Ballad (Ayumi Hamasaki song)
| "Ballad" | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Single by Ayumi Hamasaki | ||||
| from the album Rock 'n' Roll Circus | ||||
| Released | December 29, 2009 | |||
| Recorded | 2009 | |||
| Genre | You Were...: Pop rock, soft rock Ballad: J-pop | |||
| Label | Avex Trax | |||
| Songwriter(s) | Ayumi Hamasaki (lyrics) Kazuhiro Hara (music) DAI (music) Tetsuya Yukumi (music) | |||
| Producer(s) | Max Matsuura | |||
| Ayumi Hamasaki singles chronology | ||||
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| CD+ DVD version A | ||||
| CD+DVD version B | ||||
"You Were.../Ballad" is Japanese singer Ayumi Hamasaki's forty-seventh (forty-eighth overall) single, released on December 29, 2009. The single was intended to be released on December 16, but Avex Trax pushed the release date two weeks back. The first song on the single "You were..." is the theme song for the Japanese version of the Disney movie Tinker Bell and the Lost Treasure, while the second song "Ballad" is tied up with The Firmament of the Pleiades, a NHK's historical and political drama based on Jiro Asada's book of the same name. The single became Hamasaki's 22nd consecutive single to debut at number-one position since her 2002 single "Free & Easy" on the Oricon weekly charts, making her the first solo artist and the female artist to have 22 consecutive singles to debut at number-one position. It is also her 34th number-one single on the Oricon weekly charts.