Breakthrough
Luantan-Ascent

Stay
James Morris-Cotterill

Raspy-voiced troubadours are having their moment in the sun. Singer-songwriter Luantan-Ascent has a breakthrough with Breakthrough and British-Chinese newcomer James Morris-Cotterill wants you to Stay.
With his long locks, moustache and brooding mien, Taiwan’s Luantan-Ascent looks like a collection of rocker cliches. His music is anything but.
Two years ago, he won Best Male Vocalist at the prestigious Golden Melody Award for Let You Replace Me (2012), a collection of songs and instrumental pieces he wrote for movies and TV over 10 years. Breakthrough is a more than worthy follow-up.
Inspired by the natural world, the record dives into the sea, emerges on land and takes flight on songs such as Out From Water, Streams In The Desert and Iceberg.
He ponders the relationship among them on Out From Water: “The sky is blue, the sea is bluer/The sea is broad, the land is broader/The land is wide, the sky is boundless”.
At other times, he takes on animal forms. He sings on the dance-rock of Lightning Jellyfish: “I live in the depths of the sea where there is no light/ Swimming pretty freely/Can’t tell whether to love or not”.
The final track here is The Pure World. After traversing the breadth and depth of nature, the album ends on a note of tentative hopefulness: “Am I really existing?/ Or just living along with others/Enough of that”. This is revelatory rock, propelled by everything from buzzing guitars to his magnetic voice.
Also in possession of a compelling set of pipes is James Morris-Cotterill. He opts for a more conventional approach on Stay, which offers a mix of covers and two original English numbers written by him.
He broke out on the TV reality show Chinese Idol last year, when he made it to the top six. Some of the songs he sang in the competition are found here, including Faye Wong’s I’m Willing and Eason Chan’s Long Time No See. And the title track is none other than Rihanna’s Stay.
Impressively, he does not just cover the songs, he manages to put his own spin on them. His own compositions, The Poison and Clarity, suggest an indie folk sensibility reminiscent of Damien Rice.
I would certainly stay around for his album of original material.
(ST)