Island Song

Tang Xu

My Lonely Planet

Chet Lam

Rum Hee

Shugo Tokumaru

Sometimes, things slip through the cracks, particularly when it comes to indie and import-only titles. But good music deserves to be heard and it is worth the effort to track down these titles at CD shops or on online stores.

China singer-songwriter Tang Xu is only 22 but she is already on to album No. 3. There is a lilting warmth to her voice and her songs are intimate, unvarnished affairs.

On the title track, she croons wistfully: “Island song, drift along with the wind/Take my tears away as well”. Her voice is a soothing balm even though her heart is sore and aching.

There is also a touching simplicity and sincerity to her lyrics on songs such as Mom, Thank You: “Mom, don’t be afraid/I won’t let you go to the doctor alone/Mom, your smile is so beautiful/You must have had so many suitors in your youth.”

Perhaps her music philosophy is best espoused by Making Music Is Being With You: “Let’s make this life more beautiful together/Even if there is a little sadness/It also shimmers brightly.”

While stylistically more diverse, the double-CD Mandarin album from Hong Kong’s Chet Lam is equally cohesive. This is the prolific singersongwriter’s ninth record since his debut in 2003 and he returns to his favourite theme of travel.

Opener Victoria pays homage to his home and asks: “Whose home are you and who is your home?” Lam then takes us on a trip around the world on the Outward Bound disc with the bouncy groove of Shanghai, New York, the jazzy noir of English number Last Exit To Brooklyn and the evocative Dublin.

On Visa.Time Difference.Air Mileage, he laments over a light-hearted melody: “Visas remind you time and again that the world is not your home.”

Disc two is titled Homeward Bound, and in Homesick, he asks: “Is it me creating the journey or the journey creating me?” There are no easy answers here, though the questions themselves can be beguiling.

Lam’s lyrics are an integral part of his songs, but in Japanese singer-songwriter Shugo Tokumaru’s case, they really do not matter as the music is so gorgeous and emotionally direct.

The stirring Rum Hee features Tokumaru’s trademark use of sparkly instrumentation that has been lovingly layered. Alaska is gently bucolic and buoyant rather than icy while Inatemessa is a more experimental piece for toy piano and voice.

The EP also comes with alternate versions and remixes as well as an accompanying DVD with a couple of music videos and footage of Tokumaru’s 2008 American tour.

It serves to satiate some of the hunger for new material since 2007’s Exit until the album Port Entropy is released in Japan next month.

As disparate as these various offerings are, they share one thing in common – they take you to places you have never been. And soon, you will not want to leave.

(ST)