A One


A One is the sixteenth full-length studio album recorded by Japanese singer Ayumi Hamasaki. It was released on April 8, 2015 by Avex Trax. It reached #4 on the Oricon charts.

Background and promotion

On December 24, 2014, Hamasaki released a triple A-side single "Zutto.../Last Minute/Walk". The single consisted of a "winter ballad trilogy" that included three songs composed by Kunio Tago, Tetsuya Yukumi, Tetsuya Komuro. In February 2015, Hamasaki announced through her official website that she was going to release a new album on April 8, 2015, which marked the 17th anniversary since the release of her debut single, "Poker Face".
In March 2015, Hamasaki went to Singapore, where she sang her new song "The Gift" in collaboration with singer-songwriter JJ Lin.
Upon release, it entered the Oricon album chart at number 4 for the week of April 20.

Personnel

Credits for A One adapted from liner notes.
  • Mastered by - Shigeo Minamoto
  • Recorded by Naoki Yamada, Yuichi Nagayama, Hiroshi Sato, Hideaki Jinbu
  • Second Engineers: Yujiro Yonetsu, Yutaro Wada, Atsushi Ohta, Junichi Shinohara, Motohiro Noguchi
  • Composer Management - Tomonori Takeda, Tadayoshi Matsuzaka, Yuki Iwabuchi, Kohji Satoh
  • Engineer Management - Rieko Furukawa
  • Studio Coordination in LA - Mai Takamizawa
  • Studio Setup Assistant - Noriko Yajima
  • Players and Studio Coordination - Yoji Sugiyama
  • Track 9 Support - Alvin Goh, Shinji Miyazaki, Tomoko Kabeya
  • Track 12 Support - Hidenobu Okita, Nozomu Kaji
  • Director - Hidetomo "Kome" Yoneda
  • A&R - Jiro Nakagiri
  • General Supervisor - Shintaro Higuchi, Hiroaki Ito
  • Executive Supervisor - Shinji Hayashi, Shigekazu Takeuchi, Ryuhei Chiba
  • Photographer - Akinori Ito
  • Art Direction & Design - Takuma Noriage