I guess it's all a matter of taste with HEART STATION - some love it, others think it's for the birds. Utada's previous albums (with the exception of ULTRA BLUE) were less of a hit-or-miss, but I still think HEART STATION is her best work to date.

Song length is not what makes a song a preludfe/interlude or a full song. Catcher In The Light was made with an obvious intent of being a prelude. The lyrics on it are short and vague and somewhat incomplete. Boku Wa Kuma is a complete song, as it delivers what it should: simply to be a simple child's song. You don't see a single made out of an interlude song. Boku Wa Kuma had its own single, thus, it is a full song, people like it or not.

I like Boku wa Kuma :P

This was rather hard... and frankly, it went only between two options. HEART STATION sucked ass and was the worst thing I have heard so far this year + ever from Hikki.. so that was in the garbage.. so it went between Kingdom and GUILTY. Kingdom, because there was variety from pop to urban to soul to cutish pop and GUILTY had my favourite genre of music which is rock and my favourite song of 2007 which was talkin' 2 myself. Eventually.. I choose for ayu's GUILTY not because as someone who registered at an ayu forum, it's expectable to like GUILTY more than the other two, but because I still listen to the first half of GUILTY a lot... and Kingdom has some tracks I listen to a lot, but I sometimes once in a while go listen to some tracks and then it's done for a few days

Also.. like I said.. I'm a fan of rock music.. and if it's well produced then it will get my attention XD

I'd have to say GUILTY... though HEART STATION was really close. But in terms of # of songs I liked, GUILTY wins. Kingdom... meh.

(P.S. For the poll, GUILTY should be all caps :laugh)

what a surprise, kuu is all the way losing. :rolleyes

It's really tough for me to be honest. Vocally, I think Utada trumps Ayumi 9 times out of 10...but Guilty is a really good album, bar one or two songs, I don't think I disliked much about the album. Heart Station is really relaxed which I love...so I suppose it depends on what I want to listen to?

However, which can I see myself still listening to a few months down the line? Probably Heart Station. Guilty is good, but it's an album I can only listen to every so often and not get bored of it. Utada wins this one I think.

I really dislike Koda Kumi, so Kingdom doesn't even come into this debate for me :P

Well this is an Ayu forum, whaddya 'spect? :B

I, on the other hand, think Ayu trumps Hikki vocally 9 times out of 10 :) Yes, Hikki has better technique (especially when listened to in the context of Western standards) but I prefer Ayu's more emotive and Japanese singing. It's closer to enka and old J-pop than anything else.

Vocally, I'd say Guilty was the superior album out of the three, and the most emotionally affective.

Heart Station, on the other hand, has one masterpiece of a song in it: Beautiful World. It's the best song among all three albums.

However, I find Kingdom to be a the pinnacle in terms of Koda Kumi's career. It seems she's finally made the songs she's been trying to make: for the first time the album organically combines her dance songs, ballads, R&B and cute songs. Unfortunately, the album also contains the worst track out of all three: Freaky. I'd rather have I'll Be There in it.

Quite frankly, Ayu and Hikki seemed to have reached a stalemate in their careers. Guilty sounds like the last tired gasp following the My Story - miss(understood) - secret style arc (and what an impressive record that is with each album managing to sound different, except for Guilty which sounds too much like secret). And Hikki hasn't quite moved past her Traveling - Sakura Drops - Colors - Dareka compositional themes (again, each of those manage to sound unalike each other), wherein the instrumentation seems to go on for the entire song in a steady unbroken line containing slight vocal and emotional deviations. (Compare something like Uso Mitaina with Flavor of Life. The latter comes across as lifeless.) Each track in Heart Station moves, progresses, and ends in the same way, with Beautiful World the only one that emerges unique because it is the best-made in these terms.

I vote for Kingdom because it is, I think, Koda Kumi's First Love and My Story. It's probably the best non-compilation album she'll ever make in her career. Guilty and Heart Station are decent, but I expect much much much more from Ayu and Hikki.

See? Not everyone here hates Koda Kumi :D

Wow, you've managed to put to words perfectly what I've been thinking about Heart Station! The album is basically one long monotone.

GUILTY
HEART STATION
Kingdom

i'm just a huge fan of GUILTY... but i love HEART STATION... and Kingdom is starting to grow on me!

GUILTY!!! that's for sure...
Heart station - a little boring
kingdom - ... just 2 songs that i like

1.GUILTY
2.Kingdom
3.HS

I don't like Hikki^^'.....and Kingdom was okay 2-4 songs are good:)

GULITY
HEART STATION
KINGDOM

i like all the albums but I've listened to GUILTY the most ^^

Uemarasan, I *heart* you. <3

Aww, I heart-hug back :D

But you should know that overall Koda Kumi is not among my favorites though... :dead2

ahhh, such a hard poll. hmm...i'll pick GUILTY this time around, because i did enjoy it. but i seriously enjoyed HEART STATION and kingdom (i bought the album, lol) too. so it's really all equal for me, despite the poll.

01 GUILTY
02 HEART STATION
03 Kingdom

I was pretty happy with all of the albums. :)

for me GUILTY 9/10
heart station 7/10
kingdom 4/10
black cherry is nicer

BoA - The Face is so much better than Kingdon and Heartstation....

Guilty its the best off course..