On the other end, there were the Popteen Gyaru who still loved the mainstream gal legacy that Namie Amuro had set forth and they had already set sight on their new Avex-driven “it-girl” to lead the way as Namie Amuro worked behind the scenes to find her next trendsetting image. This truly is where Gyaru separated into two entirely different sub-styles with very different values and would go on to affect the Gyaru boom later on in the 2010s. Where Egg Gyaru were fun-loving, laid-back, wild party girls, the Popteen Gyaru of the 2000s were built entirely different: They were driven by high-end glamor and hyper-femininity. These gals traded Louis Vuitton and Burberry for Dior and Dolce and Gabbana, they adored creams and pink tones, wore luxurious fur, donned pointed-toe boots and pin heels, and wore full-volume curls as they strutted down the streets. More importantly, they weren’t confined to just Shibuya but also existed in the spaces of Ginza, Shinjuku, Ikebukuro, and Roppongi.

Their new muse was the newly debuted Avex-idol Ayumi Hamasaki. Her detail-oriented style took Japan by storm and her lyrics expressed both the brightly hopeful but also the darker sides of young girls’ feelings as they struggled to find a space where they were accepted and felt like they belonged. In a sense, Ayu was the predecessor to the Koakuma space–visually having a cute exterior but internally her feelings and experiences were more than what meets the eye. Ayumi Hamasaki was a diva in her own right as she filled the massively large shoes that Namie Amuro had left behind. Ayumi could comparably be considered the Madonna of Japan and was dubbed as “The Queen of J-Pop” thanks to her international popularity, something that, strangely enough, Namie Amuro never managed to gain the title of.

Ayumi Hamasaki was previously a model and actress as a child. She also had a short failing rap career through the means of Nippon Columbia before being discovered at the club Velfarre where she was partying with friends on a night out by producer Max Matsura in 1998. Matsura had become fascinated with his newest find after a round of singing at karaoke and aggressively decided to pursue her both professionally and romantically. While Ayu did not reciprocate at first, Matsura’s sweet talk about having faith in her talent eventually ended up making her sway and also give interest. Both of them worked together to create songs for her first album, “Loveappears” which occasionally conveys Ayumi’s feelings for Max. For example, songs such as “Appears” speaks of her first meeting in which Max had pursued her by calling her many times on the telephone to bribe her to sign onto Avex in order to work alongside him. Both secretly dated for several years with many listeners of Hamasaki’s songs relating to the messages she was conveying whether it be about loneliness or debating who this mystery prince that their new queen was enchanted by.

Stylistically, Ayumi Hamasaki had large doe-like eyes that captivated her audience as she peered upon them in promotional media while her hauntingly relatable lyrics dominated anywhere with a speaker system. Soon after or on the cusp of Ayumi Hamasaki’s first album, she and Max had broken up once she had found another woman’s shoes at his apartment. Intolerant of his disloyalty, Ayu decided to be her own management by entirely controlling her own image and music. It’s rumored that during the filming of both promotional videos for “Kanariya” and “Fly High” is when the queen of J-Pop endured her difficult break up with the one person that she had sought out not only for emotional support as a lover but also as a mentor. She had worked herself to the ground around this timeframe, controlling every aspect of her image by herself from the makeup for “Kanariya”’s music video down to writing lyrics for a new song and planning a massive tour after she made an abrupt disappearance for several days without notifying anyone.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5witdwVSpqk

“Fly High” also depicts her massive image change and disdain for her old self that was curated by Matsura’s vision for her. In a behind-the-scenes documentary, an overworked and exhausted Ayumi is carried by her staff out of the staff van, entirely passed out as she’s coaxed awake in the powder room in order to get a start on hair and makeup so filming could begin on the video. She groggily awakens unaware of where she is at, however, by the time filming is set to start-no one would ever guess that she had previously been dragged into filming utterly spent from her work schedule. The original version of “Fly High” was produced by Max but in the PV, we hear a different version of the song that was mixed by the infamous production group HAL, who often did stuff later on for the soon to be group Dream and continued to aid in producing more of Ayu’s future top-selling tracks.

In the promotional video for “Fly High”, the audience witnesses two versions of Ayu. The one on stage that everyone sees and adores and the one that is in the audience watching in disdain-as if saying that she hates her past self and is ready to forge forth by herself as a new person, without the influence of anyone else.

For her massive tours, Ayu became infamous for her elaborate stage designs and costumes. She did an entirely different outfit change for each song during her 2000 tour. As a dramatic transition between songs bides Ayu time, she races under the stage almost entirely in the dark as staff scrambles to help change her stage outfit and change her hair for the next song. In this tour, there’s even an outfit that may be a nod to the first peek of a “hime Gyaru” style that would occur later on towards the masses. This is where Gyaru had become allured by the likes of Ayumi Hamasaki. The hyper-control of her image on her own and the relatability of her lyrics truly touched them. They too dealt with breakups from boyfriends and the pain of feeling exiled from society as much as their peers. They admired her strength as much as they admired Namie’s ability to push through her own hardship during this era of time.

The difference between Namie and Ayumi was the iron-grip Ayumi had on her image. Similarly to Gyaru, Ayu wanted to be the dictator of her own narrative and image; She didn’t want to be told by her management what was “cool”. Instead, Ayumi Hamasaki wanted to decide what was cool or groundbreaking for herself. This then trickled down to influence her young audience who latched on to everything she would ever be involved in. They had found their new queen and she was dominating every single space.

This wasn’t the first or last time a celebrity would be featured on the front cover of Popteen magazine, however, now that more eyes were looking at Avex and Ayu than ever before, and what better place to be than in Popteen. Popteen was originally a trend-based magazine that catered to teenagers and Gyaru alike. Apparently, in the 80s, Popteen had gone through some scrutiny via the government over featuring Koakuma Ageha-like stories written by young gals about their sexual exploits and abortions. Perhaps, it was Popteen and previous magazines that were axed due to the nature of their content that would, later on, also be the inspiration for the hostess-driven publication later on in the mid-2000s. However, Popteen since then had attempted to keep things clean and left the wild and sexy image to other magazines such as Egg later on in the 90s.

Instead, Popteen focused on a teenaged demographic that may be lured in by the cover due to the celebrities featured in them. For some, Popteen magazine was their first impression of Gyaru fashion. Unlike Egg, the Gyaru in Popteen were more approachable and easier to relate to. They were not the club-going Gyaru on a permanent vacation no matter what time of day or year it was. Instead, Popteen Gyaru were the definition of celebrity worship and glamor in a rather attainable way. They had strong connections to Avex signed artists and to the 109 department store that would often showcase their collections through spreads in Popteen. While there was some overlap between Egg and Popteen, the latter primarily featured some of the clothes that were in 109 that weren’t showcased in Egg magazine and vice versa.

In regards to Ayumi Hamasaki, the popularization of eye enlarging contacts and the “shiro Gyaru” aesthetic being promoted in Popteen may be something of her doing given the outside shift in Gyaru brand name clothes. Ayumi Hamasaki’s popularity would create massive influence beyond the teenage demographic by inspiring future hostesses, hime Gyaru, and perhaps even agejo gals later on. In all, Popteen Gyaru aimed to either look like like cute pseudo-princesses or glamorous celebrities through the family of models who channeled inspiration from their local celebrity icons such as Ayumi Hamasaki, Namie Amuro, Morning Musume’s Goto Maki, and Aya Matsura, Dream, Max, and later on Koda Kumi. This doesn’t even touch the tip of the iceberg if influences from abroad were also counted in this list.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y8qZ5_WfkGg

Speaking of which, as Namie Amuro was going through her traumatic life crises as a single mother and Ayumi Hamasaki was rebranding her image as a pop star after a private but messy breakup from her producer, a new star was being gradually discovered at Avex’s 2000 “Dream Audition” where fourteen-year-old Koda Kumi performed Judy and Mary’s, “Hello Orange Sunshine” in an attempt to fight for a spot in Avex’s new girl group Dream. Unfortunately (or fortunately), she did not make the cut for the set of girls that would form Dream. However, she was still offered a contract under Avex’s sub-label Rhythm-zone where she would then train for a few years with setbacks such as weight or visual direction before making her official solo artist debut a few years later.