Ayu's music: when did it start to go downhill for you?

[waterballoon]

Originally Posted by Andrenekoi

^She acted like that cuz the studio was late, not cuz she disliked the final result... It's totally different! And If I'm not wrong, that wan't a magazine shot, it was a promotional shot for herself during ABest. She was paying, she was the boss...

It's different from fashion magazine shots were they are paying to have her...

xD my bad... I couldn't remember much of the video

well even so, there must be a reason why, say a Vivi shoot in 2003 could look so different (and much better) than one in 2009 for example... I wish I worked with Ayu so I know everything that's going on

[Andrenekoi]

^Fashion Trends... As people stated on this thread, right now japanese fashion magazines are full of girls with those "Don't rape me, I'm a lifeless doll" expression... I agree it's looks terrible, but I'm on a totally different cultural context! I still believe she looks totally like a 30 years old woman on her own stuff like concerts, lyrics, thematics, etc 90% of the time (what means "when she is not singing step you, energize, sunrise, etc")

[waterballoon]

Originally Posted by Andrenekoi

^Fashion Trends... As people stated on this thread, right now japanese fashion magazines are full of girls with those "Don't rape me, I'm a lifeless doll" expression... I agree it's looks terrible, but I'm on a totally different cultural context! I still believe she looks totally like a 30 years old woman on her own stuff like concerts, lyrics, thematics, etc 90% of the time (what means "when she is not singing step you, energize, sunrise, etc")

It's a trend indeed, but don't you think Ayu doesn't seem to fit that... anymore? I dunno, I'd rather see Kana Nishino doing the "Don't rape me, I'm a lifeless doll" (awesome line btw) expression than Ayu... but well that's just me..

but yeah I do agree with u that regarding her OWN matters, she's reli taking it on a mature perspective. This reminds me that I don't reli know how people can say her lyrics are getting repetitive etc. when the lyrics from Rock'n'Roll Circus clearly explores themes she has never/rarely touched on:

Life of a singer/music in general: Microphone
Life/loss of hearing: count down
Regrets/personal doubt: Don't look back

I do think the older she gets, the more mature her lyrics turn out to be. In the ASFxx/LOVEppears era, there was a very young and immature (not in a bad way) tone in her lyrics, like the "i don't understand why all these are happening to me; FML!" situation lol. But her recent lyrics (I would say from MY STORY onwards), she seems to understand more of herself as a person and musician, and that reli changes the tone of her lyrics

[Andrenekoi]

^I would say every album she released had new themes to her portfolio... Some of them entered on her typical themes list, and other were never touched again...

Even themes that show up over and over again, like women... Real me, My name's women, bautiful fighters, sexy little things... They don't have the same point of view... They don't talk about the same thing

[waterballoon]

^ which is pretty amazing for a singer who releases an album every year and writes the lyrics all by herself

But tbh, I would love another song with similar lyrics to LOVE ~Destiny~ or TO BE; but I think those are lyrics only the young Ayu would be able to write ^^

[Andrenekoi]

And I would love another alterna or 1love, but the angry-ayu-era ended after Secret
She was lost, she found herself, she got angry and now she is pretty much trying to figure out what to do about her life...

[waterballoon]

^ which is why we got Microphone & count down? I don't mind this transition period either, tbh

[Andrenekoi]

^I'm not very found of RnRC, but I understand why it was released... As far as my playlist goes, it's a Mini album with 6 songs: Microphone, Don't look back, Sexy little things, Lady Dynamite, Sunrise ~LOVE is ALL~ and You were...

did anyone noticed that some of Ayu cutesy songs have some of her most agressive themes and are the ones she shows the most skin on performances?

[waterballoon]

^ cutesy songs like, EnergizE etc? I think her cutesy songs have the most honest and straightforward themes tbh, or at least, that's what the recent ones seem to be. Just reli honest, without hiding anything... I think EnergizE, Sunrise are good examples of that

[Uemarasan]

Thanks everyone for keeping up the discussion! I'm glad a lot of people have something to say and contribute to the topic

Originally Posted by ストロボ・EdGE

I wasn't belittling anyone's efforts, and I don't appreciate the assumption. These are good threads were people give honest opinions and respond to each other civilly. The thing is, it's just kind of mind-numbing when all those posts are so long and you want to try to read them all and it becomes a little too much.

And intelligent posts don't necessarily equal eight paragraphs just as short posts don't necessarily equal lack of thought or depth, and by that I'm not implying that anyone here's posts were pointless.

Well then, I apologize for the assumption, but I thought you were being sarcastic. It's hard to read people intentions through only text, and I just thought you were being a bit patronizing putting your two messages together. So sorry for that.

I never said that short posts are automatically shallow and poorly thought out. I clearly said in my post that I prefer reading long INTELLIGENT posts over short, abrupt sentences LACKING in thought and depth. I never said length is equal to intellect. Short posts and intelligence are not mutually exclusive, although brevity does have a general tendency to lack nuance and insight.

[Andrenekoi]

Originally Posted by waterballoon

^ cutesy songs like, EnergizE etc? I think her cutesy songs have the most honest and straightforward themes tbh, or at least, that's what the recent ones seem to be. Just reli honest, without hiding anything... I think EnergizE, Sunrise are good examples of that

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Looks like the cuter the performance, the shorter her skirt gets Those are among the performances with the less clothes most of the time, when they aren't the performance of the show where she shows more skin

And even if EnergizE and Sunrise lyrics are very straightforward, I can't say the same about Step you, Beautiful Fighters, SLT and even older ones like Trauma

[Nukaru]

I don't know what to think about Ayus music nowadays. I still listen to the newer stuff, but for me, it started to go downhill, the moment SECRET was released. Every album up to (miss)understood, I can listen to without skipping one song. Secret, GUILTY, NEXT LEVEL & Rock'n'Roll Circus not. Okay, there are songs I really like (Moon, Don't look back, Days, Mirrorcle World, Together When.. asm.) but with albums like (miss)understood, MY STORY or RAINBOW I loved the whole concept, not just every song.

Nowadays Ayus music is more mainstream than it used to be, she sounds like all J-Pop artists to me. There are new things she's trying out, but.. I don't know.
The last time I was totally blown away by a simple song is so long ago, that I wish I could start loving her again, just to feel that way again.
My Ayu-Hype ended with (miss)understood and even thought she made songs I really like, for me, it's not enough.

[Uemarasan]

Originally Posted by Ranma Matsuri

@Uemarasan: I think in terms of the actual music (the singles, the happy summer songs, the angry rock songs, and the few oddities etc.), Secret has for the most part laid down what she's been doing recently but as for the actual structure of an album, I believe that all started back with RAINBOW. It wasn't anywhere as cohesive and clean cut as say Secret and GUILTY but the blueprints was there... before then, she had interludes but their function wasn't necessarily to lead into the 'sections' of an album. I felt like she tried to give the album a layout but since there wasn't any clear idea of what each section would represent, it ended up just being a fluid album that went gradually up and gradually down but with no sense of direction.

With MY STORY she tried it again and since there was a very strong central idea this time, she not only got it right but actually perfected it. Each interlude lead seamlessly into the next part of the album capturing the tone and moving the 'story' along. You had Catcher in the Light, soft and light starting the story from the beginning showing that at one point, everything was fine then at the two minute mark here comes trouble with the heavy guitar then you dive right into About You as Ayu rocks out her anger until Wonderland when she suddenly loses her fighting spirit and becomes melancholy instead. Then around Kaleidoscope is when she finally starts making peace with herself and comes to a resolution in winding road, celebrating her new outlook in the final track.

She went away from this format in miss(understood) which was an album that broke away from pretty much everything she had been doing with her albums until then, not that that was a bad thing. I think with Secret, she went back to the format but with different ideas and less polished tracks and has stuck with it since. Imho, none of her albums featuring this structure has come close to MY STORY's fluidity and cohesiveness. NEXT LEVEL was close but the odd placing of Days/GREEN (which imo should've just stayed a stand alone anniversary single like it's predecessor) ruined the flow... at the very least, GREEN should have been put in the same section as Days and Curtain Call... but now I'm rambling lol.

Sorry for the great wall of text but I thought should back up my claims.

This is an excellent post, Ranma Matsuri. I agree, the seeds had already been planted even before Secret. The summer single began with Boys and Girls and reached its apex with H, the winter ballad with M, but for me at this point in her career she was still interested in musical exploration. With Blue Bird, she seemed to have settled for a more uplifting, exuberant sound in contrast to Fairyland (and maybe that's why Next Level is a slightly more interesting listen than the others: there is no typical summer track). Rainbow is definitely a predecessor of the structure of her recent albums, but it's far more interesting precisely because of its lack of polish and direction. The album is still unpredictable and volatile; you don't know where its coming from and where its going. With regards to My Story, though, I think its structure is very different. It's not easily divided into three parts and there is no turning point; rather each track seems to react and respond to what came before it. It's like a diary in musical form. Each track seems like a self-enclosed entry at first but then listening to the entirety of the album gives you the sense of why the songs were sequenced that way, as though they were slowly unfolding her identity. Unlike Guilty et al, none of the singles stick out. They are all seamlessly integrated into the album.

So what I meant to say with calling Secret the blueprint for what came after is that each subsequent album seems to share the same thematic progression. With Rainbow, Ayu might have had a vague idea of the direction she was heading towards, but she turned against that by experimenting with the albums that followed, until Secret, which was the crystallization of all her musical preoccupations.

[neuteka]

I guess if I were to pick a time where her music went "downhill" it would be with the album Next Level. I liked that album a lot, but it wasn't so much... up to "Ayu Standards" or so to speak. She brought it back up with Rn'RC, where she seemed like she was trying harder, IMO. Of course I am not Ayu, so I couldn't necessarily say, but I felt her heart a lot more in Rn'RC than Next Level.

But on our definition of "downhill" in this thread, Her music has never really gone "downhill" to me

[amorphose]

I don't think her music has really gone down hill at all.. If you would've asked me before the release of Rock'n'Roll Circus, I would've said her music started to decline in quality with the release of NEXT LEVEL, because for the release of that album, Sunrise/Sunset, and You were.../BALLAD, I was more bored and uninterested with Ayu than I have been in the six years that I've been a fan.

However, the Rock'n'Roll Circus album as a whole, imo, is really awesome! Because I feel this way, I don't think "down hill" would be the proper way for me to describe how I feel about the period of NL - You were... simply because saying her music is going "down hill" would imply you've liked each release less and less and since I like GUILTY and I like Rock'n'Roll Circus, just not NL, that's not down hill. Am I making sense?

I do understand where some of you are coming from though because Ayu's music has seemed... somewhat, less passionate the last few years. But like other haves already stated, she's found her niche and she's working it for now, so it's bound to be a little less genuine and a little more repetitive and that's okay as long as the music's still good.

I guess I could say that after Secret, starting with GUILTY her music stopped going "up hill," but it didn't start going "down hill." I'd say it leveled out and it's stayed constant and so for some of the older fans, that's why the latest releases have been either hit or miss, cause that's how it's been for me for sure.

[CHE.R.RY]

In my own personal opinion, I've liked all of Ayu's music throughout the years...I did find RAINBOW to be sort of mediocre and kind of a let down after listening to I am..., but I enjoyed Memorial Address and the albums following it. I do agree that Ayu's music took a little bit of a dive in Secret as well, but I enjoyed GUILTY. NEXT LEVEL was slightly disappointing as well, but still I was able to appreciate it. And I absolutely adore RnRC so yeah .

I DO NOT agree, however, that Ayu is no longer experimenting regardless of the risk. First of all, MU itself was a big risk that Ayu took, and her sales dropped pretty sharply after that album. And then if you listen to NL and RnRC they are both full of genres that are pretty different from the norm. In fact, I think Ayu is starting to experiment more than ever before. Even in her Secret album Ayu shows her fearlessness by incorporating bold lyrics of not caring about what other people think. IMO Ayu has still got that special something that separates her from the rest, with two functioning ears or not.

[primavera♥]

I just can't say ayu is any less passionate. She is still putting her heart into the songs. Or at least that's what I feel. She's just putting it into different things that many fans I suppose aren't used to or like or appreciate much. And that's unfortunate but oh well~
I just have no issue with ayu understanding what she's doing and her career instead of being confused and depressed and constantly controlled.
She's in a point where she doesn't have to worry about being forced to release something like A BEST
Where she doesn't have to compose her own songs when she's not even like decently trained in music theory and her voice isn't exactly perfect and its more work than I'm sure she wanted to do

I'm not a fan from these old eras of ayu (only became a big fan around GUILTY and obsessed fan in 2009)
But I don't think she straight up went into her earlier albums with the mindset that she should be daring and risky and work to surprise everyone. I think she was finding herself.

If she can make good music, I don't care what the "formula" is. Although I still think she's varying and trying new things...for those that think her music is following a pattern, a change will not make things any better. Ayu is not perfect at everything and she may know this herself.

Reading earlier posts I discover many fans didn't like RAINBOW (cmon XD that's like my second fav album) when it came out. Its just an example of her changing and it not being much appreciated. NL is another example.
So to me. Ayu being risky is not at all any problem as I think she is enough and I still love her music and honestly her music now has certain qualities her music then didn't have. But that goes for each era

Its just like those who suggest her taking long periods of time. That won't fix anything. And her trying to completely change her next albums to something so out of this world will not change anything

Her mindset now is fine. As long as I can sincerely say not one album reminds me of another I think she's changing enough. Growing at her own pace

[AyumiAi]

:O Im surprised at all the hate NL is recieving!!! its one of my all time favorite albums!
The up beat songs are amazing, and days, green and curtain call are really emotional and i love them!
AHh !!
I think Ayu's music hasnt gone down hill at all, but like some have said she's found herself.
Ayu's music reflects who she is, and early in her career she was extremely unstable,and trying to find herself, now she is a balanced and stable person and so will her music.
I love ayu's new music , but i must admit i miss her high pitched voice like in powder snow and still alone those are some of my favorite songs!

[evolution7931]

Originally Posted by hsienko

Her last good tour was AT 2007 after that they've all just been crap, especially the CDLs, they're just garbage, same stage every year with rehashed costumes/concepts.

Yea I get annoyed with this too. It's like every arena tour for the last 5 years has been based off Arena Tour 2005. 2006 was really good cause the concept was still new. Then 07 & 08 were like..... okay.. change the stage already?

I didn't really like the 04 tour THAT much because Ayu's hair was gross on the DVD so it didn't make me like it very much (LOL) but at least it kept me entertained and not knowing what to expect. 2005 was amazing, the long catwalk with the circle b-stage at the end was a brand new concept (dome tour & stadium tours weren't used as much). Now when I download a new Ayu tour I know its gonna have that 2005 stage with some screens added, then some rock, cuteness, sexy, hip, & encore. Like a watered down Arena tour 2005/6

[love in music]

Originally Posted by kagami

^ I think calling them garbage/crap is pretty rude tbh. Ayu and her staff put in a lot of work to produce these tours/concerts so even if you don't like you could go about saying it in a better way.

I personally love her most recent CDL; it was fun, the setlist was awesome and her vocals sounded better than they have in ages.

I also wonder if I'm the only one who isn't bothered if she has a few not so good photoshoots and concerts. Some people here seem to agonize over them, as if they spend their whole lives looking at her pictures and watching her performances. I only usually watch her concerts occasionally, even if I love them. Maybe I'm just odd lol.

I love her most recent CDL too and am a huge fan of most of her live performances/tours/cdls. I think it's kind of rude to call them garbage too, because while watching them, I notice just how much effort she's putting into each performance. It's not the end of the world if she reuses an outfit or theme for a performance, most of the time she still puts on an amazing show. I'm not too bothered if she has a few bad photo shoots or performances either. I think getting so upset over a photo shoot is ridiculous. Yes, I know the S/S covers were an abomination etc, but I swear people acted like it was the end of the world/the end of her career when they came out and I was just like "srsly?". Other artists I'm a fan of never get that treatment when they'll come out with a cover just as bad or worse with almost every release.