoi Andrenekoi is offline
HAPPY ENDING Initiate
 
Join Date: Oct 2006
Location: Brazil
Posts: 6,930
Quote:
Originally Posted by all.night.raver View Post
I always though electro pop would fit Ayu well.
She's done STEP you and Ladies Night.
(don't) Leave me alone is electronic rock too.

This time she's just doing more of it. Which I'm glad.
Yeah... its not like she is doing this for the first time... She have some electro pop songs in almost all (if not, all) of her albums ... And by the previews... she is not having much more than before... I think she oriental sound this album has is more unusual for her than the eletropop thing...
__________________

http://stan-wars.com/1989.html


I live around AHS (Ayumi Haters Sekai)

Reply With Quote
  #4  
Old 12th March 2009, 07:28 PM
Uemarasan Uemarasan is offline
End roll Initiate
 
Join Date: Nov 2005
Location: In Asia dreaming of Asia
Posts: 783
Quote:
Originally Posted by SunshineSlayer View Post
At least to me though, it simply seems with this album that she is mostly just following the current trend of electro-pop music because she DOES think it will sell, not because its necessarily what she feels like she has to make because she wants to. No one here can say either way though unless they are Ayu themselves though.
If Ayu wanted to follow current trends in Japanese music and sell well, she would put out pop R&B (Thelma Aoyama and Exile) or urban pop (Namie Amuro) or gimmicky pop (Hexagon) or even boyband pop (maybe she could get her backup dancers to be an Ayu boyband? Ayurashi?). You seem to be forgetting that electro-pop is past its expiry date in Japan, having peaked during the euro-pop of the late 90s/early 00s

The only techno-pop artist of note in J-pop is Perfume, but I would hardly call this a trend.

It just seems like Ayu wants to go back to her euro-pop roots. After all, it's the euro-pop trend that helped launch her as a top artist back when LOVEppears came out.

Last edited by Uemarasan; 12th March 2009 at 07:32 PM.
Reply With Quote
  #5  
Old 12th March 2009, 07:38 PM
SunshineSlayer's Avatar
SunshineSlayer SunshineSlayer is offline
walking proud Initiate
 
Join Date: Oct 2004
Location: Japan/USA
Posts: 7,019
Quote:
Originally Posted by Uemarasan View Post
If Ayu wanted to follow current trends in Japanese music and sell well, she would put out pop R&B (Thelma Aoyama and Exile) or urban pop (Namie Amuro) or gimmicky pop (Hexagon) or even boyband pop (maybe she could get her backup dancers to be an Ayu boyband? Ayurashi?). You seem to be forgetting that electro-pop is past its expiry date in Japan, having peaked during the euro-pop of the late 90s/early 00s
No its not.(past its expiration date) Eurodance and this type of pop are very different. And btw, the peak period for the Euro dance/pop sound in Japan was the early to mid 90s. Aoyama Thelma is turning out to be a one hit wonder (unfortunately). Koda and Namie are both doing the electro pop thing these days and Perfume obviously is huge. A lot of artists are starting to incorporate the Perfumy kind of sound. And an even larger amount of western artists have recently or are currently doing the same type of style. It's certainly not something new or anywhere near revolutionary at all.

And am I the only one that doesn't quite see any similarity between this album and loveappears other than that they both encorporate techno elements? For me, Loveappears is a totally different sound than this.

Last edited by SunshineSlayer; 12th March 2009 at 07:48 PM.
Reply With Quote
  #6  
Old 12th March 2009, 08:03 PM
Tom Punks's Avatar
Tom Punks Tom Punks is offline
Heartplace Initiate
 
Join Date: Dec 2007
Location: Florida
Posts: 3,782
Quote:
Originally Posted by SunshineSlayer View Post
And am I the only one that doesn't quite see any similarity between this album and loveappears other than that they both encorporate techno elements? For me, Loveappears is a totally different sound than this.
It's not just you, I don't get the LOVEppears comparisons either. Then again, I haven't listened to all of the previews, but nothing about this album has ever reminded me of LOVEppears in the least bit. @_@
Reply With Quote
  #7  
Old 12th March 2009, 09:04 PM
Uemarasan Uemarasan is offline
End roll Initiate
 
Join Date: Nov 2005
Location: In Asia dreaming of Asia
Posts: 783
Quote:
Originally Posted by SunshineSlayer View Post
No its not.(past its expiration date) Eurodance and this type of pop are very different. And btw, the peak period for the Euro dance/pop sound in Japan was the early to mid 90s. Aoyama Thelma is turning out to be a one hit wonder (unfortunately). Koda and Namie are both doing the electro pop thing these days and Perfume obviously is huge. A lot of artists are starting to incorporate the Perfumy kind of sound. And an even larger amount of western artists have recently or are currently doing the same type of style. It's certainly not something new or anywhere near revolutionary at all.

And am I the only one that doesn't quite see any similarity between this album and loveappears other than that they both encorporate techno elements? For me, Loveappears is a totally different sound than this.
Scratch what I said. Eurodance/euro-pop/eurobeat peaked in Japan in the mid to late 90s, and maybe a bit of 2000-2001. I forgot about Super Monkeys. But the early 90s were definitely NOT euro-pop. Maybe shibuya-kei. Euro-pop hit its stride when the Para Para game came out, Avex capitalized on the upcoming trend, and club-going entered the mainstream.

Koda's still pushing the R&B/urban sound mostly, although I doubt Ayu would look to her for inspiration for this album since the girl is on her way down down down. I think Namie still manages to retain her urban sound. Her music's increasingly becoming more dance pop, but there is a world of difference between her urban dance pop and the techno-pop of Sparkle. Too bad about Thelma (she is still part of the R&B trend), but Miliyah Kato's hanging in there for R&B.

The only major Japanese artist close to Ayu's techno sound is, as I said, Perfume, but having just one artist do that kind of music does not constitute a trend.

Music listening is a subjective art after all. Anyway, we don't even know how Next Level will sound like (since the other tracks haven't even been released yet in any form), but speculating on what we have so far, I find many similarities. For instance: Whatever and Sparkle. They don't sound alike exactly, but structurally they are very close and share a lot of musical elements. Next Level (the track) has the upbeat, driving sound of Trauma, Too Late, and Immature, Rule has the heavy bass of PSII and monochrome, Green has the Asian sound of End Roll, and Days is in the same league as Love refrain and Who. The one distinct element in LOVEppears (the relentless, restless techno-like pacing) is apparent in all the Next Level tracks available so far, even Days. But again, it's all subjective.

Madonna isn't doing dance pop anymore (Confessions was so long ago). With Hard Candy, she's doing retro urban. Still, Ayu isn't selling to the Western market, so why take up that trend? It's not even selling or doing that well in Japan, Western-artist wise.

So let me just reiterate my stance: techno-pop is no longer a trend in Japan. Urban dance pop is. The euro-pop of the 90s/00s evolved into the techno-pop trend of the early 00s, the biggest selling representative album being Ayu's LOVEppears. Then R&B/J-urban picked up and evolved into urban dance pop, which is the biggest trend now. And then we have Ayu (with the release of Sparkle) reaching back to her euro-/techno-pop roots and here we have Next Level. Hope I'm clear this time.

Last edited by Uemarasan; 12th March 2009 at 09:36 PM.
Reply With Quote
  #8  
Old 13th March 2009, 04:19 AM
SunshineSlayer's Avatar
SunshineSlayer SunshineSlayer is offline
walking proud Initiate
 
Join Date: Oct 2004
Location: Japan/USA
Posts: 7,019
Quote:
Originally Posted by Uemarasan View Post
Scratch what I said. Eurodance/euro-pop/eurobeat peaked in Japan in the mid to late 90s, and maybe a bit of 2000-2001. I forgot about Super Monkeys. But the early 90s were definitely NOT euro-pop. Maybe shibuya-kei. Euro-pop hit its stride when the Para Para game came out, Avex capitalized on the upcoming trend, and club-going entered the mainstream.
And see I disagree. Parapara may have been a popular underground trend, but there weren't a lot of big selling parapara albums in comparison to other genres. The mid 90s were definitely THE time for euro-pop. By the time LOVEppears came out, the trend then actually was R&B (with singers like Utada, Kuraki, and MISIA being huge). So actually when LOVEppears came out, it was going against the trend. Whereas now, Next Level is going with the trend.

The only case of R&B music selling well these days is EXILE and I think their sales have more to do with them being a boyband than it does with them doing R&B. Lord knows there are a ton of R&B style artists in Japan that don't sell hardly at all.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Uemarasan View Post
For instance: Whatever and Sparkle. They don't sound alike exactly, but structurally they are very close and share a lot of musical elements. Next Level (the track) has the upbeat, driving sound of Trauma, Too Late, and Immature, Rule has the heavy bass of PSII and monochrome, Green has the Asian sound of End Roll, and Days is in the same league as Love refrain and Who. The one distinct element in LOVEppears (the relentless, restless techno-like pacing) is apparent in all the Next Level tracks available so far, even Days. But again, it's all subjective.
I totally don't think any of those sound anything like each other.

Last edited by SunshineSlayer; 13th March 2009 at 04:29 AM.
Reply With Quote
Reply


Posting Rules
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts

BB code is On
Smilies are On
[IMG] code is On
HTML code is Off



All times are GMT +1. The time now is 12:40 AM.


Powered by vBulletin® Version 3.8.4
Copyright ©2000 - 2025, Jelsoft Enterprises Ltd.