What did you think of Hotel Love Songs?
 

Since some people have the DVD already. From the performances I've seen (Appears, NaNaNa, Sparkle, A Song Is Born, Happenin' Here) it looks really good, I appreciate the change in arrangements to songs like Appears and NaNaNa.

i only liked the Tell me why performance

The whole thing was... surprisingly dark...

I'm still digesting it.

I've only watched a few songs.

I liked NaNaNa and Sparkle, because ... Ayu reminded me of Shuichi Shindou ... which is probably not a good thing when judging a performance by a real singer.

I'll wait until the whole concert becomes available before I decide whether I like it, and whether or not to buy it.

omg the concert in full minus the interludes! :cool
i feel like they downscaled CDL 11-12 on purpose, just so that AT 2012 would feel more epic and mindblowing (love the new rearrangements they made to love song btw)

I just watched the first performance and until now I always dreamed that Happening Here never happen :| idk it's just hard to like the song and I hope she'll never perform it again in the future. The first act of the tour look nice :)

can I just copy n paste my thoughts from the other thread? haha

My blue-ray disc arrived today. I'd say the concert goes beyond my expectation, i really hate to say it, i enjoyed it more than rock and roll circus. The song happening here was such a perfect opening song. She wasnt lying when she sang "there's some great things happening here" lol.

Song 4 U was cut short i dont know why but still great.. Then tell me why and remind me, omg her voice was flawless in these songs, the choreography really suits the songs well very very emotional.

Appears and missing were allright, not bad and again missing was cut short, i was like what the hell.

Shake it and step you. She's unbelievably so cute in that maid custom, i really love shake it performance, i went crazy when she shook her butt like in the pv lol, step you was also cute just like her older performances

Nanana and sparkles, AMAZING !!!!!! ******ing SEXY !!! I didnt mind timmy's rapping to be honest, he was funny and entertaining

The next love and eyes, smoke, magic. This is ayumi's version of broadway show. So many things going on in this part. I really really enjoyed this part.

Skip to the ending, she chose how beautiful you are as an ending song, and it works, so emotional and beautiful.

This is probably the BEST arena tour ever since MY STORY tour. I love the performance of "Song 4 u", wonder why she decided to cut the song short.

Costume wise, i don't like the outfit of "appears" and "missing". It's just too normal...

I'd rate this concert a 9 out of 10! :love:love

After watching the Tell me why~reminds me segment, I couldn't look at the other parts of the concert the same way. Like a lot of people said, the show was really dark. Even the songs with up-tempo songs felt different. I wish Return Road had stayed in the setlist.

AT10 will remain my favourite tour ever, but this concert was really good. The fact that it was so dark is what appealed to me, plus Ayu's vocals. They were great :)

My blu ray arrived yesterday and I literally started watching it 5 hours after playing Ni No Kuni so I was pretty damn tired... So far I've only watched nearly half of it. But I liked what I saw and heard.

Happening Here is a song I still hate but it serves as a good opener given the concept. It was fun to watch :P

Song 4 u: I can't say much about... Why was it cut short? O.o

Tell my why & reminds me: Awesome! I thought the choreography and theatrics fit in really well and Ayu singing these songs so passionately just transcended them into a whole other level.

appears: I didn't really look at the tracklist before I popped in the disc so I was really surprised to hear this one... I got really tired at that point so I don't remember much about it.

Missing: Solid but the performance around it was very typical, in my opinion.

Shake It: Was this the point when Timmy was going mental on the mic? Or was that NaNaNa?

STEP you/NaNaNa/Sparkle: I don't remember much... I think I fell around this point. I'll watch it from this point on tonight and see what I think :P

So far I think it's a pretty solid show. Although it comes nowhere near to her 2011 tour (which I thought was mind blowing). I also don't really like "hotel" concept. I know that's just the backdrop and decoration and all that but... I dunno. I found the video interludes uninteresting and the "hotel tour guide" thing at the start just had me cringing :P

Still , Ayu herself is amazing as always and so far it's as enjoyable as I expect any of her live shows to be.

Watching bits and pieces now..why can't she perform Ladies Night? I wish she would perform the ~Another Night~ version so she wouldn't do the obnoxious cute voice and stuff.

OMG, how dare you, lol. R'n'R Circus is a masterpiece.

Don't have time to do full write-up now, but it was an interesting watch. Hated the re-hashed crap from CDL. Really didn't care for the new non-Party Queen songs (even though I love Missing, I was just not feeling a performance for that... maybe because it was just a 'tacked-on' performance).

She can quit with the contacts garbage too.

Timmy is way too INTENSE for the show. I mean, half the time you can't help but stare at him, tot he point where he is over-shadowing Ayu, and definitely overshadowing her other dancers. And like, wtf was that giant lips gettup he wore near the middle/end there... Lol. He looks down-right scary the majority of the time.

I'll review performances later.

I actually kinda like it.

It's like, there are a lot of details that I completely hate. Like I hate the dancers, even though they work with the concept, or I hate the stupid mattresses, or I hate the whole ESM part...I hate a lot of the vocals, outfits, ideas, lol happening here...

THE ****ING CLOWNS ****ING **** GO AWAY

...but as a whole, I feel like, it was structured nicely, there were distinct parts, and production was really nice. And I really like how Love Song tied everything together.

I think they all had a lot of energy, and even though I was bored at parts, I think it was still fun on the whole.

I liked the upbeat sections, Shake It - the next LOVE. I hate ESM with so much passion. Even live. It was so cheap and such a rip off. I just hate it. But then I loved kiss o kill to the end.

Surprisingly enough, Timmy doesn't bother me much. I think his craziness adds to the fun, because her stupid dancers, their ****** choreography, and other vocalists are boring as ****.

The dancers are best when they're upbeat dancing. Not when they're acting or flailing around. It's too much.


I was also happy that for at least one song, Missing, it was just her and the stage for a bit.

This tour still kinda bugs me a little, because I feel like they could have had something really big and epic with the concept of Party Queen...but then I guess this goes too.

I guess life is like that. Fun and heartbreaking.

idk if it's better than her last tours, cause I don't remember them. But it was fun. So. Meh. I'll watch the rest of it some other time. So yeah, as much as I didn't like a lot of things, I think they did a good job putting it together.

Same issue I have with a lot of her recent concerts, too much dancer involvement. A performance like kiss o' kill did not need that many dancers, or the other slower songs.

I've had that problem for a while now myself. It seems like only once in a blue moon we ever see Ayu performing a ballad without some kind of distracting dancing going on around her. I remember AT03-04 when she sang teddy bear and Memorial address and it was amazing... The whole focus was just on her and the emotion was felt a hell of a lot more because of it.

I mean, imagine if she had one of her dancers flinging himself around while she was pouring her heart out during Memorial address... It just takes away from the magic of the performance.

Memorial address at AT10 was just her, and count down as well - they were really good. But yes, I noticed during this tour it's like Ayu has become a narrator for a "scene" being portrayed on screen. She's rarely an active participant in the scene itself... and if she is, it's minor. That being said, I thought reminds me was quite effective. At first I thought it was all over the place, and I was disappointed that it sounded more like a ballad live than rock (I imagined them really pushing the guitars and it being all-out intense), but the ending redeemed the performance and I rewound it and watched it again. I was bawling, lol.

I really didn't like this tour. To many dancers. Ayumi is sitting on a chair in the back I want to see Ayumi not her dancers. And what can I say about Timmy.:no At least Ayumi looks happy.:D

Yeah the clowns need to go, haven't they been hanging around since CDL 2010-2011? God when Ayu likes something she runs it into the ground.

I'm actually quite tempted to watch AT10 quite frequently these days. It's become one of my favourites recently :P

And I thought Tell me why and reminds me were just amazingly performed. I was annoyed by the theatrics at first but it all came together rather well. I was nearly in tears myself. Easily the best part of the entire show :)

Just watched reminds me again. Still bawling. Lol.

She does and often do that and I don't like it either :no
I know it's nice but having clowns for like every live she had ever since she got them are just ridiculous.

Uhm.. I think clowns were appropriate during the Rock'n'Roll Circus Tour, because of the word circus.. lol

Finally I watched it full! :heart
And I have to say that I really enjoyed it a lot. Her vocals were just amazing.
Songs like Tell me why, reminds me, how beautiful you are were awesome.
Shake It♥ was.. lol
And then kiss o' kill.. Love love love it~ :heart
Maybe it's not better than Rock'n'Roll Circus Tour, but it's one of the best, imo.

Anyway, Timmy really scares me.. XD

I agree that there were way too many people bugging out on stage most of the time.

Reminds Me is like a huge brawl on stage. I found it really over dramatic and distracting. Everyone must have been really exhausted after intensely fighting for 5 minutes straight. Though, I did think the ending was powerful.

The concept of the mattresses and everyone in pajamas was just weird. Who thought of that?

Shake It...those girls really know how to shake it! It was cute and fun, but I didn't like Ayu's vocals. The one guy who was dancing with them cracked me up.

Even though I'm not a big fan of the two jazz numbers, I thought they were executed quite well. I loved when she used the row as guys as stairs. But again, there was just waaayy too much going on. Dozens of dancers in different costumes, people spinning in the air, Timmy and his ridiculous, scary facial expressions...I felt like I was developing ADD trying to watch it all.

The lighting and imagery for Kiss 'o' Kill was cool, but not the fake fighting and the "bluurggghh I can't reach yooouuuu" stuff because we've already seen enough of that. And the moment when Shuya gets stabbed by a comically oversized sword was a serious WTF moment.

One Night Carnival was awesome.

Finally my bluray arrived today!

I had this love hate feeling for this tour.

the opening is different with Timmy's voice describing about the hotel.

but then at certain part you feel like theres too much stuffs going on the stage, drama, fighting, the special screen at the back, sometimes you feel like Ayu is lost among the dancers.

and of course MY BIGGEST PROBLEM is that when TIMMY is overshadowing Ayu all the time =__= he didnt need to put on that red outfit when Ayu is wearing a silver bling bling dress, you attention surely turned to him not Ayu.

surprisingly, i love the Tell Me Why performance, they did a new movement here, and wow at the end of Reminds me performance, ayu just really cried O.O

Maro!! He did a step dance! that is something new! even its such an awkward thing after the drama between him and Ayu to watch him in this tour >.<

Im so loving the next Love and ESM ! OMG Ayu is really sexy and she can do it a la broadway!

The Kiss 'o Kill performance, again too many dancers on the stage, but then I love the outfit and voice sounds really good! she looks like shes on fire at certain angle there!


Love song got new arrangement, i like the ending too.

and oh, I forgot xD Appears seems weird in that outfit and that choreography, really bring back the great performance at AT07 not a bed messy performance like that,ruined my favorite song =.=

Watching it right now, but for me it seems like Ayu is really enjoying herself on the stage, being all sexy like. I think she likes that, its not just some 'act'. So far, I like it a lot. I wish Ayu had this kind of energy on CDL11-12 too. She's all over the place!


Also, GREAT VOCALS


Edit: Shuya, please get the **** off the stage during kiss'o'kill, you have no business there.
http://i.imgur.com/n3WVpvj.png
Way to ruin my favorite performance of all time, ever. During the tour of secret Ayu was "escaping" from the masked men(which are not masked here), now she's more like "SHUYAAA, I WANT YOUUU~" Ugh. UUGh. I'm SO disappointed in this performance. I thought it would be like Tour of Secret performance. Shuya carried as cross? No thanks.

^

yeah same hereeeee!!! I was sondering what is exactly Shuya is doing there!!!! I want the mask men to chase after Ayu not him >.<

And then ayu ~ disappears~ (quite obviously) ... TO TURN UP ON THE OTHER STAGE. What a let down.

Great concert!! But A MUSEUM is still my number 1!

Timmy can't help it if he's more charismatic and has more stage presence than Ayu

^
Lol at you XD

Some stuff I noticed:

Is it just me or is Ayu a total ******* during Kiss'o'Kill? She makes Shu-ya fight for her over, and over, and over, and over again, and when he is almost reaching her, she vanishes and leaves him alone to suffer alone. @_@ It's a really interesting metaphor to some relationships...

The level of sarcasm of having cutesey/happy Ladies Night~Party queen~Sur-evo-Sur after Shu-ya's death and the tissue dancer's suicide is overhealming xD It's like the whole happiness on the end of the concert is pretty much faked xD And when she tries ending such a dark concert on such a cynical and pessimistic way, the concert refuses finishing that way, "forcing" her into singing Love song on the most sincere performance of the whole main set.


It's not her most entertaining concert performance-wise, and not her most impressive concert musical-wise (those would be AT10 and AT11 IMO), but it's her most mature and inteligent concert, I believe... I'm surprised.

My only problem with Ayu's concert nowadays is that there is too much going on and you barely can see her, I miss when it was just her during ballads too... CAROLS @ AT05 is flawless.

The high point of this concert was Party Queen imo, my mom was watching with me this part and she said "Wow, she looks sad, and it's even more sad that she had to keep faking a happiness for the rest of the song" and that's how I feel about loneliness sometimes.

No he can't :spazzed


@andrenekoi: I completely hate the way she portrays relationships most of the time. I know it's not easy trying to explain how complicated things are through dance, but...idk ew....I guess her and I just don't always see eye to eye with that stuff lol

But you're right about the intelligence and structure. I think that's what was what was best. And that Love Song finish. It was perfect.

For that, respect~

Honestly, I still want more of the musician feeling from her...but meh. These big, cinematic concerts do work for her I guess. Visuals aren't for me, outfits, and stage props, and whatever...but I didn't mind too much.


And yes, omg whoever said it. Her cutesy voice needs to die. There were a few songs where she'd use it...and then later in the song it'd be gone, and she sounded a million times better. And I'm like, why even start with it!

Her singing is great as always. RNRC had more than enough going on when instead of sticking with the usual # of dancers they added another dance troupe for the clowns. Every concert since RNRC has gotten worse with the dancers becoming more of the show and now Timmy added for them to have 2x the backup singers. But Timmy is not a background singer, he's always in the foreground instead. I think Avex and Ayumi herself have completely lost it when it comes to putting together a concert. If fans are going to pay $200 - $1000 to a reseller or even if they get the tickets at normal price, they are going to see Ayumi Hamasaki, not the largest dance troupe on earth with 4 of the worst sounding backup singers on earth featuring a special appearance by Ayumi Hamasaki. This was the worst tour to date, with songs from PQ (one of the worst albums by any artist I've listened to). Fortunately the next tour includes songs voted for, so PQ, Love Songs & Love Again will probably go away quietly for awhile.

I don't agree on the way she portrays relationships on her work, but I believe this is way Love song was so powerful as a concert ending... It was the point of the show where she herself states she is more butthurt than actually believing things are that way.

I loved the tour, ayu did a great Job with the vocals and acting specially during tell me why, and Timmy was so fierce the whole time :). I couldn't help but sing and dance along with them throughout the concert. I love the whole ayu and Timmy combo. But one thing I can't get off my mind during party queen ayu sang " I am a lonely queen" I don't know why but I think ayu was serious :(

Things I loved:

1. The concept as a whole. I loved the idea of segmenting the concert based on different rooms of the hotel. Segments that stood out for me were:
- Tell me why/reminds me
- the next LOVE/Eyes, Smoke, Magic

2. The concert was surprisingly colourful and the costumes were top-notch.

3. Zin's pecs.

Things I did not love:

1. Dear God someone pull Timmy off the team. His backup vocals are absolutely terrible. He was mumbling through Happening Here and it sounded like he lip-synced his part through NaNaNa. His next composition should be titled "Hot Mess feat. ayumi hamasaki".

2. Ayu's cute-sy singing. I don't think it suits her anymore. I didn't mind it as much for Shake It, but Ladies Night was dreadful.

3. Even though I loved the Tell me why/reminds me segment musically, the acting was a little over-dramatic.

4. Clowns. They didn't even fit the concept. It's time they retire!

Pros:
-Colorful and lively!
-The cuteness of Shake It<3
-Ayu was obviously having fun (Major points)
-Timmy's outrageous stage presence (outfits and all)
-Majority of songs were enjoyable
-Stayed to the Hotel theme
- the next LOVE wwwooooo!! She was classy and SEXY!!

Cons:
-Though colorful and lively...was a tad bit gimmicky
-Too many dancers and flailing (-__- something new please)

In between:
It was like AT09 after AT08
Ex. AT08 was EPIC and had major props and costumes, memorable. Then you get AT09, it was fun but overall ehhh b/c of the striped down factor. And it repeats itself with AT10 EPIC...and now this. But it's not really a con or pro.

it was a very crowded stage, and i didn't know where to look because of all those dancers. I was like... where's ayu?

but vocalwise it was a good concert, a bit of their concepts were overused though... i guess it's a great time for a change. You know, for the best live tour maybe. Please please please tissue dance or separated lover dance no moreeee T.T

i cant stand those stupid clowns anymore, and yeah, there are too many dancers... reminds me would have been too much better if it was ayu alone on stage... and omg, that "cute" voice on shake it was annoying :=

haven't seen this yet, but listend to the mp3 versions and I'm pretty impressed compard to the last 6 concerts.

best were Happening Here, Love song (gosh, so greta and the lalala at the end) and One night Carnival (she should do a cover/collaboration album)

I was really pleased with the concert!!
Happening Here was such an epic concert opener, and the costume is one fo her bests ever! Song 4 U was great also, such a pity they didnt use the full version
Tell me why/reminds me was entertaining, but im super tired of the "love wars" concept. She sounded amazing though
appears/Missing was great vocally, but the concept is megasuperused. The dress was really cute
Shake It was actually super funny and she looked really lovely, and I really liked her vocals here. STEP you was fun as always, but they cut the second verse T.T
NaNaNa and Sparkle were a BIG surprise. LOVED the video before NaNaNa, and how energetic ayu was during both performances. Her outfit needs to go tbh, we've seen it 74647849 times already. Still loved both perfs.
the next LOVE was great, but ESM was a little bit crowded. kiss o' kill was really good, but cant be compared to AT2007
Ladies Night was the worst performance: awful outfit, awful vocals, 0 energy. Party Queen was saved by the "lonely queen" part, but I missed energy too. SURREAl~evolution~SURREAL was as great as always, and I actually loved Love Song (i would never imagine it would work that well as a concert-ender)
The encore was way too short, but i loved the outfit

Overall:

Best performance: Happening Here/Shake it
Best vocals: Tell me why
Best outfit: Happening Here/Song 4 u

Worst performance: Ladies Night
Worst vocals: Ladies Night
Worst outfit: Ladies Night/Party Queen/SURREAL~evolution~SURREAL/Love Song

Setlist i would have used:
1. Happening Here
2. Song 4 U
3. UNITE!
4. Tell me why
5. reminds me
6. is this LOVE?
7. appears
8. Dearest
9. Shake It
10. STEP you
11.NaNaNa
12. Sparkle
13. the next LOVE
14. Eyes, Smoke, Magic
15. Virgin Road (a capella) + Return Road
16. Party Queen
17. SURREAL~evolution~SURREAL
18. Love Song

ENCORE
19. Letter
20. Trauma
21. Boys & Girls
22. how beautiful you are

I love HLS Tour.. love the stage design, the costumes and the whole thing has the HOTEL feel. the only thing that bothered me is the clowns act also the acrobatic dancers, Ayu should really give them a break and hire magicians instead. and yes sometimes in some songs, there are too much dancers. i think ayu should decide which songs should use only 5-6 dancers, not ALL dancers involved in one song. and i think the dramatic "can't reach you" concept is quite boring already~~

i'd give this tour 8/10

my favorite performances were "Shake It", "NaNaNa", and "Sparkle". i thought those performances were awesome! i also liked the outfits that ayu wore during the "NaNaNa" & "Sparkle" performances. i thought the outfits were very cool & ayu was so cute in the outfit she wore during the "Shake It" performance, as well. that performance was so cute! :heart

After watching the concert on blu-ray.. I kept thinking.. something is missing.. and then I realized what it was when the credits went by.. a performance with a huge dress was missing!.. She didn`t wear one for the filming of the concert.. but wore one in other performances... and it looked really cool changing colors and such.. Other than that, I thought it was a fun concert, with dark themes..

The concert was great but I agree with some others that there are too many dancers now and those clowns do need to be retired. Less is more :-)

I think this tour is kinda disappointing like the CDL 2011-12. There are too many people, the clowns, Timmy, and too much stuff on stage. Maybe because I feel a "hotel" theme could've been better implemented. In the original HLS poster (in 2011), Ayu was popping out of a suitcase.

full concert with Mandarin subtitles:

http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list...lmvIWv2lX4ecA5

Agree.

anyway what made me feel like this concert is lacking something is when AYU GOT LESS SCREEN TIME! :thud what they with RnRC Tour, they zoom in her face and we got so many close up on Ayu but not this time, kinda bothered me beacuse at some performances you can barely see her :no

and the Appears performance should have been done the way at AT07 :(

during Surreal time, I hate it when Timmy is stealing the attraction with his huge Lips thing, and Ayu with silver dress while him in red outfit; no,no you 'll surely see him first. Surreal is always my favorite perf of Ayu with Yo chan Enrique and fans, not too many distraction please :thud

It actually looked pretty cool! I enjoyed watching it.
Not her best concert, definetely not, but it was fun!

Only, and yet I agree with others, the clowns...
Clowns are not funny. She should come up with another thing.

I am more or less done with the concert. All in all i enjoyed it, i even found reminds me part with english subtitles and it reached me, i felt bad after this performance, really strong emotions here. And i hate totally timmy, he destroyed surreal with his behavious, outfit and simply with his person. I hope that if letting him go is impossible, may he go into shadow...

I think what I didn't like was that there were too many things - too many dancers, too many emotions, too many back-up singers, too much 'Chicago' thing going, which made me actually like the concert much less

I say I really liked the theme and theme execution and interlude movies. btw, why were the interlude movies much better than her new PVs? do not understand
costumes were good too :)

sick of Shu-ya and Maro and all these 'relationship portrayals'

also, Timmy was too bad there, like a drag queen parody, bad outfit, hilarious make-up. eww

I hate 'Tell me why - reminds me' part and 'appears' performance was the worst ever performance of appears. the matress thing's ridiculous

kiss o' kill performance seemed really out of place

her vocals were better than I've expected

and her best performance for me was 'Sparkle'

I've finally watched HLS yesterday after a long waiting...I enjoyed the show a lot,liked the costumes and the special screens (the one for A Cup Of Tea was really hilarious and fun especially the moments when Ayu was falling..oh,and what a mess they did).Her voice was in a very good shape,much more than I expected,especially if you look at her A-nation 2012 performance.I don't know,she always manages to make a great figure in her tours but her most TV performances seem so flat and bland.The songs that I enjoyed most in this tour were the NEXT love,Eyes,Smoke Magic, Surreal~Evolution~Surreal and the first part of Kiss'o'Kill (FIRE!!).The jazzy songs were fabulous,her voice was really good in it and it was a really unique and different moment in her live carrer.Also,the opening was BIG.