That's true, I hadn't noticed it ! Well, I think I'm going not to ask myself about this album anymore and wait for it leaks xD

SCREAMSS. love all her different looks. Ayu's realli doing her best for the upcoming albums i can feel. realli looking forward to the new albums =) hoping for her comeback

Ahhh, I am addicted to this new pics! :O
I was here before going to school and saw them and now.. I am back from school and then rushed back here to look at them again. First it hyped me up and made me want the announcement even more but now these news made me kind of.. peaceful XD I just know this album will be great. I know I will love it. Therefore I can wait a little longer :)

Thanks, I do, too..:P:) labello's works are so gorgeous ;)

I too think that if Ayu does even a tiny thing wrongly for this one, she's gonna be criticized heavily because almost Everyone is hyped for this album. it's scary to imagine if this hyped turned bad...

but i know i'll love it :)

*o*
*O*
I love this pics *-*

yay! finally a translation! :D
thanks deli! :)

and what? Kazu again? tsk 3x

and one thing...

her hair in the last pic is really Gaga-ish -> remind me a lot with Bad Romance MV -> especially the bath-tub scene... :(

oh ayu~~~

Thanks so much for the translation. I like her response to the black lace pictures-- they were about the same as mine. XP

OMG, love love love the style, I never thought that after Next Level she is still able to do sth this good O_O

She looks awesome!

I love her hair in the last pictures! I've been itching to cut my hair around her length for awhile and I'm tempted to try and mimic that style at some point. It's so cute!

she looks so mature, she looks like an upgraded woman

Seems like, she made a PV vor a Ballad-Song.
Looks interessting. Hope, we can see them soon.
The pics are really nice. Might be vor the Album... don'tit?

The shots that aren't for the two PVs are for Vivi and another unknown magazine. The album photoshoot is done already

ALL of this look gorgeous ! The first shoot is very electro, plastic, colored ^^ The second is so class, glamour, for me it's the most beautiful it's just perfect ! A true diva I'm in love ! For the mags it's sexy but not trash, it's really beautiful and esthetic !

Ayu is at the top !

these look amazing. im so excited. i really do feel ayu has taken a new step into her career as a woman leaving all else behind

i love these pics lol

Yes.. I see. I read the translation after writing the message.
So.. this pics are for Vivi. Seems to be a good photoshoot.. don't it?
SO.. can't wait to watch that Vivi-Pics! :D

Every things so awesome!!!!!

Can't wait anymore ToT

About the era of criticizing, I agree.
Although I have loved every work Ayu has put out since after LoveAPPEARS. :)
She has yet to disappoint me. xD (well I am not counting the Sunrise/Sunset cd cover).

Ahhhh I love these pictures!!! Especially the last two... Gorgeous!

Ayu looks GORGEOUS and SEXY and HOT and sooooo BEAUTIFUL!!!
The first pic with the lolly is *.*

Wahhhhh, I cannot wait to get this new album AND the photobook!!!!

AMAZING, Ayu-chan! <3

Now that we have a possible date of April 14th, I feel relieved, haha.

Awoh, is she adorable or what? XD You just gotta love her. Looking forward to whatever she's working on, whether magazine or album! :)

Wow, she is gorgeous~~! :luv2

huuuh why would that be a possible date

It was reported by haru@AyuChina aka Cloud@AHS. He usually gets CDs 2 weeks before release and etc....

He's very reliable.

i remember there are lots of singer/band releasing album on that day.but i think they are not ayu's competitor.

There are only about 4 bands releasing that day right now.

ya.and the others are releasing single.i guess the cover,title and tracklist will announce by today or tomorrow?

Hmm, still no official news on TA website as of now...

excited. :)

So close! :D About 5 weeks notice before release isn't totally unheard of either, NEXT LEVEL info was only released about that far ahead wasn't it?

Yes, that's right. It was just as close with Secret, if not closer.

The only time of year I get excited about Ayumi news is right before an album release, and the PV pics make me excited! Though I don't think her ballad PV this year will surpass Curtain Call, the one shot idea was stunning!

:( I can"t wait ayu new album T_T

It feels like ayu is spending more time and putting more effort into this album compared to NEXT LEVEL...so this longer wait is worth it but I really hope they'll announce the release soon.

^ I don't know about that. We didn't get as much insight into the making of NEXT LEVEL than we have with this album. But 4 new PVs is one more than usual. I wonder if the album will be a 10 song 4 interlude one again?

It's looking like it'll be 16 tracks this time around... if not more.

12 track-4 interlude is possible, but I wouldn't think she'd put that many after recording for the last 4 weeks...

The list I made about two weeks ago about her 1:1 ratio of video clips to music tracks:
Memorial address - 5 single PVs, 2 album PVs - 7 clips - 7 tracks on the album (8 with Memorial address bonus)
MY STORY - 4 single PVs, 3 album PVs, 4 making-ofs - 11 clips - 17 tracks on the album
(miss)understood - 7 single PVs, 2 album PVs, 6 making-ofs, 1 side story - 16 clips - 16 tracks on the album
Secret - 4 single PVs, 3 album PVs, 7 making-ofs - 14 clips - 14 tracks on the album
GUILTY - 4 single PVs (if Distance Love is split between the songs), 3 album PVs, 7 making-ofs - 14 clips - 14 tracks on the album
NEXT LEVEL - 3 single PVs, 3 album PVs, 6 making-ofs - 12 clips - 14 tracks on the album
This new album - 4 single PVs, 4 album PVs, 8 making-ofs - 16 clips - 16 tracks or more on the album??

More often than not, she's had about the same amount of tracks as video clips since she's started the +DVD thing (if not more...)

I still don't think she's going to include Sunset on the album. Really no need for both of them on the same album, even if it was a double a-side single. In essence they are the same song with different arrangements, it just won't "fit" in an album setting. So I think there's going to be 7 PVs - that's why she made 4 new ones, in line with the rest of her recent releases.

The fact that they both got PVs imo makes it more likely that she will put it on the album along with the making of for Sunset. I don't really see the big problem with including both of the songs as they're inseparable imo. We'll see what she's doing with the songs when the true tracklist comes out, but some people really need to get over their dislike of Sunset, haha. (From what I've seen, no other artist has really done this sort of thing with two compositions and two opposite arrangements since usually they either try to keep the songs both upbeat or both midtempo/ballady, not one of each, which makes it easier to decide to axe one... plus she chose to create Sunset over a completely different ballad that Ayu hated, so I doubt she'd just leave it off and let it die like that ballad.)

^ Why should we get over our dislike of Sunset if it's a totally boring song...? @_@

i think sunset still gonna be on the new coming album , there are no reasons to eliminate this track out of the tracklist as well.The lyrics and arrangement are different like another
one song. I like sunset LOL

no sunset pls...i would rather have red line for ta :D

^^^I think th means that some shouldn't believe Sunrise/Sunset or both are not going to be on the album just because they find it boring or something. Japan loved Sunrise based on the Recochoku downloads and she herself said Sunrise and Sunset should stay together, so it would be really strange for her not to include them. I think there was a long discussion about this in one of the anticipation threads already though. :P

i don't mind if she includes sunset into this album because i didn't buy her s/s single :P
i wish that she'll announce it by today or tomorrow

wow!!! Is that Ayu?!?

She looks different and much mature not the usual glam gal.

Then again, Kazu... :thud
Oh well, I hope he doesn't "mess up" Ayu on his silly choreography. XD

Im now much more excited to her new album release! :D

I suddenly recalled from that mad party about HUMMING 7/4 lol...and with a night club, I have an image of a fun, high, electro track..lol..
(which leaves me to wonder if Sexy little things is a rock track...i guess it probably is from the transition from Microphone)

^I personally think Sexy little things could be a dance/electronica song. :)

And I love the pics. Ayu (I almost said Kuu) looks good. I'm curious about the new PVs now. :3 I wonder what they will be like. :)

wow!
But i only love MW~ :D

Sunrise/Sunset better be on the album just so I can use the new album cover as artwork for the songs on my ipod and get rid of the S/S covers attached to the songs and still have it be official.

I love MW and Sparkle :D

I think Kazuyoshi as video director is not so bad, even he's fun (I can't stop laughing while watching the making-off for Sparkle, haha.. crazy guy!) but as photographer is a *******ing disaster (I don't like S/S covers) xDD

That's a really good point......

I think he's okay as a photographer his visions are really good but not well executed who I really hate are the photo editors.

Maybe not so much get over the dislike for a song, but get over the fact that there is a extremely strong possibility this song will NOT be excluded from the album. Not because I said so, because AYU SAID SO.

YEAH, I AGREE WITH YOU.

Hey guys, I wonder why Ayu didn't notice her UGLY PHOTO especially the FISH MOUTH AND DEAD FACE?????????? Did you know why?????

SORRY AND NOT MAD IF YOU ARE NOT AGREE WITH ME.

I personally don't think I ever said it shouldn't be on the album or that Ayu might not include it on the album... I just think it's a boring song. ^o)

I'm not talking about you personally. I think the song is boring, too. But a lot of people seem to think this song will never make it on the album for whatever reason when Ayu has already stated it will be forever ago. I think that's what TH was trying to say when he said "get over your dislike for this song."

I have to sort of agree. Sometimes he does really good.. like the YW/BALLAD covers and booklet pics...they were flawless. But if you take a look at his website hardly any of his photos are impressive.. most are uninspired and have plain backgrounds and too much photoshop/weird expressions. Everything just looks so amateur, especially compared to the photos ND CHOW takes.

they have different style of photography.you can't expect kazu to have a photo shooting style like ND Chow.If he is able to do so,ND CHOW is not special anymore.

Shimomura isn't so bad as photographer. His photos are just more plastic/fake than ND CHOW's ones.
Even if he failed hard sometimes D:
I prefer ND CHOW but Shimomura isn't so crappy as almost all AHS said, some pics from his website are really good :yes

lmao He even got Beyonce to open her mouth and let him take pictures. Maybe he has a fetish with mouths...

edit: Actually... if you look, everyone has their mouth open, and some fishlips... what the hell. lmao.

LMFAO :roflmao

when's the album out!!!!!! omg... i can't FEAKING WAIT>>>>>>>>>.... ayu is smokin hot and it sure gonna be awesome!! :)

That's true, I'm just not a big fan of his type/style of photography. I like that ND CHOW at least has ayu appear more natural in his photos and has her outdoors a lot of the time. Imagine if she took kazu to London with her, they'd probably still wind up shooting indoors in front of some plain white background for the album cover and not taking advantage of all of the great stuff outdoors like ND CHOW did... or if kazu DID shoot outdoors the cd covers would probably wind up having a photoshopped big ben and other various photoshopped buildings in the background and ayu tilting her head and pushing out her lips :shakehead

I'm not saying this 'cause I don't believe in it, but I'm curious as to where/when Ayu said Sunset was going to be included? -clueless-

Kazu's videos are different from his photography. Neither are exceptionally creative or exciting, but it gets the job done... I didn't actually hate MW and GREEN, but it wasn't brilliant or mind blowing, either. They are flat, but not so much that the ruin the essence of the song. Sparkle was pretty okay. Still rather flat, though. =/ (He needs to put his energetic personality into his works.)

As far as the S/S covers... I didn't mind her outfit, and her facial expression could have even been tolerated... just what the hell is the logic behind the background? That's the worst part... to state the obvious. XD

^Well she doesn't have to specifically say it's going to be included, that's the basic presumption. Just like we naturally presume You were... and Ballad are going to be on it too. Why would Sunrise be excluded when it was an a-side single too after all?

That is different, though, isn't it? I just don't get what's so crazy about breaking pattern.

^There's nothing crazy about it, but I don't see why everybody thinks she's gonna break the pattern when it comes to Sunset? :shrug Have I missed something that has happened that makes it seem like she's going to leave it out?

She didn't say it would be. All she said was that she couldn't imagine Sunrise and Sunset being separated from each other. So it's not likely that she'd only have one of them on the album.

I think people are just thinking of how Koda Kumi did Yume no uta/futari de... by leaving futari de... off of her album.
But that's a little different, those were both ballads with the same melody so it would be awkward if she put them both on her album. With ayu it wouldn't be that way since one is upbeat and one is a ballad.

^ Ah, that's what I thought. 'They can't exist without the other.' That's the only part that would make this make sense.


I'm running out of ways to justify this feeling--I just have a gut feeling saying that Sunrise and Sunset shouldn't be included. Weird, 'cause having them on would make the most sense.

He made MW, Sparkle, GREEN and Kuroi Namida(from Anna Tsuchiya), so he's grate for me!

Kuroi Namida is from Kazuyoshi? O__O That's a beautiful PV. He can when he wants XDD

Yes! Is on his website (someone put here the link...) I got impressed too, it's a a really beautifull PV!

she looks soo beautiful in the pics!!! *-*

For me... kazuyoshi when it come to PV, he seems to have great ideas, but then he fails on the execution to put together all his ideas and have an impresive result... MW had great ideas and scenes, but I don't like how he edited it and how all was together... the hotel room was a scene he had to use more, for example... and with GREEN he fails with what that PV is about and maing ayu act that way... Sparkle... Sparkle is Sparkle XD

It's because of the same compositional and VERY similar lyrical nature of the two songs and when most artists do this, they only choose ONE track out of the two (or three, like with AAA). I think most people either want one or the other (obviously Sunrise over Sunset) but I feel that because Ayu totally scrapped a completely different song that wasn't Sunset when she was creating the single, that alone should hint at how she'll deal with it when it comes to the album. She could make a mash-up of the two songs... who knows? But just that she preferred to make a song from the same composition as the main A-side... it just sticks out to me too much as "THAT'S how good Sunset is, enough to scrap this other song!"... though I do wonder if anyone would've liked that original ballad over Sunset.

He did shoot her outdoors for Deji Deji Diary's bikini shots. IMO, I didn't love them as much as her CD DATA shoot in 2008 with ND CHOW. Something about the way he takes his photos or his camera's settings... they make his subjects look like wax figures... He also did the last two calendars on-location, and... for the most part the first calendar was a BUST and the second had a few good photos, but was still kind of disliked for having dead eyes, haha. Hm, now I want Ayu to be in a studio with lots of wind for some reason...

To be fair, ND CHOW did glitter/fated, which was mangled horribly in post-production with the oversaturation of the colors in that photo... and her wet hair just looked weird... I don't know what happened with that shoot.

(I mentioned in my letter to Ayu that she should have no more Shimoko and use Leslie/ND more... wtf... haha)

^you said it really? LOL hope she will read it xDDD

That shoot was very pretty, I almost forgot it was by him lol. If he's going to work with her, he should have more shoots like that. But I agree, I think ND's shoot was better. He has a way of capturing her beauty in a more natural way.

I guess the problem with Kazu might be that he doesn't really bring out the invidual in the person he shoots.. seems like, he has an idea what looks good to him and doesn't really emphasize the characteristics of the one he's shooting. To me, looking at his shoots, he's more of a commercial photographer (hence all the poses and "plastic/fake" looks) while ND, for example, is more of an artistic photographer. That's just my POV though.

Back on the S/S issue, to me, Sunrise was the main song. The one she promoted. Sunset was a little re-arrangement, more like a remix than a standalone song that she made a video for. I personally think it wouldn't work having both of them on an album because they are, in the end, very similar songs, with similar lyrics. So that's why I think it won't be included. But then again, she did make a video for it, it was a double a-side single so of course the presumption is that it will be included. However, she's never done a single like S/S before so the rules don't really apply. We'll see. I just can't imagine hearing Sunrise as like.. track 3.. and down the line we get sunset as track 10 or something.

He made the Kuroi Namida PV? He didn't do a bad job on it, but for me, the song made the video, not the other way around.

Love...ly....!

Wow Ayu looks beyond gorgeous in the black lace! :love It has a sort of goth feel to it.

I cannot wait to see the PVs!

disco?
I tought it was a gay bar XD

anyways I love the pics! the ones with the stokings are so speachles, she los sexy-gougeous (I thought that can't be posible D: )

and the chupa-cups pics are my favorites ever!~

Love the lollipop pics, she looks great there! :heart
But I'm a bit worried with the rest of the PV...
And she looks bad in the pics for the ballad PV. The white dress and the red lipstick... :no

I LOVE her in all these pictures! The PV pictures, in them she looks so beautiful!! I think she looks pretty classy in all the pictures and I can't wait to see more!

Nice photos! Not too keen on the lace get-up.

With all of the new information transpiring, I have faith that this album will be terrific. Her last album left me bemused and seemed overtly monotonous. Her two previous singles were some of her most impressive in a long time and I have not been too enthralled with her music over the past 4 years. That says something.

This new direction she is embracing is beneficial for her, overall I'm greatly pleased and contented. I can't wait to receive my copy of her album in the mail.

Looks like a gay club. I like.

Oh oh oh amazing amazing !!
Ok I'm sure for getting the CD+DVD version :D

I really like her short curly hair in the pics here.

I can't wait to see the PV and album cover ..... but I won't spoil myself like last time