Bad MEG news, everyone. :(

In a post titled "MAVERICK," MEG revealed on her blog today that she will be releasing a best-of compilation album this fall before retiring from her record label and leaving on a trip to Paris alone next spring. Her upcoming birthday concert in Sanrio Puroland seems like it'll be her last performance anywhere for some time. It was quite a lot to translate, so I apologize for any errors there may be, but you can read her thoughts on this whole thing below:

This spring, I've decided that I'll take a solitary trip to Paris.

It'll be a brief reset.


It's sudden, but this autumn, I, MEG, will be releasing a best-of compilation,
and will also leave my current record label, taking a break for a little while
from my domestic release activity with regards to music.

I have no plans for any one-man live performances or tours in the year that follows.


Because this is something I've considered since the year before,

making things and delivering things, what I love doing as "creating"
has become "work," and I've lost what I wanted to do so carefully.

Whoever I deliver these things to, I want to craft them with perfect care.

In the scope of the things I can do, I've considered what can be done,
but the place I'm in no longer excites me, and from that, new ideas can't be born.
Within such a repeating cycle, I felt like I didn't know what to do.


I have to change something, I have to find something;
the period in which I thought those things went on for a rather long while.



In that sense, timing is a strange thing.

Putting on an image, even as I say that it suits me, with a single hint,
the feeling that the road before my eyes is made up from various parts becomes apparent.

The things that interest me, though they may not be for the best, are what I want to try.
Even if I overdo it the same way, even if I have to start from scratch, I want to try it.
Ever since that determination transformed itself into its own power, everything past that has gone quickly.


In the past, as if moving in place, I was convinced that I'd wasted too much time,
and now, moving in quite a roundabout way, I'm connected to this place I'm at.

People who aren't fake still won't be fake even as several years pass by.
There are reunions like that, too.

Because living is interesting.
It's the continuity of "no experience is meaningless."


As next year is also the tenth anniversary of my debut,
I believe that I want to make it the year of challenging new fields.

That is, what I've done up until now, regardless of whether it's music or fashion, it also won't be trapped in terms of "domestic" or "overseas."

It's not that I was in an environment where anyone could go and get work for me,
but retiring from a major label and having nothing left, wondering if it'll be okay,
even though I may feel conflicted, if I don't challenge myself, nothing can happen.


I've decided a few of the things I want to do next year already, but there are preliminary arrangements I need to take care of for a little bit.
There's anxiety that comes with freedom, too, but the possibilities are increasing,
and I'll be able to challenge things I've wanted to do for a long time, as well as work I've been wanting to lend my voice to.

Above all else, I am not alone.
Watching out from all around me, there are kind people, people I rely on right here, aren't there?
Even the people reading this blog entry here.

I'm thrilled.
For Team MEG, too, this is a good thing.



At my live parties, through creating music, I have the precious opportunity to meet you all,
and I have no doubt that this has become the source of my own power, too,

so I love music.
Taking a break for a little bit, when I have the self-confidence to do what I really want to do,
when I'm able to create the things I want to send out again, I firmly want to deliver that to all of you.

When that time comes, I don't know yet if I'll start an independent label, or, perhaps,
sign with a record label somewhere else—I still don't know for sure.

Whichever way I go, I have a feeling that when I start over again next time, the new environment will allow me to enjoy music once again.


Going ahead of my own free will, something has to be thrown away.
Because no one knows for sure if it's the right thing or not.


...that said, listening again to the lyrics of "MAVERICK" now, hearing every single one of the words,
I feel that it was a good thing that I was able to write my thoughts out frankly and honestly, and in that way, it's a treasure.


Aside from that, after two-and-a-half years and roughly fifty songs created, I've written a new song.
With so many individual thoughts and feelings in it, I believe it's taken the shape of my own personal history.



So, the end is a beginning.

The new song that will be my final single with this recording company is called "PASSPORT".
The CD title that I came up with over a period of three years until now is hidden in the lyrics.

Going along with the title, using these songs as identification, a passport,
I was thinking that I want to go on a journey to a new place.


On the day I perform at Puroland, though it'll be my birthday, I wonder if it'll also be something of a brief farewell.
It'll be nice if it's a wonderful day that I can share powerfully and happily with everyone, I think.


And now.
Fan mail, messages I get through Twitter, etc., I always feel them close to me.
For worrying about me, who is so prone to getting sick easily, thank you.

Phrases like "suspension of activity" are flowing through Twitter already,
but it isn't a suspension—it's breaking out of a routine I've had for several years, so it's positive.

From now on, too, if you're able to watch over me warmly
and still support the ever-defiant MEG, I'll be happy.



Thank you.




MEG

--

... so I'm really upset. Everyone else?

I forgot to mention that she also linked to this YouTube upload of "MAVERICK," which I found kind of interesting, buuuuut now I also feel weird knowing that she may have seen my shitty translations of a few of her other songs from that album if she looked at those ones. :|