Five is Hamasaki's first mini-album since
Memorial address, which was released in 2003. This is Hamasaki first album not to have any singles. Its five songs had commercial endorsements prior to the release of the album: "
Progress" was used as the theme song of the
PlayStation 3 videogame
Tales of Xillia; "Another Song" was used as theme song of the TV show
SweetTV of channel BeeTV; "Why..." was used in TV commercials of Taiwan campaigns of travel agency
H.I.S., as well as in commercials for RecoChoku; "Beloved" was used as the theme song of August of
NTV show
Sukkiri!!; and "Brillante" was used in TV commercials of Music.jp. The limited edition of the
CD includes an access card to download a character costume for
Tales of Xillia. Also, first pressings of the CD+DVD edition included a serial number to access a special website broadcasting making-of material of
Ayumi Hamasaki Countdown Live 2010-2011 A: Do It Again. Many netizens have wondered why this mini-album was named
Five, if it was just because the album has only 5 tracks. On the
Sweet interview, Hamasaki hinted that there is a hidden word in the title of the mini-album, 'H♡PE', which was figured out by her fans. They predicted that
Five was released not only because it has 5 songs, it was also 5 months after the disastrous earthquake and tsunami that hit
Japan in March. For the first time, Hamasaki undertook the artwork of the font design herself. ==Track listing==