Month: May 2009

Categories
J Pop Music Reviews

Next Level by Ayumi Hamasaki – I Love It

Ayu's Next Level

I met my friend for lunch one day at Shokudo and told her that Ayumi Hamasaki has released a new album.  “Who’s [What’s] that?” she asked.  Maybe I am too naïve to think that everyone know who she is.  Japanese artist Ayu has been my inspiration for years.  Since 2000, she has been releasing one studio album, one video recording of her concert tour, and one video recording of her New Year countdown tour per year, non-stop.  She is involved in all aspects of production including the branding of her own image.  That makes her one of the most hardworking and successful artists I have seen.  Even with the loss of hearing on her left ear since 2008 amongst other distractions such as her failed love relationship, the show must go on.  This sort of spirit inspires.

At 30, onto the 10th year of her commercially success career, I thought the title “Next Level” is timely.  The sound is mostly electronic, the fashion is colorfully fresh, “Next Step” is a premium production that fans will love.  I do.  As seen in her previous productions, “Next Step” has songs of similar nature packaged in segments divided by the instrumental tracks.  The opening tracks are energetic, discotheque-like, and almost sound like a series of remixes.  Midway through the album, it is transited to be more rock and “Next Step” is closed with an acoustic track that she shot the video barefoot walking around the movie street set in what seems like a freezing evening (see below).  My favorite track is the non-single track “Rollin’”.  That reminds of “Startin’”, not sure why.

Comes with the package is a CD recording of her Premium Countdown Live 2008-2009 and a DVD consists of 6 videos from “Next Step” as well as the making clips.  That covers the entire spectrum of studio production to live recording to video production with a glimpse of her personality.  Would I prefer the Countdown Live in DVD format instead?  In a way, yes, because her live concerts are always so out-of-the-world.  However, without the visual impact, I tend to pay more attention to her vocals.  I have got to say, for someone who has partial hearing loss, that is one heck of a performance.

Below is the last track of the album – “Curtain Call”.

Categories
Diary Reflection

Into the Valley of Selegie

An area around Selegie

A few good friends of mine commented that I have come to a full circle when I told them that (1) I’ve moved to a “new” office that isn’t new and (2) year 2000 I worked at the same building for the same employer.  The difference is: I was a consultant to them back then and am one of their gazillion employees now.  I have no idea what a full circle means.  Year 2000 was perhaps a mini-peak of my career.  And then kind of crashed and burned for a while.  Recently, things started to look up and then I am working in the same building as I was nine years ago.  Now, is that a full circle?  What is a full circle?

Back in the beginning of this millennium, the surrounding area of my office was awesome.  Vast area of greenery right in the middle of the city.  And then the unthinkable happened: our government has decided to build a university that spans across adjacent plots of beautiful parks.  I was much saddened, kind of upset.  Today, Singapore Management University (SMU) looks pretty awesome, architect in a way that blends in well with the surrounding.  But I still prefer the parks to a set of buildings that mean nothing to me, personally.

I still prefer the newer looking old office to my older looking new office.  One friend at work said to me: Once it gets into your system, you’ll be fine with it.  My desk space has shrunk at least 4 times; I no longer have my own desk; there are junks, empty water bottles, half drank water bottles left behind from the previous occupants; dust everywhere; I now look up and see tons of faces staring at me; and there are even more staring at the back of my head.  These two days, I have this hallucination that I am working inside a cube farm.  I know what I am producing each day.  I wonder what everyone else are producing each passing moment.  Time to get plugged in.  I need a phone line.

I am a natural when it comes to making myself happy creatively and realistically.  So I took the opportunity to explore the area during my lunch hours.  It turned out so fun that I am going to set up a plan to explore this strange neighborhood systematically.  Day one after my brief lunch, I took a walk into the area of Selegie, discovered quite a number of eating places, old fashioned shops that sell interesting stuffs, new shops that are opening soon, quite a number of night clubs, and I came face-to-face with the awesome looking building called LASALLE College of the Arts.  I took some pictures with my phone.  I wish I had my dSLR with me.

I took a picture of LASALLE in year 1996 when the construction was started and another one in 1997 when it was completed (see my previous blog entry).  Perhaps life is as such: At times we go through changes in life and some are dusty, some are messy, and through all these unpleasantness, inconvenience, something good, something beautiful may blossom.

LASALLE College of Arts

Categories
J Pop Music Reviews

Rimi Natsukawa 夏川りみ – ココロノウタ – A New Studio Production, A Live Recording, and A Concert DVD

Rimi Natsukawa

I wouldn’t imagine in a light year that I would enjoy listening to Japanese folk music.  Rimi Natsukawa’s previous album “Self Selection” has been like a comfort album to me.  So when I saw her 13th album “ココロノウタ” selling on the shelf, I quickly grabbed one without even test listening to it.

“ココロノウタ” comes with 3 discs.  A 8-track studio album, a 9-track live recording of her December 2008 concert held in Taiwan, and a DVD of that concert (12 tracks).  I’ve watched that DVD.  Even with zero knowledge in Japanese, she connects to me – with her expression, her tone, and her gesture.  Rimi can sing live really well and she plays the instrument too.  I don’t even know what that guitar-like instrument called.  It looks fretless and it looks difficult to play.  Most tracks are slow to moderately paced.  Towards the end of the concert, she picked up the pace with lots of colorful music arrangements.  It is a pleasant surprise and I can understand why some of these live tracks are not present in the CD recording.  They work better with the visual impact.

The songs from the new studio recording is just as pleasant as her previous productions.  Lyrically – judging from the Chinese translation – is poetically beautiful.  Beyond the visual images of the light and the blue sky, the wind and the hills, the moon and the darkness are a set of songs about yearning, about love and life and the embrace of a loving mother.

Click here if you wish to sample the album.  Below is one of the live recordings (not from this album collection) if you are curious about how Rimi’s music sounds like.  From the Chinese translation, the album title “ココロノウタ” means “Songs from the Heart and Soul”.