'LOVE again' composers/arrangers and new track lengths
 

Looks like they were released! And surprisingly, Yuta Nakano did untitled for her... story 2!

04. SAKURA - 4:33
music: Kunio Tago
arrangement: Yuta Nakano

06. task'n'bass - 1:57
music & arrangement: tasuku

07. Bye-bye darling - 4:02
music: Yasuhiko Hoshino
arrangement: tasuku

10. petal - 4:10
music: Kunio Tago
arrangement: Yuta Nakano

11. glasses - 1:45
music & arrangement: Yuta Nakano

12. untitled for her... story 2 - 5:22
music & arrangement: Yuta Nakano

13. Gloria - 4:38
music: Yasuhiko Hoshino
arrangement: Yuta Nakano

http://i.imgur.com/geU0yuh.jpg

Lots of Yuta!

excited for the new tracks. lots of my fav Ayu composers ^^ too bad DAI and CREA isn't part of the list

I sort of wonder where CMJK went, but he just did a cup of tea for Party Queen so he may have just been busy, haha.

DAI at least did Sweet scar!

01. Wake me up
music: Hiten Bharadia, Philippe-Marc Anquetil, Bardue Haberg from PhrasedDifferently
arrangement: tasuku

02. Song 4 u
music: HINATAspring, Yuta Nakano
arrangement: Yuta Nakano

03. Missing
music: Kazuhiro Hara
arrangement: Yuta Nakano

04. SAKURA
music: Kunio Tago
arrangement: Yuta Nakano

05. Melody
music: Yasuhiko Hoshino
arrangement: Yuta Nakano

06. task'n'bass
music & arrangement: tasuku

07. Bye-bye darling
music: Yasuhiko Hoshino
arrangement: tasuku

08. snowy kiss
music: Tetsuya Komuro
arrangement: tasuku

09. Sweet scar
music: DAI
arrangement: Yuta Nakano

10. petal
music: Kunio Tago
arrangement: Yuta Nakano

11. glasses
music & arrangement: Yuta Nakano

12. untitled for her... story 2
music & arrangement: Yuta Nakano

13. Gloria
music: Yasuhiko Hoshino
arrangement: Yuta Nakano

14. Ivy
music: Tetsuya Komuro
arrangement: Yuta Nakano

15. You & Me
music: Tetsuya Komuro
arrangement: tasuku

This should be complete with all of the composers/arrangers for the album. Soooo much Yuta.

seems like Yuta Nakano & tasuku, owns this lol

You can never go wrong with Yuta.

I'm so glad, that Hoshino-san composed at least 3 songs of LOVE again.
He did a great job on ASFXX back then, just love him.

needs more TK

14. Ivy
music: Tetsuya Komuro
arrangement: Yuta Nakano


No wonder this is my favourite song in the entire album (so far).

I didn't check the composers for when LOVE and again got released, so yeah lol

I was hoping for more TK but I had already assumed it wouldn't be the case haha.

I can't waaaaaaait!

wow! I loved Snowy kiss so much! and Ivy too and both actually from TK haha,he really is a masterpiece!

interesting.
thanks

I'm glad there is a lot less TK this time around. :D

I would like she works with news people or others composers/arrangers ^^

Now we know why this album sounds so nostalgic...

thanks for posting

No wonder I like untitled 2
Tago didn't touch it!
YESSSS

And wasnt Nakano part of HAL?
No wonder Ayu uses him/her a lot.

Also I agree that she should use new people
Most complaints I see are because she reuses old composers like dried up tissues.

I'm glad there's only one TK song...I'm not really a fan of his work -- too stuck in the '90s for the most part, in my opinion. Ivy is good, though :). I think there's just enough of him in this album.

There are three! You & Me/Ivy/snowy kiss.

Yes, and it seems he was the good part of H/\L before he left. Now H/\L is dead, lol.

Kunio Tago?!?! omg..the dude who gave me Together When... :D :D now im very pumped for them. Gloria and Bye-bye darling (which reminded me of blossom) sounds very Hoshino indeed.

Oh goodness! Well...at least it's not the majority of the album, like Love songs. I really like You & Me, though. snowy kiss is okay. He's not a bad composer...a lot of his songs just sound really dated.

hmmm Yasuhiko Hoshino maybe thats why I keep getting ASFXX vibes :D

This album is turning out to be much better than I thought! I don't think the problem is her composers, but rather her arrangers need to be different. I think ayu has a strong set of composers that know her voice really well. I think new arrangers will really take her to the next level.

btw, with these leaked...is that a sign?

Arrangements tend to date songs imo more than compositions. (see ASFXX)

Snowy kiss and Ivy are the masterpieces!!!

i always love Yuta's arrangement!

I have mixed feelings toward Yuta Nakano :/ I think it's not her best arranger sometime it's too artificial (I don't know how to explain my feelings lol) Though he has doing a great job with her ^^

i think this album will have great flow :heart

Only two interludes after all...

You're right, but at the same time, I feel no originality in his songs... They're all generic. Good, very good, but generic and not "new" at all.
I'm kind of sick of him lately, I hope that Ayu will hire some international composers for future songs (and not just buy some music from foreign studios, like she did with Tell me why or Wake me up), I mean, real collaboration.

he's been around for that long?! damn. bless him.

I wouldn't say all his songs are generic. I think he's versatile and can be original. He did "Sexy little things" which isn't generic imo.

Yes, but in terms of ballads, he's not very innovative, and I tend to hate his little "tinkerbells-winterish" sounds and useless violins -__-

Effing LOVE those tinkerbells and winterish type synth sounds!

The arrangement of Return Road comes to mind. Way too bombastic and overdone.

Return Road's was a superb song. The arrangement is really strong and adds to the song's theme a lot.

I dislike Return Road. I also feel like it wasn't mastered properly when listening to certain parts of the chorus - it sounds almost screechy, as if there is too much going on and the speakers can't handle it.

I was wishing for mor TK and DAI, but oh well... A lot of Yuta Nakano sounds interesting! And It's nice to see a composition from Kunio Tago as well :)

Why are people asking for her to work with new composers? Did you forget about Timmy? Remember how well that turned out? :laugh

I'm really anxious for something upbeat and also new rock songs. Sucks that these all sound like ballads

BRILLIANTE was a masterpiece though

International composers will generally try to create western-sounding pop songs. There's a whole host of Japanese artists who are making western-sounding songs, it won't work well for Ayu who has mostly avoided that trap her entire career. International compositions worked very well for tell me why but Wake me up tends to sound too western.

Yuta Nakano's compositions are fantastic if Ayu wants one of her (now) generic pop-rock songs. Seems Ayu seems to want to go for that familiar sound for her 15th anniversary. And that's the compositions she has selected - there's a reason he appears so much here.

hmm..............................

maybe not a masterpiece but an excellent piece of work =)

I couldn't disagree more about Wake me up. That song is the first song in a long time that actually showed that Hamasaki Ayumi "attitude". It was classic Ayumi.

Yuta only really arranged for the most part on this album, but he's been doing that since GUILTY/NEXT LEVEL. I am guessing Ayu uses him because he's extremely versatile, knows exactly what Ayu wants, and can execute it.

He actually disappeared for a loooonng time before he came back for MOON/blossom.

^^ maybe you're talking about "Love songs"?

no hidden track.. but still looking forward to those new songs!!

This album will be one of her best imo!!!

me too...

Although I think I will enjoy this release a lot, I can't help but wonder and think about how some international influence would help her out a bit. I think keeping her Japanese composers will keep that distinctive "Ayu" sound. Moreover, they know how she likes to stress the "iii" which is something very un-western. But having some other people arrange the music and instrumentals would be nice to kick her out of a rut. Yes, Party queen delved into musicals, but we could use some more upbeat music every now and then :).

On the other hand, as a 15th anniversary, I think she is looking to bring back classic Ayu :)

^ she is deffinitelly bringing stuff back to basics, since all of the songs pretty much make me think "i did hear that before, somewhere..."

it turned out well, for me xD I liked everything except PQ and The next LOVE. i think he was good xD *shrugs* wasn't too impressed with BRILLANTE tho, but it wasn't bad either.

thanks for info!

I wouldn't mind Ayu working with GEO again and Timmy has done quite well so far. Though GEO's compositions aren't really that western sounding...

what's the differences between music & arrangement?

a lot of Japanese ayu fans i know they said they tired with TK,he's old-fashioned according to them...

In my opinion it was a masterpiece. It was so different from anything she had ever done, ever. The song meaning is great, the music is great, the PV is amazing, her voice sounds great. I love that song a lot. :love


@chu-lips;
Easily explained:
Arrangement-> the structure of the song. What comes where and how and how to place the instruments together without it sounding cluttered.
Music->composing. The ones who made the music/melody (and in some cases, wrote the lyrics, but Ayu writes it herself)

It's like back to basic again..
And I just knew that Sweet scar was composed by DAI...
No doubt it's really a masterpiece

I'm really getting an "old school" vibe from this album so far, reminiscent of "RAINBOW", actually. She may not have songs that are funky like Real me, July 1st, and everywhere nowhere on it, but there's something about the overall structure -- the softness, the theme, the lyrics, the songs -- that just make me think of that record. Truth be told, I really do prefer her having songs that all link together thematically and musically. When she has songs that stand out like sore thumbs thrown into the mix of really pretty ones, I get a little bummed. It just feels like she did them to placate the expectation of creating super pop songs (I don't think she's done a sugary pop song since, what, Sunrise?). I guess if you're in the mood for it, it's perfect to hear her take on it. And it did kind of help establish her early on, but it never felt like something Ayu really had her heart in. This darker but also more melodic, midtempo stuff seems to be her speed, and there's definitely a lot more of those songs in her discog than anything else.

However! I look forward to see what she'll be doing AFTER this 15th anniversary business is complete. It's like "NEXT LEVEL" all over again: the idea that she's going to take a different approach to her career and her albums, her style, her shows, etc. Some changes may have been subtle or just plain small (the set up of her shows, for instance, going from a flat stage to a round one on all sides) but I think that "NEXT LEVEL" to "LOVE again" is kind of like her 'softer' years. She's older, she's reached several mile stones in her career; she's no longer one of the only massive solo female artists out there, so she doesn't have to constantly worry about hits, sales, image, etc. That's not to say she's taking it easy, but simply that Kuu and Namie are also reigning queens who do their own thing, and it's therefore easier for Ayu to do her own approach, too.

Am I explaining myself properly? lol I just think if you take a step back and look at the progression of Ayu's albums through the years you can definitely see an evolution of them, all kind of building up to her sound and style in this current post-NL era. I hope "LOVE again" is sort of like the 'finale' to that approach, though, and she'll be trying for some different stuff in the next batch of releases. Personally, I'm jonesing for a concept album.

There's really no denying the western electropop influence that song has to the point where it comes off as somewhat generic. It's a great song, don't get me wrong, but it's not the kind of music I'd want Ayu to produce on a large scale. I prefer NEXT LEVEL album or Last Angel-type compositions if she was going to continue producing electronic-influenced songs.

It's like Sparkle which was from NEXT LEVEL, lol. I think it's totally Ayu, straight from the opening.

Party Queen on the other hand, that one doesn't sound anything like Ayu...

But I get I am...-ish vibes from Wake me up mixed with her classic power-house tracks.

I agree with Zeke here, and don't think Wake me up has a generic western sound. It sounds MODERN to me, which had been missing from alot of Ayu songs recently (IMO). Sparkle actually sounds alot more like a western dance track to me but Ayu played both styles well with both lyrics and the strenght of her voice in them. Last Angel is nice but sounds like 2 songs melded together; the chorus is fun but the verses bog it down so much...

I welcome any song that has a Sparkle/Wake me up modern and fun sound with open arms. All in all, LOVE again is such a step up from FIVE-Party Queen and even Rock'n' Roll Circus (which i LOVE).

I like Last Angel, I really do. But the arrangement sounds so dated. I mean, the mix of WHATEVER on LOVEppears sounds more modern than Last Angel does and that was from 1999. Lol.

Only two interludes! And Sweet Scar is longer on the album?

I am surprised to see that SAKURA and petal are composed by Kunio Tago. Just the right lengths, I'd like to add.

I love Yuta! I'm glad to see so much of him!

many old friends, no wonder it is called LOVE again~take us back, time machine~

After hearing Bye-bye darling, tasuku needs to arrange more songs!

who's Tago?

Definitely !!!! !!!!

I love petal's arrangement and composition
:heart

I'm disappointed that there is no hidden track :/

i was hoping we would get one as well... :*(

Sit down son!
You love petal, and tago touched that!

I love petal the most :heart