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Tracklisting
1) LOVE LETTER
2) Rocket Sneaker (ロケットスニーカー)
3) Bye Bye
4) Kurage, Nagareboshi (クラゲ、流れ星; lit. Jellyfish, Shooting Star)
5) Ningyou (人形; lit. Doll)
6) Kimi Fechi (君フェチ; lit. You Fetch (Fetish?))
7) Creamy & Spicy
8) Do☆Positive (ド☆ポジティブ)
9) 360°
10) Shachihata (シャチハタ; lit. self-inking rubber stamp)
11) OnexTime
12) Pocket (ポケット)
13) Ai (愛; lit. Love)
LOVE LETTER is the fifth full-length studio album from Otsuka Ai, and had three singles prior to its release: Pocket, Rocket Sneaker/OnexTime (A double A-Side), and Kurage, Nagareboshi. A recut single is also planned to be released, with the main track being Bye Bye, the third track on this album. The album leaked a full month before its planned release, with the only missing track being track 5, Ningyou. The tracks 360°, Do☆Positive and Ai have all received PV’s to promote the album. It debuted at #1 on the Oricon daily charts, and was released on the 17th of December, 2008.
The album opens, suitably enough, with Otsuka’s first title track, LOVE LETTER. The song has a very sentimental feeling to it, with Otsuka singing along to a lone piano for almost the entire duration of the song, in a light tone that helps give the song a very touching atmosphere. It’s definitely a ballad, but it’s not something grandiose and synthed to the hilt, and it suits Otsuka’s vocal style well, despite a few strained notes in the chorus. If anything, I feel this style adds something to the song itself. It does have its positive sides to it, but most of the time it carries a sad tone to it, which is nice to hear from a song with such a title.
We now come to my favorite of the single a-sides, Rocket Sneaker. This is a throwback to Otsuka’s pop-rock songs, opening with a lone piano and Otsuka singing again, followed by an array of instruments like the drums, guitar and a continuation of the piano. It has a nice, fast pace to it that matches the happy sound of the song perfectly, and Otsuka isn’t giving us her overly cute voice for once. While I’m not a huge hater of that voice, it wouldn’t have suited this song, so it’s good that she left it out. My biggest gripe is how she’ll miss a few notes and go a few octaves under what she wanted to his in the choruses, but it’s not a huge problem. At least it doesn’t sound like every chorus is just one repeated recording like most songs get. It’s still ony of my favorite Otsuka tracks.
Bye Bye, the planned recut single, is another upbeat song, but it takes a different sound, with more of an acoustic feel to it than Rocket Sneaker had. The verses carry a similar sound, but it has a different tone altogether, and Otsuka’s using her voice differently, while still managing to keep it from going overly cute. Despite having some similarities to Rocket Sneaker, I feel that it actually manages to sound BETTER in many aspects, especially the arrangement, and the overal vocal performance Otsuka gives us.As surprised as I am to say it, Rocket Sneaker (wow, third time in one song’s section) has actually been knocked down a peg.
Kurage, Nagareboshi, Otsuka’s fifth anniversary single, comes in next as the fourth track, giving us our first fully-accompanied ballad on the album. I’ve heard some people say there are differences between the single and album versions, but I can’t notice any, so I’ll leave that be for now and just review this version as I see it. It’s still the same brilliant ballad that the original single version was, though with maybe a few arrangement-based differences in this version. Either way, it still loses out slightly to Rocket Sneaker as my favorite single track, but it’s a brilliant ballad from Otsuka either way, and one of my favorite ballads from her.
Now comes the elusive track we all waited that proper month for, Ningyou. It starts out similarly to LOVE LETTER, with the lone piano and Otsuka singing, and eventually gains some strings to help fill out the sound of the song. It’s another ballad, and it still has a rather simple sound to it, but I just find it to be another plus for the song itself.
Now, the next song seems to have some title problems. Some people say it’s translated into “You Fetch”, while an equal number seem to say “You Fetish”. Either way, Kimi Fechi opens with an old phonograph sound to it and a muffled vocal section from Otsuka, with an older sounding backing track, which is carried on somewhat by the instruments. It’s the first slower acoustic song on the track, and the first to use these instruments that isn’t a pop-rock track, and I feel that it works the sound well. The song has a bright, optimistic sound to it, but I think there may be more to it than I’m noticing. Either way, it’s yet another enjoyable track.
Creamy & Spicy gives us another acoustic pop song with a rock edge to it. The simple acoustic beginning to this song is really cute, and Otsuka’s vocals compliment it well. One odd thing, though, is the way Otsuka pronounces Spicy. This wouldn’t usually be a bad thing, what with her not being English, but at that high note (despite how I love how it sounds), it doesn’t sound so hot. That aside, the arrangement is still rather enjoyable, and this is one of the first songs where the real cute voice begins to rear its head to the listeners. It’s a very Otsuka-ish track, so it suits her well.
Now, I have a rather love-hate relationship with Do☆Positive. I used to love it, but it has its problems. It’s yet another pop-rock song, and the cute vocals are used a LOT in this song. This can make the verses sort of annoying, but I do like how the better half of the chorus sounds. This is a song I’m not really able to sit through and all-out claim that I love without lying at least a little bit, but she HAS made much worse songs in the past, so I can bear it every now and then. Side note, Otsuka looks horrible with that afro in the PV.
Now, here is where the songs start to get really interesting. 360° has a looping, high-pitched piano melody to start with, and it’s very reminiscent of the carousel that bears many features in the song itself, and its accompanying PV. The synth that they add later on in the introduction helps add a tone of mystery to the song, and gives the “running out of time” kind of feeling. The vocals have a sort of echo effect added to them, and they’re sung at a higher pitch, which I thought was interesting, as it’s the first time Otsuka’s done something like this in the era. I’m not a huge fan of the repeated lyrics at the beginning of the chorus, but the rest of the song is absolutely brilliant, especially near the end when the piano comes back in, and Otsuka makes her extended high note as the song reaches its peak. Pure GENIUS!
Remember that I said things get interesting at 360°? Well, they did, but it doesn’t stop there! Shachihata caught many of Otsuka’s fans by surprise, and that includes me. It has the whole big band, brass arrangement sound to it, which I thought was a great thing to do after the abundance of safer songs on the album. There’s a twist to the song though: Otsuka’s singing at a pitch so deep that you can barely tell it’s her. Also, the song has no real vocals: Otsuka’s using the rarely-heard style (these days, at least) known as Scat Singing, which is a form of vocal improvisation that used to be, and probably still is, widely used in the jazz genre, making it perfect for this song. Despite being a scat song, it only features a heavy repetition of the sounds “da” and “ba” in quick repetition, which I assume has something to do with the title of the song meaning “Self-Inking Stamp”. Many may view this as a joke song, but the true fact is, I absolutely LOVE! THIS! TRACK! Probably more than anything else on the album, simply due to the fact that it’s so non-Otsuka that it isn’t funny. The turkey sounds she made near the end with the “da” “ba” sounds was rather funnyand joke-y, I’ll admit, but otherwise, this is absolutely brilliant, if you can get past the fact that it isn’t a proper vocal song and enjoy it for what it’s meant to be.
The calmer side to the Rocket Sneaker single, OnexTime, is up next. It features the use of the piano, drums, strings and probably a few more instruments to make up its arrangement, which sounds great when put together. Despite the rather simple verses, the choruses are a lot more interesting, and despite the fact that Otsuka’s missing notes here and there again, as she did in the other a-side, it can still be a really enjoyable song, though a bit underwhelming in comparison.
The semi-final is the first single of the era, Pocket. It has a calming, wintery feeling to it, which is nice, though I feel that the song can be rather underwhelming at times, despite having a few high moments to it. It is an enjoyable song, but it can be rather underwhelming when placed after everything else the album has managed to entertain us with at this stage.
We now come to the final track on the album, the song named AFTER THE ARTIST HERSELF, Ai. It has a rather simple acoustic sound to it thanks to the lone guitar, but the added synth that plays behind it and Otsuka’s vocals gives it an interesting sound that keeps it from sounding exactly the same as every other track of this kind on the album. It sounds a lot better when the grandiose instruments come in at the second half of the song, and the few parts with just Ai singing are a nice addition too. At 6:27, the song does get rather long-winded, which can be a big problem at times.
Album Score
A+
Favorite Tracks
1. Shachihata
2. 360°
3. Bye Bye
4. Rocket Sneaker
5. Creamy & Spicy
Well, a lot of people seem to consider this one of Otsuka’s weakest albums, if not THE weakest. I, on the other hand, can safely say this is my favored out of all FIVE of her albums. It has a few consistency issues when it comes to track placement, but most of the new tracks on the album are extremely high-quality, and there wasn’t one song I hated. I can definitely recommend this to curious listeners.
Tracklisting
1. Kurage, Nagare Boshi (クラゲ、流れ星; lit. Jellyfish, Shooting Star)
2. H2O
3. Ame no Tsubu, Waltz ~LOVE MUSiC~ (雨の粒、ワルツ ~LOVE MUSiC~; lit. Raindrops, A Waltz ~LOVE MUSiC~)
4. Kurage, Nagareboshi (Instrumental) (クラゲ、流れ星; lit. Jellyfish, Shooting Star)
5. H2O (Instrumental)
Kurage, Nagare Boshi is Otsuka Ai’s 18th single, and the third in her latest era. It is also her Fifth Anniversary single, and as such, had Fifth Anniversary CD+DVD and CD Only versions, and a normal CD+DVD and CD Only version. The Anniversary covers were shot to mimic the poses from the covers of her debut single, Momo no Hanabira. The single was also released five years from the day of the release of the same single. It reached #4 on the Oricon weekly charts, and sold approximately 39,801 copies. It was released on the 10th of September, 2008.
Kurage, Nagare Boshi opens with the lone piano once again, but the ethereal tone the piano with the rising strings make sounds absolutely beautiful. The verses feature only the vocals with the piano, and Otsuka sounds great here. It’s amazing that she can reach that note at the end of the verse, too. It’s nothing like thee mountain or whistle notes artists like alan and Stephanie can pull off, but I’ve never heard Otsuka use a note like that. At least, I can’t remember any. Despite having a beautiful arrangement, and Otsuka singing beautifully with it, it still tends to get a bit boring by the end. Not boring to the point of hatred, but it does kind of ruin the mood. It’s definitely a brilliant song, but I actually find it slightly inferior to Rocket Sneaker. (The song, not the single as a whole.)
The first b-side, H2O, opens with nothing but the guitar, and is quickly joined by the drums. It starts out sounding like another rock-influenced pop song, similar to what we heard on the previous single, but at a slower speed. Otsuka’s vocals can get a bit annoying at parts during this song, the it could do with being a bit faster as well. Something about this song seems to scream 70’s rock to me, and I’m not sure why, but it’s not exactly that kind of song. I’d call this a definite b-side level song.
Ame no Tsubu, Waltz ~LOVE MUSiC~ acts as the single finale, and it’s another song that opens with a lone piano, with a quiet synth line playing in the background. Otsuka sings in a lower key with nothing but the synth line at first, which is nice, but when the piano and the rest of the instruments come in, it ends up sounding a lot better. The song seems like another linear arrangement song, except this time in the form of a ballad. I’m not a huge fan of this song, really.
Single Score
B
Favorite Track
Kurage, Nagare Boshi
While I think the a-side of this single is gorgeous (if not a bit boring at times), the b-sides really dragged this single down. I think you’d expect something a bit better than this to be her Fifth Anniversary single. The a-side was certainly good enough for the landmark that is this anniversary, but the b-side situation could have easily been fixed. I guess they mainly are just things to fill up a single though, so it isn’t a huge thing. It’s nice to see her showing some variety in the styles of her singles instead of focusing on one genre, at least. It’s not great, but it’s good.
Tracklisting
1. Rocket Sneaker (ロケットスニーカー)
2. OnexTime
3. Sora to Kujira (空とくじら; lit. The Sky and the Whale)
4. Rocket Sneaker (Instrumental) (ロケットスニーカー)
5. OnexTime (Instrumental)
Rocket Sneaker / OnexTime is Otsuka Ai’s 17th overall single, and the second in her latest era. Rocket Sneaker was used as the ending theme to the Japanese drama Sanma no Manma, and OnexTime was used as the POND’S CM song; Otsuka herself featured in the commercial. It reached #4 on the weekly Oricon charts, and sold approximately 44,428 copies. It was released on the 21st of May, 2008.
Rocket Sneaker opens instantly with Otsuka singing alongside a piano, before bringing in an assortment of fast-paced instruments that give the song a much more pop-rock influenced sound. It’s a much faster song than anything on Pocket was, and as such it’s a nice change after what was pretty much a slow single. Otsuka’s voice fits the song well, and she seems to be singing in a deeper voice at times in this song. The song tends to be a bit linear in its arrangement until the end, when Otsuka sings the final chorus at a higher key. The arrangement itself is interesting enough to keep you listening (Especially if you’ve been listening to a lot of Techno-Pop lately. Believe me.), and the fun atmosphere the song has only helps that fact.
The second a-side, OnexTime, starts in a much different manner, opening with a piano playing by itself with some finger snapping accompanying it, before some sparkling synth and a string arrangement and acoustic guitars join the mix. This song slows it down considerably after Rocket Sneaker, but it’s still an upbeat song. Otsuka’s using a lower tone in her singing for this song, which suits the change very well. Again, in comparison to anything on Pocket, the song is rather linear in its overall arrangement, and with a slower song like this, that’s not usually a good thing. It’s not in the same league as Rocket Sneaker, but it’s still a good song.
Sora to Kujira is the final non-instrumental song on this single, and once again it takes a different style. It opens instantly with a lone acoustic guitar, which Otsuka sings along with. It has a much more folk-influenced sound, which is nice to hear. Of course, more instruments slowly join the fray, with an electric guitar and the drums being just two of the present instruments. It’s around the half-way point when these songs gain more prominence that the folk elements are lost, which is a shame, as it makes the song sound like a simple rock-influenced ballad. The rock elements allow it to fit in much better with the single than if it was an entirely folk song, but it would’ve been nice to hear something like that.
Single Score
A
While Pocket was more of a piano-based single, Rocket Sneaker / OnexTime had a much rockier sound to it, which was nice to hear. Once again, every song on the single was enjoyable, but there are the usual linear arrangement problems that a lot of songs seem to face lately. Either way, it all sounds great, and the tracks were of better quality than most of the material on her previous single, which is a good thing. It was nice to hear a few different styles on this single, too, despite the most interesting only lasting for about half a song.
Tracklisting
1. Pocket (ポケット)
2. Ticket (チケット)
3. LIFE – LOVE CiRCLE
4. Pocket (Instrumental)
5. Ticket (Instrumental)
Pocket is Otsuka’s 16th overall single, and the first in the post-LOVE PiECE era. The title track was the CM song for music.jp during the month of November. It reached #5 on the charts, and stayed on the charts for a total of eleven weeks. It was released on the 7th of November, 2007.
Pocket opens with the soft sound of a piano playing alongisde some strings. It creates a very calming atmosphere, and Otsuka’s vocals fit this style when they come in. Her voice sounds a bit different compared to the LOVE PiECE album, but I can’t really tell how. Maybe it’s just me. Either way, it fits the song well, and compliments the arrangement perfectly. After the first chorus, strings are added into the mix as well, and the guitar takes a more prominent role in the song. While I did enjoy the calmer atmosphere the beginning had, the fuller arrangement featured in the second half of the song certainly sounds great as well. A perfect choice for an a-side.
Ticket once again opens with a piano, this time with strings accompanying it, but it eventually leads into a much fuller arrangement with a more upbeat sound, featuring similar instruments to what were used in Pocket. Otsuka’s voice sounds great in the verse, with maybe a few shakes at the beginning, but they don’t seem to fit the chorus as well as they could, as they use the same key as the verse. It doesn’t sound as bad in the second chorus, but that could be after getting used to it from the first chorus. After the second chorus, there’s a rather enjoyable instrumental that has a heavy focus on the violin, followed by the final verse and a chorus that features less instruments for the first half before going back to normal, and closing with a short, three-second piano solo. It’s a nice contrast to Pocket as a whole.
Closing the single is LIFE – LOVE CiRCLE. It starts with a short guitar and drum-based solo, before Otsuka comes in with some rather prominent male back-up vocals, and a slight change in her voice. It sounds a bit deeper than it did in Ticket, which is good. However, there’s a lot of repetition in the lyrics in the song, and they sound a bit… Odd at this point, especially if you don’t know what they mean. It’s definitely the poppiest song on the single, and it wins points for that, but it’s definitely b-side material. Interesting note, I couldn’t for the life of me tell that this song was in total English. That’s sone bad Engrish right there.
Single Score
A-
Favorite Track
Pocket
This is a great single from Otsuka. While the second b-side could have been better, both Pocket and Ticket were very enjoyable, and they worked well next to each other through the use of similar instruments and a reminiscent sound despite the differences in tone. A great way to start this era. Hopefully she steers clear from excessive English or learns to speak it better, because as much as I love Otsuka, LOVE – LIFE CiRCLE was just a bad example of the language being used in the Japanese music scene. It’s still a good song, but you can just barely understand it. Anyway, it’s a great single.
No, I’m not gonna document every step in the ever changing Japanese music industry. For someone with my attention span, that’s physically impossible. I can barely review an album as it is.
Kidding aside *cough cough*, I’ve decided to take a break from reviewing (As if I hadn’t done so already), and instead document different firsts related to the Japanese music industry for me. I just thought you’d like to read something like this from me instead (Then my ego took hold and here we are.)
Anyway, if you want me to add any questions to answer or whatever, then just comment with one, but here’s everything I could come up with. They won’t be that great, but hopefully they’ll do.
First J-Pop Artist/Song
Utada Hikaru / Sanctuary
So, it was about… Oh… Two to three years ago, maybe? I might be off, but a friend of mine from school randomly sent me a song she claimed was J-Pop. I was curious, but not altogether interested in listening to it despite having said curiosity from reading manga for about a year or less beforehand. Also, I thought Utada was some old chick when her name came up.
ANYWAY, I was an idiot back then, and despite her first song that I heard being in English (As Sanctuary is), I was in love with her voice at that stage. So I went on a downloading spree. At this point, I couldn’t be bothered worrying about albums due to only having an iPod Shuffle to listen to music on, so I had a whole jumble of songs from her from different eras.
First Full Album
Exodus – Utada Hikaru
Yeah, it’s not Japanese. But I didn’t care. I found Easy Breezy exceedingly cute when I first heard it, which was what made me REALLY interested in seeking out more of her English songs. Despite this album seeming sort of bland to me now, I loved it when I first heard it. It also containted the last song I heard from Utada before I decided to start searching for other artists. I BELIEVE that song was either The Workout or Kremlin Dusk, but I’m not overly sure.
First Single
Frienger – Otsuka Ai
I sometimes don’t believe it still, but Otsuka Ai was actually my second ever J-Pop artist. It seems odd when I say that to myself, but anyway. Yes, Frienger was the first single I had heard while conciously knowing that it was actually released as a single. I don’t remember if I heard the whole single STRAIGHT away, but I LOVED Frienger from the moment I heard it. This was back when I still used P2P software to get my music, as I didn’t know about those download sites (And I thought Get Asian Music was a lying hassle of an Asian site. How wrong I was.) so I was frantically looking around for this song. I was looping it for a good few hours when I did find it, along with more of Otsuka’s music.
First Non-Pop Artist
AN CAFE
It was actually quite recently that I started getting out of solo female artists and heard some groups and such. AN CAFE was my first foray into Japanese rock, but they were admittedly a bit poppier with a few of their songs. I’m using past tense because I really couldn’t give a damn about them since Bou (The blonde trap second from the right) left, as they’ve gone downhill. I was an idiot and started reviewing from there, which is why I haven’t gotten to their album yet. Anyway, they have some brilliant songs in their repertoire, and their albums that include Bou still hold some of my favorite songs (With some standouts being Wagamama Koushinkyoku and Super Rabbit.)
First Non-Japanese Asian Group
Wonder Girls
So I heard of these girls and their song Tell Me through DeviantART, actually, on a really cute flash. It was an instrumental, but it got me interested. So I decided to look it up. Along with finding out what a fad their dance had become, I found out that they were the first band that doesn’t sing in Japanese AT ALL that I actually liked. Not including western artists. I’ve been trying to decide whether to feature them or not, that’s how much. And I wanted to keep this blog solely Japanese. Anyway, my interest is finally dwindling, so I doubt I will be. They were the first, though!
Current Favorite Artist/First Song Heard
Bonnie Pink – A Perfect Sky
Despite A Perfect Sky now being one of my least favorite songs from Bonnie, I must admit, I’m glad I heard that song, because it’s what introduced me to this GODDESS. I say everyone’s my favorite at one stage or another, but this is the utter truth: At the moment, Bonnie Pink is literally my absolute favorite musical artist. No matter what my current musical taste is, I can always listen to Bonnie and not get bored of her. And that’s special, especially with someone like me. So she HAS to be doing something right.
AND THERE WE GO! I’m gonna leave it here, and urge you all to suggest more questions and such that I could answer and edit into this blog post. It needs more, but my brain died on me. Hopefully someone enjoyed this bit of trivia about yours truly.
However, I have another reason for posting this blog…
I will now be featuring the aforementioned Otsuka Ai. I remember a few people asking me to feature her, and I finally decided to. I’m not overly sure where I’ll be starting with my reviews, but she’ll now be featured here. Look out for one of her single covers on my Upcoming Reviews page!
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