‘LOVE LETTER’ was released in 2008 and up to now it’s the last studio album of Ai Otsuka. ‘LOVE LETTER’ topped the Oricon Daily Chart on 17th December 2008 – the day of its debut. At the end of the first week it sold 104,232 copies which resulted in the 3rd place on the Oricon Weekly. The album stayed on charts for 16 weeks, selling 179,670 copies in total. It was a relatively low result comparing to previous albums, as ‘愛 am BEST’ sold 727,192 copies altogether, ‘LOVE COOK’ – 835,333. Nevertheless, some say that this album might be one of the best Ai-chin’s works ever and I strongly agree with them.
Definitely this album sounds different than any of the earlier albums: in ‘LOVE LETTER’, Ai-chin left her typical youthful image and cute mood of music, heading into a more mature style: more piano-dominated ballads, a small flirtation with jazz, also, which is interesting, a brand new dimension of upbeatness. Apparently, Ai felt that it was time she had grown up and this is it – as she said in the interview for Excite: “I feel I have matured a lot in this album”. It could have been this definite change which caused the sales to decrease. In fact, such songs as ‘Sakuranbo’ or ‘SMILY’ always sold better than ballads, even as good as ‘Kingyo Hanabi’ or ‘Daisuki da yo’.
The booklet also reflects the growing maturity – no more Ai-chin throwing fruits, pulling faces or staring at you with a frying pan in her hand... Instead, we have an exquisite collection of photos of a pretty young woman, delightful in her delicacy and feminine charm. There is Ai dressed in a too big blue sweater revealing her neck and thighs in a seductive yet tasteful manner... Ai-chin with meaningful eye expressions: either full of nostalgia or filled with curiosity... And finally Ai with her pretty face lightened with joy of love... She shines! However, there is one big BUT: the technique used to take these photos spoils some of their charm - most of them are unsharp, blurred and generally out of focus. Maybe there was a reason why those photos look like they had been taken by some amateur (sorry, Mr. Photographer), but it doesn’t appeal to me at all... At the beginning of the booklet there is a fabulous panoramic photo with great light and sharpness – why couldn’t all the pictures be like this one? I believe that a traditional school of photography would unveil the natural beauty of Ai-chin better than some sort of artistic experiments...
What about the music? The whole impression about the album could have been better if the songs flew smoothly from one to another – instead we have a set of songs which seem to be just piled up without any thoughtful arrangement. Three ballads, then two faster songs, then ballads again, then an ‘experiment’ and then a ballad once again. This messed up order of songs doesn’t allow you to truly appreciate their value, which sucks! As far as my experience is concerned, I often skip “Creamy & Spicy” and “Do Positive” simply because they spoil this precious nostalgic feeling aroused by having just listened to “Kurage Nagareboshi” and “Ningyo” before... Those two skipped songs are fine as well, but I can’t really see it as I find them disturbing in that particular place.
The album consists of songs which could be classified into 3 groups: ballads, “neo-upbeatness” and experiments. I didn’t want to describe the songs one by one, because that would be too long. Moreover, as I mentioned above, there’s no point as the order spoils the impression... Thus, let’s stick to my classification. Here we go:
The album includes 7 ballads. It’s more than a half of the album and the first time Ai has included so many of them in one album. All the ballads here feature piano, soothing voice and deep love message. The new thing about them is that two of these ballads (“LOVE LETTER” and “Ningyo”) go without almost any decorations – we can say that they are almost raw. There is also Ai singing a cappella at one moment, which is definitely a new idea. In my opinion, in this album Ai-chin has shown us the real mastery in touching the listener’s emotion using only soft voice, self accompaniment of piano and a little bit of strings. She doesn’t offer any majestic sophisticated ballads such as BoA’s “Winter Love”, but still she reaches the very bottom of our hearts with her simple melodies – it’s truly fantastic. Of course, not each ballad is like that. “Pocket” starts relatively softly, but then it evolves into a magnificent piece of music with piano, strings and startlingly strong Ai-chan’s voice. It’s the same with (unfortunately underrated) “Kurage, Nagareboshi”. It’s pure perfection.
I’d like to say also some things about “Kimi Fechi” and “One x Time”. Well, these two have revealed the new, up to now unknown, nature of our sweet singer... Ai singing about love with implicit but still recognisable sexual undertones? Yes... “Kimi Fechi’ lyrics seem to be the most sensual ones in her discography. Nevertheless, even while referring to the close relationships between a man and a woman, Ai leaves a wide margin for our imagination and chooses the words carefully, so that her text stays away from any nasty explicitness. Some say that “One x Time” is also a kind of “erotic” song, but more because of the music than the lyrics. I can agree to some extent with that claim, but I don’t think I can precisely determine the nature of this sensual music :P “One x Time” is such a good song that I don’t usually think much about it, only immerse in delight...
(Note: neo-upbeatness is a term in otsukalogy invented by me, so don’t claim as your own xD)
What does it mean that Ai-chan has become neo-upbeat? Well, simply that there are less upbeat songs in the album and they are much different than previous happy songs. Let’s take “Rocket Sneaker” as an example. Ai has never done anything like this before – a hyper song whose main instrument is... piano? That sounds incredible, but in fact the song itself is incredible. I love this song mostly for the freshness of idea and the way Ai and Ikoman showed the piano’s power of expression. No more thinking that piano is reserved only for ballads, Skywalker, no more... I hope Ai-chan will create more songs like “Rocket Sneaker” ^^ She has to use all potential of such an idea, definitely!
The rest of neo-upbeat zone isn’t that impressive. Of course, the songs are great, but they are simply not as innovative as “Rocket Sneaker”. I like “Bye Bye”, because it’s a catchy and sweet pop-rock song. What’s interesting is that it was written by Ai in the “LOVE PUNCH” era. I wonder why Ai waited so long to release it on her 5th album...
As I mentioned above, “Creamy & Spicy” and “Do Positive” lose some of their value only because they were poorly placed. It’s a pity, because such a funny nasal singing should be more appreciated...
Experiments are those songs which are so peculiar that they don’t belong to any of those groups above or even come close. Ai has always liked a little bit weird ideas for songs and realised them on her CDs (for example: “Mousou Chop” called by me as “The R2-D2 song” or “Babashi”). This time however, the outcomes of Ai’s crazy drives please me much better than any of the previous “jokes”. But I have to warn you – these ones don’t have anything in common with anything created by Ai before. “Shachihata” is interesting for sure. At the beginning it puzzles everyone, especially because the singer seems to be someone else than the expected person :P I can assure you that it is Ai who sings :P She only uses a very low voice, completely different than her usual high-pitched tone. This attempt in creating a pure jazz song turned out to be fairly successful, at least in my opinion. Ai always knows what to do to astonish her listeners :)
What is left is “360’”. I can’t describe this song. I can only say that it’s addictive. And the PV is scary. I’m confused every time I see it. I can’t say anything more :P
OK., so what can I say about ‘LOVE LETTER’ after a pretty thorough analysis? I still claim that it’s the best Otsuka’s album. I like that Ai still doesn’t stick to one pattern and follow it just because it sells well. She wanted to grow up, show us her maturing soul and she did it, even though after such an album as “LOVE PiECE” she could have re-used the ol’ good recipes for hits and wait for the money to flow. Fortunately, Ai has proved that she’s a great artist who creates music to express herself, not to rule the charts at any cost. Generally, I don’t see much faults in this album – I guess the biggest of them is the bad order of songs. The rest is almost flawless. If Ai-chan decides to continue recording albums like this one, I will definitely be one of those people who buy the CD. I really hope that when Ai comes back to music with her pretty head filled with joy of love and maternity, she will delight us with more “love letters” :)
