Omg at one point she looked like her Together When self

The MV looks really cool!

I just watched the video. And indeed it's very Game/About You/ ourselves, and while the visuals and aesthetics are right up my alley, i agree with those who say that they could have totally played a bit more on the monster part, added more to the story - get her to bite someone with those fangs or just straight out show her transforming into a vampire creature by the end of the video or something. It's like ALMOST there but not QUITE. Also am i the only one who thinks that the lip-synching video parts with the audio are off or something, there's something weird about it that kept irking me throughout, but i can't put my finger on it - is it Ayu's overdramatic lip-synching, the editing or both.

Over all though, it's a decent video and fits the song's mood well, i like it. I missed this kind of Ayu. She looked great in it.

I like how she is sort of a manipulative monster in the end of the video, not just a literal one. The statue of some goddess of deceiving reminds me BRILLANTE (but this time she is not killed in the end).

WOW. Super happy and impressed. Breathes life to this song which has now been out for over 2 months.

I am glad she did not turn into a monster, we already have ANGEL'S SONG. Loved the dancers, maybe featuring them too much but we know that is very Ayu.

I love this.

some storyline that would give life to the lyrics would indeed have been nice, but I didn't expect her to do this so I'm happy with what we get.

she looks awesome, the set pieces are dark and dramatic, the dance and the dancers look cool, the visual effects and camera work are great—everything's good. it's not another one-scene video that was shot in her backyard with the shakiest camera in the universe, and that's the bar for me :laugh

I Like it!
she abused the "I touch my face,hair and look at my claws" maybe,
but I enjoyed actually :) it is very nice to have good new material

It's so Marionette!

PV def helps me out, finally liking the song. She looks fierce!

Pretty bland to me, nice visuals but nothing more to me: and definitely nothing we needed to wait so long for. Now let's see if episode 1 refers to the song or the 23rd year in general.

I'm surprised no one has mentioned Thriller :laugh

I like it but she looks awkward in the scenes with the dancers around her. I thought the rest was pretty good. Was it worth being teased so long ago? No. But it's not bad and it's nice to have something new.

the Michael Jackson video? I guess some part of the dance kind of reminds me of that, yeah.

by the way, by now we have three videos from three singles, plus that filler ballad Pray for you. if I didn't know better, I'd say a new album might be coming.

I love the shots of Ayu in front of the moon.

ayu what the actual fu-

that was incredible. :yeek
the zoom on her when the last chorus starts, the next 6 seconds where she completely stares the camera lip synching the song, the shots of her in front of the moon, the editing! I honestly don't have any complaints!

It is decent, which is the best I can expect from her modern PV. She went so low with colors with very bad videos and now she reached back the level of good enough.

The video is fine. It's cool. Dark. Gothic. I'm just kinda... "meh" as a whole though just because of the long ass wait! I would've been hyped for this at the initial release of the single but so much time has passed already that I'm ready for the next single now.

"23rd Monster" is an accurate title, because the visual kei scene was hot about 23 years ago.

The PV gives me Game vibes, which I love.

Loved it!

Hmm not my cup of tea. But it's nice to see so many people are enjoying it

exactly! i think this is very 2006-2007ish and not my cup of tea.

Agreed. I think those scenes are awesome, for the dancers. But Ayu doesn't look very "elegant". I wouldn't expect her to do some incredible dance a few weeks after giving birth... :laugh But the little dance she does in these scenes looks kind of "heavy".

I wonder what’s the story/significance behind some of the elements. E.g.
- ayu have claws on one hand but not for the another. And in the end she removes the claws.
- dancers disappearing one after another
- the statues at the very last scene. (Does that really exist?)

Tbh, kinda boring. Don’t know, maybe because the releases of the single and the video it’s too long. Missed the hype and moment. Only 90k in 1 day.

I like the aesthetics. It’s a beauty shoot but different and I’m happy with that. Tbh I don’t care about a storyline anymore lol But it was boring and awkward sometimes.

Oooooo! Totally getting Tiger Mom vibes from the MV. Actually scratch that--she's become a werewolf. She's calling back her power by the full moon, and reclaiming her shadow side. The shadows that insist on making her feminine side feel weak and scared to "bare her fangs". They have no power over her anymore. And as the dancers disappear, the shadowy figures, those are her inner masculine qualities charging her up haha. She talks a lot about the beginning and the end. Basically she is accepting all the good and the bad and making something new out of herself that is constantly influx. That's where the holographic effects are coming from. So if you think you can pin down "who" she really is, it's fruitless.
She is shapeshifting constantly haha. Good luck.
Major love for all the Divine Feminine elements in this. It's like the shadow version of "forgiveness"

Dark at times, briefly elegant and then plain creepy, very interesting concept. That scene with the dancers disappearing made me so petty. I was like “ somebody’s getting fired”. 3:11 though chills.

The song has like r&b elements or something that just sound odd encapsulated within a rock track. It lacks whatever it is that About You, GAME, talkin’ 2 myself, MICROPHONE, etc, all have that make it feel like the roofs been blown off.

Haven’t watched the video but not a fan of when she uses lenses — she has the fierceness and spirit of hamasaki ayumi here for sure, but the product itself falls flat.

^ I actually think the whole synth part or whatever is what throws it off, at least for me, cuz the guitars end up on the backseat. They are also very muffled, which makes them sound more like A BEAT thing rather than a melody. If it was more like instrument based or the synth parts were in a lower note i think it would have more power in it. The ones you mention are very instrument based - you can hear ACTUAL drums and other stuff and guitars basically lead in them, it's almost like symphonic rock while this is a hybrid of electronic stuff pop and guitars that don't quite sound as heavy as guitars CAN sound. Electronic stuff can really sound flat if done megh, to add to that a lot of the stuff is done digitally nowadays, very few artists actually hire musicians to record instruments, and for me usually that's the thing what makes them very flat. I think that's probably why. At least in my opinion. Maybe i'm just getting the wrong idea what you're talking about.

However, I'm not sure how the video can "fall flat" if you haven't actually watched it in full yet :D And i think the contacts work here, cuz she's not supposed to be entirely HUMAN.

BTW, i've tried looking closer at the closing shot of the statue. It sort of makes me think of Hera. Cuz you can if you look closely spot a few mythical beings there. Basically she's very feminine deity- a goddess of marriage, women, childbirth, and family, but at the same time, she does not take any BS from anyone, and she WILL screw you over if you mess with her.

I looked at the statues too, and I can see what you mean, but I don’t see Hera in there at all. Same with the statues below, I don’t see any that I can actually pin on any one person from mythology.

I think that’s another reason the video is disappointing to me actually, because she had the opportunity to give some really powerful symbolism there but style over substance won out.

The result is you have these painfully plastic looking statues probably trying to say what BlackSilence here is getting at, but falling flat because there’s no care taken to make it work well. I think it’s almost lazy, which is kind of sad because the video was being worked on for so long and then we get this rushed finished project.

I get it gothic, “spooky” imagery looks cool, classical imagery looks cool. But what is the point if it is just a collection of images? (Not that I’m saying a music video can’t just be a collection of images, but I really don’t think that’s what Ayu ever wants).

And so the MV is finally on, it was about time :)
I like it. Everything is on point, her look, effects, editing, faces... I would just point a little over crew in the dancer's department, but it's ayu :laugh
It reminisces the GAME and About You aesthetics... and I really dig the last one
It's not my preferred PV but it sure gives me high hopes for the next works after Haru Yo Koi and 23rd Monster :heart
It seems my beloved high budget ayu is coming back :laugh

oh so this was directed by the same guy who did Because of You, GAME, and About You: Hideaki Sunaga.

I still don’t like the song so my hopes weren’t too high to begin with, but I do think it’s her best video in a long while.

I was about to say it IS her first video in 5 years, except haru yo koi. I completely forgot ohia no ki abnd dreamed a dream exist.

Right so at least we know there’s more coming - the Bob hat and lipstick shot is still nowhere to be seen, so it’s at the very least reserved for whatever episode 2 is coming!

I'm more than happy with the video :) She looks so fierce, plenty of amazing shots there.

I dare to bet that chapter 2 will happen on the return to music tour / live stream or whatever. Maybe some background or introduction video?

I would laugh out loud if there were no more episodes and 0 and 1 are the only episodes.

Still so happy about this PV. Ayu and her team did a great job! :heart

Thanks for the reply — agree on the lack of real instruments. I mentioned previously how much of a role the drums used to play in her tracks (even in ballads like walking proud, the drums are such a star).

Regarding my comments on the product falling flat, it wasn’t in reference to the video. It was the song. She had great attitude, interesting approach to video this time, some momentum, etc. But dragged out for a track like this? Just very unfortunate. Anyway, hoping for some real good rock song in the future, but it’s been such a long time, I feel she’ll move away from rock for a bit and go back to some ballads or something, sadly.

There is a lot to unpack but I love it!! Need to watch it a few times

The video is cool and definitely reminds me of GAME for sure! Not a fan of the dress and half long fringe/short hair look, but the slick hair back with lenses look is awesome!!

I'm confused about episode 0 though, was that whole set just built for a teaser??

Hope there's more coming with the red lipstick / black hat look!!

This has got to be the BEST video she's done in over a decade

The classic Ayu is back ^o^

I’m really confused by the “episodes” thing.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tRCh94u7x_4

Stumbled across this. I like it :)
Nice to see people covering her newer songs! I feel like she doesn't[ get much covers on youtube (she totally should!)

This guy covered Ohia no Ki too and I guess he did Mad World too. I searched a bit and found some Ohia no Ki amateur covers. It's not A FLOOD, but there's some attention from people about her newer stuff on YouTube.

Shinpei Fujita is definitely an Ayu fan. I think he once even said something like "I would have quit music with Ayu's songs." Not completely sure.
It was a part of this caption (he's doing the MY ALL dance in the video to celebrate her 22nd anniversary):
https://www.instagram.com/p/B-uRuSPl...dium=copy_link

He covered JEWEL, too: https://www.instagram.com/p/CCQdtGKJ...dium=copy_link
I think he also did M.

I thought about it the first second haha

Well... I don't have hopes for any more episodes. :laugh
I think initially she thought about doing the episode thing with scenes with the hat and close-ups on that screen BUT she had the baby and stopped.
In the meantime it seems she replanned everything and clearly wanted to give more effort to the MV, after all she did reshoot AND made auditions with new dancers...
This explains to me why she postponed the release, to give her best after all that Ayumi Hamasaki comeback TA entry :P
Or maybe I'm overthinking haha