Album Rating: 2.0

none of those are rlly the problem; its a good sounding record in terms of production and arrangement and instrumentation and style, but the songwriting is fucking trash. its so emblematic of the mainstream pop shit in japan; its all shiny and polished and sounds adventurous and ambitious in comparison to western pop music, but the songs are just as empty. hardly any interesting melodic ideas here at all, and where there are, shiina fails to take them anywhere worthwhile (usually because of cliched, repetitive, or anticlimactic structuring).



also the showtune sound isnt that common in j-pop but its the same old same old from her and people are tired of it.

Album Rating: 3.0

Yea i totally agree. I was just tryong to say that this is a pretty fun record, and while i dont regard it nearly as high as I do her first 3 records, I still appreciate it overall. Hence why ive rated this a 3 : )

Album Rating: 2.0

i dont think you do agree with me. i dont give equal weighting to “songwriting” and “sound”. imo if the songwriting is trash then the whole album is trash. if i dont enjoy the choruses and the melodies and the structuring, it doesnt matter how good the sounds of the album are. like im not going to put this album on every once in a while and go “wow this production is so nice, these arrangements are so detailed, too bad this chorus is stupid”.



doesnt matter how skilled the playing is, how impressive the production is, how cool the style is, how energetic and vital the delivery is: the song has to have good writing underneath it all.

Album Rating: 3.0

I agreed with most of your points, other than that the songwriting was trash. I don't find much special about any of the songs, and the album itself isn't anything groundbreaking, or even entirely memorable. I didn't find any of the songwriting to be straight up 'trash' though, just acceptable, But nothing more. Doesn't mean I don't enjoy the album as just a means of semi-mindless fun. Apologies if I confused you when I said 'I totally agree', I can be a bit air-headed sometimes and don't double-check my posts before I submit them, so I can see how I was misinterpreted there : )

Album Rating: 3.6

This ain't as bad as some of y'all are trying to make it out to be

that artwork is post-cringe

Album Rating: 3.6

tell me about it

like, i would cringe about it but spiritually, emotionally, intellectually, we're beyond cringing and now we just appreciate like it's a pastiche of 2000s dA artwork

Album Rating: 3.6

you could look at it like that

but, all i keep seeing is something straight out of a final fantasy game

it's cool but it's, like, weird that it's the artwork for a shiina ringo album

she's no stranger to weird artwork but

Album Rating: 2.5

the title across it makes it look like a stock image

that too

Album Rating: 3.6

it's been said before, but "no more show tunes pls" [393930]



it was cool when it was new circa 2003 but even by 2009 it was kinda old hat



i think it'd be cool if she just went full electronic pop like she's teased a lot over the years (think Hatsukoi Shoujo)

I still haven't listened to this in full. This whole thread had a big impact on how I thought about it when I hadn't even heard it :/ My gf also had a negative reaction to the single, saying it had a lot of national symbolism, and that Shiina had been leaning that way recently.

alt right queen !

Album Rating: 3.6

"leaning that way recently"



try more like ten years

MAGA queen before it was cool !

Album Rating: 2.0

This whole thread had a big impact on how I thought about it when I hadn't even heard it :/

Album Rating: 2.5

honestly one of this thing's biggest sins is that it feels like a double album and it's only 40 minutes long