"Memorial address" Beatfreak Track-By-Track Interview
Can you give us your thoughts looking back on the past year? This year was as busy as ever, right? From March until the end of May, you had your first Fan Club Members-only Live House tour, "Limited TA Live." Then in July, you released the four-song maxi single "&." On August 30th, the single "forgiveness" and, starting in October, your 30th single release commemorative concert tour "A museum." Then the November release of "No way to say," and now in December you've released the "Memorial address" mini-album.
A: Yeah. But '03 went really smoothly, I think. I took on various challenges. Of all of them, the "A museum" tour I did in the fall is the biggest deal for me... After that was done, "No way to say" was created and then the Mini-album "Memorial address" was born.
"A museum" made use of the entire venue, with you teleporting between several stages, wearing a pure white wedding dress with a 50 meter veil trailing behind, the whole thing was really amazing. And 22 songs! Performing for two and a half hours!! It was really quite surprising.
A: I know, right? And performing "A museum" let me see all my supporting band members & dancers, who I'd worked with before, in a new light. It's hard to accurately describe it, but there was so much that came from putting on this concert, I think it had an immesurable influence on me. This concert, being called "A museum," was really huge for me personally.
This album, "Memorial address," comes in two versions, a CD-only (2100 yen) and a CD+DVD (3465 yen), and on the DVD there are PVs for all tracks excluding the bonus track, plus an "A museum" digest video.
A: Mm-hmm. If you watch the DVD I think you can get an idea of the overall feeling of "A museum."
At any rate, the CD+DVD is packaged in a nice 2-disc set. Can you give us some details of the PV and Live contents compiled on the DVD?
A: I've started to have an interest in film since the beginning of this year, watching the works of various directors proactively. Because of that, for this year's first release "&", I had new directors working on each of the three songs' videos. When the producers watched those works, they started saying things like "You should release a CD+DVD mini-album." So, having heard that input, I compiled the 7 PVs and the "A museum" digest, all shot in 2003, which all together took shape to reflect me, and I could feel the potential and appeal that the films from this year projected.
It became a work expressing the ways those films appealed to you personally.
A: And I want people to plant their bodies and watch it as closely as possible! This is something that moved ayu to really feel. I think whether you watch it alone or with alot of other people, experiencing it with both your eyes and ears is very different from only taking in the sounds.
Continuing on, can you tell us the theme of the album artwork?
A: The jacket's themes are "strength hidden inside" and "thoughts & feelings kept to oneself." Because I wanted to express this, the cover photo and inside photos are all "neither smiling nor crying, totally expressionless," and the colors are de-emphasized so it's mostly all gold.
When you get to the photo of you in green, you're posed rather like a doll or a puppet, which also reflects that feeling. Inside that doll, there is a heart that cries out in protest, but...
A: Yes. That's exactly how it looks.
Can you tell us a little about the contents of the mini-album itself? This time you had 5 songs released on singles, so there are three new songs put together here. Was the album originally intended to have 8 songs?
A: Eh, well... From the time I started this "mini-album" I was thinking about "what songs are good?" So when I finally decided on the 8 songs, there were 5 that happened to already be on singles plus 3 new songs. I think it turned into just conveying more than just the thoughts I had packed into those five songs.
The three new songs are "ANGEL'S SONG," whose main characteristic is its pop melody; "Because of you," which speaks of love feelings that you can't get rid of; and then also "Memorial address," which was recorded with your band. All good pieces of music. You chose "Memorial address" as the album's title track, but didn't publish the lyrics inside the booklet. Could you tell us the reasoning behind that?
A: When thinking about the fact that "this mini-album = myself this year", "Memorial address" contains things that had become fundamental to me. So I think using it as the title for the album was the right thing to do. But as far as the song is concerned, I didn't plan on explaining the various things going on inside me. I'd prefer if people listened first. I think if people listen to the song properly, they'll get a better idea of what I'm thinking in it. The lyrics aren't printed in there, so people have to listen to the song first, before having any information (any written characters to look at). This is because I wanted people to feel the song.
INTERVIEW: Kazuki Okabe
*Profile
Born October 2nd, 1978. Hometown is Fukuoka. Blood type A. Debut on April 8th, 1998 with "poker face." Since then, has released 31 singles and 19 albums (including remixes and best-ofs).
*New Release
Mini Album "Memorial address"
CD+DVD: AVCD-17410/B / '03.12.17 / 3465 yen (tax in)
CD Only: AVCD-17411 / '03.12.17 / 2100 yen (tax in)
01 "ANGEL'S SONG"
Music: Tetsuya Yukumi / Arrangement: HΛL
PV Director: Hideaki Sunaga
"ANGEL'S SONG"'s melody really gets at you. The version that came to me from the composer, Yukumi, had more of a rock taste, and more of a sad feeling, but HAL did the arrangement and it really became more of a "UPBEAT HAL!" sort of arrangement... So the song is much closer to what was inside me. The PV was directed by Sunaga, who also directed the "Greatful days" PV. I change into a wolf and fight a gang. But what I thought of in my head when I heard about the aforementioned change, and how it actually turned out, they were two very different things... I was quite surprised (bitter smile).
02 "Greatful days"
Music: BOUNCEBACK / Arrangement: HΛL
PV Director: Hideaki Sunaga
The subject matter in the lyrics is really very simple, maybe I didn't have alot I wanted to say? Actually, even though it's easy to listen to, there's probably alot I'm saying... That's the kind of thing I wanted to do, actually. The melody has this proactive feeling of "let's go this way!" But since the song is absurdly and excessively bright, you can't understand what sort of face I may be making in singing it (bitter smile). I was pretty much always smiling during recording. "We can be naughty because the summer gives us freedom" became the theme of the PV. It feels like, if "ourselves" is the nightmare, this is the good dream.
03 "Because of You"
Music: BOUNCEBACK / Arrangement: HΛL
PV Director: Kouki Tange
A friend of mine has someone they met who they got to really like. Things were nice between them for awhile, but then quickly dropped off. When I asked, "Do you think it would have been better if you'd never met?", that friend was able to reply with a sunny face, "I think it was good that we met, as far as I'm concerned, the moment we encountered each other was a happy one." That moment stuck with me very strongly, and "Because of You" was born from it. The dancers I usually work with on tour perform in the PV, but I suggested this to the director Mr. Tange. That's because when I did "A museum," I was really moved by the expressiveness I saw from them. That day, I saw the dancers on-set, and it sort of manipulated the atmosphere, and I think I understood what my goal was exactly. The "How do you do, friend?" atmosphere was something we had to not let out, but I think was visible in the final film.
04 "ourselves"
Music: BOUNCEBACK / Arrangement: CMJK
PV Director: Kouki Tange
A cool and incredibly pure song. Rather than "romantic passion," I'm singing about life itself, not just happiness. I have more than enough to fulfill myself, but honestly, there's still this sort of unending sadness. I wanted to write about such a feeling. As for the PV, I'm in very striking makeup & costume, and I'm thrown into an insane world where these scientists are tearing up my posters and there are eerie anti-fans. And they've put on these masks with my face. This video feels like, totally "Tange's World!"
05 "HANABI ~episode II~"
Music: CREA + D.A.I / Arrangement: tasuku
PV Director: Shuuichi Tan
"HANABI", released last summer on "H," ended with the lyric "I can't do anything about it," it seems. That's all well and good, but I thought I should give it a proper ending. Of the 7 PVs on the DVD, this is the only one shot on-location (Kujukuri Beach). From sunrise to sunset, we kept to the shooting schedule even in worrying weather. The gray and hazy sea in the background, rain sliding down the glass, tears falling, and in the middle of this lonely time I furiously play guitar. And then, the transient fireworks scatter. I think my sad faces and everything in this video all marks the end of summer so entirely.
06 "No way to say"
Music: BOUNCEBACK / Arrangement: HΛL
PV Director: Ukon Kamimura
I want to explain, but I can't explain well enough. The more I talk, the more a wall is built up, and the more words become obstructed. There have been times when I felt like I'm terrible and expressing myself when I talk. So when I was saying this to people, there was someone who said "everyone feels like that sometimes, right?" And those words were the reason I was able to create this song. I requested Kamimura, who directed "Real me," for the PV. Standing on a street corner, Santa is handing tissues to the people who are coming & going, but he gives me a different color of tissues from everyone else, and when we meet again there's a scene where he hands me a present in red wrapping. In this world today, we can communicate so many feelings and business details with email and other conveniences, but I think it's just so nice to hand-deliver a gift, that we put alot of thought into, to someone we care about. So I included a scene with that sort of feeling.
07 "forgiveness"
Music: BOUNCEBACK / Arrangement: HΛL
PV Director: Yoshiya Okoyama
Instead of raising and lowering my gaze unreasonably, I was thinking, whatever age someone is, whatever era of their life they're in, there are still so many younger children out there, and what do we all have in common? And I thought, "love." From the time we're babies until we're old grandpas & grannies, I realized, we always have "love." The title, "forgiveness," comes from an image of "feelings of wishing," "feelings of repentance," and "feelings of solemnity." In Japanese, we have words like "yurusu (permission)" and "kandai na (leniency/tolerance)," but for this song I think "kandai na" is the closest to what I mean. The PV is very busy with CG, and the director Okoyama would say things like "Okay, so I think such-and-such a thing is gonna go here...", and there were a bunch of places where I would have to perform while imagining it. It was extremely difficult.
08 "Memorial address"
Music: Tetsuya Yukumi / Arrangement: tasuku
This is the title track, but also the bonus track, and the only one of the 8 tracks that was recorded in a band session. Originally I was going to record this song by myself in the studio, but during recording, there wasn't just me, the band and chorus were all around me. When I heard them playing I just wanted to sing, I think. Yo-chan's guitar, Enrique's bass, Shingo's piano. It calmed me down, the sound of all these people who've supported me. I think I really needed it. "Memorial address." In my mind, it's very special, and when I made it, it became important to me in the same way "teddy bear" (from "Duty") is.
Credit: Delirium-Zer0 @ AHS
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