Lightyears

The Batman series by Christopher Nolan seems to be getting better, and darker. Batman has been my all-time favourite superhero since young, with all his gadgets and machines. And with all the hype surround thing movie, it certainly lived up to its status and I think “The Dark Knight” is probably one of THE shows to catch! Christopher Nolan has definitely injected a lot of depth into the Batman series, as compared to its predecessors.

I missed the first 20 minutes of the movie, as I usually do with other movies, and when I got in, Bruce Wayne (Christian Bale) was sewing up his wound… Moving on, I think Joker’s (Heath Ledger) performance in the movie was stunning, and for the first time, Joker was actually scary for me. In my opinion, Heath Ledger was really into this Joker role that it sort of drove him crazy (I think). The Joker was really sinister, and loony at the same time, and it probably overwhelmed Heath more than he ever imagined… But it was an amazing and convincing performance. It almost seems like it was his role.

Of course the movie was not only just about Joker. We have seen how Christian Bale portrayed Bruce/Batman in Batman Begins, and he continued his splendid performance here. And then there is Two-face/Harvey Dent played by Aaron Eckhart whose performance was just as good, and probably being overshadowed by Joker. And how can we forget Jim Gordon (Gary Oldman), Alfred (Michael Caine) and Lucius Fox (Morgan Freeman) who put up such amazing performances as well!! Our very own Singaporean Ng Chin Han as Lau also deserves some credit!!

It is amazing that how Christopher Nolan has been able to bring in a stellar cast to produce such an outstanding movie, which used to be rather superficially portrayed (in comparison). In addition to all the content, there are more action scenes this time round, like leaping off buildings, and it really keeps you on the edge of your seat because you don’t really know what is going to happen next. I cannot wait for the 3rd installment of the series!!!

I am super excited for the 2nd leg of A*mei Zhang Hui Mei’s Star Tour! This time the Taiwanese Pop Diva will be travelling to North America and Japan, and also Singapore (again)!! Tickets are already on sale for these performances, including the Singapore show, which started at 9 this morning! And of course, I have gotten my tickets already! Hopefully the A34 side will be the side she faces more often this time round (she faced the A15 side more last year, and thankfully I was on that side!). Oh yes, the concert will be held on 4th October (Sat) at the Singapore Indoor Stadium!

Anyway, I hope the setlist will be slightly altered this time round to make the show even more exciting, and probably her alter-ego thing, Amit, will show up as well, like what happened at the 19th Golden Melody Awards in Taiwan just a few weeks ago. View her performance here: http://www.im.tv/vlog/personal/2366751/4557273

This time I will try to take less pictures so that I can enjoy the concert even more, and also will bring more cash to get some of the tour merchandise!!!

For the North America leg of her tour, she will be performing at Harvey’s Lake Tahoe/ Harveys Outdoor Arena on 19th July, and also River Rock Show Theatre on 22nd July. In Japan, she will be having shows in the ACT Theatre on 22nd and 23rd September!! I think the performances at these places will be spectacular!

Lastly, the links to get the tickets online are as follows:

Harvey’s Lake Tahoe :
http://www.harrahs.com/EventsDetail.do?locationCode=HLT&detailName=a-mei-2008-detail&eventTitle=A-Mei%20live%20in%20Concert

River Rock Show Theatre: http://www.riverrock.com/entertainment/river_rock_show_theatre/performances/event07220801.aspx or http://www.ticketmaster.ca/event/110040CBB8A695B2?brand=gca_riverrock&camefrom=CFC_GREATCANADIAN

ACT Theatre:
http://www.tbs.co.jp/act/event/ameilive2008/

Singapore Indoor Stadium:
http://www.sistic.com.sg/portal/dt?dt.isPortletRequest=true&dt.action=process&dt.provider=PortletWindowProcessChannel&dt.windowProvider.targetPortletChannel=JSPTabContainer/sEventsCalendar/Event&dt.containerName=JSPTabContainer/sEventsCalendar&dt.windowProvider.currentChannelMode=VIEW&dt.window.portletAction=RENDER&contentCode=amei1008

 Get your tickets before they sell out!

Well, I had high hopes for this DVD, since it’s Rihanna’s first tour release on DVD.

On the songs, the show started with her first hit ever, Pon de Replay, which I think was apt since it was a song that introduced her to the world.  Next came a song Break It Of” which I don’t know because I only bought her latest album, which is Good Girl Gone Bad. Then after a few more songs came Rehab and Breakin’ Dishes, both songs that I really like from her album, and Rihanna delivered then very well.

She did a cover of Bob Marley’s song “Is This Love” which isn’t really what I like, but it was ok.  SOS was hot! The arrangement was given a different treatment, making it rather cabaret-ish, which was great! Next was Good Girl Gone Bad, one of my favourite songs from her album, and again, she did her thing. Hate That I Love You followed, and after that was Unfaithful. After Sell Me Candy, she worked the crowd again with songs like Don’t Stop the Music, Shut Up and Drive. Just before launching into Umbrella, her mega-hit, she sang Question Existing, which was very heartfelt. And Umbrella just brought the house down!

Overall I think the setlist was not bad, but there could be more done to the choreography. And I think black isn’t really a good colour on stage, so next time she might consider more fanciful stuff?  I can’t wait for her to tour Asia. Not quite a Beyonce yet in terms of experience and skills, but I think she will be a great entertainer in the near future!

3.5 out of 5

Tanya wins 2 major awards (at least, from what I watched on TV) at the 19th Golden Melody Awards in Taiwan! She scored wins in Best Female Vocalist, as well as Best Album Producer. It must be an amazing win for her since her album “Goodbye and Hello” was a new beginning for her in many ways, like being her own album producer, moving to Taipei etc. For the second time, she won Best Female Vocalist (she got this back in 2006 if I remember correctly). Even though I am rather unhappy that my favourite singer (A*Mei) did not win (again) this time round, I am still glad that Tanya won this award.

On another note, Karen Mok won best album, and I think it really means a lot for her since it was really an album she wanted to put out; she wrote songs, decided the direction and stuff. I probably will get her album in the next week, or probably tomorrow. I thought Tanya was going to win Best Album as well, since she was awarded best female vocalist and best album producer. Probably something went wrong with the jury?

On yet another note, Jay Chou sort of swept most of the awards he was nominated for, including awards for non-vocal recordings. As much as I do not like him, his character that is, I still admire him as a musician. Ok moving on, I feel a bit sad that Stefanie Sun (Yanzi) did not win any awards this year. Her album was great too, maybe concept wise it wasn’t as strong as Karen’s. And A*mei did not win any awards again! I cannot believe it… … no comments on that… …

Anyway, A*mei performed on the show, which I conveniently missed because of the waiting for my milkshake at Carl’s Junior. How slow can the service get? I mean if you are understaffed, go get more people…

As much as I do not really agree with the record company for releasing this song as Mariah’s 3rd single, I’ll Be Loving You A Long Time sounded quite nice live, at least at the the Japan MTV VMAs.

Anyway, I really disgusted with how Bye Bye has been promoted, if there were actually promotions done for it at all. A potential hit that sort of vapourised… Hope that the future singles from E=MC2 will do well.

Elva is back with Virgin Music! She never should have left anyway, since she was really well treated over there. Anyway, I was really looking forward to hearing her new music, until when I finally heard it…

As much as I do not want to compare her current album to her previous Virgin Music albums, I am pretty much forced into doing so. Firstly, her vocals are not as strong, in the sense that she glides through some notes, and quite a bit of lazy singing here and there. It was really obvious on her first (and final) album with Warner Music, “1087″. She probably needs better producers…

Ballads used to be one of her strengths, but recently they prove to be one of her weaknesses. Even with rather good songs like “Chong Dong”, “Shi Guang Sui Dao”, “Zhi Hou” and “Ni Kan Bu Jian De Di Fang”, she doesn’t really shine. She needs to be more sensitive to the lyrics and song I think.

On the other hand, the quick tempo songs sound much better. The first single off her album, “I’ll Be There” is one of the better tracks on the album, and is paired with a great mv. The oriental-infused urban track of “Baby Girl” is also not bad. Same for “More More More”.

Overall, I think Elva needs to do some work on her vocals. Song choice is rather ok for this album, what it lacks is the vocalist she used to be.

3 out of 5

I’ll Be There:

Chong Dong:

 More More More:

Finally back from Europe! Still struggling to adjust back to local time after like 2 weeks plus overseas. Really enjoyed myself a lot overseas, even the weather was rather cold (for me at least), especially London.

Never in my life have I spent more than 2 weeks overseas, and it got me thinking about studying overseas again. Would like and want to have an exchange with an overseas university, either in the United States or Europe.

Anyway, some pictures that I took while overseas:

It’s been some time since we saw Fantasia Barrino, and I was really surprised to see her on today’s episode of American Idol. She is probably my favourite American Idol, though I also like Kelly Clarkson and Carrie Underwood, because of the genre of the music she does.

However, I was rather disappointed with her performance of “Bore Me (Yawn)” in terms of the vocals; loved the choreography though. Thought the dance was hot! Anyway, she was like screeching throughout, quite excessively in my opinion. The performance could have been much better… sighz..  And thought her hair looked rather out-of-point…

Anyway, I am looking forward to her new album! I am sure it would be a great album.

Here’s the performance:

It’s been some time since I watched concerts of Chinese music. It was really great to hear traditional Chinese music once again, especially when I used to play the Suona myself.

The recital was a relatively short one, but it showcased the versatility of the suona. The soloist, Meng Jie, is a musician with the Singapore Chinese Orchestra. There were traditional as well as modern pieces played in the concert, which I think was really appropriate, given the misconception people have with Chinese music. The performance began with a traditional piece titled “Celebrations” which was a great piece to start.

The following 2 pieces were rather modern, and were written by Meng Jie’s teacher, Zuo Ji Cheng. The first of the 2 pieces, “Rustic Morning Tunes” sounded rather nice and mellow, while the latter I thought was a bit cheesy, probably because of the music that was played on the MIDI file. Didn’t really like the composition I think…

The fourth piece “Family Portrait” I sort of forgot how it sounds like so moving on… A modern arrangement of a traditional piece I assume, cos it is also played with an MIDI file as an accompaniment. It started off rather ok, until rather cheesy music came in again. I hope I am not badmouthing about Chinese music, but I didn’t really like the tunes that were played on te MIDI file…

After which, “Polka”, a Polish dance, was played. It was a fun and entertaining song, which was played very well on the alto-levered suona, sort of like a clarinet. The evening’s performance ended with a suona classic “A Flock of Birds”. It was an amazing performance by Meng Xi in my opinion, with a bit of flaws nonetheless.

Overall, I think Meng Xi is a rather charming and talented performer, but probably needs to work on certain stuff, like the decrescendos and smorzandos because the sound sort of disappears too quickly. It was a great performance nonetheless, for someone who has never done a “solo” performance!

Was just browsing for live performance of Ken Hirai on youtube when I chanced upon his interview with CNN on a programme called “Talk Asia”, I think, which was recorded last year. There are 3 parts to the interview, where he talks about how he became a singer and what his musical influences are, and his appearance!! Hahaha!

Ok, back to studying…