So I’m late to the party (as always), and just started watching this year’s season of Sing my Song (中国好歌曲), which has been airing for a couple of weeks. It’s honestly my favorite of these many music contests because it’s new songs. I never ever stay through the actual contest, but… I do enjoy their blind auditions for the surprises!
Episode one, so far, has given me that awkward moment when Laurence Larson 罗艺恒 sings better Mandarin than me… nobody turns for blues singer 黄晓宁 Huang Hsiao Ning which makes David Tao cry (and reminds me of my dad, hence also making me teary), and gives us the meta moment of the night (and probably of the season) when Liu Wei 刘维 sings Because You Are Mavis Fan (因为你是范晓萱), using many Mavis music and lyrics cues, to make Mavis herself cry.
I’m a Mavis fan and I love I Want Us to Be Together to bits, so of course I loved it.
The song is available for download over at QQ (apparently, officially), but you gotta download their APP, sign up for an account (maybe pay to get the 320kbps version)… and for sign up, it’s asking for a mobile number to send a verification code, and I don’t use a phone, so I can’t sign up [Hipster First World Problems]~~~ so I only got myself a 128kbps from somewhere murky on the net LOL. If you happen to get the 320kbps one, do share it with me pretty please.
And it’s not like EVERYTHING is available on iTunes. On time.
I finally took the time to catch up with all seasons of Orphan Black, which I had trouble sitting through during its first season… even though I think I might have actually sat through those 10 episodes on reruns without knowing they were 10 episodes. there’s a slump there somewhere between the first 3-4 eps, but once you go through that threshold, it’s a breeze worth the binge-watch. Season 2 flowed better as a viewing experience because half the first part rides on its S1 high and it sets itself for Season 3, which doesn’t glide as smoothly.
But feelings have been had. In terms of Sarah dealing with Beth in a near-death dream sequence that totally reminded me of the Buffy episode, Restless… which interestingly fits into Season 4 of that show where they also deal with the military and conspiracies xD
Feelings were also had because of that messy relationship between Cosima and Delphine, sidetracked by Shay. I haven’t had the fandom feels in so long… and it’s Cosima’s relationships because Sarah-Paul is so impersonal, and Cal -as good as he may be- has been mostly off-screen history. It’s Cosima and Delphine because I’m a sucker for that “I’ll give you up for you” thing, and Cosima with Shay because- man, Shay’s gotta be bad for Cosima’s heart. She seems soooooooooo damn good and caring, it’s gotta be setting up a heartbreak even though it would be “Delphine is your monitor 2.0” and it’s only been freaking 19min. of them together through the whole season.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ZKDbIlnr4s
And man is Ksenia Solo as Shay the type. Yup, there’s a type. Carly Pope meets Juno Temple. lol
Though Fitoor might get trapped by remaking Alfonso Cuaron’s version of Great Expectations… I’m still looking forward to Tabu as Begum. I’m also looking forward to see Haminasto (aka. also romanized as Haminastu) [YouTube] because it’s my favorite track in the whole soundtrack, even though I’ve been butchering some of the other songs out loud late at night. xD I like the song so much that I ended up looking for Zeb Bangash, found Pakistani duo Zeb and Haniya, discovered Coke Studio [1][2][3][4][5 non-Zeb related], and downloaded the compilations on iTunes [S2][S6].
It messed up my language library because there’s so much Punjabi, Urdu and Pashtu, and Turkish… I don’t know which is which xD
ANWYAY~ OCD frustrations aside~
Fitoor promotions are at full throttle~ and it includes the release of this micro clips of dialog, which I don’t understand at all… but Tabu’s just saying “Firdaus, Firdaus, Firdaus” gives me the chills.
Well, that was quick.
And don’t give me that excuse that the voting audience doesn’t like World Music because Han Hong is pretty much World Music too. Shaking bad vibes aside, HAYA Band’s sound fills me with energy. It’s the show’s loss. CoCo loves them too, you can tell. Anyone who loves music could feel their passion and energy.
I usually don’t watch the show myself, just the clips, and wait for the recap that just lists the final ranking~ but, my gosh~~~ is the ranking section annoying as f*ck! Why does that have to last like 30min?
If I’m not mistaken, I’ve been listening to Daiqing Tana (黛青塔娜 / Дайчин Тана) for quite a few months, so total surprised to find out that they’ll be performing in the latest season of I Am A Singer (我是歌手). Strange on its own, because we all know that Chinese people’s music taste is all sorts of conventional love ballad. And I love LOVE LaLa with all my bobo heart, but come one~ COME ON!
Now THAT’s a fuckin’ performance!
Also~ the mysterious Guan Zhe (关喆), who performed that catchy Beijing, Beijing, Wo Ai Beijing (北京，北京，我爱北京) number, will also be participating. Both he and HAYA Band (HAYA乐团) placed last.
If you’re interested, the performances (sans interruptions) are available on Xiami. Including the clean version of HAYA Band.
Also check out HAYA Band’s albums Migration (迁徙) and Crazy Horse (疯马), which are available on Xiami and iTunes. Apparently, you can also buy Migration on CDBaby, and there seems to be an up-to-date-ish Facebook page. However, the best place -always- is Weibo + DaiQing Tana’s.
Yup, once again~
Back in 2010, the YAM Magazine website was launched officially— it was my grandpa’s 5th death anniversary. Today, it’s his 10th year anniversary… also it’s the 5th YAM web anniversary! Numerology galore~~~
Anyway~ I posted my 2015 music highlights~ early, once again. There were a few albums of my biases, but most of these picks are new people I’ve begun following this year. So… happy listening!
So I finally gave myself time to listen to both Buddha Jump (佛跳牆) albums. Their 2014 one, Let You See (給你看), is pretty good. Fell in love with this tune at first listen~ also, surprised to learn it’s a project by Penny Tai.
The clip below is from a small show they did in China.
You can get the album on iTunes.
