Distance is her best album for me, hands down.

If you actually find Hikki's music insulting... are you even a fan? Doesn't sound like it. PLAY was a mess of an album and deserved to sell only half of what ULTRA BLUE did :yes And what are you talking about with BEST FICTION? It's just some best album, nothing new...

You think POL is mediocre? And K&C? FOL?! I'm assuming you didn't like Distance or First Love much then, right?

Japan's taste isn't bad... it's just different from Westerners. But from a Japanese perspective, most people liked HS much better, which is quite evident :yes

It's not hard to know what Japan likes since most of us here follow the charts and sales like crazy. But I agree about UB and HS not being too far apart, but for me ULTRA BLUE is so inconsistent and uneven. You've got great tracks like BLUE but then total failures like "Nichiyou no Asa." And you've got really fun, up-beat catchy tracks like "Keep Tryin'" and then the messy, boring "Kairo." HEART STATION doesn't have the peaks like UB, but it also doesn't have the horrible lows like UB.

I really like HEART STATION and ULTRA BLUE, but DEEP RIVER is my favorite Hikki album. :)

HEART STATION's definitely got consistency. The whole album flows together the way an album ought to, but each track shines in a different way. I remember Utada once talking about the album in an interview. She said something like, "It wasn't that I was simplifying the music, but growing musically." I can't remember the exact words.

I feel like DEEP RIVER was her most mainstream album - First Love and DISTANCE were R&B-flavored, and ULTRA BLUE and HEART STATION were ethereal/synth-styled. My favorite album of hers would be HEART STATION, simply because I loved it the moment I started listening to it as an album. Before the album came out, I was sure I'd hate HEART STATION because the singles didn't appeal to me very much. They were, as many have said, boring; they just didn't stand out on their own. When I began listening to the whole album on my iPod, starting from Fight The Blues, something just clicked. I can definitely understand why some listeners despise the album, because I once felt the same way, but after listening to the album as a whole, my opinion completely changed.

(That sounded corny and way too mushy. It wasn't meant to, though.)

you can still be a fan and not like an album.

what does that have to do with anything? :confused Distance and First Love don't even compare. I thought POL and FOL was very mediocre and forgetable. K&C, First Love and Distance (the songs and the albums) are gems.

you can buy the album and still not like it. lol. Does having a Japanese perspective change everyone's opinions?

I agree completely. POL is crappy. Even utada herself said she dumbed down the lyrics so the Japanese audience could relate more to them...ugh

But Deep River is by far the best imo

Deep River is the only album I can stomach all the way through. For the most part, I don't really care for her music.

^Because it's Japan's taste :3. My opinion of it is that it's a pile of crap. I adore her first four albums, I love every track on Distance and DEEP RIVER, and I love most of First Love(though, I haven't listened to it in a long time), and an EXODUS is okay too. I just don't like Heart Station. Separately, the songs are fine, but together, I just don't like it.

to be completely honest, i've known of utada since 2003/2004 and i only ever listed to these albums: ULTRA BLUE, Exodus, DEEP RIVER, & HEART STATION. :weep but i've heard all of her singles. either way i like the music utada puts out, and it's really far from being bad music to me. maybe i'm just an easy and casual listener. if i like a song, i like the song. i don't really try to find bad things about it. as long as it sounds good, i like it. :P

:dead2 *will leave thread now...*

Because I'm not a fan. I only listen to her music when I find something that appeals to me, which is usually very sporadic in intervals.

POL sounds like FOL~episode II~, and Boku wa Kuma sounds like all the other tracks.

i really don't think POL sounds anything like FOL (ballad). honestly. :no POL sounds more dramatic while FOL sounds more..calmer? and slower.

POL is not a guitar and piano ballad... it's an up-beat R&B track that sounds more like "For You" than anything. And BWK sounds like everything? Really? K&C? Stay Gold? Have you even listened to this album, seriously?

POL sounds like FOL?..lol just noticed it's POL and FOL, i think they like two different songs, i mean...they're kind of ballady, but they have two different styles to them~

Seriously, they sound absolutely nothing alike. They are completely 100% different styles.

was that comment even necessary Haruka? =/ Hikki's music is the best **** that you'll ever hear and still luv for many more years. I see you'll still luv and play Simple and Clean/Hikari/all the gawddamn UB songs. >_>

As for her albums, I never remembered this many folks hate'n HS. >_> Seriously, I can't. HS is one the hottest album this year and just because she ain't 30 and sayin' garbage like, "Poppin' my body or coochie or wuteva that hell I should pop." in her songs just to young folks to like her stuff doesn't make the album bad. :rolleyes HS does have a amazing flow and although I think Fight the Blues wasn't a great opener for the album, it still connected well with the rest of the album. I really can't say much for BF since it's a best album but I do think she should have put TSS and VS on there and gotten rid of her most horrible songs ever created (WMWM/CSCEIS). :rolleyes

@Grace: Dude! Seriously! Namie's stuff is good but it ain't hot ****. The only thing that was hot from her was 60s70s80s. =/ You see that she just created to garbage songs that had craptastic PVs. O= Seriously, I hadn't been that disappointed in her since she released BDC. How that song ended up being her "comeback" single is beyond me?! O=

Everyone has a different perspective on things. Not everyone has to feel it any ONE way.

and listening to POL and FOL, you get two different feelings
FOL, well for me i feel really sad
but for POL, i feel the courage to keep fighting, something like that

and listening to HS, i think it's the greatest album of 2008! one little album packed with so many different styles, is really amazing!

LOL thank you, Shanny, HEART STATION is amazing. And yes, some people must be so used to hearing about artists poppin' they coochies that they can't even recognize GOOD music that is written and produced by the artists. At least Hikki writes and produces her own music and doesn't sing whatever's given to her.

True, but why do people find it necessary to come into an artist's thread and say that their album is crap or that they can't even stomach their music? That's just asking for a fight.

Eh...don't you mean Namie?! I mean, most of the tracks thats on that best album sound the same from start to finish. All of them are upbeat.....just like her last 4 albums. :rolleyes

i was kinda disappointed with the songs on BF, i never heard namie's past song..but basically, mostly the songs were just fast,upbeat, and i feel like listening to the same song over and over again~ i mean it's ok for a fast,upbeat songs, but it's a best of album...does that mean namie have no ballads! only like 2 on the whole album

at least with hikki, she gives variety