I was going through the united lounge tokyo catalogue of Kumi's stuff someone posted a while ago and came across this

http://www.united-lounge.com/wp/wp-c...08/001_s61.jpg

It's described just as ''single goods'', does anyone know what that was? Wonder if that's an scrapped idea cause the singles are all out of order.

Those are laser pointers with her silhouette. I believe it was for the Second Session tour.

https://i.imgur.com/2AxCzF6.jpg

http://welcometokodakumiworld.com/database/goods

Oh, I never saw that page on WKKW before, so cool! Thanks for clarifying!

Kuu is going to appear at the TV programme Roomic together wit LiSA and one member of BOYS AND MEN.
Airing August 1st.

https://www.instagram.com/p/CDDdlJVD...=16i4iktlvrm8c

Also Kuu showed some tour goods in her stories yesterday - parka and pants.

https://imagizer.imageshack.com/v2/6...923/CIhAcs.png

She mentions tho that this tie dye is a sample.
I do hope she keeps different pastel/pale colours like this!


Ah and weren't some people here sad that Kuu is not using united lounge tokyo anymore or something like that?
She does again, the 20th anni visuals for the tour were done by them.
Here's the official post:
https://www.instagram.com/p/CCdfVhcD...d=5i3mgz2q98o1

4 hot wave :heart

JUICY



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H4Oc4LpJhvQ

With your smile



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DT0YxStUxEs

I'll be there



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8FvnRMQZV3g

Ningyo Hime



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GkdlkAHoW0I

The Summer single that launched future great Summer singles of Kuu

Still have so many great memories towards I'll be there cos that was the very 1st PV I watched back when I still subscribed to MTV Taiwan a long time ago , damn

Everything about 4 hot wave was iconic, from the music, to the PVs, to the Maroc photoshoot. LOVE.

Considering Kuu likes to cover a lot of songs, I think she would probably love a tribute cover album of her songs if Avex allowed it! I think FAKY would deffo be on there if it were to happen. I don't know if they have mentioned Kuu, but Beverly and Kira follow Kuu on Instagram and like a lot of her posts, so they could be good candidates. Beverly would be an excellent ballad choice. Dream's Ami also covered 'Koi No Tsubomi' not too long ago on Youtube. :)

'Puff' has officially passed 'k' on views now I believe, so well done Kuu!

ugh this video is amazing

I still don't get why she's not performing this song (excluding a-nation'06 which we never saw and the remix on AT'13) :grumpy

Kuu showed us another new tour good today:

https://imagizer.imageshack.com/v2/6...923/9IDm2o.png

Looks like a blanket or a bathtowel.

EDIT:
It's a blanket.
Her manager posted about it.

She is wearing a crown! our true queen.

Also I always adores her with the blonde hair in the JUICY PV so much

4 hot wave was such a powerful single. I have so many great memories linked with its release. Definitely her best produced single.

Always make me nostalgic of 2006. Such a great year

Edit : quite surprised by the success of EX-TAPE : 70K in 4 days.
I thought Lick Me, Lollipop and FREAKY would do better too!

I don't think the japanese audience like JUICY that much, so at some degree I can understand she not singing the song except for those two times.

4 hot wave is a strong single for sure, one of her best eras. All 4 songs are strong and the Ningyo hime remix from outroduction is awesome as well.

--

I'm surprised by EX TAPE's numbers, it's almost 75k, which none of the songs from Gossip Candy, FREAKY and 3 SPLASH got there yet. Sleeper hit in the making.

I was wondering if Break it down replaced JUICY in BC tour... Cause it fits so well... Seducing guys to stole the key... But I won't complain, I love Break it down so much, and the dance is awesome... and JUICY is what it is for some western fans because the MV not the song itself...

^nah I think it is the best song on that single, and even though I loved the MV as a teen I think it is so damn silly (as I just watched it today). Especially the costume change to promote her necklace - and at the end the guy is touching the necklace and she is like "bitch, you can touch my all over but not my necklace - bye!"

Such great memories with that single. I can’t believe how long it’s been!

J-pop community was so thriving at that time.

My favorites in order: I’ll be there, with your smile, juicy and ningyohime

4 hot wave was the first jpop cd I ever bought. I didn't buy it right when it came out cause I wasn't a fan, but when I got into Kumi that single blew me away, like how can all these quality songs be just a single??? The videos???? I just HAD to buy it. So many memories around that. Black Cherry era was just fantastic, so many great songs and videos ugh.

Chase PV has been uploaded



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xn98Z4B5SUk

It's so funny thinking that Chase and 4 hot wave are just two years apart from each other lol The secret > first things > second session period was so intense with so many stuff happening, must have been so wild for her.

The entire secret period was a massive breath of fresh air in female J-Pop.

I was low key hoping they'd drop that unreleased PV for Heat as well. Chase is a another underrated bop, and the video always makes me chuckle a bit with the "peeping tom" element.

Chase is one single that it should have been double a-side, both songs are strong enough for it, and also for the unreleased Heat PV.

Did that PV ever got shot or was it just an idea? If it was indeed shot what a waste not to release it, it could have been on the secret special edition or best first things... Sometimes I wish she'd pull a namie and release PV for old tracks like she did with Ballada.

And I just remebered the first time I saw Chase, that one of the first PVs of hers I watched and I loved the plot twist in the end cause I was not expecting such a thing, the video seemed pretty simple plot-wise :P

I always thought that Chase and Heat were meant to be a double A-side, but something happened and the PV for Heat was scrapped, despite being finished. I know the single cover for Chase directly comes from the Heat PV shoot.

That was the story I heard anyway

I just read on twitter that OSAKA TOKYO is not available overseas cause of copyright issues, pretty much like Rich & Famous. If that's real I'll be so mad lol

Does anyone have OSAKA TOKYO? The previous on Recochoku sounds so good.

I have it on my Spotify. But I didn't face any issue with Rich & Famous too.

The song sounds pretty fun!

Osaka Tokyo is available in Brazil, so probably worldwide.

--

https://i.imgur.com/iWVgk9t.jpg https://i.imgur.com/DAd3YKD.jpg

From what I remember Heat was supposed to be the main song, but they switch to Chase.

I remember people claiming this was allegedly part of the PV (it's part of the First Things tour pamphlet):

https://i.imgur.com/nL18jvi.jpg

From the same pamphlet we see that they had a native american concept for the 12 singles as well, but it was scrapped.

Nowadays is quite hard to get info from back in the day, most of the online forums from the early 2000s are gone.

Woow Osaka Tokyo is dope!
If promoted well I could definitely see it becomes a small hit!

Yeah I remember back in the day I used to visit a Kumi forum which was maybe called Stream of Stars? Or was Stream of Stars in the website address?

Heat is such a good song - can only imagine how amazing the PV would be!

^I wanna see that original 12 singles concept (glad it got scrapped tho)

The amount of info from Kuu you've collected/remember never ceases to amaze me hahahah thanks for sharing those!!

I can understand scrapping some pictures or a look, like this native american for the 12 singles project, or that colorful look from Get Up & Move that was also tossed aside, but a whole music video is on another level to me, sounds like a total waste of money. Unless it's a situation like Gaga's Do What U Want, of course. Maybe Kumi wasn't satisfied with the whole thing or maybe it was a problem with Megaryu? Image rights and such? Cause otherwise I don't see a reason for them not to release video, I mean, she has that short video for Star, so why not the same for Heat? Or a bonus video for Bounce & Lovers? I think there's more to it than just looking at the video and thinking "nah this won't do"

I remember AT THE WEEKEND being planned as her 49th single instead of POP DIVA and Kuu changing it at once when she got the demo for PD, and the screen video from Dejavu Tour makes me wonder how much far into recording and shooting a music video they were. But then if there was an almost finished PV, she could have released it as a new PV for an album track on Dejavu like Bambi and Passing By.

Those things always make me wonder how much stuff we haven't seen from what she's produced throughout her career. This will be something that always makes me curious geez I mean if she has a couple scrapped music videos, imagine how many demos and songs lol A pity the Japanese music industry doesn't seem to be into releasing demo or scrapped songs to celebrate an album's anniversary or such. I'd kill for something like that from Kuu.

---

Regarding OSAKA TOKYO, it's a fun song but it doesn't get nowhere to me. I like the beat, Kuu's voice is great, but it misses an energy peak to me. Nonetheless it's a nice collab, one of her best in the last years.

I knew that Kaled or Corvina would help clarify things LOL.

I'd love to know how many scrapped projects she's had over the years too. There's probably so many songs, PVs/PV concepts, and photo shoots that we will probably never see. Kumi strikes me as an artist who most likely wouldn't want something seen, if it wasn't up to par.

I'd love it, if she released a special book detailing the past 20 years. You know with sketches of tour outfits, sketches of PV outfits, outtakes from album/singles/DVD shoots. I'd also like to have in depth commentary on each studio album, starting with affection to now.

^yet again she has some very mediocre productions. IT#s not like her artistic integrity is in danger and I can't believe a PV looked that bad that she did not want it released.

"Scrapped" PV is not a new thing for Kumi. We didn't know about SO FEVER and NEVER GIVE IT UP before Legend Live pop up, and both PVs visually look like something from the Summer Trip era. We knew about Kimi Omoi because years before the release she was talking on FC about recording some videos, which ended up being Kimi Omoi (the white suit and the pink skirt with the snow scenes) and the flight attendant scene for the Legend Live pachinko. All 3 PVs seemed too much for just a pachinko machine promotion, since the DVDs weren't available for purchase for the general public. But that's just speculation.

I guess there are many reasons to scrap something like this, such as not being satisfied with the final cut, having problems with the director, the company not being happy with the image of it all, to name a few. We know COLOR OF SOUL almost was an animation video because her team wasn't happy with her image. And even for the videos released, we don't get to see everything from it. I said a couple of weeks ago about the squash scene for Like it, it didn't fit the rest of the narrative, so that could be the reason for not using in the final cut.

https://i.imgur.com/Ix8iwf0l.jpg

anytime was also "shelved" for a while, it was supposed to be part of FREAKY. Back when it was announced it was FREAKY, anytime and two untitled tracks, with RFYL, girls and Sora replacing it (probably Run For Your Life since it had a PV).

@lovethatkuu&ayu I also would love a book of "what could it be" for things that didn't make the final cut. Even tho the production or the idea of the scrapped things could be bad, at least it gives a good direction of what her and her team wanted for the audience at some point.

I also don't really care that much about OSAKA TOKYO, it sounds quite dated to be honest. It's a fun little track, but nothing more than that.

To be honest, I've always wondered if the Legend Live material was a planned summer concept album/mini-album that got downgraded to a single aka Summer Trip.

Kaled, you make a great point about how the Legend Live PVs fit with Summer Trip a little too well.

Maybe instead of a maxi single she was planning a mini album? It'd be cool for her to change that formula, and since she didn't have a studio album that year maybe there was room for that. I mean, her summer maxi singles are really close to actual EPs, but in the end the tracks are put in a full album, so it still gets a single type of treatment. Her look in the cover of Summer Trip is really really similar to the poll one from SO FEVER, could even have been planned to be the main track.

I believe the leak of TOUCH DOWN and LALALALALA rushed the project a little. Both PVs leaked, we only knew the single had 3 tracks and 2 videos, not even the name of the single was out besides the song LALALALALA being part of the JAPONESQUE Tour. On the next day they revealed the covers and the tracklist asap. The single had the "THE KODA WORLD" mention in its description, but it ended up being nothing (besides both PVs being recorded in LA). It's hard to know for sure, we can only speculate about it.

I forgot about the koda world, and since the album she came up with was called bon voyage, I can see a line of thought on these releases. I guess she had the going on a new journey idea very clear in her mind after giving birth to her son.

Kuu was in the studio again today... and showed us another tour good, a lion choker.

https://imagizer.imageshack.com/v2/6...923/8tvGSV.png

As if that lion wasn't already giving me enough Versace vibes lol I legitly thought it was a versace choker until I paid attention to the text

I didn't even know Versace has a lion apart from their signature pattern, but I'm also not a fan of high-fashion brands. So I don't mind, lol.

Yeah, it's veeery close to the medusa head choker they have right now https://clothbase.com/items/205224a1...cklace_versace

Versus Versace has a belt that it's basically this choker https://www.intro-clothing.com/mens-...ck-gold-p35382

Well, that gold on black round design is not that original to begin with, as well as a lion as symbol. All of that was already very similarly used in ancient times in Europe/ Middle East.
Kuu's lion is at least wearing a crown and I bet there's her name and the tour engraved on the round.

Yeah I think it's a cause of common references plus minimal styling, so there's no much way to avoid similar outcomes. And I love it tbh shows how Kumi's fashion taste is amazing lol

Big news were just announced at her FCs.

She's releasing a FC limited album called "MY NAME IS..." for the tour.
Release date September 11, a day before the first day of the tour.

CD will contain 21 songs in total, inlcuding puff and 2 additional new songs.
The DVD will contain a best selection of her live concerts and tours from "secret ~ FIRST CLASS LIMITED LIVE ~" to "KODA KUMI LIVE TOUR 2019 re (LIVE)" as well as audio commentaries for every one of them from Kuu.
There's also a shirt, sticker and a special booklet added as goods.
Price is 9,900 Yen.
Details like tracklist are still to be announced.



As we know she already finished more new songs than just three, I suppose she's going to release another regular album or something else this year as well.
And this is going to be the best of for this year?

The tracklist for the CD might be based on the 20th anniversary poll they did for Koda Gumi, like 6 songs from every part of her career?
And maybe the tracklist is also going to be a hint for the setlist of the tour.

New spacial album "MY NAME IS..." is scheduled to be released on September 11! One edition available only for the Fanclub members, 3 new songs+best songs, DVD includes best lives (like JAPONESQUE DVD2 I think) and goods (Photobook, t-shirt ect)

damn FC T_T

It's also stated that this is not only FC limited, but also limited in general.
Once the first batch is gone, it's going to be sold out.
So probably not all fans will be able to buy one.
There are e.g. also still fans asking for further restocks of the latest goods (puff shirt, puzzle, mask s.o.).

I think this is simply a way to cater to her fans before the tour, old ones as well as new younger ones she gained through her Tik Tok hit.

So it’s kind of a fan club best of?

I’m interesting to see the tracklist!

This seems a bit odd for me. First of all, the price. Guess the package will be really cool, probably another vinyl-sized box? It's cheaper than reCORD FC edition but still a lot of money.

Then... It seems weird that a "get to know me" kind of album will be released to her FC. In my mind, if you're in an artists' FC you already know them (especially their name lol). But they have all data about for how long people have been on her FC, their age and stuff, so I hope they took a look at that and thought this would make sense. Or maybe even it's an idea to make the new fans join her FC. But if that's the case, they only want rich fans lol If I was a casual fan I wouldnt join FC just for that.

I'll wait for more details, hopefully they won't start its pre-sale before giving us more info.

That's cool, I guess? As Corvina said, it might be basically the setlist for the new tour. I guess it still will be available as a playlist on spotify and others music stream services. The new songs probably includes for...

It's not a release for me, for sure. I dont really care for another best selection of live. She has 5 DVDs with this kind of content already and I don't care for the commentary. This release I'll pass.

And we got some news about the tour and a new song already!

Kuu wants to further deepen the connection with her fans through the tour and so they start a video campaign with the new song Lucky Star!
The song is scheduled to be performed at the tour and FC fans can send in videos with the chorus of Lucky Star as well as message videos for Kuu.
A part of those fan entries will be used for the performance at the tour.
Kuu included a choreo and message video about it for the fans to use.

Not gonna share the song as they ask not to, but it's similat to Put Your Handys Up! on re(CORD).
Including the damn autotune.

Well, that's kinda what kaled talked about these days with Kim Petra's Malibu, that's really cool!! And I'm a big lover of Put Your Hands Up so this is incredible to me lol Is this gonna be playroom only? Nothing on Global Koda Gumi so far :/

Fanclub only?....

Ugh, I'm kind of annoyed by that. I'm tempted to buy it just for the commentary portion.

We all want ku to get more recognition and we all are obsessed with the idea of releasing an besto album and gaining more fans and selling a lot but we all know it probably won't happen like that.

Unless you like to collect her stuff then I understand the pain, but the album is going to be on all music sites so it really doesn't matter. Even if it's a trick for the fans to join her fc, they do it all the time in her concerts with her limited items sold only there, so.

Anyway myy point is that yes it sucks the limited release, but hopefully something bigger and hotter will come later.

PS: bet the photos and the design and artwork is going to be all luxurious and beautiful T_T....

https://64.media.tumblr.com/054e14fb...r4qrzs_540.gif

I want part of the proceeds. I'm still waiting for my paycheck for my Premium Night cover that became the real deal.



Good luck for those who are going to be part of it. I'm not part of the FC so clearly is not for me. I'm not a fan I guess. lol

The last image is a cover I did in January of that year (https://www.flickr.com/photos/46841086@N05/8344680284/), prior the release of the concert. Months later the DVD was released with the cover being quite similar (her skin is b&w/desaturated, pose is almost the same, the flower dress being the main focus). Not that my work was used, but the whole situation is kinda funny to me. lol

--

I found the thread http://www.ahsforum.com/forum/showth...=117241&page=2 pretty fun to look back and see the comments :)

SUMMER TRIP PVs have been uploaded

LALALALA



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZWueWKREVEk

TOUCH DOWN



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-WWTOgSlamg

Hoo boy at TOUCH DOWN after all these years :tipsy

7 years and I'm still not over IS THIS TRAP not getting a video lol

Yeah, that was not cool at all, Kaled. Someone on her staff must have seen it at peeproom or something, because the official cover was WAY too similar to yours.

TOUCH DOWN really grew on me with time. It's a very good track, and it's unfortunate she decided to focus so much on the rather bland LALALALA during that time.

IS THIS TRAP was absolutely wasted as a song. I'm still trying to figure out how it never really got the big push it deserved.

Touch down is so hot!! and I really like lalalala tho i don't play it as much! the pv is great.

Very interesting!!! at least it's a good design!! I love that cover!

avex ain’t shit—i knew they jacked Ayu’s sixxxxxx cover from some fanart on twitter but had no idea this happened to you :( I’m so sorry! That’s wildly fucked up.

There were also some logos ayu's team used based on fanart iirc but last time they acknowledged it. Unfortunately seems to be a recurrent thing for avex, a pity. If at least they were like HYNA who approached Kaled and asked permission to use his work...

They actually link the global FC for the campaign on her official site, but no, nothing up yet. :/

Here are the chorus lyrics they shared:

【Lucky Star歌詞】
心のパレットを
カラフルに混ぜて
愛を 愛を 愛を 君に!!
自分の指で描こう 虹を描こう
この愛を 愛を 愛を 君に!!
<Give me a smile> Give me a smile
<Give me your love> Give me your love
この愛を。。。君に!!!
<Give me a smile> Give me a smile
<Give me your love> Give me your love
<Give me a smile>
この愛を。。。君に!!!

*they actually wrote smail instead of smile, but as I can't share it like that I corrected, lol

And the song is more like a mix of Put Your Hands Up! and Love Technique, the part of one verse they included in the shared part is rapped like that.
So, yeah, it's not the full song for those who wondered.
But it sounds really nice so far, just the pretty heavy autotune again is bothering me a bit.

If it's not going to be up on the global FC over the weekend I gonna post here...

At first I also thought one of the two new songs is going to be for..., but now I believe they gonna put Lucky Star and the tour theme song they teased in the tour trailer on the new release.

Thanks for sharing, Corvina! You also mentioned Love Technique which I LOVE TO DEATH, can't wait for this!

I think for... has some chances of being released on AI's discography rather than Kumi's, since she's also celebrating her 20th but through what seems to be a series of themed mini albums, so I wouldnt be surprised if she has a collab EP coming up. Either way, I can't wait to hear them together!

Its no secret that Avex is trash but this is a Supreme level garbage. Im bitter for you. Who knows how many other artists have had their intellectual property blatantly stolen by them.

Kuu is going to be on the TBS variety show モニタリング in one of the next episodes.
Not much info given yet apart from a short preview at the end of the last episode today.
Looks like they visited a Kuu fan.

https://imagizer.imageshack.com/v2/6...924/FXJfSf.png

https://imagizer.imageshack.com/v2/6...922/y78zle.png

https://imagizer.imageshack.com/v2/6...923/ZCoYp1.png

I'm in love with the snippet of lucky star, it's her type of happy, uplifting songs like Love Technique without being too cutesy! and it's danceable!!

^This! xD The autotune sounds bad for me cause I heard it on a crappy preview, but at this point i dun mind, she's going to use it in very random ways xD

Kuu is doing an Insta live 9 pm JST today.
Announced by the official account of her loveil lenses.

EDIT:
Alright, they informed again that her daily schedule changed, so it won't happen.
They gonna give notice when a new date is set.

EDIT 2:
Kuu now confirmed the Insta live for tomorrow 9 pm JST.
She's going to talk about loveil.

Thanks guys! :) That wasn't cool at all. And yes, as Gustavo said, HYNA was quite the sweetheart DM'ing me on twitter to use my freak me out cover. Sadly her career didn't take off, poor TARATIKA. It was on her website even with my awful watermark.



--

Someone posted Lucky Star on instagram, it's not my favorite but it does have the same vibe of Put your hands up!! and Whatchu Waitin' On. Hope the rest of the song is cool.

Just heard it on Global Koda Gumi and indeed it's very similar to Put Your Hands Up!!!, but the rapping part sounds like it'll be even better. A pity you can barely hear it. I think I'll love the full song!!

The preview on Insta is missing the part of the verse they included.
There she's rapping like in Love Technique.
I can try to rip it when I'm back at home.

I read once that it was because she was too embarassed to do the dance on stage. Which is a shame cause it's such an iconic song of hers and I still love it now. I think the only times I've seen her perform it was a remixed version on the JAPONESQUE tour like you said and for the Dirty Ballroom live on the Trick album. :(

I don't think that's the case, SHAKE IT is way more "raunchy" and she did just fine, nobody expects for her to do the original choreo anyway. I personally don't care that much to see a performance right now, I would like to see the a-nation because that was the time where the song was new and the festival fits the vibe of the song. Her a-nation performances compiled in one DVD/BD would be one of the things I would really love to have, and I would even pay good money for it, but I don't hold my breath for it. With Beach Mix they thought that they were doing something with "never released" performances of a-nation and rhythm nation, and it was just the songs we saw on TV anyway.

She didn't perform the song during the Dirty Ballroom tho.

Whatchu Waitin' On? PV has been uploaded



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8-BJjkqOogY

:yes:yes:yes:yes:luv2

There's still a bit more from the 20th anniv shooting to come out, a lockscreen calendar has just been uploaded on Global FC and in the pics they used Kumi's hair is in a ponytail and her hand is highly "dirty" with bigger dark nails, like claws. So far my favorite from this shooting!

The monthly video is up as well, I wish she talked about the FC album on it but she just talked about the tour and teased a towel from the goodies.

That's the monthly playroom calender.
Surprised and happy they upload it now to the global FC, too!
Looks nice and gives the concept an additional dimension.
Lookign forward to it.

Here's the preview.

On the FC shop page of the new album they state that the best live selection on the DVD will last over 2 hours.
So it should be full performances, even if they put one from every tour/concert on there.

And regarding JUICY, she simply might not like the song herself that much or performing it at least.

I feel like Kumi tends to not perform songs not written by her, and JUICY is one of them. Maybe she doesnt connect to those as much as her own written songs and prefers other songs. And as far as I know JUICY wasnt a hit amongst her Japanese fanbase, so another less reason.

Thank for sharing Corvina.

The auto-tune ruins it for me...

Lucky Star sounds cute. Thanks for sharing the preview, Corvina!

re(LIVE) Documentary episode 2



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wOzYkiXg2Kg

LIT PV has been uploaded



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AdS--NSJABw

In the Insta live Kuu announced a new colour for her lenses - pink.
She also shortly talked about the tour and the new album, e.g. there will be lots of pics in the booklet.

This morning they revealed some of the goods and more info for the tour album!

Cover

https://imagizer.imageshack.com/v2/6...922/50kdLA.png

Sticker

https://imagizer.imageshack.com/v2/6...922/kTW2qe.png

Shirt, comes in size L

https://imagizer.imageshack.com/v2/6...924/2cL10j.png

CD will contain 21 songs in total, 75 minutes.
DVD will contain 145 minutes of a best live selection, ending with a special edit of walk, going from the past till present + audio commentary by Kuu for everything.

Mezamashi TV tomorrow morning will broadcast footages on Kuu & EXILE ATSUSHI

https://twitter.com/cx_mezamashi/sta...34874633232384

Curious

The cover is a little disappointing, but oh well.

It is but tbh I was expecting a mix of the promo pic and the tour logo so it didnt surprise me lol Not a big fan of the goodies as well so I think in the end I'll just skip this release.

The walk edit seems to be cool, remided of ayu's Who... live lyric video, and since she always performed it on her tours, gives an extra meaning to it. Kinda hoping they upload this edit to YT as well but not counting on it :P

Just noticed Megumi no hito finally surpassed Crazy 4 U and is now the most viewed PV in Kuu's YT channel. I'm still happy C4U got so much attention, I love that song to death! you is at #3, very close to it.

Instead of the best live selection this kinda repeative stuff, she was supposed to release rare or unreleased footages like new mvs from some popular songs or Universal lives.

I like the ideal of rare/unreleased stuff but it wouldnt fit the idea for this compilation, since the idea of "MY NAME IS" is basically showing off her trademark/best stuff. I'd die for a release like this in future, but I can see why she went that way for this one.

I'll wait for the tracklist tho. Maybe there will be a surprise.

I wonder if there's a chance of the old songs getting new vocals or instrumentals or maybe even a remaster? I kinda wish instead of this she had released re-remastered version of BEST first things with a Bluray disc for the PVs.

There's a reason unreleased stuff wasn't released, so I wouldn't count on getting that ever.
It's also her decision what to do and she's not supposed to do anything.... And as thinkingoutloud89 said, I'd wait for the tracklist.
We never got such a compilation with full performances, only those DVD books with parts of performances and never more than about 70 minutes. The best selection on the Japonesque special edition was voted by fans for her first 11 years of her career and not in full included either iirc.
The song tracklist might have some surprises, too.

^yeah I low-key hope for remasters, rerecording, rearrangements or something like that (ala Namie Love Enhanced). At this point I don't think that will be the case but on the other hand I think that would justify it to be a fanclub only release a bit more (as someone said, it is strange to introduce yourself to your fans). But we will see - if not, I'll skip it but that's nothing to bad as we will get something new soon anyways (Kumi is the only one I count on to get something new constantly - meaning every year).

As for unreleased stuff. The German Band Jennifer Rostock did a "Worst of" when the went on hiatus. They recorded 12 tracks from song ideas or lyrics that were scrapped and made 12 full songs out of them. They really weren't that spectacular, but it was a cute idea and at the same time it was kind of a retroperspective in their past 10 years as you could cearly tell where each song came from.

idk the Japanese market overall doesn't seem to be into releasing discarded songs or demos like we see with artists from the US and Europe. I think it's like what was said in an ayu's thread once, probably they release most of what they got to the final stage so the leftovers are too raw to release. ayu herself has done tons of stuff throughout her career and iirc she only released video footage like that in A COMPLETE, so I don't expect it from Kuu either.

And geez twitter is on a whole drama with the album cover. It was so... expected (?) to me, no surprises at all. But some people seem to be hating her too much for this release, when if you don't want it you can just simply not buy it lol
At the same time tho I do wish she announced it all at once, I guess people get their hopes up that the next thing will be superb just to be disappointed by their own expectations when the cover is a promo pic we've seen before, and I feel it'll happen again when the tracklist is announced at it includes Ai no uta and Moon Crying, or when she reveals the goodies and the promo pic is used again in something new lol If it all was announced at once I think it would be received with a bit less of drama.
Plus, I don't think western fans overall seem to realise they're not the main focus of Jpop artists. Kuu's social media isn't even published in English, let alone her do a compilation of songs we want but the Japanese fans are not into.

This is probably going to piss people off, but the fanbase has been spoiled rotten.

Some fans need to gain some perspective to be honest.

^:yes

I'll never understand how somebody can get angry about something trivial like a cover or music in general.
If you dislike something, just go over it or concentrate on the things you like.
Life is too short for unnecessary negative feelings.

In other news.... We will get a PV for OSAKA TOKYO!

https://imagizer.imageshack.com/v2/6...924/I3LmcH.png