What did you think of Hotel Love Songs?

[Jason]

Originally Posted by Zeke.

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

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

[Zeke.]

Originally Posted by Jason

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.

[terra]

Originally Posted by ExodusUK

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.

She does and often do that and I don't like it either
I know it's nice but having clowns for like every live she had ever since she got them are just ridiculous.

[Livey~]

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

Finally I watched it full!
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~
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

[SheFliesHigher]

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.

[AyuWorld]

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 =.=

[kimmeh]

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.

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.

[AyuWorld]

^

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

[kimmeh]

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

[Didz-19]

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

[ExodusUK]

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

[mizuki-7]

^
Lol at you XD

[jiarongisme]

Just watched the concert (up till the encore because the rip I downloaded didn't include that). To me, this is one of her most cohesive in terms of theme and concept. HOTEL Love songs is a pretty dark hotel to be in. I'm not sure if I want to stay in it

I loved the opening. I think it's probably her best one yet. Or maybe right behind A museum's one. I don't get the inclusion of Song 4 u. Felt pretty haphazard. I've always felt that Song 4 u is a really badass and yet grand kinda song.

My favorite part of the concert has got to be Tell me why ~ reminds me. For me, I think the amount of dancers on staged worked. So well. And man, this part was SO INTENSE. The end of reminds me where Ayu was pleading Shuya to not leave was a nice touch imo. From here on, I think the tone of the concert was set.

appears and Missing were pretty impressive, vocal wise. Everything else was just so-so, since it's pretty much similar to the CDL.

Can we talk about the video for a cup of tea for a second? I was so confused. So very confused. LMAO. But the performances that followed were pretty enjoyable and entertaining. The cute voice kinda irked me a little in Shake It♥ though.

NaNaNa and Sparkle were pretty cool. Nothing else.

the next LOVE and Eyes, Smoke, Magic were meh. Like someone said, this section did have potential, but it bored me. Kinda disappointing because I liked both songs on the Party Queen album.

Didn't think much of kiss o' kill. I just wished that Return Road was still inside and not replaced. The side stage looked pretty unnecessary though. Just another distraction.

Ladies Night, URGH. She needs to stop using that cutesy voice of hers for this song. It just doesn't work. It kinda worked for Shake It♥ ngl, but Ladies Night is just.... URGH. It frustrates me so much. Party queen was pretty... Interesting, I must say. The whole lonely queen part may throw you off if you didn't expect it imo. I felt sad for a moment there. Then SURREAL ~ evolution ~ SURREAL came out. Honestly, it felt different from her usual SUR~evo~SUR. Maybe because of the tone of this concert, but something just felt off there. I really liked Love song as a closer. It felt like the concert had a nice closure to it, and not really leaving me hanging.

Overall, I would say that this concert was pretty eclectic. Not your run-off-the-mill Ayu concert, but for what it's worth, I enjoyed it. It's something new, a breath of fresh air. I wouldn't mind seeing concerts like this from her from time to time. Vocals wise, it's pretty decent. Though there were some parts where I felt it could be better, but overall, pretty good!

I wished there was a documentary film for this though. I'm so interested on how she conceptualised everything, from the time before POWER of MUSIC, to the CDL, then to this. A lot of things must have changed so much.

[Andrenekoi]

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.

[kaled kalil]

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.

[emi♡]

Originally Posted by ExodusUK

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

No he can't


@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!

[saigodansu]

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.

[Andrenekoi]

Originally Posted by emi♡

No he can't


@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!

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.

[calltome]

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

[FoObY]

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!