Message In A Bottle
JJ Lin
The lead single, Wei Da De Miao Xiao (Little Big Us), sounds like a sequel to JJ Lin’s big hit ballad, Bu Wei Shei Er Zuo De Ge (Twilight), off his previous album, From M.E. To Myself (2015). But not to worry, it is a sequel done right, capturing the moving grandeur of the earlier track without sounding like a retread.
Singapore’s Xiaohan wrote the lyrics and, as usual, she has a way with words, piquing one’s interest with the opening stanza: “A rose is surrounded by thorns, maybe it wishes for an embrace/Dolphins always have a smile on their face, maybe the ocean has washed their tears away, so no one knows”.
It is a song about the universal need for love and finding the courage to pursue it. Lin sings with yearning and a sparkle of hope: “Love is not a coincidence/Let us hold on to each other’s hands/Although we are minuscule/Never run away”.
He composed all of the album’s music and also penned the lyrics in the English version of the track, Until The Day, which is about the circular nature of life (“Lovers straying, seasons changing/Strangers to lovers/What comes around again”). Both work, though I find the Mandarin take more compelling.
The ballads make a greater impression here and Wo Ji Xu (Eagle’s Eye) is another standout number, with lyrics from frequent Mandopop king Jay Chou collaborator Vincent Fang. Lin sings about believing in oneself and rejecting so-called destiny: “I want to be carefree like an eagle, fly far away from fate on the ground”.
The Taipei-based Singaporean singer-songwriter has been on a roll in recent years, with Golden Melody Award wins for Best Male Vocalist for Stories Untold in 2014 and From M.E. To Myself in 2016. He suggests that his greatest challenge right now is himself as he seeks yet another breakthrough.
He asks in Chuan Yue (Stay): “Who breaks through, overcome who/If I don’t, if there’s no me/Who would surpass”.
The message is clear.
(ST)
Thursday, January 11, 2018
Story Thief
A-mei
On her last album, Amit 2 (2015), Taiwanese singer A-mei seethed and snarled. For example, she let it rip on Matriarchy: “Men proclaim themselves kings while women have to bear the weight of the world.”
As though in deliberate contrast, Story Thief is quieter and less confrontational. The singer is more concerned with matters of the heart and the pared-down arrangements place the focus on her voice and naked feelings. It is the ballads which shine here as she works with top collaborators such as Jay Chou and JJ Lin.
The opening title track, penned by Taiwanese singer-songwriter Eve Ai, has A-mei ruminating on a failed relationship: “When you left that day, I stopped telling stories/ Stopped weaving transitions, no need to fret about an ending.”
There is no chorus with an obvious hook here, but the melody sneaks up on you and the honesty of the emotions draws one in.
On the ballad A Bad Good Guy, with lyrics by Singapore’s Xiaohan, A-mei acknowledges: “Whose heart hasn’t been damaged, hasn’t been trapped/Grateful to have survived, that’s enough to be real/Not much innocence left in life/I’m willing to wait again for a bad good guy.”
Full Name, composed by Mandopop king Chou, narrates a poignant tale of unrequited love. A loss of intimacy is conveyed by a telling little detail: “When you mention me again, it’s already by my full name.”
This is the sound of someone a little rueful, a little older and wiser, and yet still clinging to hope.
A handful of tracks take a different tack, including the synth number Withdrawal, which presents another aspect of relationships – desperate desire: “Want to breathe you in deeply/Dig my nails into your flesh.”
Story Thief, it turns out, is a pop album for adults.
(ST)
A-mei
On her last album, Amit 2 (2015), Taiwanese singer A-mei seethed and snarled. For example, she let it rip on Matriarchy: “Men proclaim themselves kings while women have to bear the weight of the world.”
As though in deliberate contrast, Story Thief is quieter and less confrontational. The singer is more concerned with matters of the heart and the pared-down arrangements place the focus on her voice and naked feelings. It is the ballads which shine here as she works with top collaborators such as Jay Chou and JJ Lin.
The opening title track, penned by Taiwanese singer-songwriter Eve Ai, has A-mei ruminating on a failed relationship: “When you left that day, I stopped telling stories/ Stopped weaving transitions, no need to fret about an ending.”
There is no chorus with an obvious hook here, but the melody sneaks up on you and the honesty of the emotions draws one in.
On the ballad A Bad Good Guy, with lyrics by Singapore’s Xiaohan, A-mei acknowledges: “Whose heart hasn’t been damaged, hasn’t been trapped/Grateful to have survived, that’s enough to be real/Not much innocence left in life/I’m willing to wait again for a bad good guy.”
Full Name, composed by Mandopop king Chou, narrates a poignant tale of unrequited love. A loss of intimacy is conveyed by a telling little detail: “When you mention me again, it’s already by my full name.”
This is the sound of someone a little rueful, a little older and wiser, and yet still clinging to hope.
A handful of tracks take a different tack, including the synth number Withdrawal, which presents another aspect of relationships – desperate desire: “Want to breathe you in deeply/Dig my nails into your flesh.”
Story Thief, it turns out, is a pop album for adults.
(ST)
Thursday, January 04, 2018
Call Me By Your Name
Luca Guadagnino
The story: In the early 1980s, academics who stay for a spell in the family home in northern Italy and help out his professor father are a summer ritual for Elio (Timothee Chalamet). When young Jewish-American scholar Oliver (Armie Hammer) walks through their door, he stirs up strong feelings of desire on the part of the precocious 17-year-old. Based on Andre Aciman’s 2007 novel of the same name.
Having read and loved the book, I was a little apprehensive about a big-screen adaptation. The Egyptian-born American writer Aciman crafts lyrical prose and much of it is in the form of interior monologues in Elio’s head. How would this translate to the big screen?
Drawing on a beautiful source text, Italian director Luca Guadagnino (I Am Love, 2010) has made a film that is its own kind of wonderful.
It is an adaptation that is loving and faithful, but not slavishly so. There is no voiceover, for example, but we still get glimpses into Elio’s head through the clever conversion of some of his thoughts into dialogue as well as scrawlings in a journal.
From the gorgeous setting of an idyllic northern Italian town to the casting to the choice of music, the film-maker gets the details just right in evoking a world that we become completely immersed in.
Chalamet slips under the skin of Elio to give a sensitively tuned performance as he swings from the heady rapture of sexual awakening and first love to being torn apart by doubt and insecurity. He flits so naturally from English to Italian to French that it comes as a jolt to find out that he is American, born and raised in Manhattan.
His star-making turn has landed him Best Actor nominations for the Golden Globe Awards and Screen Actors Guild Awards and wins from several critics associations. Nominations and wins have also been chalked up for best film, best director and best supporting actor for Hammer and Michael Stuhlbarg, who plays Elio’s father.
Hammer is well cast as the athletic academic with the movie star aura, the object of Elio’s desire. His Oliver has an easy confidence about him and also an innate sense of decency. He says to Elio at one point: “I want to be good, we haven’t done anything yet.”
Elio’s raging hormones are acknowledged – there is a scene involving him and a peach and he also sleeps with a girl from next door – but there is more than unbridled lust between him and Oliver. They talk about books, music and people and share a deeply intimate connection.
There is also a remarkable scene that takes place between Elio and his father, which Stuhlbarg handles with grace and gravitas. The professor talks to his son about love with the wisdom of one who has experienced it and the protective instinct of a parent who wants the best for his child.
Movies often make a big deal about the sex talk, but you rarely see one in which a teenager and his parents have a serious conversation about romantic love.
(ST)
Luca Guadagnino
The story: In the early 1980s, academics who stay for a spell in the family home in northern Italy and help out his professor father are a summer ritual for Elio (Timothee Chalamet). When young Jewish-American scholar Oliver (Armie Hammer) walks through their door, he stirs up strong feelings of desire on the part of the precocious 17-year-old. Based on Andre Aciman’s 2007 novel of the same name.
Having read and loved the book, I was a little apprehensive about a big-screen adaptation. The Egyptian-born American writer Aciman crafts lyrical prose and much of it is in the form of interior monologues in Elio’s head. How would this translate to the big screen?
Drawing on a beautiful source text, Italian director Luca Guadagnino (I Am Love, 2010) has made a film that is its own kind of wonderful.
It is an adaptation that is loving and faithful, but not slavishly so. There is no voiceover, for example, but we still get glimpses into Elio’s head through the clever conversion of some of his thoughts into dialogue as well as scrawlings in a journal.
From the gorgeous setting of an idyllic northern Italian town to the casting to the choice of music, the film-maker gets the details just right in evoking a world that we become completely immersed in.
Chalamet slips under the skin of Elio to give a sensitively tuned performance as he swings from the heady rapture of sexual awakening and first love to being torn apart by doubt and insecurity. He flits so naturally from English to Italian to French that it comes as a jolt to find out that he is American, born and raised in Manhattan.
His star-making turn has landed him Best Actor nominations for the Golden Globe Awards and Screen Actors Guild Awards and wins from several critics associations. Nominations and wins have also been chalked up for best film, best director and best supporting actor for Hammer and Michael Stuhlbarg, who plays Elio’s father.
Hammer is well cast as the athletic academic with the movie star aura, the object of Elio’s desire. His Oliver has an easy confidence about him and also an innate sense of decency. He says to Elio at one point: “I want to be good, we haven’t done anything yet.”
Elio’s raging hormones are acknowledged – there is a scene involving him and a peach and he also sleeps with a girl from next door – but there is more than unbridled lust between him and Oliver. They talk about books, music and people and share a deeply intimate connection.
There is also a remarkable scene that takes place between Elio and his father, which Stuhlbarg handles with grace and gravitas. The professor talks to his son about love with the wisdom of one who has experienced it and the protective instinct of a parent who wants the best for his child.
Movies often make a big deal about the sex talk, but you rarely see one in which a teenager and his parents have a serious conversation about romantic love.
(ST)
Sunday, December 17, 2017
BEST
Wei Bird 2017 Concert
Resorts World Theatre, Oct 28
Given that shows are now planned down to the last note, Taiwanese singer-songwriter Wei Li-an’s 20-minute encore was a lovely surprise. He emerged with a guitar and proceeded to take requests before ending the night with the delicate beauty of Cloudy Sunflower.
The rest of the show was not too shabby either. Live, he was an affable presence whose pipes shone whether he was rocking out on Wolves or soaring in his falsetto range on early track Translation Exercise. He seemed comfortable enough on stage that one would not guess that he is, in his own words, an introvert.
Eason Chan Says C’mon In~ Tour In Singapore
Singapore Indoor Stadium, Dec 3
Usually, when an album is released, only a few numbers from it would be plugged and performed in concerts. Hong Kong singer Eason Chan tried something different with the C’Mon In~ tour, which is also the title of his latest Mandarin record. He performed all 10 tracks, giving each its moment to breathe on stage.
It worked, thanks to his reliably fine vocals and the strength of the material, which ranged from the retro dance of Hai Dan (Sigh) to the poignant balladry of Shei Lai Jian Yue Guang (Miss).
MICappella You And I Live In Concert 2017
Capitol Theatre, Nov 4
The a cappella sextet started out doing covers and have since gone on to put out an entire album of original material with last year’s MICappella Reloaded.
They were at their best here in the high-octane original numbers One Of These Days and Never Be Defeated, in which all the elements – from the vocal percussion to the harmonisation – formed a satisfying whole. In their biggest solo show to date on home ground, they conveyed the joy and excitement of coming together to make music.
WORST
Least enjoyable aspect of concerts: queues
Long snaking queues to get into gig venues are now par for the course. But people are stoic about the fact that this is the new normal, with enhanced security checks a necessity in a time of terror threats.
Maybe we should take heed of what Bono from Irish rock band U2 said in Paris. The band were rehearsing in the city during the deadly attacks in November 2015 at a rock concert by Eagles Of Death Metal that took 89 lives inside Paris’ Bataclan venue. Bono said: “Be vigilant, but be unafraid.”
(ST)
Wei Bird 2017 Concert
Resorts World Theatre, Oct 28
Given that shows are now planned down to the last note, Taiwanese singer-songwriter Wei Li-an’s 20-minute encore was a lovely surprise. He emerged with a guitar and proceeded to take requests before ending the night with the delicate beauty of Cloudy Sunflower.
The rest of the show was not too shabby either. Live, he was an affable presence whose pipes shone whether he was rocking out on Wolves or soaring in his falsetto range on early track Translation Exercise. He seemed comfortable enough on stage that one would not guess that he is, in his own words, an introvert.
Eason Chan Says C’mon In~ Tour In Singapore
Singapore Indoor Stadium, Dec 3
Usually, when an album is released, only a few numbers from it would be plugged and performed in concerts. Hong Kong singer Eason Chan tried something different with the C’Mon In~ tour, which is also the title of his latest Mandarin record. He performed all 10 tracks, giving each its moment to breathe on stage.
It worked, thanks to his reliably fine vocals and the strength of the material, which ranged from the retro dance of Hai Dan (Sigh) to the poignant balladry of Shei Lai Jian Yue Guang (Miss).
MICappella You And I Live In Concert 2017
Capitol Theatre, Nov 4
The a cappella sextet started out doing covers and have since gone on to put out an entire album of original material with last year’s MICappella Reloaded.
They were at their best here in the high-octane original numbers One Of These Days and Never Be Defeated, in which all the elements – from the vocal percussion to the harmonisation – formed a satisfying whole. In their biggest solo show to date on home ground, they conveyed the joy and excitement of coming together to make music.
WORST
Least enjoyable aspect of concerts: queues
Long snaking queues to get into gig venues are now par for the course. But people are stoic about the fact that this is the new normal, with enhanced security checks a necessity in a time of terror threats.
Maybe we should take heed of what Bono from Irish rock band U2 said in Paris. The band were rehearsing in the city during the deadly attacks in November 2015 at a rock concert by Eagles Of Death Metal that took 89 lives inside Paris’ Bataclan venue. Bono said: “Be vigilant, but be unafraid.”
(ST)
BEST ASIAN ALBUMS OF 2017
The Silent Star Stone
Guo Ding
The Hunan-born singer-songwriter deservedly broke out with his third album.
He has a mesmerising voice with a slight drawl that hints at both intimacy and attitude, one that is magnetic at the lower end of the register and equally persuasive on the higher reaches.
From Qi Mei Di (The Fog Space) to Shui Xing Ji (Mercury Records), this is lush and imaginative pop, propelled by a pulsing beat and urgency of feeling.
He might have missed out at the Golden Melody Awards despite six nominations, but the greater exposure he has received as a result makes it a win for him.
The Servile
No Party For Cao Dong
Da Feng Chui (Simon Says), which won Song of the Year at the Golden Melody Awards, is a scathing criticism of society’s obsession with material goods and the need for one-upmanship.
Frontman Wu Tu sings without heat and then tears into the chorus at the end: “Cry, shout, ask your mother to buy a toy/Hurry to school and show off, child, make some friends.”
The Servile is the sound of Taiwan’s disenfranchised youth venting their frustrations and it has struck a chord in their homeland. But its searing honesty and seamless musicality would resonate with anyone.
Artists’ Mood
Leo Wang
The Taiwanese musician’s mission, as laid out on his Facebook page, is “trying to combine jazz, hip-hop, reggae and scat singing with Mandarin Chinese in a groovy way, and making his people dance”.
He achieves that on his fourth so-called mixtape, a fun and irreverent grab bag of genres and influences.
Jam All Night is about the pure pleasure of making music: “I think everything will be all right/As long as we can jam all night/Use your hands to drum, use your feet to drum/Use your mouth to drum, use your body to drum.”
The joy is infectious.
WORST
Appreciation
Alan Tam
Props to Cantopop legend Alan Tam, 67, for continuing to put out new work but, unfortunately, this disc of Mandopop duets is a misfire.
Despite rounding up collaborators such as Kit Chan, Eason Chan and Mayday, the pairings do not work. While it is true that Tam’s diction has improved compared with when he started singing in Mandarin, his Cantonese accent remains discernible.
Simplicity Is Happiness packs a double whammy of accented Mandarin with the addition of Andy Lau, another singer who is better in his native Cantonese.
(ST)
The Silent Star Stone
Guo Ding
The Hunan-born singer-songwriter deservedly broke out with his third album.
He has a mesmerising voice with a slight drawl that hints at both intimacy and attitude, one that is magnetic at the lower end of the register and equally persuasive on the higher reaches.
From Qi Mei Di (The Fog Space) to Shui Xing Ji (Mercury Records), this is lush and imaginative pop, propelled by a pulsing beat and urgency of feeling.
He might have missed out at the Golden Melody Awards despite six nominations, but the greater exposure he has received as a result makes it a win for him.
The Servile
No Party For Cao Dong
Da Feng Chui (Simon Says), which won Song of the Year at the Golden Melody Awards, is a scathing criticism of society’s obsession with material goods and the need for one-upmanship.
Frontman Wu Tu sings without heat and then tears into the chorus at the end: “Cry, shout, ask your mother to buy a toy/Hurry to school and show off, child, make some friends.”
The Servile is the sound of Taiwan’s disenfranchised youth venting their frustrations and it has struck a chord in their homeland. But its searing honesty and seamless musicality would resonate with anyone.
Artists’ Mood
Leo Wang
The Taiwanese musician’s mission, as laid out on his Facebook page, is “trying to combine jazz, hip-hop, reggae and scat singing with Mandarin Chinese in a groovy way, and making his people dance”.
He achieves that on his fourth so-called mixtape, a fun and irreverent grab bag of genres and influences.
Jam All Night is about the pure pleasure of making music: “I think everything will be all right/As long as we can jam all night/Use your hands to drum, use your feet to drum/Use your mouth to drum, use your body to drum.”
The joy is infectious.
WORST
Appreciation
Alan Tam
Props to Cantopop legend Alan Tam, 67, for continuing to put out new work but, unfortunately, this disc of Mandopop duets is a misfire.
Despite rounding up collaborators such as Kit Chan, Eason Chan and Mayday, the pairings do not work. While it is true that Tam’s diction has improved compared with when he started singing in Mandarin, his Cantonese accent remains discernible.
Simplicity Is Happiness packs a double whammy of accented Mandarin with the addition of Andy Lau, another singer who is better in his native Cantonese.
(ST)
BEST MOVIES OF 2017
Call Me By Your Name
Luca Guadagnino
American writer Andre Aciman’s 2007 novel of the same name is a thing of beauty, an account of a love affair between 17-year-old Elio and visiting 24-year-old scholar Oliver in a small town in Italy in the 1980s.
Against an idyllic backdrop of rural Italian gorgeousness, director Luca Guadagnino conveys the headiness of first love and sexual awakening. Timothee Chalamet slips thoroughly under Elio’s skin and gives a sensitively tuned performance as he swings from heady rapture to being lacerated by doubt. Armie Hammer is also well-cast as the athletic American academic who wants to do right by Elio.
Adaptations are tricky things, more so if the original is beloved, but this movie is its own kind of wonderful. After two sold-out screenings and winning the Audience Choice Award at the Singapore International Film Festival, the drama is slated for a run at The Projector from Jan 4.
Midnight Runners
Jason Kim Joo Hwan
A thoroughly entertaining and satisfying South Korean buddy action flick, thanks to the chemistry between the two charming and likeable lead actors, Park Seo Jun and Kang Ha Neul.
They play a pair of police academy trainees who witness the abduction of a young woman and decide to follow up on their own time, even at the risk of getting expelled.
Writer-director Jason Kim Joo Hwan deftly mixes comedy, action, crime and morality drama. Hopefully, there is a sequel.
Mad World
Wong Chun
Young Hong Kong film-maker Wong Chun’s debut feature is a compassionate look at the often-ignored topic of mental illness. The 28-year-old depicts the maladies of intolerance and fear, but does not pretend there are easy remedies.
The drama is also grounded by fine performances from Shawn Yue, as a bipolar disorder sufferer trying to navigate his way in society, and Eric Tsang, as a father who is faced with difficult questions about how to best care for his mentally ill son.
Kudos to the Singapore Chinese Film Festival for screening it in its original Cantonese.
WORST
Love Contractually
Liu Guonan
Yet another dire and dour movie which purports to be a romantic comedy.
Sammi Cheng’s nitpicking executive-type taskmaster is a cold and cheerless creation that is hard to warm up to and there is no chemistry between the Hong Kong star and Taiwan’s Joseph Chang. He is a paratrooper-turned-courier who ends up as her assistant, only to realise later that he was picked to be her sperm donor.
When a movie shifts its location to scenic Paris for no good reason, that is a sign that the film-makers are clutching at straws.
(ST)
Call Me By Your Name
Luca Guadagnino
American writer Andre Aciman’s 2007 novel of the same name is a thing of beauty, an account of a love affair between 17-year-old Elio and visiting 24-year-old scholar Oliver in a small town in Italy in the 1980s.
Against an idyllic backdrop of rural Italian gorgeousness, director Luca Guadagnino conveys the headiness of first love and sexual awakening. Timothee Chalamet slips thoroughly under Elio’s skin and gives a sensitively tuned performance as he swings from heady rapture to being lacerated by doubt. Armie Hammer is also well-cast as the athletic American academic who wants to do right by Elio.
Adaptations are tricky things, more so if the original is beloved, but this movie is its own kind of wonderful. After two sold-out screenings and winning the Audience Choice Award at the Singapore International Film Festival, the drama is slated for a run at The Projector from Jan 4.
Midnight Runners
Jason Kim Joo Hwan
A thoroughly entertaining and satisfying South Korean buddy action flick, thanks to the chemistry between the two charming and likeable lead actors, Park Seo Jun and Kang Ha Neul.
They play a pair of police academy trainees who witness the abduction of a young woman and decide to follow up on their own time, even at the risk of getting expelled.
Writer-director Jason Kim Joo Hwan deftly mixes comedy, action, crime and morality drama. Hopefully, there is a sequel.
Mad World
Wong Chun
Young Hong Kong film-maker Wong Chun’s debut feature is a compassionate look at the often-ignored topic of mental illness. The 28-year-old depicts the maladies of intolerance and fear, but does not pretend there are easy remedies.
The drama is also grounded by fine performances from Shawn Yue, as a bipolar disorder sufferer trying to navigate his way in society, and Eric Tsang, as a father who is faced with difficult questions about how to best care for his mentally ill son.
Kudos to the Singapore Chinese Film Festival for screening it in its original Cantonese.
WORST
Love Contractually
Liu Guonan
Yet another dire and dour movie which purports to be a romantic comedy.
Sammi Cheng’s nitpicking executive-type taskmaster is a cold and cheerless creation that is hard to warm up to and there is no chemistry between the Hong Kong star and Taiwan’s Joseph Chang. He is a paratrooper-turned-courier who ends up as her assistant, only to realise later that he was picked to be her sperm donor.
When a movie shifts its location to scenic Paris for no good reason, that is a sign that the film-makers are clutching at straws.
(ST)
Saturday, December 16, 2017
The Mayday 2017 Life Tour takes its name from a track titled Life Co Ltd on the Taiwanese band's last album History Of Tomorrow (2016).
It also serves as an inspiration for the humorous and action-packed videos interspersed throughout the concert at the Singapore Indoor Stadium on Friday (Dec 15). The concept is that the quintet - frontman Ashin, guitarists Monster and Stone, bassist Masa, drummer Guan You - are out-of-work superheroes recruited to work in a company to fight evil once more.
The slick-looking clips were in keeping with the high production values of the gig, from the programmed light sticks given to every ticket holder to the versatile stage, parts of which could ascend and descend. The band performed The Dark Knight on a raised platform and it looked as though they were atop an apartment building with the rest of the city spread out behind them. It definitely made an impact visually.
There was quite a lot going on but it was not quite enough to distract one from the fact that Ashin was not in top form at first.
Perhaps starting with the fast-paced and high-pitched Party Animal was not the best idea and his vocals felt a bit raw. He sounded strained on the high notes and even waded into dubious keys at points.
But just as I was wondering if this would be the first Mayday concert where I did not get up on my feet, the band found a second wave of energy and Ashin's pipes finally warmed up. Following the high-octane Jump and the Minnan number Motor Rock, he asked the fans to help fulfil their dream of holding an outdoor concert in Singapore by lifting the roof with some noise. They duly obliged.
He quipped: "We'll have to see ear doctors when we get back."
Taiwanese band Mayday mark their 20th anniversary in 2017 and over the years, they have built a large and dedicated fanbase.
The band mark their 20th anniversary in 2017 and over the years, they have built a large and dedicated fanbase.
Some of the fans prepared the mini blue banners ("Mayday is.... Monster Stone Masa Ming Ashin & ME!") that were displayed during People Life, Ocean Wild, the rousing title track of their 2001 album. (Guan You is also known as Ming.)
Others prepped the audience to chant "jia ban (overtime)" instead of "encore" at the end of the set, in keeping with the show's theme.
The band kicked things up a notch during the encore with a line-up that included the fast-paced Sad People Should Not Listen To Slow Songs and the ballad Onion, written by Ashin for Taiwanese singer Aska Yang.
The highlight of the concert was 10,000 people - on the first of three sold-out nights - fervently belting out the classic hit Tenderness as lightsticks shone in unison.
The highlight was 10,000 people - on the first of three sold-out nights - fervently belting out the classic hit Tenderness as lightsticks shone in unison.
By the time Mayday ended their three-hour-long gig with the defiant Stubborn, I was ready for more overtime.
(ST)
It also serves as an inspiration for the humorous and action-packed videos interspersed throughout the concert at the Singapore Indoor Stadium on Friday (Dec 15). The concept is that the quintet - frontman Ashin, guitarists Monster and Stone, bassist Masa, drummer Guan You - are out-of-work superheroes recruited to work in a company to fight evil once more.
The slick-looking clips were in keeping with the high production values of the gig, from the programmed light sticks given to every ticket holder to the versatile stage, parts of which could ascend and descend. The band performed The Dark Knight on a raised platform and it looked as though they were atop an apartment building with the rest of the city spread out behind them. It definitely made an impact visually.
There was quite a lot going on but it was not quite enough to distract one from the fact that Ashin was not in top form at first.
Perhaps starting with the fast-paced and high-pitched Party Animal was not the best idea and his vocals felt a bit raw. He sounded strained on the high notes and even waded into dubious keys at points.
But just as I was wondering if this would be the first Mayday concert where I did not get up on my feet, the band found a second wave of energy and Ashin's pipes finally warmed up. Following the high-octane Jump and the Minnan number Motor Rock, he asked the fans to help fulfil their dream of holding an outdoor concert in Singapore by lifting the roof with some noise. They duly obliged.
He quipped: "We'll have to see ear doctors when we get back."
Taiwanese band Mayday mark their 20th anniversary in 2017 and over the years, they have built a large and dedicated fanbase.
The band mark their 20th anniversary in 2017 and over the years, they have built a large and dedicated fanbase.
Some of the fans prepared the mini blue banners ("Mayday is.... Monster Stone Masa Ming Ashin & ME!") that were displayed during People Life, Ocean Wild, the rousing title track of their 2001 album. (Guan You is also known as Ming.)
Others prepped the audience to chant "jia ban (overtime)" instead of "encore" at the end of the set, in keeping with the show's theme.
The band kicked things up a notch during the encore with a line-up that included the fast-paced Sad People Should Not Listen To Slow Songs and the ballad Onion, written by Ashin for Taiwanese singer Aska Yang.
The highlight of the concert was 10,000 people - on the first of three sold-out nights - fervently belting out the classic hit Tenderness as lightsticks shone in unison.
The highlight was 10,000 people - on the first of three sold-out nights - fervently belting out the classic hit Tenderness as lightsticks shone in unison.
By the time Mayday ended their three-hour-long gig with the defiant Stubborn, I was ready for more overtime.
(ST)
Wednesday, December 13, 2017
En
Li Ronghao
Chinese singer-songwriter Li Ronghao has made his name with finely crafted, and performed, mid-tempo tracks about life and love on Model (2013), 2014’s eponymous album and An Ideal (2016).
He shakes things up here on the opening title track by serving a slice of electronica pop with lyrics that sketch a portrait of millennial youth: “Don’t like tattoos of dragons and phoenixes/To bleed for one you love/Perhaps the upper classes won’t get it.”
The misguided attempt to connect with a younger audience is worrying. Luckily, much of the album is still Li doing what he does best – contemplating the vicissitudes of life and relationships at a slower pace.
The poignant Ballad sees him draw strength from ditties that remind him of home: “Ballads from hometown/ Are a good thing to me/They’re the most tenacious side of me/Whenever I feel low, I’d sing them.”
Wish You Happiness is melodic and moving: “Last night, unknowingly, falling leaves fell, a fairy-tale like autumn/That day a girl faced the phone, do you still love me.”
There is also Teenager, a song about taking life by the horns which features a cappella harmonisation: “While you’re still unafraid/Choose a path and set off/Don’t look back/ While you’re still a young man.” Despite the title, this might resonate more strongly with older listeners looking wistfully back on their youth.
(ST)
Li Ronghao
Chinese singer-songwriter Li Ronghao has made his name with finely crafted, and performed, mid-tempo tracks about life and love on Model (2013), 2014’s eponymous album and An Ideal (2016).
He shakes things up here on the opening title track by serving a slice of electronica pop with lyrics that sketch a portrait of millennial youth: “Don’t like tattoos of dragons and phoenixes/To bleed for one you love/Perhaps the upper classes won’t get it.”
The misguided attempt to connect with a younger audience is worrying. Luckily, much of the album is still Li doing what he does best – contemplating the vicissitudes of life and relationships at a slower pace.
The poignant Ballad sees him draw strength from ditties that remind him of home: “Ballads from hometown/ Are a good thing to me/They’re the most tenacious side of me/Whenever I feel low, I’d sing them.”
Wish You Happiness is melodic and moving: “Last night, unknowingly, falling leaves fell, a fairy-tale like autumn/That day a girl faced the phone, do you still love me.”
There is also Teenager, a song about taking life by the horns which features a cappella harmonisation: “While you’re still unafraid/Choose a path and set off/Don’t look back/ While you’re still a young man.” Despite the title, this might resonate more strongly with older listeners looking wistfully back on their youth.
(ST)
Tuesday, December 05, 2017
Eason Says C’mon In~ Tour In Singapore
Singapore Indoor Stadium/Sunday
No fancy staging, no eye-popping costumes and no sign of his best-known hits.
Instead, Hong Kong singer Eason Chan tried something different with this C’mon In~ gig, which is also the title of his most recent Mandarin album.
He performed all 10 tracks from it and shared anecdotes about them. Usually, only a few numbers from a new record would be plugged and performed, but he gave all of them space to breathe with this format.
It was a conceit that worked, thanks to the fine form of his voice and the strength of the material. It ranged from the beautiful balladry of Shei Lai Jian Yue Guang (Miss) to the lively Hai Dan (Sigh), a retro dance tune that served up sea urchin as a metaphor for how a man lives his life.
And “slow song with a groove” Ling Xia Ji Fen Zhong (Freeze), inspired by the late English singer-songwriter George Michael, painted a picture of wintry New York as smoke swirled on stage.
Dressed in a casual ensemble of jacket, T-shirt and trackpants, Chan was in a relaxed and expansive mood on the final stop of the tour.
With no strict run-down to adhere to, he digressed all over in his chatter (“Let’s talk about gossip. Actually, I’m really out of it.”) and danced when the mood seized him.
Speaking in a mix of Cantonese, Mandarin and English, he recalled the madness that would usually follow when a movable stage descends. Complete with actions and exaggerated expressions, he recreated the rush to change costumes and take a sip of water – sometimes getting a mic poked in his face.
In addition to songs from C’mon In~, he also performed a selection of Cantonese tracks for the sold-out crowd of 5,000.
As he rattled off names of past hits, including King Of Karaoke and Next Year Today, the crowd roared with approval – only to have him declare that these were tracks he would not be singing.
Instead, he dug deep into his back catalogue and came up with numbers such as Superman’s Theme from 1998 as well as a Canto-Mando mash-up of White Rose and Red Rose.
It was not as though he was out to alienate the audience, but this cosy setting – though perhaps, say, the Esplanade Concert Hall would have been more ideal – was a good platform to trot out material that might not have been big hits, but was still important to him.
And what was important to fans was another chance to hear Chan live in concert – regardless of the format.
(ST)
Singapore Indoor Stadium/Sunday
No fancy staging, no eye-popping costumes and no sign of his best-known hits.
Instead, Hong Kong singer Eason Chan tried something different with this C’mon In~ gig, which is also the title of his most recent Mandarin album.
He performed all 10 tracks from it and shared anecdotes about them. Usually, only a few numbers from a new record would be plugged and performed, but he gave all of them space to breathe with this format.
It was a conceit that worked, thanks to the fine form of his voice and the strength of the material. It ranged from the beautiful balladry of Shei Lai Jian Yue Guang (Miss) to the lively Hai Dan (Sigh), a retro dance tune that served up sea urchin as a metaphor for how a man lives his life.
And “slow song with a groove” Ling Xia Ji Fen Zhong (Freeze), inspired by the late English singer-songwriter George Michael, painted a picture of wintry New York as smoke swirled on stage.
Dressed in a casual ensemble of jacket, T-shirt and trackpants, Chan was in a relaxed and expansive mood on the final stop of the tour.
With no strict run-down to adhere to, he digressed all over in his chatter (“Let’s talk about gossip. Actually, I’m really out of it.”) and danced when the mood seized him.
Speaking in a mix of Cantonese, Mandarin and English, he recalled the madness that would usually follow when a movable stage descends. Complete with actions and exaggerated expressions, he recreated the rush to change costumes and take a sip of water – sometimes getting a mic poked in his face.
In addition to songs from C’mon In~, he also performed a selection of Cantonese tracks for the sold-out crowd of 5,000.
As he rattled off names of past hits, including King Of Karaoke and Next Year Today, the crowd roared with approval – only to have him declare that these were tracks he would not be singing.
Instead, he dug deep into his back catalogue and came up with numbers such as Superman’s Theme from 1998 as well as a Canto-Mando mash-up of White Rose and Red Rose.
It was not as though he was out to alienate the audience, but this cosy setting – though perhaps, say, the Esplanade Concert Hall would have been more ideal – was a good platform to trot out material that might not have been big hits, but was still important to him.
And what was important to fans was another chance to hear Chan live in concert – regardless of the format.
(ST)
Wednesday, November 29, 2017
Martial God Cardea
Sandee Chan
Watch out, Taiwanese singer-songwriter Sandee Chan is on the warpath.
But instead of a cacophonous war cry, she has crafted a melancholic, chilled out album which seems to take aim at the impact of technology on our lives in the elliptical lyrics.
In the synth-rock number He’s A Space Debris From The Doomsday Prophecy, Mayday’s Monster and Stone are roped in for guitar duty. Is doomsday linked to the ubiquity of the online realm (“Anime, chasing serials, cheap flights and then search/For a long vacation”)? The repetition of the phrase “keep floating” in English suggests a kind of alienating bubble or cocoon which that world creates.
There is both pessimism and optimism as she vacillates between helplessness in There’s Nothing I Can Do About It and a guarded hopefulness in That’s Not The Only Thing I Can Do.
The title track imagines that Cardea is someone’s online handle, which is appropriate, given that Cardea is the Roman goddess of the door hinge. Chan grapples with the nature of the Internet beast: “When information civilisation is preserving me through text/An ideal life is a sorrow that loses control the more it stays silent.”
Romance is ephemeral in this brave new world. In the track Three Days And Two Nights, she writes: “I just wanted to like you at that time in that way/So I liked you at that time in that way.”
After all, being alone is not necessarily a bad thing, as depicted on the opening track Solitude.
With a line in Japanese, “Densha de iku (Going by train)”, one could imagine her on the Tokyo subway, wrapped up in her own world: “I’m not a prime number, don’t beautify the pain, reading a book, traversing imaginary lands.”
It can be a challenging journey, but one is happy to tag along for the ride.
(ST)
Sandee Chan
Watch out, Taiwanese singer-songwriter Sandee Chan is on the warpath.
But instead of a cacophonous war cry, she has crafted a melancholic, chilled out album which seems to take aim at the impact of technology on our lives in the elliptical lyrics.
In the synth-rock number He’s A Space Debris From The Doomsday Prophecy, Mayday’s Monster and Stone are roped in for guitar duty. Is doomsday linked to the ubiquity of the online realm (“Anime, chasing serials, cheap flights and then search/For a long vacation”)? The repetition of the phrase “keep floating” in English suggests a kind of alienating bubble or cocoon which that world creates.
There is both pessimism and optimism as she vacillates between helplessness in There’s Nothing I Can Do About It and a guarded hopefulness in That’s Not The Only Thing I Can Do.
The title track imagines that Cardea is someone’s online handle, which is appropriate, given that Cardea is the Roman goddess of the door hinge. Chan grapples with the nature of the Internet beast: “When information civilisation is preserving me through text/An ideal life is a sorrow that loses control the more it stays silent.”
Romance is ephemeral in this brave new world. In the track Three Days And Two Nights, she writes: “I just wanted to like you at that time in that way/So I liked you at that time in that way.”
After all, being alone is not necessarily a bad thing, as depicted on the opening track Solitude.
With a line in Japanese, “Densha de iku (Going by train)”, one could imagine her on the Tokyo subway, wrapped up in her own world: “I’m not a prime number, don’t beautify the pain, reading a book, traversing imaginary lands.”
It can be a challenging journey, but one is happy to tag along for the ride.
(ST)
Fireworks, Should We See It From The Side Or The Bottom?
Akiyuki Shinbo
The story: Norimichi (Masaki Suda) and Yusuke (Mamoru Miyano) have a crush on their junior high school classmate Nazuna (Suzu Hirose). On the day of the summer festival, Nazuna asks Yusuke to go with her to watch the fireworks after she wins a swimming race among the three of them and gets to have her way. Norimichi later finds out the reason for her actions and wishes that he had won the race instead. In frustration, he throws a mysterious ball picked up by Nazuna from the sea – and finds himself back at the moment of the swim.
While it is based on the 1993 live-action movie of the same name, the timing of this adaptation might have something to do with the runaway success of the anime Your Name (2016), a youthful romance fantasy which had body-swopping and time-travel.
And unfortunately for Fireworks, that makes its time-travelling conceit feel a little tired. The animation also seemed more lush in Your Name, though director Akiyuki Shinbo, best known for the magical girls fantasy series, Puella Magi Madoka Magica (2011), comes up with some beautiful shots of colourful fireworks going off at close range.
There are other things to like about the film as well.
The setting is a seaside town and the depiction of giant wind turbines, rocky promontories and students on bicycles tearing down the steep roads anchors the film with a strong sense of place. Perhaps as a clue, the name of the town is Moshimo, a homonym for “if” in Japanese.
The nuances of teenage male friendships and loyalties are sensitively handled: What do you do when you and your bestie both like the same girl?
The awkward silences and denials of Norimichi and Yusuke about this huge thing between them are entirely believable.
In fact, this feels more interesting than the actual romantic coupling as Nazuna remains somewhat opaque beyond being an unhappy figure of desire.
Meanwhile, the title is linked to a discussion Norimichi’s friends have about fireworks – are they round or are they flat? It is a question upon which everything and nothing hinges.
(ST)
Akiyuki Shinbo
The story: Norimichi (Masaki Suda) and Yusuke (Mamoru Miyano) have a crush on their junior high school classmate Nazuna (Suzu Hirose). On the day of the summer festival, Nazuna asks Yusuke to go with her to watch the fireworks after she wins a swimming race among the three of them and gets to have her way. Norimichi later finds out the reason for her actions and wishes that he had won the race instead. In frustration, he throws a mysterious ball picked up by Nazuna from the sea – and finds himself back at the moment of the swim.
While it is based on the 1993 live-action movie of the same name, the timing of this adaptation might have something to do with the runaway success of the anime Your Name (2016), a youthful romance fantasy which had body-swopping and time-travel.
And unfortunately for Fireworks, that makes its time-travelling conceit feel a little tired. The animation also seemed more lush in Your Name, though director Akiyuki Shinbo, best known for the magical girls fantasy series, Puella Magi Madoka Magica (2011), comes up with some beautiful shots of colourful fireworks going off at close range.
There are other things to like about the film as well.
The setting is a seaside town and the depiction of giant wind turbines, rocky promontories and students on bicycles tearing down the steep roads anchors the film with a strong sense of place. Perhaps as a clue, the name of the town is Moshimo, a homonym for “if” in Japanese.
The nuances of teenage male friendships and loyalties are sensitively handled: What do you do when you and your bestie both like the same girl?
The awkward silences and denials of Norimichi and Yusuke about this huge thing between them are entirely believable.
In fact, this feels more interesting than the actual romantic coupling as Nazuna remains somewhat opaque beyond being an unhappy figure of desire.
Meanwhile, the title is linked to a discussion Norimichi’s friends have about fireworks – are they round or are they flat? It is a question upon which everything and nothing hinges.
(ST)
Wednesday, November 22, 2017
The Golden Monk
Wong Jing, Billy Chung
The story: In a time of demons and exorcists in Hangzhou, Butong (Zheng Kai) is a monk with supernatural powers – and a head of hair so tough that he cannot receive a tonsure. He crosses paths with Jade (Kitty Zhang), an exorcist who retains memories of her past life as a fairy banished from heaven after breaking a rule by falling in love with another fairy, Golden Child (Zheng). However, she is unable to see that Butong is Golden Child’s current incarnation.
After a surprisingly worthy outing with the crime epic Chasing The Dragon (2017), Hong Kong film-maker Wong Jing is back to his sloppy ways.
He co-directs with Billy Chung (The Man From Macau, 2014) The Golden Monk, a nonsensical fantasy that is only briefly, intermittently amusing, and inexplicably turns out to be the origin story of another well-known character of whom numerous television series and movies have been made.
If more jokes hit their mark, one would not have time to wonder why heaven here is a vaguely Greek-looking construct. Neither do the nonsensical moments tickle the funny bone. Instead, Butong jarringly breaks into a rendition of Andy Lau’s Water Of Forgetfulness, and Taiwanese actress Evonne Hsieh, who made her debut in the contemporary drama Tiny Times (2013), cringingly parades about as a mustachioed male buffoon.
The central love story is not persuasive and the mix of comedy and romance is strained.
The film is also saddled with an unsavoury and unfunny episode of a man who pimps out his wife, as well as a lame side plot of a dragon spirit attempting to seize control of the court by poisoning the emperor. The running time is further stretched with the inclusion of unnecessarily long recap scenes.
It culminates in a clash of the computer-animated titans as an army of golden monks battles with a villainous dragon. But the CGI stakes are not enough for one to feel invested in this showdown.
Perhaps The Golden Monk might have greater appeal in China, where Zheng is best known as a cast member in the Chinese version of the South Korean variety show Running Man.
He proves himself to be a game and affable actor but, next time, he should run away from such slipshod material.
(ST)
Wong Jing, Billy Chung
The story: In a time of demons and exorcists in Hangzhou, Butong (Zheng Kai) is a monk with supernatural powers – and a head of hair so tough that he cannot receive a tonsure. He crosses paths with Jade (Kitty Zhang), an exorcist who retains memories of her past life as a fairy banished from heaven after breaking a rule by falling in love with another fairy, Golden Child (Zheng). However, she is unable to see that Butong is Golden Child’s current incarnation.
After a surprisingly worthy outing with the crime epic Chasing The Dragon (2017), Hong Kong film-maker Wong Jing is back to his sloppy ways.
He co-directs with Billy Chung (The Man From Macau, 2014) The Golden Monk, a nonsensical fantasy that is only briefly, intermittently amusing, and inexplicably turns out to be the origin story of another well-known character of whom numerous television series and movies have been made.
If more jokes hit their mark, one would not have time to wonder why heaven here is a vaguely Greek-looking construct. Neither do the nonsensical moments tickle the funny bone. Instead, Butong jarringly breaks into a rendition of Andy Lau’s Water Of Forgetfulness, and Taiwanese actress Evonne Hsieh, who made her debut in the contemporary drama Tiny Times (2013), cringingly parades about as a mustachioed male buffoon.
The central love story is not persuasive and the mix of comedy and romance is strained.
The film is also saddled with an unsavoury and unfunny episode of a man who pimps out his wife, as well as a lame side plot of a dragon spirit attempting to seize control of the court by poisoning the emperor. The running time is further stretched with the inclusion of unnecessarily long recap scenes.
It culminates in a clash of the computer-animated titans as an army of golden monks battles with a villainous dragon. But the CGI stakes are not enough for one to feel invested in this showdown.
Perhaps The Golden Monk might have greater appeal in China, where Zheng is best known as a cast member in the Chinese version of the South Korean variety show Running Man.
He proves himself to be a game and affable actor but, next time, he should run away from such slipshod material.
(ST)
Coco
Lee Unkrich
The story: Miguel (Anthony Gonzalez) is a 12-year-old Mexican boy dreaming of becoming a musician like his late idol Ernesto de la Cruz. But music is banned in his household because his great-great-grandfather had left his family to pursue those dreams. Then, Miguel unexpectedly finds himself crossing over to the Land of the Dead during the Day of the Dead festival, where he meets charming, troubled trickster Hector (Gael Garcia Bernal), comes face to face with Ernesto (Benjamin Bratt) and learns the truth about the skeleton in his family’s closet.
There was another animated movie recently made about the Day of the Dead, The Book Of Life (2014). Coming in second for a similarly themed project is usually not ideal given that audiences might not have the appetite for more than one such film. Then again, Pixar does have a strong track record in animation works in general.
And indeed, they deliver once again with Coco, with director Lee Unkrich (Toy Story 3, 2010) at the helm.
The film is a visually gorgeous tapestry of Mexican culture and it fills the screen with the colourful vibrancy of Dia de Muertos (Day of the Dead) as people honour the memory of the departed with visits to cemeteries and gather for music, food and drink while bright orange marigold blooms carpet the ground.
The loving attention to detail impresses. There is the use of paper cut-outs to effectively convey a brief backstory involving Miguel’s great-great-grandfather and the latter’s daughter, Coco, and the wondrously imagined Land of the Dead, complete with fantastical spirit guides and the depiction of skeletal figures in a way that makes them come alive as characters.
The voice work by the all-Latino cast is spot-on as well, never overshadowing the roles, but instead, fleshing them out and disappearing into them. Gonzalez’s Miguel is realistically torn between following his dreams and listening to his family, Bratt brings a smooth swagger to Ernesto and Garcia Bernal is by turns likeable and pitiful.
It would be all too easy to use Dia de Muertos as a somewhat exotic backdrop but – as far as it is possible for me to tell – there is a ring of authenticity to the proceedings as cultural traditions such as the construction of ofrendas, a collection of objects placed on a ritual altar, are faithfully depicted. Indeed, ofrendas are turned into a key detail in the story, thus weaving them seamlessly into the film.
While The Book Of Life was hampered by an unsatisfactory storyline, Coco is full of heart and it glows with a cosy familial warmth.
(ST)
Lee Unkrich
The story: Miguel (Anthony Gonzalez) is a 12-year-old Mexican boy dreaming of becoming a musician like his late idol Ernesto de la Cruz. But music is banned in his household because his great-great-grandfather had left his family to pursue those dreams. Then, Miguel unexpectedly finds himself crossing over to the Land of the Dead during the Day of the Dead festival, where he meets charming, troubled trickster Hector (Gael Garcia Bernal), comes face to face with Ernesto (Benjamin Bratt) and learns the truth about the skeleton in his family’s closet.
There was another animated movie recently made about the Day of the Dead, The Book Of Life (2014). Coming in second for a similarly themed project is usually not ideal given that audiences might not have the appetite for more than one such film. Then again, Pixar does have a strong track record in animation works in general.
And indeed, they deliver once again with Coco, with director Lee Unkrich (Toy Story 3, 2010) at the helm.
The film is a visually gorgeous tapestry of Mexican culture and it fills the screen with the colourful vibrancy of Dia de Muertos (Day of the Dead) as people honour the memory of the departed with visits to cemeteries and gather for music, food and drink while bright orange marigold blooms carpet the ground.
The loving attention to detail impresses. There is the use of paper cut-outs to effectively convey a brief backstory involving Miguel’s great-great-grandfather and the latter’s daughter, Coco, and the wondrously imagined Land of the Dead, complete with fantastical spirit guides and the depiction of skeletal figures in a way that makes them come alive as characters.
The voice work by the all-Latino cast is spot-on as well, never overshadowing the roles, but instead, fleshing them out and disappearing into them. Gonzalez’s Miguel is realistically torn between following his dreams and listening to his family, Bratt brings a smooth swagger to Ernesto and Garcia Bernal is by turns likeable and pitiful.
It would be all too easy to use Dia de Muertos as a somewhat exotic backdrop but – as far as it is possible for me to tell – there is a ring of authenticity to the proceedings as cultural traditions such as the construction of ofrendas, a collection of objects placed on a ritual altar, are faithfully depicted. Indeed, ofrendas are turned into a key detail in the story, thus weaving them seamlessly into the film.
While The Book Of Life was hampered by an unsatisfactory storyline, Coco is full of heart and it glows with a cosy familial warmth.
(ST)
C’mon In~
Eason Chan
Thank goodness Hong Kong singer Eason Chan’s mentoring duties on reality show Sing! China have not kept him from putting out new music.
And if he was stressed with juggling a busy schedule, it does not show on C’mon In~, his latest Mandarin album since 2014’s Rice & Shine.
In keeping with the welcoming title, the opening track Fang (Relax) is an invitation to lounge on the sand: “If the world turned into a beach/Just laze if you want to laze, who cares, ya, how nice.”
It is enough to make one forget about the grey skies and thunderstorms outside the window.
The relaxed vibe carries through to the second and third numbers. Hong Kong’s Jerald Chan (no relation to Eason) and Taiwan’s David Ke are behind the music and lyrics respectively for this breezy trio.
The retro dance of Sigh is a winner, but I prefer the Mandarin title, Hai Dan, which means sea urchin.
The word “dan” is also a homonym for “courage” and Ke’s lyrics paint a picture of a man whose prickly exterior is merely a protective shell: “It’s just that this man, whose thoughts are milder than anyone else’s/Won’t admit, but sigh, living like a sea urchin.”
Just when it seems like C’mon In~ is going to be the Mandarin counterpart of sorts to the all-dance Cantonese disc Listen To Eason Chan (2007), the pace slows down for Shei Lai Jian Yue Guang (Miss), which literally translates to the evocative Who Is Going To Cut The Moonlight.
Chan’s rich pipes have always shone on ballads and Miss is tailor-made for him to do precisely that. He sings tenderly, reminiscing: “Too many memories, how am I supposed to pack them into the luggage.”
Adding to the variety here are dance number You Shang Jiao (Notice), which takes a swipe at social media obsession, and dramatic electro-pop track Fu Ke Bai (Leap), which uses the Foucault pendulum as a metaphor for the inexorable forces of life.
He sings on Miss: “The world is a mess, but what can we do/Lift our heads up occasionally and good thing there’s a moon to admire.”
Good thing there is an Eason Chan album to indulge in every once in a while.
(ST)
Eason Chan
Thank goodness Hong Kong singer Eason Chan’s mentoring duties on reality show Sing! China have not kept him from putting out new music.
And if he was stressed with juggling a busy schedule, it does not show on C’mon In~, his latest Mandarin album since 2014’s Rice & Shine.
In keeping with the welcoming title, the opening track Fang (Relax) is an invitation to lounge on the sand: “If the world turned into a beach/Just laze if you want to laze, who cares, ya, how nice.”
It is enough to make one forget about the grey skies and thunderstorms outside the window.
The relaxed vibe carries through to the second and third numbers. Hong Kong’s Jerald Chan (no relation to Eason) and Taiwan’s David Ke are behind the music and lyrics respectively for this breezy trio.
The retro dance of Sigh is a winner, but I prefer the Mandarin title, Hai Dan, which means sea urchin.
The word “dan” is also a homonym for “courage” and Ke’s lyrics paint a picture of a man whose prickly exterior is merely a protective shell: “It’s just that this man, whose thoughts are milder than anyone else’s/Won’t admit, but sigh, living like a sea urchin.”
Just when it seems like C’mon In~ is going to be the Mandarin counterpart of sorts to the all-dance Cantonese disc Listen To Eason Chan (2007), the pace slows down for Shei Lai Jian Yue Guang (Miss), which literally translates to the evocative Who Is Going To Cut The Moonlight.
Chan’s rich pipes have always shone on ballads and Miss is tailor-made for him to do precisely that. He sings tenderly, reminiscing: “Too many memories, how am I supposed to pack them into the luggage.”
Adding to the variety here are dance number You Shang Jiao (Notice), which takes a swipe at social media obsession, and dramatic electro-pop track Fu Ke Bai (Leap), which uses the Foucault pendulum as a metaphor for the inexorable forces of life.
He sings on Miss: “The world is a mess, but what can we do/Lift our heads up occasionally and good thing there’s a moon to admire.”
Good thing there is an Eason Chan album to indulge in every once in a while.
(ST)
Wednesday, November 15, 2017
A Dancing Van Gogh
Stefanie Sun
When the first single, A Dancing Van Gogh, dropped, I was not quite sure what to make of it. One friend remarked that it was “super offbeat” and that not many Mandopop singers could pull it off. Another thought it was terrible.
It was certainly an unlikely choice to herald the release of a new album by home-grown Mandopop queen Stefanie Sun following 2014’s Kepler and last year’s EP Rainbow Bot.
Neither a conventional ballad nor an out-and-out dance number, A Dancing Van Gogh references the famous Dutch artist and his paintings to a mysterious end. There is a breathy edge to Sun’s familiar pipes in the languorous opening couplet: “Sunflowers, golden like fire/Doing away with being wrapped by sunlight.”
This could be a fever dream as suggested by the enigmatic music video of shifting identities and the bridge in the song: “The Starry Night spins me around/Sorrow and merriment roam all over/I can’t bear to, don’t want to wake up”. It builds to a dramatic chorus, with even a choir chiming in eventually.
What it undoubtedly was was attention-grabbing. The track topped the iTunes chart in Taiwan, Hong Kong, Malaysia and Singapore and the music video has chalked up more than 1.1 million views on YouTube.
It still has not quite grown on me, but it suggests that Sun is open to taking risks in her choice of material, which is something to cheer about for an established star.
The question was whether this signalled a completely new direction for the record as a whole, say, the way Tanya Chua went electronica on Aphasia (2015). Perhaps to the relief of her fans, the answer is no.
After all, she works with several familiar names here. Taiwanese singer-songwriter Hush, who penned the track Kepler, writes the lyrics for The Brighter The Day, The Darker The Night and Everyday Happiness.
Also contributing to the album are her regular collaborators, local songwriting-producing twins Lee Shih Shiong – who composed some of her best-known hits such as Cloudy Day, Green Light and Magical – and Wai Shiong, who, not to be outdone, has composed My Desired Happiness, Kite and Angel’s Fingerprints, among others.
Between them, they wrote the music for half the album, tailored to her distinctive, versatile voice. Their songs include the standout poignant number Wind Jacket (“Flying pages of a calendar/Cut and assembled into a wind jacket”).
Elsewhere, Sun displays an aching vulnerability on the ballad A State Of Bliss, while she gets to rock out in the exploratory Floating Islands and the rollicking Oxygenation Period.
Several of the songs are about the passage of time and of people who come and go. But in the midst of change and upheaval, there is also constancy.
Sun sings in the spare closing ballad Extremely Beautiful, for which she penned the lyrics: “Because no matter how cold the wind blows, the umbrella is by my side/Even if the jacket is old, it’ll still keep the chill at bay”.
While A Dancing Van Gogh is not quite as immediate as some of her previous releases, a new album from a well-loved singer can still be a source of comfort.
(ST)
Stefanie Sun
When the first single, A Dancing Van Gogh, dropped, I was not quite sure what to make of it. One friend remarked that it was “super offbeat” and that not many Mandopop singers could pull it off. Another thought it was terrible.
It was certainly an unlikely choice to herald the release of a new album by home-grown Mandopop queen Stefanie Sun following 2014’s Kepler and last year’s EP Rainbow Bot.
Neither a conventional ballad nor an out-and-out dance number, A Dancing Van Gogh references the famous Dutch artist and his paintings to a mysterious end. There is a breathy edge to Sun’s familiar pipes in the languorous opening couplet: “Sunflowers, golden like fire/Doing away with being wrapped by sunlight.”
This could be a fever dream as suggested by the enigmatic music video of shifting identities and the bridge in the song: “The Starry Night spins me around/Sorrow and merriment roam all over/I can’t bear to, don’t want to wake up”. It builds to a dramatic chorus, with even a choir chiming in eventually.
What it undoubtedly was was attention-grabbing. The track topped the iTunes chart in Taiwan, Hong Kong, Malaysia and Singapore and the music video has chalked up more than 1.1 million views on YouTube.
It still has not quite grown on me, but it suggests that Sun is open to taking risks in her choice of material, which is something to cheer about for an established star.
The question was whether this signalled a completely new direction for the record as a whole, say, the way Tanya Chua went electronica on Aphasia (2015). Perhaps to the relief of her fans, the answer is no.
After all, she works with several familiar names here. Taiwanese singer-songwriter Hush, who penned the track Kepler, writes the lyrics for The Brighter The Day, The Darker The Night and Everyday Happiness.
Also contributing to the album are her regular collaborators, local songwriting-producing twins Lee Shih Shiong – who composed some of her best-known hits such as Cloudy Day, Green Light and Magical – and Wai Shiong, who, not to be outdone, has composed My Desired Happiness, Kite and Angel’s Fingerprints, among others.
Between them, they wrote the music for half the album, tailored to her distinctive, versatile voice. Their songs include the standout poignant number Wind Jacket (“Flying pages of a calendar/Cut and assembled into a wind jacket”).
Elsewhere, Sun displays an aching vulnerability on the ballad A State Of Bliss, while she gets to rock out in the exploratory Floating Islands and the rollicking Oxygenation Period.
Several of the songs are about the passage of time and of people who come and go. But in the midst of change and upheaval, there is also constancy.
Sun sings in the spare closing ballad Extremely Beautiful, for which she penned the lyrics: “Because no matter how cold the wind blows, the umbrella is by my side/Even if the jacket is old, it’ll still keep the chill at bay”.
While A Dancing Van Gogh is not quite as immediate as some of her previous releases, a new album from a well-loved singer can still be a source of comfort.
(ST)
Wednesday, November 08, 2017
Unlearn
Ling Kai
Cross Ratio Entertainment
The Greatest Journey
Ruth Kueo
Cros Music
Local female singer-songwriters Ling Kai and Ruth Kueo offer different listening experiences on their latest releases.
Ling Kai’s Unlearn EP is more intriguing. It kicks off with the pop-rock numbers Dumbfounded and Eat, Drink, Sleep, Repeat, which are propelled by her distinctive power pipes. She takes aim at the obsession with social media in Dumbfounded: “Face the camera, don’t be too frank in your emotions/What’s beneath, just guess.”
The singer turns the dial down on the title track and Eighteen, but keeps things compelling. She croons poignantly about growing pains on the latter ballad: “18/That year I thought the world/Was as old as me/ Growing up/Stabs of pain”.
Kueo’s seven-track album is a breezier affair primarily concerned with matters of the heart.
From the bop-along pop of Let It Go to the ballad Without You, the songs are a good foil for her sweet voice. On the track Fake, she shows a bit of welcome sass: “Can we not be fake/Be a little honest/Laugh if you like/If you don’t/Say out loud what you think.”
Simple Happiness is a melodic guitar-accompanied track which is unfortunately marred by lyrics which seem derivative of the well-loved home-grown number If There’re Seasons (“Come home when it’s cold, don’t linger in the wind/There’s understanding in mother’s eyes/And a glint of helplessness”).
Kueo sings on her ballad: “No matter how strong the wind and rain, remember to come home/Thinking of what mother used to say.”
Unlearning what you know might be a good idea when it comes to penning lyrics.
(ST)
Ling Kai
Cross Ratio Entertainment
The Greatest Journey
Ruth Kueo
Cros Music
Local female singer-songwriters Ling Kai and Ruth Kueo offer different listening experiences on their latest releases.
Ling Kai’s Unlearn EP is more intriguing. It kicks off with the pop-rock numbers Dumbfounded and Eat, Drink, Sleep, Repeat, which are propelled by her distinctive power pipes. She takes aim at the obsession with social media in Dumbfounded: “Face the camera, don’t be too frank in your emotions/What’s beneath, just guess.”
The singer turns the dial down on the title track and Eighteen, but keeps things compelling. She croons poignantly about growing pains on the latter ballad: “18/That year I thought the world/Was as old as me/ Growing up/Stabs of pain”.
Kueo’s seven-track album is a breezier affair primarily concerned with matters of the heart.
From the bop-along pop of Let It Go to the ballad Without You, the songs are a good foil for her sweet voice. On the track Fake, she shows a bit of welcome sass: “Can we not be fake/Be a little honest/Laugh if you like/If you don’t/Say out loud what you think.”
Simple Happiness is a melodic guitar-accompanied track which is unfortunately marred by lyrics which seem derivative of the well-loved home-grown number If There’re Seasons (“Come home when it’s cold, don’t linger in the wind/There’s understanding in mother’s eyes/And a glint of helplessness”).
Kueo sings on her ballad: “No matter how strong the wind and rain, remember to come home/Thinking of what mother used to say.”
Unlearning what you know might be a good idea when it comes to penning lyrics.
(ST)
Monday, November 06, 2017
MICappella You And I Live In Concert 2017
Capitol Theatre/Last Saturday
Since their second-place finish in the televised competition The Sing-Off China in 2012, local vocal group MICappella have been honing their craft and growing as a band.
They released their debut album Here We Go in 2013 and followed that up with an ambitious album of original material, MICappella Reloaded, last year.
They have toured as far afield as Europe and Australia and, finally, performed again in Singapore after four years – in their biggest solo show.
Over 21/2 hours, they showed the sold-out crowd of more than 1,000 fans just how far they have come since they formed in 2009.
The sextet were at their strongest on the high-energy original numbers, One Of These Days and Never Be Defeated. They showcased the tightness of MICappella as a music-making unity where everything fit together perfectly, from the vocal percussion to the harmonisation.
The band comprise leader and vocal percussionist Peter Huang, soprano Tay Kexin, alto Calin Wong, tenor Juni Goh, baritone Eugene Yip and bass Goh Mingwei.
It was all too easy to forget sometimes that every note and sound is generated solely by the six of them.
And if there seemed to be quite a reliance on video clips during the evening, it is worth bearing in mind that there were no other musicians or dancers to take over even for a little while to give them a breather.
Huang’s beatboxing solo was a potent, not to mention entertaining, reminder of the musicality of the group’s members as he gave the concertgoers drums, thumping bass and even turntable scratching in the course of his showcase.
Each member had his or her moment to shine and they also took turns at the microphone to share anecdotes, including how they came to cover legendary English band Iron Maiden’s The Trooper.
It was in response to a gauntlet thrown down by some musician friends who asked: “A cappella cannot do heavy metal right?”
The stomper of a cover with an impressive wall of sound certainly proved the doubters wrong.
Even as MICappella stretch themselves by composing their own material, they did not neglect the fans who first got to know them through their covers.
They took on Pharrell Williams’ Happy, Bobby Chen’s One Night In Beijing and, of course, Hu Xia’s Those Bygone Years and Hebe Tien’s A Little Happiness. The music clip for their Hu-Tien mash-up has garnered more than 1.6 million views on YouTube.
The evening had also started with two mega medleys that went through 22 songs in Mandarin, English and even Korean.
However, that felt like packing in too much as it did not give the audience a chance to settle down as the band were constantly switching gears. It was a good thing the pacing became less frenetic once the show got underway.
The final number was a rendition of Mayday’s Minnan dialect ballad Peter & Mary – the first song that MICappella did, back when they had no idea where they were headed.
What came across loud and clear, in that track and throughout the evening, was their joy and excitement in coming together to make music – and that is the heart and soul of a cappella.
(ST)
Capitol Theatre/Last Saturday
Since their second-place finish in the televised competition The Sing-Off China in 2012, local vocal group MICappella have been honing their craft and growing as a band.
They released their debut album Here We Go in 2013 and followed that up with an ambitious album of original material, MICappella Reloaded, last year.
They have toured as far afield as Europe and Australia and, finally, performed again in Singapore after four years – in their biggest solo show.
Over 21/2 hours, they showed the sold-out crowd of more than 1,000 fans just how far they have come since they formed in 2009.
The sextet were at their strongest on the high-energy original numbers, One Of These Days and Never Be Defeated. They showcased the tightness of MICappella as a music-making unity where everything fit together perfectly, from the vocal percussion to the harmonisation.
The band comprise leader and vocal percussionist Peter Huang, soprano Tay Kexin, alto Calin Wong, tenor Juni Goh, baritone Eugene Yip and bass Goh Mingwei.
It was all too easy to forget sometimes that every note and sound is generated solely by the six of them.
And if there seemed to be quite a reliance on video clips during the evening, it is worth bearing in mind that there were no other musicians or dancers to take over even for a little while to give them a breather.
Huang’s beatboxing solo was a potent, not to mention entertaining, reminder of the musicality of the group’s members as he gave the concertgoers drums, thumping bass and even turntable scratching in the course of his showcase.
Each member had his or her moment to shine and they also took turns at the microphone to share anecdotes, including how they came to cover legendary English band Iron Maiden’s The Trooper.
It was in response to a gauntlet thrown down by some musician friends who asked: “A cappella cannot do heavy metal right?”
The stomper of a cover with an impressive wall of sound certainly proved the doubters wrong.
Even as MICappella stretch themselves by composing their own material, they did not neglect the fans who first got to know them through their covers.
They took on Pharrell Williams’ Happy, Bobby Chen’s One Night In Beijing and, of course, Hu Xia’s Those Bygone Years and Hebe Tien’s A Little Happiness. The music clip for their Hu-Tien mash-up has garnered more than 1.6 million views on YouTube.
The evening had also started with two mega medleys that went through 22 songs in Mandarin, English and even Korean.
However, that felt like packing in too much as it did not give the audience a chance to settle down as the band were constantly switching gears. It was a good thing the pacing became less frenetic once the show got underway.
The final number was a rendition of Mayday’s Minnan dialect ballad Peter & Mary – the first song that MICappella did, back when they had no idea where they were headed.
What came across loud and clear, in that track and throughout the evening, was their joy and excitement in coming together to make music – and that is the heart and soul of a cappella.
(ST)
Wednesday, November 01, 2017
illi
Will Pan
After a head injury sustained while rehearsing for his Kingdom Of Eve tour in 2014, Taiwanese-American singer-actor Will Pan dreamt about giving birth to a baby alien – which he believed was his reincarnation. As far as backstories for mainstream albums go, this is pretty left-field.
Not to worry, though, as illi is a solid offering of hip-hop – head for party-hearty track Go Hard and the old-school jam of Coming Home – and ballads with some extra-terrestrial imagery worked in.
On the propulsive number Close Encounter – the title references the 1977 Steven Spielberg sci-fi flick Close Encounters Of The Third Kind – he sings: “Don’t tag this biological aesthetic as a dangerous monstrosity that belongs to Area 51, that’s right I belong in this world.” Area 51 is a classified place in the United States which some believe harbours evidence of alien life.
It is not just an attention-grabbing gimmick here – an alien is also a metaphor for being different and Pan makes a case that he is one.
He is not the strongest singer, but one can see that he puts in the effort from debut album Gecko Stroll (2002), in which he likens himself to a gecko waiting for mosquitoes on the title track, to his latest, 11th record.
It helps that he can also pen radio-friendly hook-filled tracks such as Numb with its stinging chorus: “Break it, forget it, let it go/Don’t test your own cunning/Quiet, don’t speak/Learn to be a mute.”
Sometimes, the material feels a little generic, such as the lightweight love song Fight For You.
The antidote is Dear Memories, in which the bitterness and vitriol aimed at an ex is leavened by the breezy melody: “Didn’t think you were such a beast/Hope you’ll never forget me/Suffer every day.”
Despite the unusual premise, illi is far from alienating.
(ST)
Will Pan
After a head injury sustained while rehearsing for his Kingdom Of Eve tour in 2014, Taiwanese-American singer-actor Will Pan dreamt about giving birth to a baby alien – which he believed was his reincarnation. As far as backstories for mainstream albums go, this is pretty left-field.
Not to worry, though, as illi is a solid offering of hip-hop – head for party-hearty track Go Hard and the old-school jam of Coming Home – and ballads with some extra-terrestrial imagery worked in.
On the propulsive number Close Encounter – the title references the 1977 Steven Spielberg sci-fi flick Close Encounters Of The Third Kind – he sings: “Don’t tag this biological aesthetic as a dangerous monstrosity that belongs to Area 51, that’s right I belong in this world.” Area 51 is a classified place in the United States which some believe harbours evidence of alien life.
It is not just an attention-grabbing gimmick here – an alien is also a metaphor for being different and Pan makes a case that he is one.
He is not the strongest singer, but one can see that he puts in the effort from debut album Gecko Stroll (2002), in which he likens himself to a gecko waiting for mosquitoes on the title track, to his latest, 11th record.
It helps that he can also pen radio-friendly hook-filled tracks such as Numb with its stinging chorus: “Break it, forget it, let it go/Don’t test your own cunning/Quiet, don’t speak/Learn to be a mute.”
Sometimes, the material feels a little generic, such as the lightweight love song Fight For You.
The antidote is Dear Memories, in which the bitterness and vitriol aimed at an ex is leavened by the breezy melody: “Didn’t think you were such a beast/Hope you’ll never forget me/Suffer every day.”
Despite the unusual premise, illi is far from alienating.
(ST)
Monday, October 30, 2017
Wei Bird 2017 Concert
Resorts World Theatre/Last Saturday
The best encore is an unplanned one.
Nowadays, concerts are planned in detail, down to the last note an artist sings. But every once in a while, something surprising and magical happens – as it did at Taiwanese singer-songwriter Wei Li-an’s gig.
The two-hour-long set ended with a planned-for encore of the rousing track Girl and the hit ballad Still that had his fans on their feet and making a beeline for the stage. It left everyone on such a high that the cries of “encore” grew with renewed urgency.
Happily, Wei emerged with a guitar and proceeded to take requests for songs such as Still Loving You and Think Of You First before ending the evening with the delicate beauty of Cloudy Sunflower.
He ended up performing for another 20 minutes.
The singer, who is also known as Weibird or William, said: “I hope you’ve found your moment to take home with you. I’ve found mine.”
On disc, he comes across as a thoughtful young man sensitively probing matters of the heart in melodic songs that linger in the mind, including Have Or Have Not, Slowly Wait and Someone Is Waiting For Me.
Live, he is an affable presence whose pipes shine whether he is rocking out on a number such as Wolves or soaring in his falsetto range on early track Translation Exercise.
He seemed comfortable enough on stage that one would not guess that he was, in his own words, an introvert.
He mused: “If I weren’t a singer, I wouldn’t get to travel to so many places and meet so many people.”
In his more recent albums, Journey Into The Night (2014) and It All Started From An Intro (2016), he has begun to move away from ballads and R&B influences to more adventurous territory, such as venturing into electronica and experimenting with song structure.
But the focus of his Free That Girl tour, which started in 2015, is on his earlier material and mid-tempo hits. Perhaps his next show could show more facets of the talented songwriter.
Still, the concert was an enjoyable one. If anything, he deserved a bigger audience than the crowd of about 1,300.
In one segment, a visual of his room showing a guitar and a work table with a screen and speakers served as the backdrop to an unplugged selection of songs, such as The Fleeing Of A Two-Legged Bookcase and What You Think Of Me.
Judging from his fans’ reactions, there is no question that Weibird flies high in their eyes.
(ST)
Resorts World Theatre/Last Saturday
The best encore is an unplanned one.
Nowadays, concerts are planned in detail, down to the last note an artist sings. But every once in a while, something surprising and magical happens – as it did at Taiwanese singer-songwriter Wei Li-an’s gig.
The two-hour-long set ended with a planned-for encore of the rousing track Girl and the hit ballad Still that had his fans on their feet and making a beeline for the stage. It left everyone on such a high that the cries of “encore” grew with renewed urgency.
Happily, Wei emerged with a guitar and proceeded to take requests for songs such as Still Loving You and Think Of You First before ending the evening with the delicate beauty of Cloudy Sunflower.
He ended up performing for another 20 minutes.
The singer, who is also known as Weibird or William, said: “I hope you’ve found your moment to take home with you. I’ve found mine.”
On disc, he comes across as a thoughtful young man sensitively probing matters of the heart in melodic songs that linger in the mind, including Have Or Have Not, Slowly Wait and Someone Is Waiting For Me.
Live, he is an affable presence whose pipes shine whether he is rocking out on a number such as Wolves or soaring in his falsetto range on early track Translation Exercise.
He seemed comfortable enough on stage that one would not guess that he was, in his own words, an introvert.
He mused: “If I weren’t a singer, I wouldn’t get to travel to so many places and meet so many people.”
In his more recent albums, Journey Into The Night (2014) and It All Started From An Intro (2016), he has begun to move away from ballads and R&B influences to more adventurous territory, such as venturing into electronica and experimenting with song structure.
But the focus of his Free That Girl tour, which started in 2015, is on his earlier material and mid-tempo hits. Perhaps his next show could show more facets of the talented songwriter.
Still, the concert was an enjoyable one. If anything, he deserved a bigger audience than the crowd of about 1,300.
In one segment, a visual of his room showing a guitar and a work table with a screen and speakers served as the backdrop to an unplugged selection of songs, such as The Fleeing Of A Two-Legged Bookcase and What You Think Of Me.
Judging from his fans’ reactions, there is no question that Weibird flies high in their eyes.
(ST)
Wednesday, October 11, 2017
Ajin: Demi-Human
Katsuyuki Motohiro
The story: After a traffic accident, hospital intern Kei Nagai (Takeru Satoh) realises that he belongs to an immortal race called Ajin. He is then whisked away by the government and subjected to all manner of experiments. Coming to his rescue is another Ajin, Sato (Go Ayano), who is prepared to destroy humanity to win rights for their kind. But Kei recoils from his violent means. Based on the manga (2012 to present) of the same name by Gamon Sakurai.
Faced with immortals amid society, the Japanese government reacts with fear and suspicion and subjects those it captures to a brutal battery of ordeals.
As a living test subject, Kei has a hellish existence – he is wrapped from head to toe like a mummy, his limbs get hacked off and he gets killed again and again. It is as though he were less than human.
Immortality becomes a curse for Kei.
There are questions here about humanity and mor(t)ality, but in the hands of director Katsuyuki Motohiro (Bayside Shakedown: The Movie, 1998), the movie also works as an exciting thriller in which Ajin is pitted against Ajin.
Satoh, as he did in period actioner Rurouni Kenshin (2012), plays a man reluctant to turn to violence, but is forced to; and Ayano (Lupin The 3rd, 2014) revels in Sato’s villainy.
The immortals are each able to project an entity outside of themselves – Kei calls his a “ghost” – which seems to have a mind of its own.
The special effects team does a good job of depicting these shadowy, not-quite-solid ghosts who are capable of inflicting very real damage.
Given that the Ajin can regenerate after death, how is one supposed to take another down? Kei comes up with a plan to trap Sato, but is blindsided by a detail he did not consider.
There are enough twists and turns to keep one engaged and the good news is that they feel organic to the fantasy world conjured up here.
(ST)
Katsuyuki Motohiro
The story: After a traffic accident, hospital intern Kei Nagai (Takeru Satoh) realises that he belongs to an immortal race called Ajin. He is then whisked away by the government and subjected to all manner of experiments. Coming to his rescue is another Ajin, Sato (Go Ayano), who is prepared to destroy humanity to win rights for their kind. But Kei recoils from his violent means. Based on the manga (2012 to present) of the same name by Gamon Sakurai.
Faced with immortals amid society, the Japanese government reacts with fear and suspicion and subjects those it captures to a brutal battery of ordeals.
As a living test subject, Kei has a hellish existence – he is wrapped from head to toe like a mummy, his limbs get hacked off and he gets killed again and again. It is as though he were less than human.
Immortality becomes a curse for Kei.
There are questions here about humanity and mor(t)ality, but in the hands of director Katsuyuki Motohiro (Bayside Shakedown: The Movie, 1998), the movie also works as an exciting thriller in which Ajin is pitted against Ajin.
Satoh, as he did in period actioner Rurouni Kenshin (2012), plays a man reluctant to turn to violence, but is forced to; and Ayano (Lupin The 3rd, 2014) revels in Sato’s villainy.
The immortals are each able to project an entity outside of themselves – Kei calls his a “ghost” – which seems to have a mind of its own.
The special effects team does a good job of depicting these shadowy, not-quite-solid ghosts who are capable of inflicting very real damage.
Given that the Ajin can regenerate after death, how is one supposed to take another down? Kei comes up with a plan to trap Sato, but is blindsided by a detail he did not consider.
There are enough twists and turns to keep one engaged and the good news is that they feel organic to the fantasy world conjured up here.
(ST)
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