What are your current favourites? - Ayumi Hamasaki Sekai
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  #1  
Old 5th July 2022, 11:06 PM
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What are your current favourites?

Just curious what everyone is enjoying most at the moment.

I had long settled on my favourite albums and my listening was pretty much restricted to these for a long time - essentially, LOVEppears, Duty, I am..., Rainbow, Memorial Address and Secret. I had the odd favourite from elsewhere (Inspire off the otherwise underwhelming My Story, for example) but my interest had sort of tapered off with the streak of Guilty - Next Level etc, which had become progressively less interesting for me.

I recently found myself listening to WINTER BALLAD SELECTION on a whim and it spurred my interest to start exploring a bit what I had left unexplored. Funnily enough, the track that really reeled me in off this compilation was You were..., a track I must have heard while playing Next Level orginally but which clearly failed to leave an impression amidst the relatively mediocre material.

It got me to listen to and reconsider some albums I had not paid too much attention to initially. Strikingly, (miss)understood, which I have given plenty of abuse for its supposed mediocrity in the past (I'm sure you can find some of my posts denouncing it in my post history), has become a huge favourite that I've not been able to stop playing. While it certainly has its flaws, it also has some songs that have become some of my absolute Ayu favs now. I am absolutely in love with is this LOVE?, Criminal, fairyland and rainy day, but most other tracks are also at least excellent (with perhaps the exception of the plodding Beautiful Day).

I've also begun to revisit other material I had not revisited forever and have been finding little gems everywhere, not new typically for me but certainly entirely reappreciated. All tracks mentioned explicitly above, but I keep finding more and more here and there, left and right, as I'm (re)advancing through Ayu's discography (whenever I can lay off the (miss)understood, haha).

The recent singles I have also enjoyed (though not (yet?) to the extent of what I'd consider 'classic era' material, c. 2000-2009). Albums I am on the fence with, I gave Colours a spin and it has some material of interest though it also is a far cry from 'classic era'.

Oh, and yeah, how amazing is Ayu at those big ballads, huh? Damn, she should do more of them.
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Old 6th July 2022, 08:44 PM
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I really need to do a re-listen of all Ayu's albums sometimes. I've found recently I've had too much new music to listen to and not enough time to revisit older albums.

My favourite album is (miss)understood and I also love Love Songs, Duty and A One. In terms of current songs I'm loving Summer Again is just so good! I am trying to not over listen to it before the album comes later in the year haha.

Last edited by mi|kshake; 6th July 2022 at 08:47 PM.
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Old 6th July 2022, 11:09 PM
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I have been listening to my name's WOMEN and INSPIRE quite a lot recently, regarding the albums two months ago I was drown into ayu-mix-7 and NEXT LEVEL (one of my favorites since its release)..
Now I've been listening to MY STORY a lot, because of the two mentioned singles <3
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Old 8th July 2022, 11:24 PM
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I've been meaning to get into MY STORY again as well, it didn't do much as an album for me back when it was released but I've had a few singles on rotation recently and there's some great stuff there. And INSPIRE has been a favourite since it was released!
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Old 9th July 2022, 11:03 AM
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I don't think is a great song, but FRIEND has been stuck in my head for a while, so I've been listening to it a lot

Also I've been revisiting Sotsugyou Shashin, made me cry a few times
And Secret (the song), I think it has such a beautiful melody, ayu sounds like an angel while singing to it
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Old 10th July 2022, 08:15 PM
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(miss) understood and GUILTY are my favs, but I've also been revisiting albums that I don't typically go for, such as LOVE again (mostly because Ivy is one of my favourite songs) and M(A)DE IN JAPAN after rewatching the arena tour.
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Old 11th July 2022, 12:34 AM
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Nice, I'm also trying to get more familiar with stuff I've neglected or not kept up with. It can yield such amazing finds though!
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Old 16th July 2022, 03:44 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by sxesven View Post
I've also begun to revisit other material I had not revisited forever and have been finding little gems everywhere, not new typically for me but certainly entirely reappreciated. All tracks mentioned explicitly above, but I keep finding more and more here and there, left and right, as I'm (re)advancing through Ayu's discography (whenever I can lay off the (miss)understood, haha).
Absolutely relevant because I have been spinning NEXT LEVEL a lot and damn, I really underestimated it. Favourite cuts thus far: NEXT LEVEL, Days and GREEN. I have a major soft spot for both Rule and Sparkle too. The single combos of this album were insane!
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