Quote:
Originally Posted by Andrenekoi
I wonder so bought enough copies of her albums so she could sell over a million copies until half of the decade and ended on the yearly top 10 until 2008... Maybe it were ghosts?
Those kind of stuff, the way generations act towards cultural phenomenons isn't something you can just ask directly the person because nobody will answer "oh, I dislike this artist because they are too old now". This is something based on numbers. Those are market curves of products.
But I guess numbers have no place on a discussion were the arguments are based on what friends think about this or that.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Andrenekoi
I wonder so bought enough copies of her albums so she could sell over a million copies until half of the decade and ended on the yearly top 10 until 2008... Maybe it were ghosts?
Those kind of stuff, the way generations act towards cultural phenomenons isn't something you can just ask directly the person because nobody will answer "oh, I dislike this artist because they are too old now". This is something based on numbers. Those are market curves of products.
But I guess numbers have no place on a discussion were the arguments are based on what friends think about this or that.
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This wasn't my point. My point was that the very early years of Ayu's career as well as Britney's were the one's which shaped the actual image of them for the general public. Both established themselves during 1998 - 2000 and their image and music during THAT time was what made them popular in the first place. At the beginnig of the 2000's both were popular for what they did before. In Ayu's case her peak was when A BEST was released. So the album which celebrates the early years of her career is the one which sold the most amount of copies, is the one which established her in jpop and is the one for which she is best known for. No wonder it does well online and it's also a smart move to celebrate its 15th anniversary. Ayu was at the peak of her popularity during the release, her image and music at this time are what the general public know her for.
And talking about numbers: calculated roughly she sold with her first three releases plus A BEST around 11 million copies. That was in just four years. From there on she sold around 13 million more copies of studio albums, minis and best ofs. So she almost sold as much in the first four years of her career as during the following next 14 years.
I actually think that backs up my argument that she reached out to a lot more people with the music from 1998 - 2000 than with the music she released after that.
Everything after I am... does the general public not really remember, simply because the hype and phenomenon was over. Sure she achieved a lot from there on too but since the hype was gone she wasn't in the public eye as before.
Casual listeners do not check every career move and every single that gets released. They may hear a song in the radio or elsewhere and if they like it check it out. And if something appears in the media about Ayu they may read it because they know her name and used to listen to some of her songs. When everything they see and hear from her is the complete opposite than what they remember her for, well chances are high they won't like it. Ayu's image was that of the rebelling girl next door being true to herself and also for her unique music and sound compared to other releases at that time.
My friends now simply said that they lost interest in her years ago because she changed from the rebelling girl into a stuck up diva and that they simply don't find her music and overall sound to be unique anymore.
Furthermore I thought it might be interesting what normal Japanese people think about her and what are their reasons for not caring about Ayu anymore in contrast to some haters on the internet.