RE: ACID QUEEN [Ayaka Ikio - Debut Mini-Album]

Tracklisting
1) RE:
2) Spin Me Round
3) Mess Up My Body
4) LoLLyPoP
5) Pain Killer
6) Spiral Storage
7) Spin Me Rond (cargo REMIX)

RE: ACID QUEEN is the debut release for dance artist Ayaka Ikio. A PV was made to produce the mini-album, for the track Spin Me Round. It was released on the 14th of January, 2009.

The album opens in a rather strange, almost Star Wars-ish manner with RE:. It opens with what sounds like the flying and firing sounds of Star Wars starships, before bringing a rather aggressive beat, with Ayaka singing over it. It’s just an intro, so there isn’t really much to expect. It’s only 47 seconds long, anyway.

Spin Me Round was the track chosen to promote the album, and I think I can see why. It consists of Ayaka singing “Spin me ’round” in a distorted voice over a rather but not really heavy synth arrangement that consists of what is actually very few individual beats. If you branch out, anyway. There aren’t very many changes, except for an extra beat added after the chorus, and a bit of a change of how it all works in the chorus. I could do without the high-pitched background vocals you sometimes hear, though. The middle of the song is almost exactly the same, albeit a bit quieter straight after this first chorus, before coming back into full swing and allowing a more echoed Ayaka to chant the title. However, the aggressive section has probably the worst part of the vocals being chosen to be looped, then an oddly vocodered high voice chanting the title in a much faster manner. It’s a bit strange, and after this, the song follows its original suit again. The middle could have been better at times, but it is a great song.

Now we have Mess Up My Body which, unfortunately, sounds extremely similar to Spin Me Round, except that you actually hear Ayaka say “fucking” in it, which was rather surprising. That treat aside, the entire structure and sound is too similar for it to make much of a proper impression when it’s placed RIGHT AFTER the song it’s taking its influence from. It’s a bit too similar and generic to be enjoyable, as well, so without the benefit of a few songs difference, it just isn’t worth listening to.

LoLLyPoP shakes things up again. Ayaka seems to love swearing, because the big F makes another appearance rather early in the song, as does the B word. Anyway, this beat is even more minimalistic, relying on a rather disjointed thump and almost distorted electric guitar-ish sound. It sounds even better when the rest of the synths come in later in the song, but for the good majority, Ayaka’s just… Talk singing. Without a vocoder. I REALLY didn’t think that was a good choice, so it comes off as rather mediocre as well.

But THIS initially sounds like what the album needs. Pain Killer opens with a gritty, in your face synth with Ayaka once again singing without a vocoder over it. The too similar beeps come in after the vocals fade out… But after this part, I must say god DAMN girl, this is hot. It’s a much faster beat that’s a lot easier for dancing to as well as just enjoying. It has a similar sort of sound to it, but it tries to make it different with the speed and use differences, and I think it came off very well. There are the occasional quieter parts, which do help the song along, but I’m afraid to say the song is missing something: A VOCODER! WHY DOESN’T SHE HAVE ONE HERE?! The bland, normal talk-singing is getting on my nerves in this song, and it keeps it from being anywhere near as good as it could have been.

And now it just gets stupid. Spiral Storage opens with some of the worst distorted vocals I’ve ever heard, and a strange foghorn kinda sound over a very familiar thumping beat. Once again, we get almost totally vocoder-less vocals. I say almost totally because there is a vocodered edge to them. The chorus sounds rather nice, it’s a lot lighter than the other songs’ choruses were, and the 8-bit-styled chorus outro sounded nice. Vocals were the big killer here, because it got a bit better musically after the beginning, despite still being a bit messy and random at times.

And unfortunately, the closer is a remix. The Spin Me Round cargo REMIX sounds a lot quieter and smoother than the original did, which was nice to hear, but they don’t suit the distorted vocals much at all, and it sounds a bit like a generic dance song would. I do like the piano-like sound it has sometimes, but it’s not really a song that’ll give you a real sense of enjoyment for listening to it or anything.

Album Score
D+

Favorite Track
1. Spin Me Round
2. Pain Killer

What a shame… This could have been a fantastic dance album, but it ended up sounding a bit too generic in the end, and most of the songs sounded similar to their predecessor, except for the change in style that seemed to happen every two tracks. Spin Me Round was enjoyable enough, and Pain Killer would have been great with a few changes here and there, but otherwise, I wasn’t entirely impressed. I’m hoping she gets better, but at the moment, I don’t know what to think about her, except that she’s generic.

More features~ (Now with 100% more buttons)

So, my internet’s messed up yet again, making downloads almost literally impossible. This means I won’t be able to do those Mika Nakashima and Emi Hinouchi review marathons that I “promised”, but I will keep trying to download their singles so I can at least make some progress in their discographies.

I’ll try and ride the month out with PV reviews, since I have some un-reviewed PV’s sitting on my computer and iPod, so Vitamin Drop won’t necessarily die again. Also, I have two new features I’m making to try and give some proper reviews to the blog during this crappy time. One is another Techno/Dance artist that a few readers may have seen on another blog… And another is a male artist I’m sure ALL of you have at least HEARD of who recently went solo and released his first album. THANKFULLY, neither have any singles I need to review, and I have their albums, meaning no horrid downloading, and I can easily do them today, even. Though I’ll probably delay them a bit so I have some stuff to review on other days.

So yes, as such, both Naota Uraya and Ayaka Ikio will now be featured on Vitamin Drop.

However, to you AAA enthusiasts, I will NOT be featuring them. Not now, not ever. I won’t even touch their discography with a 50-foot shit-covered stick, I hate them that much. Large multi-member unisex units do NOT work, they sound GOD-AWFUL, and they just make me lose faith in the Japanese music scene. I won’t even think about answering questions or requests relating to them.

Though just so you know, I’m like this about boy bands, too. I’M VERY PARTICULAR WITH MY MUSIC~ Sue me, it’s just how I am.

And now, I’ve made some very amateurish buttons to represent my site! They aren’t too good, since this is really my first time even trying, but if you’d like to use them to link here, feel free. I’ll add one of yours in return if you tell me you’re using one of mine, of course. I realise a lot of people have been doing this lately, and already had some, but I felt the blog needed a bit of visual representation instead of just being a set of words everywhere. Unless no one else wants to use any of these, which is also fine.