Ayumi = manufactured?

[SunshineSlayer]

Originally Posted by Jer Sieu

She is not manufactured... Why?

2. She forgotten her lyrics once. That doesn't mean that she did not write her lyrics herself. Everyone is human. Everyone tends to forget stuff they try to remember best. Not everyone is perfect and you should know that.

Actually she forgets her lyrics quite often. I think it's cute though.

[Dustie]

Yeah, she does forget lyrics but hell, that's like the last thing that could be used as any argument for/agains her.... geez...

[Halla]

well , I personally think a lot of the things your friend said apply to a lot of artists.

I'm pretty sure those artists he listed are handed schedules & forced to do stuff by their labels too. and does he know for sure they don't use composers & lyricists ? anyways they don't just go to a studio & records stuff just like that , there's a ton of people involved . mixers & producers & etc.

I'd say any Japanese artist that's famous enough that someone stumbled onto their stuff online & somewhere overseas is "manufactured" to some extent.

[HilaryDuffFanboy]

Manafactured? You'd have to agree to some extent for any pop artist really. But for Ayumi, it's kept at a minimal.

Which singers write songs and make PV's that protest against her record company's authorative figures? People only need to look as far as Dearest PV for what I mean.

Plus, she has written all her lyrics. That is enough to completely disregard whatever your friend has to say on Ayumi.

[ayu_fan929]

I agree with SunshineSlayer, this is how it works in Japan. She is a product of avex, but she probably has the most independence in her career than other idol singers in Japan. (ie: at the end of concert dvd, it says 'visualised by ayumi hamasaki')

Originally Posted by Dustie

LOL, if he wants manufactured star, check out BoA, for example.

To be fair to BoA, she is getting her independence as she gets older. I wouldn't expect a 13-17 year old to make that many decisions in her career (the only exception I can think of is Hikki). But she's getting that control in her career as she gets older.

edit: And, I think he got his writing part confused, I think it's supposed to be songs, not lyrics.

[Jer Sieu]

Originally Posted by SunshineSlayer

Actually she forgets her lyrics quite often. I think it's cute though.

He he.. I only remember the part when she forgets the Trauma... Is there any other time?

[shavoingin]

Originally Posted by Jer Sieu

He he.. I only remember the part when she forgets the Trauma... Is there any other time?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oGcEAweiuUY

[AyUmIXx]

she forgot lyrics for boys & girls on CDL 05-06 if i'm not mistaken..
there's another song on CDL 05-06 that she forgot too..

[Coelacanth]

Using LOVE PSYCHEDELICO as an example of a 'real' band isn't helping his argument very much (awesome band though). Any artist who releases BEST-OF compilations and LIVE albums is trying to make a little extra money, don't you think?

*side-rant* Are all fans of the rock genre like this? They put down other genres of music because of how '*****d' out they are or how unoriginal they are. Please. Korn's trademark logo is worth friggen millions, Emo/Hardcore is adored by almost every rich white teenager in the United States, and The Beatles are still releasing merchandise and albums.

And yeah, I don't think an artist being too 'manufactured' is a valid reason to not like their music.

[Dustie]

Originally Posted by ayu_fan929

To be fair to BoA, she is getting her independence as she gets older. I wouldn't expect a 13-17 year old to make that many decisions in her career (the only exception I can think of is Hikki). But she's getting that control in her career as she gets older.

Well yeah, if he/she doesn't know exactly how he/she wants his/her career to look like then yes, it's no wonder they do everything for him/her [I'm talking about ppl in general]. It's sorta logical that an average 13 y.o. won't be creative enough to decide on image and the kind of music, but for me it still doesn't change the fact it's manufactured... the conclusion would actually be that on some age level there is no other way than manufacturing...

And, I think he got his writing part confused, I think it's supposed to be songs, not lyrics.

You quoted this part as well, but I don't think I said that... 0.o

[ayu_fan929]

^sorry, I must have typed it within the quote things.

[elepop]

First, Ayu writes ALL of her lyrics. Except two songs maybe?

Second, Ayu does compose quite a few songs. And her best songs are actually composed by herself. Yeah, she may not compose all of them... But those she did are excellent. We should be happy that Ayu writes all of her lyrics and composes a few. Some artists don't get involve in any of those things at all and all they do is sing the song given.

Third, Ayu is a product. Yes, and she knows it herself. Ayu may be a product, but so is Shiina Ringo. She did quite a few CMs too. She may not have done as much as Ayu, but she still does. And that means she's a product also.

Anyway. To conclude, I think almost all artists in this world are products and manufactured because hey, they are all trying to sale their albums right? And as long as an artist is trying to sale something to people, I think they can be considered as products trying to sale their music.

I don't think your friend knows Ayu that much...

[truehappiness]

IMHO, the person that posted this seems like one of those.. 'new' Ayu fans.. :p

[For example, when I first started liking Ayu, I didn't know she wrote all of her lyrics.. I was amazed that she did after I found out ]

[SunshineSlayer]

Originally Posted by Jer Sieu

He he.. I only remember the part when she forgets the Trauma... Is there any other time?

Several times. In addition to the Voyage performance, she has also messed up the Trauma lyrics at least 3 more times on DVD, she messed up Boy and Girls at CDL 05-06, she forgot a line of Vogue at a tv performance - those are the ones I can think of off hand.

[Neo Daydream]

i thought she wrote like ALL of her lyrics!

[elepop]

Originally Posted by Neo Daydream

i thought she wrote like ALL of her lyrics!

Well, she didn't wrote "Sotsugyou Shashin". (not her song.)

And "LOVE ~since 1999~"

[bulmasman]

Ayu is manufactured to a point, but this is where things boil down to a person's own definition of "Manufactured".

Sure, initially she was very manufactured in a sense, i'm guessing her image in the early days was very controlled by Avex for a start along with the amount of promotion she had etc... All these things point to being yet another manufactured pop artist and truthfully there's not anything wrong with that since many many singers will only ever get anywhere due to it.

However, the fact that she wrote all her lyrics from the word go gave her considerable "clout"... ultimately giving her control over the direction her music went in. I remember reading that she picked the music for her songs by herself, to fit with the lyrics she'd written... whether this is true or not i don't know though.

You'll find 90% of manufactured acts don't have any input into the music that they release, generally not bringing anything to the creative process. To me, this is a real manufactured singer as they're just selling a product, not creating it.

The fact that ayu forget's her lyrics now and then is something i actually love about her. It proves she's human for a start, she also deals with it quite professionally and there's no better way to prove you're definitely singing live . Compare that to a real manufactured act like Ashlee Simpson who'd rather "ho-down off the stage then blame it on the band" than apologise and continue the performance.

[truehappiness]

LOL.

She sang the wrong line in HEAVEN at CDL05-06 too. She was gonna sing 'watashi no naka de' when it was 'toki wo koete~' so she said like.. 'watoki wo koete.. xD'

[SheFliesHigher]

Though my boyfriend likes a couple of Ayu's songs and think she's hot, he generally does not seem to think very highly of her for many of the same reasons your friend pointed out. I tell him she writes all her lyrics, occasionally composes the music, and has a lot of control over her image and what projects she takes part in, but he has a really hard time believing me because of his pre-conceived notions of what exactly "pop music" is. To him, all pop music is someone with little to no talent doing what a company tells them to do in order to make money. Obviously this a massive generalization but he's just one of those types, you know? The kind who thinks "alternative" usually means "better", and "pop" is vapid drivel. Your friend is probably also one of those types. He could benefit from being a bit more open-minded. I feel Ayu is quite different from many of the top pop singers in the US...but many people just want to dismiss her right away because of their flawed ideas concerning what it means to be a very successful pop singer.

[Dime_fan3]

First, i should probably start by saying "Hi everyone, i'm new here!"

After reading this thread, i just couldn't help but reply as, aspiring to be in the music biz mysel. I can be a little political on these kind of topics

First a little about me- I'm a 23 y.o male in Australia. I generally despise pop/r'n'b/rap/hip hop music in general because of manufactureism (if you can call that a word) Especially in the west (U.S, UK and Aus) cause to me it all sounds the same, i find this type of music annoying and theres a lot of 'fakeness' about artis like britney, christina, and the like.
Heres the main thing about me- I'm a metalhead! I'm into some of the comercial bands, but also the more underground bands, and theres nothing i enjoy more than puttin on a good metal record and waking the neighbors up
And i'm also an anime and japanese fanatic...which is how i got into ayu. While my tastes are mostly metal, and aside from the genres listed above, I can pretty much listen to anything, and I enjoyed the music from anime so much i started looking around the net for other japanese artists. Which is how a few Ayumi tracks landed in my hands...the first ayu song i ever heard was 'fly high' and since then I've become hooked on her!

Now the other thing about ayu is personally i don't consider her 'pop' as such. She has the poppy sound, but theres this 'hard rock' edge in some of her songs that attracted me. (BTW I also enjoy her ballads, too.) As a result i kinda consider her a little 'metal.' (Thats just personal opinion, though)

Which leads me to the topic at hand. Having brought a couple of her CD's (rather expisively ) I've notice she does write most of her lyrics, and apparently some music (Apparently on my fave song 'Evolution' which for me had 'metal' written all over the chorus ) and thats the main reason shes earned my respect and admiriation. 'Manufactured' isn't really a term i'd use to describe ayumi, I consider someone whos manufactured to (like said here a couple of times) have a song written for her, also a manufacture artist doesn't really have that 'live' vibe in their shows (after seeing 'Arena 2005' i thought the music was awesome, and the stage show made Kiss look like little kids playing with fireworks! ) Ayumi from what i can tell has 95% control over everything, while most overseas artists are really just made up for record companies to gain some cash (I mean....Paris Hilton's coming out with a single! You can't tell me that wasn't done just for money-making interests. I couldn't stop laughing for an hour after i heard that bit of news )

But keep in mind thats the opinion of someone who isn't in japan. It's a safe bet that if you walked down the street in tokyo and asked someone they would tell you that they've gotten sick of seeing Ayus face on everything. Thats the beauty of ayu for me- I'm probably the only person in my town who has a copy of '(Miss)understood'....and thats why i haven't gotten sick of her.

Sorry for rambling....like i said i can get a little political on this issue!
Anyways thanks for reading. Ayu rocks!!