You were... / BALLAD information and covers [VII]

[love in music]

BALLAD is amazing in full. Now all I need is RED LINE to be great and this could wind up being one of my favorite ayu singles, if not my favorite.

[njanjayrp]

BALLAD is indeed a great song The ending is totally epic, I can't wait to hear it in HQ as I feel there is more to the music than we're able to hear.

[ayumisrael]

Yep, this single might score 3/3 and be fully amazing!

[Crystal_Ageha]

Umm..... I think I like BALLAD less after hearing the full HQ version, lol! ...>___> I've listened to it a few times in a row now, and it's not growing on me at all. I don't even feel a little bit of a spark that makes me think I may like it more than "ehh...." in the future. As a matter of fact, I'm just a little annoyed by the song now. :\ Sorry, Ayu. This will be one of the very few songs I can't bring myself to like enough to put on my MP3 player, or to even keep on my computer. It's pretty, and it's something a little different, but it just booorreesss me. And there's absolutely no climax or "oomph" in the song. The only thing I like is her vocals....but again, I like You were...'s better. >_<
But no worries!! You were... more than makes up for the disappointment that is BALLAD.

[labello]

BALLAD really sounds gorgeous *__*

I didn't really like the oriental feeling of GREEN so I am happy that BALLAD sounds so amazing~

Hopefully RED LINE will be good as well, anyway I don't regret preordering this single

[noisy_harmony]

I'm speechless.


BALLAD is amazing... Welcome back, real Ayu <3

[truehappiness]

If she can get light dresses for dancers and herself and explosive special effects, I doubt they weren't able to get ahold of some trees.

Yay, full BALLAD. The arrangement is gorgeous and rich.

[SURREAL__RAINBOW]

BALLAD is epic!!


so the pv of this song is the one where ayu appears fully covered with diamonds??

[Kazeyomi]

I listening to BALLAD right now.
The previous preview was pretty meh but now omg it's such an epic song.
I can say it, Yw/BALLAD will be her best single so far.. until RED LINE previews will not coming out lol

[Ayumi_lover]

I didn't like BALLAD at all >.<

About You were... PV: It was made like planned. Ayu's dress was planned to look that way. It's pretty obvious!! It's not cheap at all, and I think it costed more than for example Greatfull days PV even with filming that alligator! And don't connect that PV to Disney's movie because PV itself connected A LOT to the lyrics!

[zoomzoom]

Originally Posted by joshohhhhh

lol people really thought the trees were supposed to look real?

I have yet to see a single post that says "omg the trees looked so fake, hahaha, they couldn't even make a real tree, so low budget". Maybe I missed something.

[jkm444]

Ballad is an okay song. It definitely has the theme of a-nation 03 feeling to it.

[Lanz16]

Even though BALLAD was leaked, I don't want to listen it
*resists temptation*

[truehappiness]

I have yet to see a single post that says "omg the trees looked so fake, hahaha, they couldn't even make a real tree, so low budget".

I think most of the posts just imply that they feel as though her budget ran out so they went with 2D tree cutouts instead of the real thing, rather than outright stating "So fake, can't even get real trees!" or something like that...

[dreamland2.0]

Ballad is very beautiful!! Very slow and soothing! Like a calmer version of GREEN. The arrangement is very nice, as I expected of Yuta Nakano

[GRACE]

BALLAD sounds like something alan rejected because it was too boring. Beautiful arrangement though, it's really destroyed by Ayu's voice. What happened ._. it's so BAD in this song.

[love in music]

Originally Posted by GRACE

BALLAD sounds like something alan rejected because it wasn't boring enough

Fixed
No I'm joking.. kind of.

I really hope we'll get RED LINE soon. I'm so curious about this song, I wonder if it'll be a ballad too.

[dreamland2.0]

I actually thought her voice was really nice in this song!! Much better than you were... in my opinion.

[jbrat2219]

Originally Posted by identity

Fixed
No I'm joking.. kind of.

I really hope we'll get RED LINE soon. I'm so curious about this song, I wonder if it'll be a ballad too.

Awww poor alan!

I'm wondering more and more about what RED LINE is going to sound like... I kind of hope it isn't a ballad. Although I'm sure it will be.

[do it again]

This single is shaping up to be my favorite Ayu release since... I don't know when, everything is just working together to create a really solid release. I really can't say many negative things about it. The quality of the music in both the songs released is just so superior to what she's been recently churning out, and the emotion that is conveyed in both songs is, to me, very powerful.

I had a good laugh reading some of the posts about there being a lack of budget for this release, especially in regards to the PV for You were... at first, I admit I was just going "what the hell is going on here?" but after reading some of the interpretations (although some were just ridiculous... sometimes a teddy bear glove is just a teddy bear glove) it made more sense to me and I was able to appreciate it more. Not to mention, Ayu herself looks absolutely gorgeous although I wish different lighting was used to illuminate the crystals on her face and body instead of just making her look oily in the dim lighting. But perhaps the darkness was intentional to convey her state of mind.

To me, taking the time to create 2D trees and make sure all of them are illuminated in an indoor set would certainly be more time-consuming and expensive than to just dump a bunch of fake snow outside and film her there. I believe that this was deliberate. The pop-up storybook effect is powerful as the PV does show a story and the PV connects with the lyrics.

Anyway, this post will probably be ignored and will be followed by a bunch of comments how cheap it is, how boring the songs are, how bad her voice is, etc, but I just wanted to say something nice, and that I truly feel like this single is a job well done.