Whoawhoawhoa, WAIT.~ Yes, Ayu's voice has not been as good for a while now, but....... A lot of people are mainly critical because of the fact that it's deeper..? Because it's not that screechy, high-pitched sound it used to be?? ._. Ugh...
I just want to say this:
her actual singing is WAY better the past few years than what it was in the beginning. WAY. Better.
For those of you who think she's shouting now, that's not necessarily the case. (I mean, there are times where she definitely is shouting now, but that's obviously because her voice is completely worn out. I think that if she didn't scream sometimes, pretty much nothing would come out. So she does it because she literally has to, because of what she's done to her voice...) She shouted more years back, and the first few years of her career she wasn't singing right at all. (You don't have to know anything about singing to realise this --Go watch a live of Depend on you, and then tell me if that's singing, lol...) Also, she doesn't miss as many notes as she did back then, either.
So, the main problem with her voice now is
BREATH SUPPORT. She is singing wrong in terms of how she's using the breath. Which, on the good side, technically means she is actually SINGING, not just speaking different pitches. It'll also give her a few notes more of range, at least without becoming nasal, and probably more control, which makes up for lack of volume she'll have.... Too bad that using your breath wrong can severely damage your voice, and can completely mess up how you sing in general.
I realise that many of you may not know how to sing --How to ACTUALLY sing correctly, not just adjusting your voice to fit a tune. So I'll try to explain a little bit, the difference between her singing then and now, and what's wrong.
1.
Ayu, before, relied on a type of false singing. She wasn't putting any real support in her voice, so this resulted in one step above speak-singing, if that. The only positive things about speak-singing is that it gives you a very clear, regular speech sounding tone, and that you can get much volume out of it. (Which is why you should only use it if you need mainly volume and emphasis control, like for musical or rock genres, and not range or actual good singing. BUT, even then, there's a correct way to "scream", so that you don't risk causing severe damage to your voice.) Many pop and rock singers sing like this, but when it all comes down to it, it's not "real" singing.
S
ure, you can produce the notes, but it often sounds like you're screaming, and your range ends up suffering terribly. If you even try to hit the higher notes, you get an extremely nasal sound (which just happens to be a signature of Ayumi's singing style, right?), because you are actually singing through your nose (which, that is certainly a huge no-no in "real" singing).
If, for whatever reason, you don't believe me when I say that Ayu didn't originally sing at ALL correctly, remember the first year...she had no vibrato, and she was....well, screechy. That's because she wasn't singing. THAT, not now, was screaming...
2.
Ayu's problem now is that she's putting too MUCH support into her voice, resulting in the overly-breathy, forced tone you've been hearing recently.
Now, her voice has obviously been wearing down for a while now... And even when it wasn't, the fact that she was singing wrong could easily tell anybody that there's a good chance her voice would become at least a little damaged in the near future... Anyhow,
because of the damage, even though Ayu knows how to sing at least somewhat now, it seems she must FORCE it out, because of the damage that has taken place (which, it was mostly from singing incorrectly, but, from what we've seen, could also be from unhealthy foods, smoking, drinking, etc.)... Which is why she's overdoing the "power", and putting much more than what's needed into her singing.... Which, oh no--it's an endless chain, because
this will result in even MORE damage. D:
For anybody who doesn't understand how putting too much power or breath into singing can be so terrible, besides the fact that you may sound like you're screaming... Using too much breath means both breathing and using your muscles incorrectly. And obviously, those are the worst things to do when singing. Because, even if you start out with a good range and a nice tone and all that,
singing wrong in this way tightens up the muscles, wears them down, and gets you used to singing in ways opposite of what you want. This can very quickly result in you having to literally force the sound out of you (if the damage is severe enough, like Ayu's), because your throat muscles are sore and damaged (which, no matter what, results in air not coming out as fluidly or correctly as needed to sing well - which can affect your range, heavily, too) and because you are developing bad breathing habits (by forcing out the sound--never should you need to force the sound out >_<).
Ayumi's problem is, she doesn't really know how to fall into a nice medium of singing (which, that's actually most "singers" problems, though she takes it to an extreme), probably because she learned to sing wrong, continued to sing wrong, and by then damage had already taken place. So even though she's gotten SO much better in singing, it seems she has never known how to sing 100% correctly, to keep from harming her voice. For a few years (around 2004-2006) she was nearly there, but breath support problems were still evident. (For example, in her 2005 tour [and others, as well, but this is just an example], she often directly cut herself off, or didn't hold her notes. Which may not seem so bad, but this is a horrible habit to get in to, because it screws up your breath support and throat muscles if you don't know exactly what your doing....which, Ayu didn't [and, it seems, still doesn't].)
So, at the core, this has always been a major problem for her, just that now it's taking a huge toll on her voice. :\
And she's only ever sang Boys & Girls HERSELF a few times. >_< Dunno why that, or the fact that Ayumi Hamasaki sings incorrectly, was just brought up NOW. >_____>
Oh, and I would also like to point out:
Everybody is going to need to give Ayumi AT LEAST a few months of hard work and practice before any great improvement will be made, but probably much longer (especially seeing how, to this day, she still doesn't sing correctly). Even then, it will be longer, still, before her voice is fully healed (or, at least healed as much as it can be--if she keeps going like this much longer, I can guarantee permanent damage, if that hasn't already happened).
OH, and why are some of you acting like she's ever been fat???? She hasn't gained significant weight this year, and there's never ever been a time where I looked at her and went, "ew, she gained weight..." There were even times where she looked too skinny! Even for a little Japanese girl... I think it's sad that some people even bring this up.
