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Hamasaki Ayumi

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Hamasaki Ayumi promoting NEXT LEVEL (2009)

Hamasaki Ayumi (浜崎あゆみ) is considered by many to be the currently reigning queen of Japanese pop and continues to top the charts with almost every release.

After a rough childhood and a brief stint as an aidoru, Hamasaki was discovered by avex producer and Velfarre founder Matsuura Max. She has worked with such J-pop greats as Kitagawa Jun (CUTEMEN), t-kimura (move), Igarashi Mitsuru (Every Little Thing), TSUNKU (Sharan Q, Hello! Project), and Komuro Tetsuya (globe, TRF, TM NETWORK) among others. She's been remixed by the likes of Ferry Corsten, Fantastic Plastic Machine, Johnny Vicious, and Armin van Buuren.

Profile

  • Stage Name: Hamasaki Ayumi (浜崎あゆみ), Hamazaki Kurumi (浜崎くるみ)
  • Birth Name: Hamasaki Ayumi (濱崎歩)
  • Nicknames: Ayu (あゆ, also see CREA)
  • Birth Date: October 2, 1978
  • Birth Place: Fukuoka Prefecture, Japan
  • Blood Type: A
  • Height: 157cm (61.8 in ; 5'1")
  • Weight: 40kg (88.18 lbs)
  • Measurements: 80cm-53cm-82cm (31.5 in-20.9 in-32.3 in)
  • Favorite Artists: KEIKO (globe), Miyazawa Rie, Matsuda Seiko, Babyface, En Vogue and Tohoshinki
  • Favorite City: New York
  • Favorite Actors: Nicolas Cage, Miyazawa Rie
  • Favorite Movies: The Bodyguard, Betty Blue, Leaving Las Vegas
  • People I Respect: People who have things I don't have.
  • People I Dislike: Liars, people who don't say hello.
  • Current Interest: Collecting white things for my room
  • Favorite Food: Biscuits (maybe my staple diet!), cakes, chocolates, kimchi (Korean marinated cabbage)
  • Favorite Things to Read: Most of the fashion magazines. Modern-language translations of the Manyo tanka poems are especially interesting. Poems of Giniro Natsuo, Aida Mitsuo, etc.
  • Lessons: Piano, Japanese calligraphy (5th rank), abacus calculation, Japanese flower arrangement, Kumon-shiki study system

Biography

Hamasaki Ayumi (1995)

Hamasaki was born in Fukuoka in 1978. At a very young age, Hamasaki experienced her father leaving her and her mother. Hamasaki woke up in the night to see him packing up his things, and when she asked where he was going, he said it was a business trip. After wishing her father a safe journey and going back to bed, Hamasaki never saw him again. Afterwards, Hamasaki and her mother (who she has always called "Mommy") lived with her grandmother. Upon moving to Tokyo later, Hamasaki and her mother both worked to put food on the table. Hamasaki's mother worked most of the time, and thus it was her grandmother that did most of the caring for young Ayumi. Hamasaki would later say that her grandmother felt more like a mother to her than her "Mommy" did. Hamasaki, in the meantime, worked as a model & actress, doing many swimsuit photoshoots for magazines like BOMB, Young Teioh, Takarajima, and Up To Boy. She starred in several movies and TV series, including Yami no Purple Eyes and Miseinen on TV, and Ladys Ladys!! Soucho Saigo no Hi , Like Grains of Sand, and Sumomo mo Momo on the screen. In 1995, Hamasaki signed very briefly with Nippon Columbia under the name AYUMI featuring DOHZI-T and DJ BASS and released one single and one mini-album, both titled NOTHING FROM NOTHING. It sold dismally. Hamasaki found little success as an idol (being unwilling to play pretend for or sleep with managers, directors, & producers) and gave it up in favor of hanging out with friends.

Hamasaki Ayumi promoting poker face (1998)

One fateful night in 1997, at a Karaoke bar in Tokyo, Hamasaki was approached by a stranger after singing. He introduced himself as Matsuura Max and told her she had a nice voice, but couldn't sing well, and he wanted to send her to voice lessons and sign her to his label, avex trax. She found him shady, but he persisted and she finally said okay. He sent her to voice lessons in New York which she rarely attended, having always had a problem with authority. She never told him that she ditched the lessons and went shopping in New York instead. She exchanged letters with Matsuura while there, showing remarkable talent for expressing her feelings. Finally she returned to Japan to record her first single, poker face. Up until the day of recording, Hamasaki had been dissatisfied with the lyrics. Matsuura, remembering Hamasaki's letters, suggested she try writing new ones, and the result was the final recording of the song.

The day before that recording, Hamasaki's grandmother was sick in the hospital. Hamasaki visited her briefly, saying that she'd come again later, but tomorrow she had to record her first single. The day of recording, Hamasaki got a fax saying that her grandmother had died.

poker face was released April 8th, 1998, followed by several singles afterwards. None were hits, but her first album, A Song for XX, reached number one on the Oricon album chart. The ayu-mi-x remix album followed, featuring a remix disc as well as an acoustic disc. Her single WHATEVER, with 2 very different versions of the song (neither listed as the original version) showed her departure from relatively safe, unassuming rock-pop to dance-pop, a staple of her discography for years to come. Hamasaki finally got her first number one single in April 1999 with the TSUNKU composition LOVE ~Destiny~. Her August 1999 single A was meant as a goodbye single, and was more like a mini-album with four all-new tracks and remixes of all of them. The single was initially released in 5 different colors. It sold a million copies, and a gold colored disc was released to commemorate that. It kept selling, and at 1.5 million copies a special edition gold disc was released. The single sold over 1.6 million copies total, and is to this date her best-selling single.

Hamasaki Ayumi promoting Mirrorcle World (2008)

Her second album, LOVEppears, solidified her title as a queen of Japanese pop. Most of the album consisted of hit singles, three of which were limited editions and are to this day highly sought-after by collectors. Her following remix series, ayu-mi-x II, consisted of no less than four albums: one of western remixers, one of Japanese remixers, one of acoustic versions, and a 2-disc set consisting of a 70 minute Non-Stop Mega Mix as well as all-new tracks. The summer of 2000 also gave us her first ever concert tour, which was a huge success and later released on DVD, VHS, and VCD. Her third album was released in late 2000, entitled Duty after her realization that as an idol to millions of girls, she had a duty to be a good role model to them. The singles that preceded it, vogue, Far away, and SEASONS, were released one-per-month and marketed as a trilogy. Hamasaki said the songs were looking at her life from the front, the back, and the side respectively, and were one of many attempts that Hamasaki made through music to deal with her past self.

In 2001, Matsuura told Hamasaki that it was time, after 3 albums, to release her Best album. Hamasaki was not happy with this, and did not want it released, but she hand-picked the songs (re-recording 4 and remixing one), and the A BEST album was released March 28th, 2001. That same week, Utada Hikaru's album Distance was released, starting an unofficial but much-watched competition between the two. Utada "won", but not by much. Both albums sold over 4 million copies.

The album included M, a turning point in Hamasaki's career. This was the first song whose melody she composed herself and it showed a definite gear-shift stylistically for the singer. Rock elements started to layer onto Hamasaki's tracks (and in copious amounts at times). Since this part of her career, nearly every single has been number one on the Oricon weekly charts, and her albums have all each shown their own character and sound. Her latest album, NEXT LEVEL, features a electro-pop sound that, while popular, is thus far unexplored by Ayu. This will surely not be the last genre Hamasaki tackles.

Discography

Albums

Compilation albums

Singles

Digital Singles

Remix Albums

Remix Singles

Re-release Singles

Germany Singles

Vinyls

Official Remix Vinyls

North American Vinyls

  • [1999.xx.xx] Boys & Girls
  • [2001.05.27] appears
  • [2001.06.12] kanariya
  • [2001.08.12] Duty
  • [2001.08.12] evolution
  • [2001.09.16] M
  • [2001.09.xx] Trauma
  • [2001.10.xx] monochrome
  • [2001.xx.xx] too late
  • [2001.xx.xx] Boys & Girls

German Vinyls

  • [2002.11.15] Connected (Part 1)
  • [2003.02.29] Connected (The Remixes
  • [2003.09.06] M (Part 1)
  • [2003.09.26] M (Part 2)
  • [2003.11.02] M (Part 3)
  • [2004.01.16] Depend on you Svenson & Gielen remixes
  • [2004.02.26] Depend on you (Part 2)
  • [2004.09.02] Naturally (Part 1)
  • [2004.09.16] Naturally (Part 2)
  • [2005.02.17] appears Armin van Buuren Remixes
  • [2005.10.04] appears The Remixes
  • [2005.10.21] UNITE! (Part 1)
  • [2005.10.24] UNITE! (Part 2)

International Vinyls

  • [2002.06.12] Connected (Belgian Vinyl)
  • [2004.05.05] M (Spanish Vinyl)

DVD / VHS

Magazine Covers

For a list of magazines Ayumi Hamasaki has appeared on the cover of, see Hamasaki Ayumi (Magazines)

Movies

  • [2002.11.13] Tsuki ni Shizumu (月に沈む; Sinking into the Moon)

Video Games

  • [2001.12.13] A Visual Mix (Play Station)
  • [2002.03.29] A TYPE (PC)

External Links

Official
Others

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Hamasaki Ayumi
Songs · Images · Magazine List
Studio Albums
01 · 02 · 03 · 04 · 05 · 06 · 07 · 08 · 09 · 10 · 11 · 12 · 13 · 14 · 15 · 16 · 17 · 18
 Hamasaki Ayumi - MASK promo.jpg
Mini-Albums
Compilation Albums
01 · 02 · 03 · 04 · 05 · 06 · 07 · 08 · 09 · 10 · 11
Live Albums
01 · 02 · 03 · 04 · 05 · 06 · 07
Remix Albums
01 · 02 · 03 · 04 · 05 · 06 · 07 · 08 · 09 · 10 · 11 · 12 · 13 · 14 · 15 · 16 · 17 · 18 · 19 · 20 · 21 · 22 · 23 · 24 · 25 · 26 · 27 · 28 · 29 · 30
Singles
00 · 01 · 02 · 03 · 04 · 05 · 06 · 07 · 08 · 09 · 10 · 11 · 12 · 13 · 14 · 15 · 16 · 17 · 18 · 19 · 20 · 21 · 22 · 23 · 24 · 25 · 26 · 27 · 28 · 29 · 30 · 31 · 32 · 33 · 34 · 35 · 36 · 37 · 38 · 39 · 40 · 41 · 42 · 43 · 44 · 45 · 46 · 47 · 48 · 49 · 50 · 51 · 52 · 53
Digital Singles
01 · 02 · 03 · 04 · 05 · 06 · 07 · 08 · 09 · 10 · 11 · 12 · 13 · 14
Remix Singles
01 · 02 · 03 · 04 · 05 · 06 · 07 · 08 · 09 · 10 · 11
Video Releases
01 · 02 · 03 · 04 · 05 · 06 · 07 · 08 · 09 · 10 · 11 · 12 · 13 · 14 · 15 · 16 · 17 · 18 · 19 · 20 · 21 · 22 · 23 · 24 · 25 · 26 · 27 · 28 · 29 · 30 · 31 · 32 · 33 · 34 · 35 · 36 · 37 · 38 · 39 · 40 · 41 · 42 · 43 · 44 · 45 · 46 · 47 · 48
Box Set
Official Website
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