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The thing is, the English "mood" coulda been captured in a studio. Doing it on-location, she would have had to have a landmark of some kind in the background, and that would have been less than congruent with the album title anyway. I think they're English "enough" really.
But I do agree with some other people's sentiments that these would be great as magazine shots, but they are pretty underwhelming as CD covers. It's becomiing increasingly obvious that Ayu doesn't really know what she wants anymore beyond a vague idea... Something like "RAINBOW" or "I am...", their covers came about because Ayu had a very specific idea in mind. Since then, I feel like she's just taken random photos and let everyone else pick the design and treatment.
These covers are good insomuch as they're simply inoffensive in almost every way. No risk taken, no imagery, just ayu and the title. The fact that those red bands are there at all is very different, and it's such a TINY thing that's really mostly pointless. The fact that all the text is readable is fantastic. It shouldn't be fantastic.
There's much more that could have been done with this idea and probably any of the undoubtedly many photos taken, but they decided to play it safe - This time they did it right and finally followed BASIC graphic design rules, so good for them. I just hope that when the next album comes along, they actually take some conceptual risks.
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