Archives For new music

I’ve been hearing Ellen Loo’s name very often for the last three years, but I never ever really took the time to sit down and listen to her albums until this weekend… and wow- I’ve just finally gone through her 2nd album You Quietly Hide Away (你安安靜靜地躲起來), which is a tremendous improvement from her debut Ripples (掀起), which isn’t all that bad either. I particularly liked Wait (等等), Hey Boy, Summer of Love, and Satellite Lover (人造衛星情人).

Ni An An Jing Jing De Duo Qi Lai comes as a surprise. I’m also surprised she sings in Mandarin so much, since my Hong Kong friends are the ones talking about her, I expected to listen to a lot more Cantonese.

Here’s some links: YouTube, Xiami, Spotify, iTunes.

I’m currently basking myself in the beauty that is Henry Huo’s (霍尊) first full-length album Heavenly Song or Tianyun (天韵). He was the winner of the first season of Sing my Song (中国好歌曲) when he cause a ruckus with his song Rolled-up Pearl Curtain (卷珠帘) [1], which he ended up performing at the 2014 CCTV Spring Festival Gala.

henry-huo-zun-tianyu-heavenly-song-album

You can listen to the album over at Xiami or Migu Music (for US locked).

Lyrics, English/Español translations and song embed below the break~

Once again, all Chinese translations by me to be taken with a pinch of salt. xD

Continue Reading…

Jin Chi’s voice was one of my favorites from The Voice of China [1], but as with anyone coming from reality contest shows, her releases had been on the so-so side. This latest song called Hao Hao Guo (好好过, which I’m guessing it’s like saying I’ve Lived Well) gave me a lot of JeA vibes [1]. Those two should collab in the future.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=568NPuupmO8

Jin Chi’s voice, though, it’s a breaking point. I love it.

It’s only a couple of days more, and the movie will finally open [1], but here’s the Rene Liu song that’s promoting the film full of feels~

… and, BAM!

You gotta love a contest that focuses on material, composition and production. That’s my main problem with singing contests, there are soooooo many great voices out there, but when albums are released, they turn out to be very boring in production. Sun Yunying’s (苏运莹) voice isn’t even bad at all, she sounds great and unique and she sells Wild Child (野子) so well right from the start.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L-1ciY-psAs

Last year, I fell in love with Carrchy’s (卡奇社) music. And honestly, their 2007 album Daylight Allure (日光倾城) is pretty good stuff [Xiami] [YouTube Sample], but they hadn’t been releasing ANYTHING for many MANY years. Last night, they surprised with the release of the single track Clouds (云, Yun), which you can get in Xiami (Sorry, those who Xiami is blocking). I don’t know anywhere else where you might listen to their music [Here’s some Douban demos].

carrchy-yun-cloud

Other than that, happy listening!

Mavis Fan’s fans (no pun intended) rejoice! She’s got three songs out this year, making a comeback since 2009 with Immediately (當下, Dang Xia). Obviously, the East doesn’t give a flying fish about End of the Year lists or the Holiday season, that’s why they keep releasing stuff- business like usual. xD

mavis-fan-dang-xia
Sorry, US-based users. I was only able to find the songs on Xiami. I know, geoblocks suck. But, as far as I know, the songs aren’t available anywhere else -even on iTunes TW- because it seems like a Xiami exclusive release.

–EDIT JAN 20–

I wasn’t aware that Mavis had added this free download link on her website.

Crowd Lu’s back! Two years after his military service with Natural Is Best (天然的最好, Tian Ran de Zui Hao) as a Happy Chinese typical Crowd Lu type of music to say goodbye to 2014 and welcome 2015. It’s a digital single (so I suppose there’s no album… yet), but there was supposed to be a concert in Yangming Shan (陽明山).

Actually, Crowd had released Becoming a Man (大人中) [clip] back in March, which you can get on iTunes.

Anyway~ Happy holidays, everyone!

I’m the crazy lady of Best Of lists~ so here’s another one.

amys-top50-songs-of-2014

Do your thing~

But if you’re lazy, I’ve set up (almost) complete playlists on Xiami and YouTube.

I never thought that I would actually, you know, really like a Hatsune Miku song. I had listened to a couple livetune tracks, but left them at bay until I saw Takashi Murakami’s Jellyfish Eyes where he used the song Last Night, Good Night to great effects during the ending credits. It was around 3-4am, so the effects of the song was perfect.

Too bad the only version available on my iTunes is the one done with Pharrell to promote the movie somehow, and nothing prior to 2012 is on.

On the topic of Miku, such a hybrid. I don’t know what to tag this post.