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~Genie~
YumeNoRui. or known as Genie.
Loves Ayumi Hamasaki, Koda Kumi, Coco Lee and color PINK.
A Huge Jpop fan, but not an otaku!!!. Craves for Ramen and ice cream.
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"I am..." I'm never gonna give up. If I can't make myself clear, then I'll keep on shouting till I do!
Ayumi Hamasaki is releasing her fourth original album, "I am...," on January 1st. The album compiles hit singles like "M" and "Dearest," not to mention the System F trance number "Connected" and the TK composition "a song is born" (although the single version was a duet with keiko, the version included here is a Hamasaki Ayumi solo version, called "A Song is born"), and Ayu has taken on the challenge of performing a huge number of music genres! She is putting the finishing touches on her work in the year 2001 and hinting at her direction in the year 2002 with this one disc.
First off, may I hear the themes that the album "I am..." has in it? A: When I make my albums, I always work from a theme, but this time, there was just about no time to work on that, I couldn't go into it starting from a theme, but I still went to work allowing the sound I want to make = the sound I wanted to express, to take shape. But because of that, I couldn't begin this album in an "I'm gonna make an album that sounds like such-and-such!" sort of way. But partway through making the album, I did notice that it had no real sense of unity, and it made me really impatient (bitter smile).
So how did you finally bring it all together into one thing? A: In this album, the song I made very last was "Naturally," and in its last chorus, there's a part that says "freedom and solitude unite," but I realized, "Whenever I make an album, something like that is absolutely always the foundation." So far, inside myself, inside the person known as Ayu, those two things didn't try to unite with one another. I kinda feel something similar to it, but a someone else might go from "It's not likely Ayu and I will understand each other" to eventually the same "People are lonely creatures" place where Ayu is.
That's possible! Is that okay to say that? (laugh) A: The part that says "Even though I wanted it, I gave up" was in my heart somewhere, but when I was writing the lyrics to "Naturally," I became someone who would never give up. Until then, I had a feeling of "It's okay if only the ones who already understand me get this," but it turned into a feeling of "If I tell you this and you don't understand, I'll keep shouting it out until you do!"
Moving on, may I hear the reason for your album's title, "I am..."? A: Of course there was the whole "projecting my true self" mood that "I am..." came from, but that's not all it was. In "Daybreak" there's a part that says "we've lost our faces because of this era," but now I think this is an era in which "faceless people (people with no inviduality, accomodating people)" are everywhere. But I don't think it's an extremely sad thing.
Ah, I see! A: Keeping that in mind, Bancho (ayu's Nail Artist, Kanako Miura) put out a book on nail art in December, and recalling a message from me that was printed on the book's obi, I thought that Bancho's "face" was in her work = the nail designs that Bancho had made. For example, in magazines there are features on nail art, and there's like a hundred photos of nails there, aren't there? But that one thing is simply what Bancho does, so when she found that "Bancho's 'face' is the fact that she has that work," she gained self-confidence.
Simply put, "face" = "individuality," right? But it was far easier said than done to put your "face" out there in this work. A: Oh definitely. Looking back at myself this time, I wondered, what sort of "face" had I been leaving behind in my work? I thought, aren't various artists' songs flowing randomly over radio and television? If all the voices were the same, even if people knew "this is an Ayu song," would I be leaving behind any sort of "face" at all? After that I started to think, "Who am I?" and later, "What am I to the people who surround me?"... Simply put, I really want to know the answer to the "..." part of "I am...". The "..." that says "You are so-and-so, aren't you? So, who is that exactly?" People might hear the title "I am..." and think to themselves "I am... what?" and that's why I chose it.
So you mean not their individual name or appearance, but instead what's inside them? Asking themselves about that? A: Yes. I was thinking, "It's so simple and fundamental, but it's such a hugely important thing."
By the way, "I am..." is going to be your fourth original album, isn't it? So we did some anlysis and comparison of these four albums. First off, "A Song for XX" had you full of this "I want to show my true self!" energy, and that was sort of your starting-off point. A: Yeah. That's definitely what I was like.
Next, on your second album "LOVEppears," we have an Ayu who's begun to look at her surroundings (the world), who has now left her starting position and begun to write about her surroundings, yes? And on your third album, "Duty," it seems like an Ayu who's watching things from the world. So, now the fourth album, "I am...," sometimes I think "What is it?" And I think that it really is that Ayu's origin is where she's departed from, and that seems to be where the energy comes from. A: Indeed... that's very deep. Yeah! I think that might be what it is.
I'm glad to hear you say that. So, recording the album this time, you visited the studio alot of times, but you had a rough time with it, didn't you? A: Yeah. The absolute worst timing. I had a hard time writing the lyrics (bitter smile). But giving birth is always painful, so bringing this album into the world was also, but I wasn't alone this time. Compared to the past, especially! So far, there was always a feeling of "I'm working on this" meaning "I'm facing myself alone", you know, "Working in solitary is nice and simple," but this time there wasn't anywhere near that sort of "private, private" feeling. So it was very enjoyable. I wasn't nearly as tense doing it that way. I think it had a rough feeling because so much weight came off my shoulders, and for good reason.
Lastly, I'd like to hear about the look of this album's jacket... A: For the album Jacket, since the title is "I am..." I never wanted to really have a decked out image. I took alot of things into consideration, but determined it'd be best to not decorate the album with extraneous things this time. So I went with a "Natural" look.
The type of image is that of the era of creation, or a time when the earth was just born, a time when there's nothing. But you're protecting with peace that which generates from that nothing. Ayu's word, "natural," seems to give that impression. A: Exactly!
INTERVIEW： Kazuki Okabe
01 "I am..." (Music/CREA, Arrangement/Tadashi Kikuchi + tasuku)
"I am..." is the song that gave the album its title. It's full of the meaning "I am me, and not anyone else...", which I say even at the very beginning of this song. It's the "core" inside of the being known as Ayu. This is a song that I wrote as a scream from my heart about "my own never-changing, most finely-tuned parts" and "(but simultaneously this too) my missing pieces." This is never-changing, I think, and what will continue to never change. But, without such a piece, I can't think that I want to become "peaceful."
02 "opening Run" (Music, Arrangement/CMJK)
03 "Connected" (Music,Arrangement/Ferry Corsten)
When I first heard this song, I thought, it's a trance song, the synthesizer is working overtime, there's no way I could do a fusion with this. I thought, I don't even speak English very well, surely someone else, not Ayu, would be better for a trance collaboration? But Ferry (Corsten, "system F") made a very strong approach, saying "I want you to write lyrics for this no matter what!" So I thought, "Well, may as well, right?" and for this song, I was transmitting a message as an outsider, and I didn't feel like I was working on writing lyrics, it was more of a comfortable, "writing a letter to a friend" feeling, and it was nice. So then, it became a letter I was writing to Ferry, but I was thinking "how can I make it Ayu-style," and I thought maybe "wordplay," or "japaneseplay," would be good. "I discover (MITSUKETE)," "I stare (MITSUMETE)," "I make sure (MISADAMETE)" and so on with other such similar words make it feel like a thesaurus has been opened up. But I got to thinking there'd just be too much to do... (bitter smile) I was just packing it so full of words with the same sound, and I had to put the words that I chose in an order that made the lyrics comprehensible. I think once you hear Ferry's song with the vocals inserted, you can hear that I'm repeating the same thing. Anyway, as for the lyrics, I thought I heard the staff who could understand Japanese going "What is she saying?" So I wrote the chorus section to say, "We are all connected at each and every place, so when you're thinking of these words, I already am too." When you understand the answer to "What is this?," the meaning of the words, it's that even though Ayu is far away in Japan, she's still connected to you! In the end, there wasn't really an excited feeling of "let's get these vocals done!" Since the synthesizer's sound was very inorganic, I thought it would be best to sing in a more expressionless manner, which was a challenge.
04 "UNITE!" (Music/CREA, Arrangement/HΛL)
05 "evolution" (Music/CREA, Arrangement/HΛL)
06 "Naturally" (Music/CREA, Arrangement/CMJK)
It took something like 20 minutes or so total to write this song. Strictly speaking, with everything floating around in my head, I think about songs for a long time, but once I started writing this one, it was surprisingly smooth sailing. When I work on a song, typically, I first write the CM size (the 30-seconds-long chorus section), and then I put together the whole thing later, but in this case the space of time between writing the CM version and writing the full song (when work on the album began) was so long, so it took longer to complete this song than the others.
This song was done in a backwards pattern from "Naturally," as what I wanted to write was very clear in my mind. But the orchestral part (the sound of its melody) was really very good, no matter what issues I had making the song. I wanted to do a song with the theme "song that seems cute," by an Ayu who isn't a woman but still a little girl, and explaining to CMJK the subtle nuances in the arrangement that I wanted was difficult. Every person has a slightly different standard of what makes something "cute" (bitter smile). I think I confused CMJK when I explained it to him. I wasn't able to explain anything but my own abstract "cute feelings." Because of that, we had to redo it many times... So, finally, the song we made became completely different from what we'd worked on at the beginning. At first, it was a much more grim song. (lol) I'd say in interviews that "The last song finished was 'Naturally'" but honestly, this song was also done in the same time period, still redoing things until the very last moment before the album was due to be finished. I think the staff were pretty impatient, saying "This will never be done in time!"
"Daybreak" is almost like a light in the dark, very warm, very fresh perhaps... It's a song with a pureness that makes you feel shy if you listen, so ayu gambled with feeling shy when being so honest in this song! To say "you're so shy about that!" I wrote with a feeling of "words that shine without saying anything." The song was written very quickly. So far, for me... I think I've been writing about feeling as though something was missing. You could say that Ayu's style was "showing honesty, but not being honest" in many things.
10 "taskinlude" (Music, Arrangement/tasuku)
11 "M" (Music/CREA, Arrangement/HΛL)
12 "A Song is born" (Music, Arrangement/Tetsuya Komuro)
The foundation for this song's lyrics were in the tour. I usually release an album after the tour has influenced it enough, this time too I did get alot of sounds I thought I should do, and I thought I should make use of those shapes. At that time, Komuro-san unexpectedly slipped in and offered a music composition... And he said, "How do you want to do this song?" and I told him my feelings that "During my own tour, I felt the way this song feels to me," and he said "Alright, reflect those feelings in this song." It was the first time I'd sung a song written by Komuro-san, but other times I'd been given songs from him I thought "oh okay, this is nice" at the time, over and over, but I felt like just the name "Komuro Tetsuya" carried alot of weight. By the way, the way of writing the title has changed from the single version (the december 12th released single, all in lowercase as "a song is born") to the album version, in order to make the distinction that instead of it being sung together with KEIKO, it's a solo song here.
14 "no more words" (Music/CREA + D・A・I, Arrangement/Naoto Suzuki, tasuku)
Once I got to the part where I was making this song, I'd started heading into the end of the album, and I thought of the phrase "no more words." Although the lyrics are rather nice for such an intense subject matter, I wanted to convey the part of a person who's "sorrow" is that "If everyone already understands, then that's okay, right? Because everyone keeps going forward, just because they have no choice but to go through life..." No matter what kind of harshness there is, I thing I should live with strength. When making this album, I thought "Gah, it's hopeless! This is impossible!" over and over again, but despite that, I persisted in making it, and I was somehow able to reach this end result... (bitter smile) Actually, I wrote the lyrics to this song once before, but scrapped it and it was newly rewritten. I think the reason was that there was a section saying something like, "after this, I'm not saying anything else." When I look at the entire album, the flow of the sequence between "I am..." and "no more words," I've put my message out there perfectly. I'm very very happy with it... So here, I was using one phrase to convey something, rather than doing it the reverse way and adding more words just for the sake of explanation, which makes the feelings become more trivial. Even I have things I don't say, and I'm sure everyone wouldn't press me to give any more answers than I have. So "I'm not saying any more right now" is what I wrote. By the way, the meaning of the title "no more words" is... "You can understand even though I'm not saying any more than this."
15 "Endless sorrow ~gone with the wind ver.~" (Music/CREA, Arrangement/CMJK)
Ayumi Hamasaki has released her third album "Duty" on September 27th. In this interview, we delve into her thoughts on the album. Let's go!
Your third album, "Duty," has been released at last, but about when did you start working on this album? A: The start of choosing the songs to put on the album started after my nationwide tour ended. So I was really worried, thinking, "A September release is going to be impossible!" (laughs)
The tour ended on August 9th, so it's probably only natural to think that. Nevertheless, now that it's done and on sale, would you say the tour had any influence? A: There was alot that I got from the tour, I think it influenced the album quite a bit. But it's not just what I got once the tour was over. Like, three songs were done before the tour began ("vogue," "Far away," and "SEASONS"), the way I was at the time is in there, me fighting with myself during the tour is in there, what I was able to do once the tour finally ended is in there, and the time I enjoyed spending by myself afterwards is there. There's an impression of a whole flow of time in the album.
Which reminds me, those three songs are in their release order on the album, but in between them there are new songs sort of "buried" in there. So, the last song, "girlish," is the real conclusion of the album, and is it also a sort of "answer" to the album's questions? A: Yeah. I think so. Like the lyric "Let's go with that feeling" from the song...
Taking "Present" from your first album and "Who..." from your second into consideration, this song is a conclusion, but until now you haven't thought of this song as a way to end things, right? A: In general, I'd think of a song like "Key ~eternal tie ver.~" as an end song.
Ah, I see. But I thought "girlish" had very good lyrics. The lyrics to this last song aren't published in the booklet like they usually are, there's no excess power in there, it's a very light feeling, but it's very good, I think. A: Where I am in my life right now, there's a girl at the top and a girl feeling very down gathering together and mingling, and these lyrics have a feeling of immediacy, in a manner of speaking.
But the songs aren't on the album in the same order as the lyrics were written in? A: It was all kinda scattered. The first one I did was, I think, "SURREAL."
Ah, the song whose single was released concurrently with the album. Considering that Hamasaki-san writes realistic lyrics about ground you've actually traveled, I was thinking that title was somewhat mysterious, though. A: Although I did want to write something realistic, I have a habit of escapism, so writing something realistic, I still thought I should use that title (laughs). When I say "Although you say that you think you're worthless / You'll put both hands out if you fall down on the road" in the lyrics, the truth is, I'm talking to a friend of mine. One day, she said, "It doesn't matter what happens to me," or something of the sort, and it just made me weep. And yet, when she fell down, she put her hands out suddenly, protecting herself even though she'd given up, and when I saw this, I thought, "Ah, it doesn't matter, does it?" It seems like whenever I'm also thinking "Whatever happens, happens," I think I'll always quickly protect myself if I fall down on the road! (laugh)
You talk about such a scene, and it's so interesting to hear about the inspiration behind your lyrics, but what's with that composure of yours? A: Ahahaha... Well, if you say it's impressive, I guess it's because it's my nature.
If you watch very calmly like that, various other people would be rather unhappy with you. A: You lie! Aww, now what do I do? (laugh)
Naah. It's already too late to do anything about it... So, getting back to the subject, reading these lyrics, it felt like a person discovering something they like, and I was dwelling on that very intensely. A: Yeah. If someone has found what they like, I think that's great. But even if they find what they like, for instance, if they decide they want to become a model, I would think adults would all say "What? Why modeling?" and "Find a real job!" and stuff like that. The thing you like, whatever it is that's worth dreaming about, I thought it seemed like it should be great, shouldn't it?
So now, I'd like to hear about "Duty," the album's title track. A: I wrote it before I wrote "vogue," and it reflected the state I was in at the time. The lyric "my turn" isn't referring to just myself though, it means each and every one of you also. Of course I do include myself in that group. For instance, there have been various "artists" out there for years and years. Mr. or Miss So-And-So was there, but the times are always changing, you know? And everyone can see when the world changes. History is always being repainted like that, one era ends and we can see it happen, we can't be as young as we are now forever, and we can't be onlookers forever. So we can't just say "Eh, I don't get it, whatever" forever, I thought.
And how does that connect with the title? A: Communicating that is something I thought it was my duty to do at the time.
Next, why were you considering following up last year's "white Ayu" and "black Ayu" with this CD jacket's "Leopard Ayu"? A: Because for some reason I just really wanted to do it! (laughs) Before, I kept asking myself "Why do I wanna do White Ayu and Black Ayu?" and stuff but there was absolutely no reason for it, but lately, doing things with no reason isn't so scary to me. So it's just like, "I'm gonna do this!"
That seems to symbolize Hamasaki-san right now. Rather like the song "girlish." Will you be running recklessly from now on, then? A: Honestly, right now, I already AM running recklessly! (laugh)
"LOVEppears" Beatfreak track-by-track interview Translation By Deli@AHS
----------------------------------------------- At the second album "LOVEppears", I tried to sing and shout along with the sharp sounds in order to express my true feeling of sadness and longing.
November 10th, Ayumi Hamasaki is simultaneously releasing her long-awaited Second Album "LOVEppears" and 300,000-copies-limited maxi single "appears". This appearance in beatfreak is her first in about 10 months. She talked about the album's production.
First off, can you tell us the origin of the title of your second album, "LOVEppears"? "LOVEppears" is the words LOVE and appears ("seems to be") mixed. People say that it's a coined term made up by Ayu, but what kind of meaning does it have?
Ayu: The title "LOVEppears" has two meanings to it, "thing that seems like love" and "discrepancy between what we see and what's really there." When I was thinking about the jacket design, I was concerned about the title I'd use, and my staff were there with a suggestion. They said, "You should use English word A and English word B, and put them together to make a whole new word."
How did you decide to connect "LOVE" and "appears" together in the first place?
Ayu: Before my trip to New York for the jacket photo shoot, I looked out the window from inside the car, and there was a couple that looked SO happy, but I personally was thinking, maybe they're in the middle of a serious crisis. Or maybe they're actually talking about separating. So I thought of the meaning "seems to be" for the word "appears" and stuck it on there. We give ourselves certain outward appearances and images, trying to make it look like things are good or bad, whatever we want to show people, but really things aren't as we're showing.
So yeah, that discrepancy between what's percieved & what's real that you mentioned. But with the sort of air you put forth, an objective third party could tell that the way you write here isn't like your style on your first album. Like for me, I think that style was more clear when put it next to songs like "TO BE" or "Boys & Girls." But what do you think?
Ayu: Mm-hmm, I think there was a change there.
Do you think it's a spontaneous occurrance, or do you think it's the result of yourself changing?
Ayu: I changed after absorbing various things & growing, but I was thinking for days about things like, what is it that I absorbed after my first album? Thanks to my writing, I think I became aware that after I figured something out, I would have to change as a result, wouldn't I?
As far as sound goes, on the maxi single "Boys & Girls" for example, there are alot of remixes with Hard House, Reggae, and other styles that have been produced.
Ayu: The producers were thinking that those sorts of sounds could be put in the second album. Both parties have to decide on a remix's core arrangement, so when people who like me & people who have helped me since my debut introduced me to the sound, I thought about it.
Tell us about how you prepared for the album.
Ayu: Sure! Well, while working on "A Song for XX," for example, during the sad times that I couldn't shake, I'd always be saying "I'm very sad, I can't shake this." Quietly crying, quietly wounded, quietly mourning. But with "LOVEppears," during sad times, I express it with furious sounds, shouting out, screaming. I can see that there are some things I couldn't change, but I had alot of that sort of tension this year. So that's how that was. This album is like that, but next time, what will I be like? I couldn't tell you. Maybe with the next album, I'll go back to sounding like I did on the first. Who knows? Or maybe I'll have a totally different way of doing things.
By the way, before doing this interview, when we talked to your producer Max Matsuura, he said: "Ayu is a very meticulous worker behind the scenes. Alot of the work she does by herself is more in the Producer's arena. I think really we should say 'Produced by ayumi hamasaki'." But what do you think of that statement?
Ayu: I've heard it said several times, "Let's say 'Produced by ayumi hamasaki'," but Ayu's producer is Max Matsuura, and it's meaningless to try to say otherwise. Sure, practically speaking, I do producer-like duties, as do a few others. But why do I do it? Why do I stretch myself to that extent? I ask myself that, but I think Max Matsuura is the one doing most of it after all. So, for the sake of holding onto myself, if anyone else wanted to be Hamasaki Ayumi's producer, I wouldn't be interested.
From that, it seems as though your producer Max Matsuura is giving you more credit than you think you deserve. Anyway, right after the album release, what kind of schedule is the year 2000 going to have for you? Ayu: Once the album is out there, once the feeling starts to come to me, I plan on releasing who-knows-how-many new singles. Then after that.... ummm... Definitely gonna do something. I think! (laughs)
That "something" is very meaningful, isn't it?
Ayu: Yup. But it is a secret.
1: Introduction (Music/Arrangement: HΛL)
2: Fly high (Music: D・A・I/Arrangement: HΛL)
I'm rapping in this song!! Magazines were all writing stuff like "Ayu's next challenge - rapping!!" weren't they? (laughs) At first I thought I'd just do it in an interlude, but Nagao-san's demo tape for this song had a temporary English rap in it and it was really good. So just spontaneously we figured, "In the place of this English rap, we should put a rap with lyrics written by Ayu." But every time I thought about writing, I couldn't write... I was worried. Every time I wrote something down, it was different, so it was really difficult. On top of it, I don't know alot about rhyming, so with the sparse knowledge I had, I had to come up with words that rhymed, which I was very bad at. So it has this "Ayu monologue" feeling to it. Listeners might not be able to hear "rapping" but my voice while not singing is what I want people to hear. I think that's what I wanted to give them.
Of all the 4 songs on "A", I was most troubled when writing the lyrics to "Trauma." When I wrote the chorus, which was gonna be used in the CM, I did okay at expressing a positive, cute "jumping up in the air" feeling, but when it came to writing the whole song, I didn't have even KINDA the same mood.... So the words couldn't come out, I couldn't concentrate. When this happens, I'm thinking to myself, "I have this thing I want to say, but it's all fuzzy in my brain." What I had to write versus what I was really thinking caused me some worry, so I had to think about what I was going to put forth. Until this, I'd never used words like "cruelty" and "insanity," so I wondered if I should say that or if I should replace those words with something else. But now, honestly, I'm glad I used them, because I was able to convey my real feelings.
4: And Then (Music: Yasuhiko Hoshino/Arrangement: Keisuke Kikuchi)
Take a building that's still under construction, for instance. When you see someone who's like that, it's not that they're incomplete, it's that they can't make any progress because they don't understand anyone but themselves. But a stranger might see it as already complete, although the inside of that "under construction" person is still completely imperfect. In "And Then," Ayu is expressing this. In "TO BE" I wrote "ibitsu (imperfection)" and in "And Then," "fukanzen (incomplete)." I think I definitely have a penchant for such words. As for the way I write lyrics, I take the writing seriously of course, but I sometimes feel like playing around with them, honestly. At the part that goes, "It felt like I was writing lyrics, la la la...," this is Ayu seriously playing around. There are probably alot of people who didn't notice this, but the lyric that goes "I can't stay in the same place forever" later on, that's a lyric that can be found on "A Song for XX."
The lyrics for "immature" were written on the same day as "And Then" (their meaning being "unskilled at Being Human"). This song was already done during work on my first album, but I hesitated to put it on there, and afterwards I talked about making it a single. So this time I was able to finally show the song to the world, but it took more than a year for that to happen, and alot of history had occurred in the meantime, so the image the song put across was totally wrong, so I wrote really great new lyrics for it. "And Then," written the same day, has the same theme, but this one, "immature," is the much brighter song of the two. When I was faced with something incomplete, I very honestly and seriously painted the shape I was faced with in this work. The other song, "And Then," is in a minor key, because I'm looking at myself with calmer eyes, really facing that incomplete thing, and talking about that.
6: Boys & Girls (Music: D・A・I/Arrangement: Naoto Suzuki, D・A・I)
"Boys & Girls" was my first maxi-single, so I guess alot of people know me now, huh? Usually, the single jackets were photographed in a studio, but we had a square to work with for the 12-cm single's design, so we said "If it's a square, we can't do that, so let's do a new photo design." So we took the photos by the ocean, which was different (laughs). During this time, in both my work and private life, I think I was making difficult faces. I understood "Boys & Girls" as a turning point, but I didn't understand it as a good thing, so I put up barriers so my misunderstood self couldn't be seen. Although I was making difficult faces at the time, they didn't reflect how I really felt. Now... looking back, I definitely seem to have a calm face.
7: TO BE (Music: D・A・I/Arrangement: Naoto Suzuki, D・A・I)
Do As Infinity have made their debut now, but this was the first time Nagao-san wrote a song for me. My first impression of Nagao-san was "large wall" (not like "a big barrier that I can't climb over cuz it's so big", I just mean his eyes were really high up! I'M SO SORRY Nagao-san! (laughs)) The chorus for "TO BE" has a much "thicker" sound than my other singles until now, but I wonder if everyone noticed? After the song's release, since I was really into 70's-style clothes at the time, I wore bandanas on my head for alot of my TV lives.
8: End roll (Music: D・A・I/Arrangement: Naoto Suzuki, D・A・I)
I've never been able to watch a movie the whole way to the end, so I'm always leaving the movie theaters in the middle. I really do want to watch until the end, but I feel like I'm stuck and I want to get up, and that's such a good snapshot of myself, I feel strongly about that... It's a great thing to write, but really, if I stay till the end, the exit is packed, and it gets so bright because of the lights, and it's such a dumb thing to worry about, but I can't take it. lol! But that's something that really symbolizes the present Ayu, I thought. Always somewhere being so very awkward. There are other things I want to do, other useless things I'm worrying about, necessary things I'm unable to do. "End roll" comes from me telling myself over & over, "One of these days I'm going to watch a movie the whole way through to the end roll."
9: P.S II (Music: Hideaki Kuwabara/Arrangement: HΛL)
This song, "P.S II," is a sequel to the song "POWDER SNOW" from my first album. I wonder if the people who didn't like me until hearing songs like "LOVE ~Destiny~" and "TO BE" after my first album was released will hear this song after hearing "POWDER SNOW"? This song was made for people who have supported me since my debut, sort of like a "secret password" with me, I think. Next to the quieter "POWDER SNOW," "P.S II" is much more intense. When you compare the two works, they have a completely different sound. This is me having a hard time using the proper phrase to express my gratitude, so I'm using the next closest phrase to replace it. It symbolizes the way I am this year.
This is my first single of 1999. Track one on the single was a remix version called "version M," and the approach to this work was different than my work until now. At first, the original version, "version J", was planned to be track 1 and "version M" was planned to be track 2 on the single, but when I listened to the original and the remix, the original version lost the contest every time. The repeating of "ta" in "kogoesou de me wo tojiteta" felt very fresh to me at the time. Putting the remix as track 1 was something I was nervous about. Would everyone agree to it? But it turned out to be a more popular decision than I thought it would.
11: too late (Music: D・A・I/Arrangement: Naoto Suzuki, D・A・I)
"too late" and "End roll." Those two songs use opposing techniques in their melodies to illustrate the same thing, in order to display the world that I wanted to display & express the words that I wanted to express. The so-called "manner of speaking" they both have. The phrase "too late" has a negative context, but in this case I mean that if there's something you can't make on time, but you still just keep going, you gain experience and knowledge for every step you take, you understand your circumstances and situation. Even if you don't make it, even if you're too late, in the end, some good has come of it, and chances are that more good will come from it eventually. Of course, if you do nothing but wait, that's no good, but... I felt, since I was expressing the idea of "too late" being a more positive phrase, the song should overflow with feelings of speed.
Before singing this song, but after I finished the lyrics, I had the words in my head but they weren't finalized yet (laughs). In my works until now, I only used the words "watashi" and "anata" (for "me" and "you"), and here a protagonist saying "kimi" makes her entrance. I usually sang about people's feelings and thoughts, what was "inside the heart," you could say. But this time was the first time I used the term "lovers." Lovers that we see may seem perfectly happy, like everything's normal. From far away, a third party looking on might get that impression. By the way, this song was on its own single limited to 300,000 copies, but the version that appears on the album is a bit different. Oh, and saying "KISU" in the lyrics here was also a first for me. I sang the song during the PV shoot and I felt very shy, lol.
"monochrome" is a song written with a "fairytale" theme. When I was a child, the idea of a princess bound to her Prince Charming was a lovely thought to me. But now that I've become an adult, really, I think that I shouldn't wish for that type of thing, I should be serious now. Thinking, "A princess is so lucky, she can wear pretty dresses and eat delicious things, right?" In the lyrics I say "This fun, sad, and tender story." I'm saying there that I, now, am grasping onto fairytale. I've been able to hold on to certain various things, but right at this moment, there are alot of things I have to let go of. That's the impression those words give.
14: Interlude (Music/Arrangement: Naoto Suzuki)
15: LOVE ~refrain~ (Music: TSUNKU/Arrangement: Naoto Suzuki)
Up until making this album, I had been looking at "LOVE ~Destiny~" as my own song, but in alot of ways, I felt like it wasn't my song at all. But this time, when I made "LOVE ~refrain~," I finally felt confident that it was my own song, and I was able to be calm about it. Truthfully, before "LOVE ~Destiny~" was created, Ayu wrote the idea of LOVE for "LOVE ~refrain~" based on Tsunku's composition. Afterwards, this song was the last one finished for insertion in the album, and recording was done in New York. I'd always felt like the circumstances were wrong. But I feel like if "LOVE ~Destiny~" was the wrong shape for the song to be in, then it came to its strongest form with "LOVE ~refrain~."
Is it love or isn't it? Is it compassion or is it shared experience? I was holding on to questions like that, and this song's theme is the answers I finally got. The ellipsis at the end of the title, because it wouldn't look like something definitive that way. It kinda feels like making a "Hmmm?" sound in Japanese, doesn't it? I wanted to express that I was in an uncertain place. Plus, it has implications of "It seems like it's such-and-such, but maybe it's really not such-and-such!" Afterwards, the end. Or rather, it "appears" to be the end (laughs)! This is a message from me to all of you. You'll understand what it means if you wait 30 seconds...
After debuting with “poker face”, she has released a single every two months, resulting in a total of five singles; Ayumi Hamasaki has run through 1998 perfectly. She entered the year 1999 together with her on New Year’s Day released first album “A Song for XX”. The album features a total of 16 songs. Of course all the lyrics were written by Ayumi Hamasaki. Furthermore this work reached the first place at the album charts.
These words were written in a corner of the album’s inner slip, “I was born twenty years ago, up ‘till now I’ve worn various faces but the naked Ayu is recorded here.”
This time, more than just being reflected in her lyrics, the “naked Ayu” recited a realness that is almost too great for a twenty year old.
----What kind of child were you? “I wasn’t talkative. Even now I don’t chat much, but I was a really quiet child. If someone greeted me with ‘good morning’, I would turn completely red, look downward and just nod. I wonder if adults thought I was an impolite child when they saw me (laughs).”
----And at school? “Even at boring times when everyone laughed, I wondered if I had to laugh along; I was desperate to blend in. Crowds tired me greatly.”
----Did you have any friends? “I first understand what real friends were after middle school. We’d all gather together while playing hooky and would talk about trivial things; those times were fun. But I wasn’t a delinquent. Though I wasn’t diligent either (laughs). It was a real rural area without any cities like Shibuya. I remodelled my uniform in order to be uniquely fashioned; I spent all my pocket money on it (laughs). Maybe I acted that way to create my own existence. I don’t really know how other people viewed my behaviour.”
----That’s cute. “I was often late, because I was happy that everyone would say “she isn’t here yet” and would worry about me.”
----Were you lonely? “I wonder (laughs).”
A lot of people probably know this, but at the end of last year Ayumi Hamasaki appeared at All Night Nippon for one day. She looked back on the road, which she has crossed together with her songs from “A Song for XX”. She openheartedly talked about the circumstances in which she’s been raised; the divorce of her parents when she was still young, not being able to remember her father’s face and about her mother who she calls ‘mommy’. It was a natural result for Ayumi Hamasaki to convey the way she had lived up ‘till now to the people who support her. When I asked her why she had talked about herself to that extent, she answered with a fresh smile, “This might surprise everyone, but I have never thought that the circumstances in which I was raised were pitiful. That’s because it was natural to me. That’s why it doesn’t mean that I talk about it because I want to be sympathised with nor because I wish to have people tell me ‘good luck’.”
----What was your mother like? “Because we have both grown older, and because I am now able to understand various things, our relationship has improved. But the feelings of wanting to be like mommy and not wanting to be like her are still coexisting together. I wonder if there’s a feeling of rivalry. It is very difficult when we take pictures together. If I’m photographed nicely, but mommy isn’t, she will yell, “it’s horrible!” and throw the picture away (laughs). Perhaps we are more like sisters.”
----Where there any instances where you were hurt due to your family background? “Because I still wanted to compare to other people in my primary school days, there might have been some cases. For example, my mother never came during athletic meetings. Those kind of things. I was never truly hurt or angry. That’s because I thought those things were natural. Actually, I feel gratitude now. Because I am here because of her.”
----Well, what path did you take after your fun middle school days? “Using the fact that I was scouted in Fukuoka, I followed high school in Tokyo. I quickly wanted to be able to do everything be myself. Paying the rent and food with my own earned money. But, that is impossible with just a part-time job.”
----What were your impressions of coming to Tokyo? “Because I didn’t fit in the atmosphere that was filled with adults, I was tired by various things. I thought that Tokyo was a scary place (laughs). I don’t even know how many times I thought about going back home. But if I would really go home, it would be regrettable because I was certain, the words, “Hamasaki has failed, just as expected”, would be said. I absolutely didn’t want that to be said. I didn’t really need the world of show business. I wanted to return home after accomplishing something by myself. Even if I would be laughed at by people, it would be all right as long as something strong was left inside of me.”
Hamasaki Ayumi was sixteen years old when she was invited to sing. For such a girl, it might have been a too sudden development. “Going to classes was boring and I was only thinking about how I could skip classes. I was tired of raising my voice (laughs).” Hamasaki answers like this with a wry smile as she remembers those days. The fact that she’s become interested in singing even though she said she didn’t like to at all is because she was encouraged by her producer to write her own lyrics.
----What if you hadn’t started to write lyrics? “I probably would’ve quit. If it had just been singing, then I surely wouldn’t have been able to find any significance there. After I started writing lyrics, I started to accept singing, because the words that I sang came from my heart. In my middle school days, the feeling of wanting to understand my own existence created the wrong impression, but at last, I discovered the way by which I could make people see me clearly. I truly enjoy writing lyrics. That’s because it is like writing a letter to everyone in the world. It isn’t a one-way traffic either.”
----On your first album “A Song for XX”, what kind of shape has been created? “I feel the real Hamasaki Ayumi is shown, not just some image. Everything is included, the bad and the good.”
----A compilation of your twenty years? “Though I felt I shouldn’t hide anything, up until now, I was denying, or should I say, hiding my past. Because I was behaving like an honour student, I felt guilty. I hated feeling like that all the time, but after my career took off, no matter what I’d do, I would be told, “that’s nice, isn’t it?”. When my days became like that, I thought it wouldn’t be an issue even if I did reveal my past for the first time. That’s why, I wrote everything like this. Since you can only have one first album in your entire life, I might be forgiven (laughs).”
----Maybe you validate the meanings you feel within you when you write? “There is only one person in the world like you. It’s often said that there are three people similar to you in this world, but that’s only your outward appearance. I believe there isn’t a single person that is exactly like you. There are definitely things that only you can do, and there are things that you cannot do. That’s why I love humans and why I believe people cannot live alone.”
----Though you have finished working on your album, you said you still have lots of things you wish to write about. “I really felt like that at the time. But, when I had to write my new song that was released in February, I totally fell down (laughs). I’d think, write and thrown it away. That process was repeated over and over.’’
Unable to sleep in such circumstances, she felt like running away and planned to escape Tokyo. When, in the car, Hamasaki opened her eyes after a long time of sleep, the scenery was covered with snow. “I said I wanted to see the snow”, in that instant the car got trapped in the gutter and Hamasaki, by raising her finger, requested the help of the Saruganseki. Her sixth single “WHATEVER” was created during such strange events. I was surprised that the first track “Version M” had a euro dance beat arrangement.
----For a moment, I wondered if you would continue along such a line. “The standard Ayu track is the second track, “Version J”. I hope that when people buy the single they will suddenly get surprised as they listen to “Version M”. I also talked about that with my producer. I wondered if it was okay to have a little fun with this year’s release.”
----I heard a rumour that you will again release singles in a fast pace this year. “It’s not a rumour. I really will (laughs). I think I’ll pick up the pace compared to 1998. Right now, there are a lot of things that I want to do. This time I’m playing around with a dance beat, but the next song might be a grand ballad or reggae. No matter what I’ll do, it’s important to me that people will recognize that I created it. I want to make such things.”
----I’ve heard there will be a secret live in March. “It’s in a small place in order for everyone to be able to see my face. I want to gather people who purely want to hear me sing. I might start thinking about a tour after that.”
*All Night Nippon was a radio broadcast. Masa's translation of it is on AHS too. *Saruganseki is a comedy duo, who hitchhiked the globe.
"I am..." I'm never gonna give up. If I can't make myself clear, then I'll keep on shouting till I do!
Ayumi Hamasaki is releasing her fourth original album, "I am...," on January 1st. The album compiles hit singles like "M" and "Dearest," not to mention the System F trance number "Connected" and the TK composition "a song is born" (although the single version was a duet with keiko, the version included here is a Hamasaki Ayumi solo version, called "A Song is born"), and Ayu has taken on the challenge of performing a huge number of music genres! She is putting the finishing touches on her work in the year 2001 and hinting at her direction in the year 2002 with this one disc.
First off, may I hear the themes that the album "I am..." has in it? A: When I make my albums, I always work from a theme, but this time, there was just about no time to work on that, I couldn't go into it starting from a theme, but I still went to work allowing the sound I want to make = the sound I wanted to express, to take shape. But because of that, I couldn't begin this album in an "I'm gonna make an album that sounds like such-and-such!" sort of way. But partway through making the album, I did notice that it had no real sense of unity, and it made me really impatient (bitter smile).
So how did you finally bring it all together into one thing? A: In this album, the song I made very last was "Naturally," and in its last chorus, there's a part that says "freedom and solitude unite," but I realized, "Whenever I make an album, something like that is absolutely always the foundation." So far, inside myself, inside the person known as Ayu, those two things didn't try to unite with one another. I kinda feel something similar to it, but a someone else might go from "It's not likely Ayu and I will understand each other" to eventually the same "People are lonely creatures" place where Ayu is.
That's possible! Is that okay to say that? (laugh) A: The part that says "Even though I wanted it, I gave up" was in my heart somewhere, but when I was writing the lyrics to "Naturally," I became someone who would never give up. Until then, I had a feeling of "It's okay if only the ones who already understand me get this," but it turned into a feeling of "If I tell you this and you don't understand, I'll keep shouting it out until you do!"
Moving on, may I hear the reason for your album's title, "I am..."? A: Of course there was the whole "projecting my true self" mood that "I am..." came from, but that's not all it was. In "Daybreak" there's a part that says "we've lost our faces because of this era," but now I think this is an era in which "faceless people (people with no inviduality, accomodating people)" are everywhere. But I don't think it's an extremely sad thing.
Ah, I see! A: Keeping that in mind, Bancho (ayu's Nail Artist, Kanako Miura) put out a book on nail art in December, and recalling a message from me that was printed on the book's obi, I thought that Bancho's "face" was in her work = the nail designs that Bancho had made. For example, in magazines there are features on nail art, and there's like a hundred photos of nails there, aren't there? But that one thing is simply what Bancho does, so when she found that "Bancho's 'face' is the fact that she has that work," she gained self-confidence.
Simply put, "face" = "individuality," right? But it was far easier said than done to put your "face" out there in this work. A: Oh definitely. Looking back at myself this time, I wondered, what sort of "face" had I been leaving behind in my work? I thought, aren't various artists' songs flowing randomly over radio and television? If all the voices were the same, even if people knew "this is an Ayu song," would I be leaving behind any sort of "face" at all? After that I started to think, "Who am I?" and later, "What am I to the people who surround me?"... Simply put, I really want to know the answer to the "..." part of "I am...". The "..." that says "You are so-and-so, aren't you? So, who is that exactly?" People might hear the title "I am..." and think to themselves "I am... what?" and that's why I chose it.
So you mean not their individual name or appearance, but instead what's inside them? Asking themselves about that? A: Yes. I was thinking, "It's so simple and fundamental, but it's such a hugely important thing."
By the way, "I am..." is going to be your fourth original album, isn't it? So we did some anlysis and comparison of these four albums. First off, "A Song for XX" had you full of this "I want to show my true self!" energy, and that was sort of your starting-off point. A: Yeah. That's definitely what I was like.
Next, on your second album "LOVEppears," we have an Ayu who's begun to look at her surroundings (the world), who has now left her starting position and begun to write about her surroundings, yes? And on your third album, "Duty," it seems like an Ayu who's watching things from the world. So, now the fourth album, "I am...," sometimes I think "What is it?" And I think that it really is that Ayu's origin is where she's departed from, and that seems to be where the energy comes from. A: Indeed... that's very deep. Yeah! I think that might be what it is.
I'm glad to hear you say that. So, recording the album this time, you visited the studio alot of times, but you had a rough time with it, didn't you? A: Yeah. The absolute worst timing. I had a hard time writing the lyrics (bitter smile). But giving birth is always painful, so bringing this album into the world was also, but I wasn't alone this time. Compared to the past, especially! So far, there was always a feeling of "I'm working on this" meaning "I'm facing myself alone", you know, "Working in solitary is nice and simple," but this time there wasn't anywhere near that sort of "private, private" feeling. So it was very enjoyable. I wasn't nearly as tense doing it that way. I think it had a rough feeling because so much weight came off my shoulders, and for good reason.
Lastly, I'd like to hear about the look of this album's jacket... A: For the album Jacket, since the title is "I am..." I never wanted to really have a decked out image. I took alot of things into consideration, but determined it'd be best to not decorate the album with extraneous things this time. So I went with a "Natural" look.
The type of image is that of the era of creation, or a time when the earth was just born, a time when there's nothing. But you're protecting with peace that which generates from that nothing. Ayu's word, "natural," seems to give that impression. A: Exactly!
INTERVIEW： Kazuki Okabe
01 "I am..." (Music/CREA, Arrangement/Tadashi Kikuchi + tasuku)
"I am..." is the song that gave the album its title. It's full of the meaning "I am me, and not anyone else...", which I say even at the very beginning of this song. It's the "core" inside of the being known as Ayu. This is a song that I wrote as a scream from my heart about "my own never-changing, most finely-tuned parts" and "(but simultaneously this too) my missing pieces." This is never-changing, I think, and what will continue to never change. But, without such a piece, I can't think that I want to become "peaceful."
02 "opening Run" (Music, Arrangement/CMJK)
03 "Connected" (Music,Arrangement/Ferry Corsten)
When I first heard this song, I thought, it's a trance song, the synthesizer is working overtime, there's no way I could do a fusion with this. I thought, I don't even speak English very well, surely someone else, not Ayu, would be better for a trance collaboration? But Ferry (Corsten, "system F") made a very strong approach, saying "I want you to write lyrics for this no matter what!" So I thought, "Well, may as well, right?" and for this song, I was transmitting a message as an outsider, and I didn't feel like I was working on writing lyrics, it was more of a comfortable, "writing a letter to a friend" feeling, and it was nice. So then, it became a letter I was writing to Ferry, but I was thinking "how can I make it Ayu-style," and I thought maybe "wordplay," or "japaneseplay," would be good. "I discover (MITSUKETE)," "I stare (MITSUMETE)," "I make sure (MISADAMETE)" and so on with other such similar words make it feel like a thesaurus has been opened up. But I got to thinking there'd just be too much to do... (bitter smile) I was just packing it so full of words with the same sound, and I had to put the words that I chose in an order that made the lyrics comprehensible. I think once you hear Ferry's song with the vocals inserted, you can hear that I'm repeating the same thing. Anyway, as for the lyrics, I thought I heard the staff who could understand Japanese going "What is she saying?" So I wrote the chorus section to say, "We are all connected at each and every place, so when you're thinking of these words, I already am too." When you understand the answer to "What is this?," the meaning of the words, it's that even though Ayu is far away in Japan, she's still connected to you! In the end, there wasn't really an excited feeling of "let's get these vocals done!" Since the synthesizer's sound was very inorganic, I thought it would be best to sing in a more expressionless manner, which was a challenge.
04 "UNITE!" (Music/CREA, Arrangement/HΛL)
05 "evolution" (Music/CREA, Arrangement/HΛL)
06 "Naturally" (Music/CREA, Arrangement/CMJK)
It took something like 20 minutes or so total to write this song. Strictly speaking, with everything floating around in my head, I think about songs for a long time, but once I started writing this one, it was surprisingly smooth sailing. When I work on a song, typically, I first write the CM size (the 30-seconds-long chorus section), and then I put together the whole thing later, but in this case the space of time between writing the CM version and writing the full song (when work on the album began) was so long, so it took longer to complete this song than the others.
This song was done in a backwards pattern from "Naturally," as what I wanted to write was very clear in my mind. But the orchestral part (the sound of its melody) was really very good, no matter what issues I had making the song. I wanted to do a song with the theme "song that seems cute," by an Ayu who isn't a woman but still a little girl, and explaining to CMJK the subtle nuances in the arrangement that I wanted was difficult. Every person has a slightly different standard of what makes something "cute" (bitter smile). I think I confused CMJK when I explained it to him. I wasn't able to explain anything but my own abstract "cute feelings." Because of that, we had to redo it many times... So, finally, the song we made became completely different from what we'd worked on at the beginning. At first, it was a much more grim song. (lol) I'd say in interviews that "The last song finished was 'Naturally'" but honestly, this song was also done in the same time period, still redoing things until the very last moment before the album was due to be finished. I think the staff were pretty impatient, saying "This will never be done in time!"
"Daybreak" is almost like a light in the dark, very warm, very fresh perhaps... It's a song with a pureness that makes you feel shy if you listen, so ayu gambled with feeling shy when being so honest in this song! To say "you're so shy about that!" I wrote with a feeling of "words that shine without saying anything." The song was written very quickly. So far, for me... I think I've been writing about feeling as though something was missing. You could say that Ayu's style was "showing honesty, but not being honest" in many things.
10 "taskinlude" (Music, Arrangement/tasuku)
11 "M" (Music/CREA, Arrangement/HΛL)
12 "A Song is born" (Music, Arrangement/Tetsuya Komuro)
The foundation for this song's lyrics were in the tour. I usually release an album after the tour has influenced it enough, this time too I did get alot of sounds I thought I should do, and I thought I should make use of those shapes. At that time, Komuro-san unexpectedly slipped in and offered a music composition... And he said, "How do you want to do this song?" and I told him my feelings that "During my own tour, I felt the way this song feels to me," and he said "Alright, reflect those feelings in this song." It was the first time I'd sung a song written by Komuro-san, but other times I'd been given songs from him I thought "oh okay, this is nice" at the time, over and over, but I felt like just the name "Komuro Tetsuya" carried alot of weight. By the way, the way of writing the title has changed from the single version (the december 12th released single, all in lowercase as "a song is born") to the album version, in order to make the distinction that instead of it being sung together with KEIKO, it's a solo song here.
14 "no more words" (Music/CREA + D・A・I, Arrangement/Naoto Suzuki, tasuku)
Once I got to the part where I was making this song, I'd started heading into the end of the album, and I thought of the phrase "no more words." Although the lyrics are rather nice for such an intense subject matter, I wanted to convey the part of a person who's "sorrow" is that "If everyone already understands, then that's okay, right? Because everyone keeps going forward, just because they have no choice but to go through life..." No matter what kind of harshness there is, I thing I should live with strength. When making this album, I thought "Gah, it's hopeless! This is impossible!" over and over again, but despite that, I persisted in making it, and I was somehow able to reach this end result... (bitter smile) Actually, I wrote the lyrics to this song once before, but scrapped it and it was newly rewritten. I think the reason was that there was a section saying something like, "after this, I'm not saying anything else." When I look at the entire album, the flow of the sequence between "I am..." and "no more words," I've put my message out there perfectly. I'm very very happy with it... So here, I was using one phrase to convey something, rather than doing it the reverse way and adding more words just for the sake of explanation, which makes the feelings become more trivial. Even I have things I don't say, and I'm sure everyone wouldn't press me to give any more answers than I have. So "I'm not saying any more right now" is what I wrote. By the way, the meaning of the title "no more words" is... "You can understand even though I'm not saying any more than this."
15 "Endless sorrow ~gone with the wind ver.~" (Music/CREA, Arrangement/CMJK)
Ayumi Hamasaki has released her third album "Duty" on September 27th. In this interview, we delve into her thoughts on the album. Let's go!
Your third album, "Duty," has been released at last, but about when did you start working on this album? A: The start of choosing the songs to put on the album started after my nationwide tour ended. So I was really worried, thinking, "A September release is going to be impossible!" (laughs)
The tour ended on August 9th, so it's probably only natural to think that. Nevertheless, now that it's done and on sale, would you say the tour had any influence? A: There was alot that I got from the tour, I think it influenced the album quite a bit. But it's not just what I got once the tour was over. Like, three songs were done before the tour began ("vogue," "Far away," and "SEASONS"), the way I was at the time is in there, me fighting with myself during the tour is in there, what I was able to do once the tour finally ended is in there, and the time I enjoyed spending by myself afterwards is there. There's an impression of a whole flow of time in the album.
Which reminds me, those three songs are in their release order on the album, but in between them there are new songs sort of "buried" in there. So, the last song, "girlish," is the real conclusion of the album, and is it also a sort of "answer" to the album's questions? A: Yeah. I think so. Like the lyric "Let's go with that feeling" from the song...
Taking "Present" from your first album and "Who..." from your second into consideration, this song is a conclusion, but until now you haven't thought of this song as a way to end things, right? A: In general, I'd think of a song like "Key ~eternal tie ver.~" as an end song.
Ah, I see. But I thought "girlish" had very good lyrics. The lyrics to this last song aren't published in the booklet like they usually are, there's no excess power in there, it's a very light feeling, but it's very good, I think. A: Where I am in my life right now, there's a girl at the top and a girl feeling very down gathering together and mingling, and these lyrics have a feeling of immediacy, in a manner of speaking.
But the songs aren't on the album in the same order as the lyrics were written in? A: It was all kinda scattered. The first one I did was, I think, "SURREAL."
Ah, the song whose single was released concurrently with the album. Considering that Hamasaki-san writes realistic lyrics about ground you've actually traveled, I was thinking that title was somewhat mysterious, though. A: Although I did want to write something realistic, I have a habit of escapism, so writing something realistic, I still thought I should use that title (laughs). When I say "Although you say that you think you're worthless / You'll put both hands out if you fall down on the road" in the lyrics, the truth is, I'm talking to a friend of mine. One day, she said, "It doesn't matter what happens to me," or something of the sort, and it just made me weep. And yet, when she fell down, she put her hands out suddenly, protecting herself even though she'd given up, and when I saw this, I thought, "Ah, it doesn't matter, does it?" It seems like whenever I'm also thinking "Whatever happens, happens," I think I'll always quickly protect myself if I fall down on the road! (laugh)
You talk about such a scene, and it's so interesting to hear about the inspiration behind your lyrics, but what's with that composure of yours? A: Ahahaha... Well, if you say it's impressive, I guess it's because it's my nature.
If you watch very calmly like that, various other people would be rather unhappy with you. A: You lie! Aww, now what do I do? (laugh)
Naah. It's already too late to do anything about it... So, getting back to the subject, reading these lyrics, it felt like a person discovering something they like, and I was dwelling on that very intensely. A: Yeah. If someone has found what they like, I think that's great. But even if they find what they like, for instance, if they decide they want to become a model, I would think adults would all say "What? Why modeling?" and "Find a real job!" and stuff like that. The thing you like, whatever it is that's worth dreaming about, I thought it seemed like it should be great, shouldn't it?
So now, I'd like to hear about "Duty," the album's title track. A: I wrote it before I wrote "vogue," and it reflected the state I was in at the time. The lyric "my turn" isn't referring to just myself though, it means each and every one of you also. Of course I do include myself in that group. For instance, there have been various "artists" out there for years and years. Mr. or Miss So-And-So was there, but the times are always changing, you know? And everyone can see when the world changes. History is always being repainted like that, one era ends and we can see it happen, we can't be as young as we are now forever, and we can't be onlookers forever. So we can't just say "Eh, I don't get it, whatever" forever, I thought.
And how does that connect with the title? A: Communicating that is something I thought it was my duty to do at the time.
Next, why were you considering following up last year's "white Ayu" and "black Ayu" with this CD jacket's "Leopard Ayu"? A: Because for some reason I just really wanted to do it! (laughs) Before, I kept asking myself "Why do I wanna do White Ayu and Black Ayu?" and stuff but there was absolutely no reason for it, but lately, doing things with no reason isn't so scary to me. So it's just like, "I'm gonna do this!"
That seems to symbolize Hamasaki-san right now. Rather like the song "girlish." Will you be running recklessly from now on, then? A: Honestly, right now, I already AM running recklessly! (laugh)
"LOVEppears" Beatfreak track-by-track interview Translation By Deli@AHS
----------------------------------------------- At the second album "LOVEppears", I tried to sing and shout along with the sharp sounds in order to express my true feeling of sadness and longing.
November 10th, Ayumi Hamasaki is simultaneously releasing her long-awaited Second Album "LOVEppears" and 300,000-copies-limited maxi single "appears". This appearance in beatfreak is her first in about 10 months. She talked about the album's production.
First off, can you tell us the origin of the title of your second album, "LOVEppears"? "LOVEppears" is the words LOVE and appears ("seems to be") mixed. People say that it's a coined term made up by Ayu, but what kind of meaning does it have?
Ayu: The title "LOVEppears" has two meanings to it, "thing that seems like love" and "discrepancy between what we see and what's really there." When I was thinking about the jacket design, I was concerned about the title I'd use, and my staff were there with a suggestion. They said, "You should use English word A and English word B, and put them together to make a whole new word."
How did you decide to connect "LOVE" and "appears" together in the first place?
Ayu: Before my trip to New York for the jacket photo shoot, I looked out the window from inside the car, and there was a couple that looked SO happy, but I personally was thinking, maybe they're in the middle of a serious crisis. Or maybe they're actually talking about separating. So I thought of the meaning "seems to be" for the word "appears" and stuck it on there. We give ourselves certain outward appearances and images, trying to make it look like things are good or bad, whatever we want to show people, but really things aren't as we're showing.
So yeah, that discrepancy between what's percieved & what's real that you mentioned. But with the sort of air you put forth, an objective third party could tell that the way you write here isn't like your style on your first album. Like for me, I think that style was more clear when put it next to songs like "TO BE" or "Boys & Girls." But what do you think?
Ayu: Mm-hmm, I think there was a change there.
Do you think it's a spontaneous occurrance, or do you think it's the result of yourself changing?
Ayu: I changed after absorbing various things & growing, but I was thinking for days about things like, what is it that I absorbed after my first album? Thanks to my writing, I think I became aware that after I figured something out, I would have to change as a result, wouldn't I?
As far as sound goes, on the maxi single "Boys & Girls" for example, there are alot of remixes with Hard House, Reggae, and other styles that have been produced.
Ayu: The producers were thinking that those sorts of sounds could be put in the second album. Both parties have to decide on a remix's core arrangement, so when people who like me & people who have helped me since my debut introduced me to the sound, I thought about it.
Tell us about how you prepared for the album.
Ayu: Sure! Well, while working on "A Song for XX," for example, during the sad times that I couldn't shake, I'd always be saying "I'm very sad, I can't shake this." Quietly crying, quietly wounded, quietly mourning. But with "LOVEppears," during sad times, I express it with furious sounds, shouting out, screaming. I can see that there are some things I couldn't change, but I had alot of that sort of tension this year. So that's how that was. This album is like that, but next time, what will I be like? I couldn't tell you. Maybe with the next album, I'll go back to sounding like I did on the first. Who knows? Or maybe I'll have a totally different way of doing things.
By the way, before doing this interview, when we talked to your producer Max Matsuura, he said: "Ayu is a very meticulous worker behind the scenes. Alot of the work she does by herself is more in the Producer's arena. I think really we should say 'Produced by ayumi hamasaki'." But what do you think of that statement?
Ayu: I've heard it said several times, "Let's say 'Produced by ayumi hamasaki'," but Ayu's producer is Max Matsuura, and it's meaningless to try to say otherwise. Sure, practically speaking, I do producer-like duties, as do a few others. But why do I do it? Why do I stretch myself to that extent? I ask myself that, but I think Max Matsuura is the one doing most of it after all. So, for the sake of holding onto myself, if anyone else wanted to be Hamasaki Ayumi's producer, I wouldn't be interested.
From that, it seems as though your producer Max Matsuura is giving you more credit than you think you deserve. Anyway, right after the album release, what kind of schedule is the year 2000 going to have for you? Ayu: Once the album is out there, once the feeling starts to come to me, I plan on releasing who-knows-how-many new singles. Then after that.... ummm... Definitely gonna do something. I think! (laughs)
That "something" is very meaningful, isn't it?
Ayu: Yup. But it is a secret.
1: Introduction (Music/Arrangement: HΛL)
2: Fly high (Music: D・A・I/Arrangement: HΛL)
I'm rapping in this song!! Magazines were all writing stuff like "Ayu's next challenge - rapping!!" weren't they? (laughs) At first I thought I'd just do it in an interlude, but Nagao-san's demo tape for this song had a temporary English rap in it and it was really good. So just spontaneously we figured, "In the place of this English rap, we should put a rap with lyrics written by Ayu." But every time I thought about writing, I couldn't write... I was worried. Every time I wrote something down, it was different, so it was really difficult. On top of it, I don't know alot about rhyming, so with the sparse knowledge I had, I had to come up with words that rhymed, which I was very bad at. So it has this "Ayu monologue" feeling to it. Listeners might not be able to hear "rapping" but my voice while not singing is what I want people to hear. I think that's what I wanted to give them.
Of all the 4 songs on "A", I was most troubled when writing the lyrics to "Trauma." When I wrote the chorus, which was gonna be used in the CM, I did okay at expressing a positive, cute "jumping up in the air" feeling, but when it came to writing the whole song, I didn't have even KINDA the same mood.... So the words couldn't come out, I couldn't concentrate. When this happens, I'm thinking to myself, "I have this thing I want to say, but it's all fuzzy in my brain." What I had to write versus what I was really thinking caused me some worry, so I had to think about what I was going to put forth. Until this, I'd never used words like "cruelty" and "insanity," so I wondered if I should say that or if I should replace those words with something else. But now, honestly, I'm glad I used them, because I was able to convey my real feelings.
4: And Then (Music: Yasuhiko Hoshino/Arrangement: Keisuke Kikuchi)
Take a building that's still under construction, for instance. When you see someone who's like that, it's not that they're incomplete, it's that they can't make any progress because they don't understand anyone but themselves. But a stranger might see it as already complete, although the inside of that "under construction" person is still completely imperfect. In "And Then," Ayu is expressing this. In "TO BE" I wrote "ibitsu (imperfection)" and in "And Then," "fukanzen (incomplete)." I think I definitely have a penchant for such words. As for the way I write lyrics, I take the writing seriously of course, but I sometimes feel like playing around with them, honestly. At the part that goes, "It felt like I was writing lyrics, la la la...," this is Ayu seriously playing around. There are probably alot of people who didn't notice this, but the lyric that goes "I can't stay in the same place forever" later on, that's a lyric that can be found on "A Song for XX."
The lyrics for "immature" were written on the same day as "And Then" (their meaning being "unskilled at Being Human"). This song was already done during work on my first album, but I hesitated to put it on there, and afterwards I talked about making it a single. So this time I was able to finally show the song to the world, but it took more than a year for that to happen, and alot of history had occurred in the meantime, so the image the song put across was totally wrong, so I wrote really great new lyrics for it. "And Then," written the same day, has the same theme, but this one, "immature," is the much brighter song of the two. When I was faced with something incomplete, I very honestly and seriously painted the shape I was faced with in this work. The other song, "And Then," is in a minor key, because I'm looking at myself with calmer eyes, really facing that incomplete thing, and talking about that.
6: Boys & Girls (Music: D・A・I/Arrangement: Naoto Suzuki, D・A・I)
"Boys & Girls" was my first maxi-single, so I guess alot of people know me now, huh? Usually, the single jackets were photographed in a studio, but we had a square to work with for the 12-cm single's design, so we said "If it's a square, we can't do that, so let's do a new photo design." So we took the photos by the ocean, which was different (laughs). During this time, in both my work and private life, I think I was making difficult faces. I understood "Boys & Girls" as a turning point, but I didn't understand it as a good thing, so I put up barriers so my misunderstood self couldn't be seen. Although I was making difficult faces at the time, they didn't reflect how I really felt. Now... looking back, I definitely seem to have a calm face.
7: TO BE (Music: D・A・I/Arrangement: Naoto Suzuki, D・A・I)
Do As Infinity have made their debut now, but this was the first time Nagao-san wrote a song for me. My first impression of Nagao-san was "large wall" (not like "a big barrier that I can't climb over cuz it's so big", I just mean his eyes were really high up! I'M SO SORRY Nagao-san! (laughs)) The chorus for "TO BE" has a much "thicker" sound than my other singles until now, but I wonder if everyone noticed? After the song's release, since I was really into 70's-style clothes at the time, I wore bandanas on my head for alot of my TV lives.
8: End roll (Music: D・A・I/Arrangement: Naoto Suzuki, D・A・I)
I've never been able to watch a movie the whole way to the end, so I'm always leaving the movie theaters in the middle. I really do want to watch until the end, but I feel like I'm stuck and I want to get up, and that's such a good snapshot of myself, I feel strongly about that... It's a great thing to write, but really, if I stay till the end, the exit is packed, and it gets so bright because of the lights, and it's such a dumb thing to worry about, but I can't take it. lol! But that's something that really symbolizes the present Ayu, I thought. Always somewhere being so very awkward. There are other things I want to do, other useless things I'm worrying about, necessary things I'm unable to do. "End roll" comes from me telling myself over & over, "One of these days I'm going to watch a movie the whole way through to the end roll."
9: P.S II (Music: Hideaki Kuwabara/Arrangement: HΛL)
This song, "P.S II," is a sequel to the song "POWDER SNOW" from my first album. I wonder if the people who didn't like me until hearing songs like "LOVE ~Destiny~" and "TO BE" after my first album was released will hear this song after hearing "POWDER SNOW"? This song was made for people who have supported me since my debut, sort of like a "secret password" with me, I think. Next to the quieter "POWDER SNOW," "P.S II" is much more intense. When you compare the two works, they have a completely different sound. This is me having a hard time using the proper phrase to express my gratitude, so I'm using the next closest phrase to replace it. It symbolizes the way I am this year.
This is my first single of 1999. Track one on the single was a remix version called "version M," and the approach to this work was different than my work until now. At first, the original version, "version J", was planned to be track 1 and "version M" was planned to be track 2 on the single, but when I listened to the original and the remix, the original version lost the contest every time. The repeating of "ta" in "kogoesou de me wo tojiteta" felt very fresh to me at the time. Putting the remix as track 1 was something I was nervous about. Would everyone agree to it? But it turned out to be a more popular decision than I thought it would.
11: too late (Music: D・A・I/Arrangement: Naoto Suzuki, D・A・I)
"too late" and "End roll." Those two songs use opposing techniques in their melodies to illustrate the same thing, in order to display the world that I wanted to display & express the words that I wanted to express. The so-called "manner of speaking" they both have. The phrase "too late" has a negative context, but in this case I mean that if there's something you can't make on time, but you still just keep going, you gain experience and knowledge for every step you take, you understand your circumstances and situation. Even if you don't make it, even if you're too late, in the end, some good has come of it, and chances are that more good will come from it eventually. Of course, if you do nothing but wait, that's no good, but... I felt, since I was expressing the idea of "too late" being a more positive phrase, the song should overflow with feelings of speed.
Before singing this song, but after I finished the lyrics, I had the words in my head but they weren't finalized yet (laughs). In my works until now, I only used the words "watashi" and "anata" (for "me" and "you"), and here a protagonist saying "kimi" makes her entrance. I usually sang about people's feelings and thoughts, what was "inside the heart," you could say. But this time was the first time I used the term "lovers." Lovers that we see may seem perfectly happy, like everything's normal. From far away, a third party looking on might get that impression. By the way, this song was on its own single limited to 300,000 copies, but the version that appears on the album is a bit different. Oh, and saying "KISU" in the lyrics here was also a first for me. I sang the song during the PV shoot and I felt very shy, lol.
"monochrome" is a song written with a "fairytale" theme. When I was a child, the idea of a princess bound to her Prince Charming was a lovely thought to me. But now that I've become an adult, really, I think that I shouldn't wish for that type of thing, I should be serious now. Thinking, "A princess is so lucky, she can wear pretty dresses and eat delicious things, right?" In the lyrics I say "This fun, sad, and tender story." I'm saying there that I, now, am grasping onto fairytale. I've been able to hold on to certain various things, but right at this moment, there are alot of things I have to let go of. That's the impression those words give.
14: Interlude (Music/Arrangement: Naoto Suzuki)
15: LOVE ~refrain~ (Music: TSUNKU/Arrangement: Naoto Suzuki)
Up until making this album, I had been looking at "LOVE ~Destiny~" as my own song, but in alot of ways, I felt like it wasn't my song at all. But this time, when I made "LOVE ~refrain~," I finally felt confident that it was my own song, and I was able to be calm about it. Truthfully, before "LOVE ~Destiny~" was created, Ayu wrote the idea of LOVE for "LOVE ~refrain~" based on Tsunku's composition. Afterwards, this song was the last one finished for insertion in the album, and recording was done in New York. I'd always felt like the circumstances were wrong. But I feel like if "LOVE ~Destiny~" was the wrong shape for the song to be in, then it came to its strongest form with "LOVE ~refrain~."
Is it love or isn't it? Is it compassion or is it shared experience? I was holding on to questions like that, and this song's theme is the answers I finally got. The ellipsis at the end of the title, because it wouldn't look like something definitive that way. It kinda feels like making a "Hmmm?" sound in Japanese, doesn't it? I wanted to express that I was in an uncertain place. Plus, it has implications of "It seems like it's such-and-such, but maybe it's really not such-and-such!" Afterwards, the end. Or rather, it "appears" to be the end (laughs)! This is a message from me to all of you. You'll understand what it means if you wait 30 seconds...
After debuting with “poker face”, she has released a single every two months, resulting in a total of five singles; Ayumi Hamasaki has run through 1998 perfectly. She entered the year 1999 together with her on New Year’s Day released first album “A Song for XX”. The album features a total of 16 songs. Of course all the lyrics were written by Ayumi Hamasaki. Furthermore this work reached the first place at the album charts.
These words were written in a corner of the album’s inner slip, “I was born twenty years ago, up ‘till now I’ve worn various faces but the naked Ayu is recorded here.”
This time, more than just being reflected in her lyrics, the “naked Ayu” recited a realness that is almost too great for a twenty year old.
----What kind of child were you? “I wasn’t talkative. Even now I don’t chat much, but I was a really quiet child. If someone greeted me with ‘good morning’, I would turn completely red, look downward and just nod. I wonder if adults thought I was an impolite child when they saw me (laughs).”
----And at school? “Even at boring times when everyone laughed, I wondered if I had to laugh along; I was desperate to blend in. Crowds tired me greatly.”
----Did you have any friends? “I first understand what real friends were after middle school. We’d all gather together while playing hooky and would talk about trivial things; those times were fun. But I wasn’t a delinquent. Though I wasn’t diligent either (laughs). It was a real rural area without any cities like Shibuya. I remodelled my uniform in order to be uniquely fashioned; I spent all my pocket money on it (laughs). Maybe I acted that way to create my own existence. I don’t really know how other people viewed my behaviour.”
----That’s cute. “I was often late, because I was happy that everyone would say “she isn’t here yet” and would worry about me.”
----Were you lonely? “I wonder (laughs).”
A lot of people probably know this, but at the end of last year Ayumi Hamasaki appeared at All Night Nippon for one day. She looked back on the road, which she has crossed together with her songs from “A Song for XX”. She openheartedly talked about the circumstances in which she’s been raised; the divorce of her parents when she was still young, not being able to remember her father’s face and about her mother who she calls ‘mommy’. It was a natural result for Ayumi Hamasaki to convey the way she had lived up ‘till now to the people who support her. When I asked her why she had talked about herself to that extent, she answered with a fresh smile, “This might surprise everyone, but I have never thought that the circumstances in which I was raised were pitiful. That’s because it was natural to me. That’s why it doesn’t mean that I talk about it because I want to be sympathised with nor because I wish to have people tell me ‘good luck’.”
----What was your mother like? “Because we have both grown older, and because I am now able to understand various things, our relationship has improved. But the feelings of wanting to be like mommy and not wanting to be like her are still coexisting together. I wonder if there’s a feeling of rivalry. It is very difficult when we take pictures together. If I’m photographed nicely, but mommy isn’t, she will yell, “it’s horrible!” and throw the picture away (laughs). Perhaps we are more like sisters.”
----Where there any instances where you were hurt due to your family background? “Because I still wanted to compare to other people in my primary school days, there might have been some cases. For example, my mother never came during athletic meetings. Those kind of things. I was never truly hurt or angry. That’s because I thought those things were natural. Actually, I feel gratitude now. Because I am here because of her.”
----Well, what path did you take after your fun middle school days? “Using the fact that I was scouted in Fukuoka, I followed high school in Tokyo. I quickly wanted to be able to do everything be myself. Paying the rent and food with my own earned money. But, that is impossible with just a part-time job.”
----What were your impressions of coming to Tokyo? “Because I didn’t fit in the atmosphere that was filled with adults, I was tired by various things. I thought that Tokyo was a scary place (laughs). I don’t even know how many times I thought about going back home. But if I would really go home, it would be regrettable because I was certain, the words, “Hamasaki has failed, just as expected”, would be said. I absolutely didn’t want that to be said. I didn’t really need the world of show business. I wanted to return home after accomplishing something by myself. Even if I would be laughed at by people, it would be all right as long as something strong was left inside of me.”
Hamasaki Ayumi was sixteen years old when she was invited to sing. For such a girl, it might have been a too sudden development. “Going to classes was boring and I was only thinking about how I could skip classes. I was tired of raising my voice (laughs).” Hamasaki answers like this with a wry smile as she remembers those days. The fact that she’s become interested in singing even though she said she didn’t like to at all is because she was encouraged by her producer to write her own lyrics.
----What if you hadn’t started to write lyrics? “I probably would’ve quit. If it had just been singing, then I surely wouldn’t have been able to find any significance there. After I started writing lyrics, I started to accept singing, because the words that I sang came from my heart. In my middle school days, the feeling of wanting to understand my own existence created the wrong impression, but at last, I discovered the way by which I could make people see me clearly. I truly enjoy writing lyrics. That’s because it is like writing a letter to everyone in the world. It isn’t a one-way traffic either.”
----On your first album “A Song for XX”, what kind of shape has been created? “I feel the real Hamasaki Ayumi is shown, not just some image. Everything is included, the bad and the good.”
----A compilation of your twenty years? “Though I felt I shouldn’t hide anything, up until now, I was denying, or should I say, hiding my past. Because I was behaving like an honour student, I felt guilty. I hated feeling like that all the time, but after my career took off, no matter what I’d do, I would be told, “that’s nice, isn’t it?”. When my days became like that, I thought it wouldn’t be an issue even if I did reveal my past for the first time. That’s why, I wrote everything like this. Since you can only have one first album in your entire life, I might be forgiven (laughs).”
----Maybe you validate the meanings you feel within you when you write? “There is only one person in the world like you. It’s often said that there are three people similar to you in this world, but that’s only your outward appearance. I believe there isn’t a single person that is exactly like you. There are definitely things that only you can do, and there are things that you cannot do. That’s why I love humans and why I believe people cannot live alone.”
----Though you have finished working on your album, you said you still have lots of things you wish to write about. “I really felt like that at the time. But, when I had to write my new song that was released in February, I totally fell down (laughs). I’d think, write and thrown it away. That process was repeated over and over.’’
Unable to sleep in such circumstances, she felt like running away and planned to escape Tokyo. When, in the car, Hamasaki opened her eyes after a long time of sleep, the scenery was covered with snow. “I said I wanted to see the snow”, in that instant the car got trapped in the gutter and Hamasaki, by raising her finger, requested the help of the Saruganseki. Her sixth single “WHATEVER” was created during such strange events. I was surprised that the first track “Version M” had a euro dance beat arrangement.
----For a moment, I wondered if you would continue along such a line. “The standard Ayu track is the second track, “Version J”. I hope that when people buy the single they will suddenly get surprised as they listen to “Version M”. I also talked about that with my producer. I wondered if it was okay to have a little fun with this year’s release.”
----I heard a rumour that you will again release singles in a fast pace this year. “It’s not a rumour. I really will (laughs). I think I’ll pick up the pace compared to 1998. Right now, there are a lot of things that I want to do. This time I’m playing around with a dance beat, but the next song might be a grand ballad or reggae. No matter what I’ll do, it’s important to me that people will recognize that I created it. I want to make such things.”
----I’ve heard there will be a secret live in March. “It’s in a small place in order for everyone to be able to see my face. I want to gather people who purely want to hear me sing. I might start thinking about a tour after that.”
*All Night Nippon was a radio broadcast. Masa's translation of it is on AHS too. *Saruganseki is a comedy duo, who hitchhiked the globe.
I'm Genie!!!!.
Happily born the 2nd day of September.
A typical singaporean, who’s aching to travel around te world!
I love Ayumi Hamasaki, Koda Kumi, Jolin Tsai, alan, Coco Lee, Jimmy Lin and color PINK.
A huge jpop fan, and no i’m not an otaku! Craves for ramen and ice cream.
A blogger, a gamer, and a poor slaving worker(=_=)
Hates coakroaches, escalators really ;).
And also to Bitches, Liars & Backstabbers Loves music and PROUDLY a leo
this leo
blah blah
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