Ayu's 6th album will be released 17 December 2003

[Unimatrix Prime™]

I suppose I don't have much to say to this, as it's a very valid point you brought up. But...

Also take into account Avex's status. Because ayu's been so profitable for them up to this point, they've let her get WAY too powerful -- it's become dangerous to the company. At one point, Ayu was responsible for 40% of the company's stock. This means that if she left, the company would be worth about half what it was.

I can understand this. No use in putting so much into Ayu, only to find out one day that she quit. But the way I see it, it's somewhat of Avex's/Ayu's fault in setting the bar for all those 10-track singles and loads of megamixes so high that it's only natural to feel that the songs/singles nowadays are perhaps not as hard-hitting as her previous stuff. I think that after I am... , Ayu hit the peak of her career, and while the songs themselves after I am... weren't that bad, it ended the days of those long singles and constant releases. It wasn't til the 2nd half of this year that Ayu finally released singles like Forgiveness, No Way to Say, etc. , along with the RMX WORKS simultaneously. Perhaps this was to make up for the "delay" of releases in previous months, but I'm still not sure why an artist who has released so much would, in a sense, be "killed off" by Avex. Yes, I know that it's to reduce the "reliance" on her in case she did leave, but if I had the rights to Ayu, I'd be sure to deliver some top-quality stuff before she did leave.

We can expect to see more disappointing releases for awhile, until ayu becomes an artist who (heaven forbid) debuts at number 2 (*GASP SHOCK HORROR!* don't alot of NORMAL artists debut at #2 instead of 1 without us worrying that their careers are totally over?? YES. Jeez. x__x).

I suppose that will happen one day, and we'll all be overjoyed when Ayu's new CDs debut higher than top 10 or something, so while she's still on top, I guess we should all enjoy it while it lasts. No one lives on forever, not even Ayu. She'll eventually fade away, perhaps not in the minds of fans, but from the jpop scene itself, and we'll all have to accept that someday. While I'd love for the days of all those remix CDs to last, there comes that time when it won't happen anymore.

Once there's equilibrium between ayu and the other artists at avex, the releases will level off and we'll be used to what we now consider disappointing.

This will be quite the surprising fact several months from now, as I suppose a sale for a single, for example, will be lucky to break 10,000 over the course of a few days. Perhaps in the future, 2-track singles will be the norm, and we'll be surprised with 4-track "mini-albums"

So once again, some very interesting points you brought up, Deli! Let's all see how true they'll all be in the coming weeks and months...