Who likes ZARD?

[HiruNoKaze]

I first heard her when I listened to Don't You See, one of the Dragon Ball GT ending themes. My first reaction was liking the sound of her voice. Second, I liked the old school feeling the musical style gave me. Anyway, a few years later, I went to bookoff for the first time and found one of her albums for $3. lol in fact a lot of ZARD stuff is dirt cheap at bookoff...so I listened to her now and then. Just recently I put a slight hold on Ayu to listen to a bit of ZARD because I'd read about how far back ZARD goes and how she is one of the classics of jpop.

From this thread http://www.ahsforum.com/forum/showth...highlight=zard,
I was like, whoa, she's got Ayu beat in certain aspects. Ayu wouldn't be quite as high up if ZARD counted as a female singer instead of a group still. Ayu releases considerably faster, though, so I expect Ayu would overtake ZARD given time.

It's really intriguing to me how she's the completely opposite of Ayu. While Ayu gets a huge amount of publicity, ZARD avoids the spotlight, having only appeared on TV early in her career back when ZARD weas still a band. Ayu goes concert crazy with annual tours and CDLs. ZARD had her first concert tour in 2004 13 years after her debut. Ayu has massive tours in massive arenas. ZARD had her first concert on a cruise ship in 1999 singing for a mere 600 people. Ayu is always changing her style. ZARD has kept like the same hairstyle from the very beginning, wore regular clothes at her concerts, and seems not to deviate much musically (from my point of view so far).

Despite their numerous differences, I find that they share a few key similarities. Both have distinctive voices that have been a huge reason for why I've been drawn to them. Both write all of their lyrics and have done some composition. Both look quite young for their respective ages. Actually, watching some recent footage on youtube, ZARD...seems to have Ayu beat here. Just as ZARD doesn't change her style much...she seems to look the same as she did a decade ago...I don't know how that would be possible. She's like 39 and she looks bloody the same. Sigh probably make up has done a number of Ayu's skin... x 100. Well, in all fairness, it's hard to make a comparison because ZARD gets a lot less pics taken of her and we don't get as many close up shots.

Anyway, I like ZARD's warm and smooth vocals, but she just doesn't have edge like Ayu...

Btw, I think on one of the music TV shows, Ayu mentioned Yureru Omoi by ZARD for some reason...maybe Ayu likes that song. Yureru Omoi was 1993...and one of ZARD's biggest hits, so Ayu was about 15 at the time, hehe. 39 years old! damn! and just released a new single this summer.