Weibird Concert Live

Weibird Wei

Releasing a live album after just one full-length record could be either an act of hubris or a blatant attempt to milk the cash cow. The good news is that Taiwanese singer-songwriter Weibird Wei’s offering is neither.

There are three strands here: live renditions from his 2010 self-titled debut which won him Best Newcomer at the Golden Melody Awards, covers of Mandarin and English songs and, best of all, new material.

The 24-year-old proves he can hold his own in a live setting and that the intimate experience of listening to his justly lauded record translates well to the stage.

As Wei shares in speech interludes about how his life has changed since his CD took off and about his ambivalent relationship with fans, you feel like you are at the gig at the Taipei International Convention Centre in September last year.

His covers are no fillers. He is equally at home covering everything from A-mei’s Hostage and Khalil Fong’s Love Love Love to James Blunt’s You’re Beautiful and Damien Rice’s Blower’s Daughter. For those who first saw him in the now-defunct TV talent show Happy Sunday in 2007, his emotive English renditions would come as no surprise.

There are three new songs included here: the humorous Me, A Pig, And His Girlfriend, the English ballad She’ll Be An Angel, and the standout Why Life.

The last track was a response to what he saw in the aftermath of Typhoon Morakot’s destruction in August 2009.

Accompanied by an acoustic guitar, its pointed lyrics go: “Why oh why, no answer/Life oh life, can’t live it over... The corrupt don’t have to run, good people help out and die.”

It is one young man’s attempt to make sense of the world and even if he provides no answers, his questions and observations are worth listening to.

Super Kelly

Kelly Poon

Local singer Kelly Poon puts on a brave front on her EP with her new record label. In the opening track, she declares: “Cos I’m an inde-inde-independent girl/And I don’t need don’t need don’t need you to rock my world.”

It sounds like a defiant riposte to critics who say she has been struggling to make a breakthrough in the industry since emerging as the female champion in the Project Superstar singing competition in 2005. chk

Part of the problem is that she never had a distinctive enough image and Independent Girl is at least a step in the right direction with its spunky spirit.

While the girl-power message gets muddied with the conventional ballad My Love and the cutesy photographs, props must go to Poon for continuing to plug away and for having a hand in writing all five songs here.

Here’s hoping she gets more love this time around.

(ST)