Ten Chinese Albums to Brag About
2004 – Ding Wei – Dear Ding Wei (亲爱的丁薇)
Here comes another diva. Ding Wei is really not one of the names that get often talked about online… let alone in English. There’s really very little information on her, and I can’t even remember how I came about her music, but thank the gods for it.
Her last album, Dear Ding Wei, released back in 2004, is a mix of pop with classical music elements and electronic influences — sometimes more influenced by classical music due to Ding Wei’s background. Since then, she has mostly focused on working on music for film and, if I’ve been informed correctly, as a judge on one of the several Chinese music competitions.
You can listen to all of Ding Wei’s album on Xiami.
2005 – Leehom Wang – Heroes of the Earth (蓋世英雄)
Who is more apt than Leehom Wang to break this divalicious list? After all, I know I’ve seen a quote by Ding Wei herself stating that Leehom’s the only one with true talent in the current commercial music scene. And boy does this guy have talent.
In his 11th album, Leehom takes Heroes of the Earth to levels out of this world when he combines genres like Chinese opera with hip hop and rap, then moves on to Peking opera and combines it with R&B. And, pfft, of course Leehom can be commercial pop too. This is, after all, to this date, his best-selling and most popular album.
Actually, a lot of Sony Music’s content is gone from Xiami, but you can still try streaming from there — if you’re lucky, it’d be back up. Otherwise, Leehom Wang is listed in several other streaming services.
I’m so glad you picked Faye’s Fable to “brag about,” Amy.
While Restless sure is an exceptional album by Western music standards, Fable has a special place in Faye’s discography in that the first five tracks constitute a mini-saga about the Buddhist beliefs of life, love, and destiny. Equally important is the fact that they were all composed by Faye herself, and so this mini-saga does serve as a prototype of the original Faye sound …
And here’s my favorite track from this saga, The Cambrian Age:
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x5u00t_faye-wong-long-time-ago_music
@Adrienne Lew, if it’s Chinese music we’re bragging about… Faye’s gotta be there. It was either Fable or her 2001 release or Jiang Ai… in the end, had to pick one.
What about the others? Who would you choose?
@amy, there’s one more album you might want to take a look at if it’s Faye’s Cantonese album we are talking about: Di Dar (1995). The title track, Vacation, Lost, and Shooting Stars were kind of trendsetting and pretty much defined Faye’s mystically tragic yet beautiful style of music.
As for other singers, I would say it’s between Eason Chan and Jay Chou. Because of my personal bias towards rock, I’d prefer Eason over Jay (who’s strength is in producing Mandarin-style R&B).
Here are my picks from these two singers’ discography:
Eason Chan – Blurting Out
http://www.tudou.com/programs/view/EZlw-q5syq4/
Jay Chou – Williamsburg
@Adrienne Lew, I actually got almost all of Faye’s discography, and I have listened to Di-Dar :)
I’m a little surprised… or maybe not, that you life Jay Chou. Hahaha. I don’t usually like his R&B style, but I definitely like his ballads. I also have a weakness for his country boy style hahaha.
I’m not that familiar with Eason’s body of work, but then again… I have LOADS to catch up with~
No pick of ten albums?
@Amy, haha — no, Jay isn’t exactly my taste. But objectively speaking, he does rule in the Mandarin world of music in Asia … so I feel that I needed to pick a song or two from his discography that has this little extra something in it — like Williamburg. I love that he mixes the organ sound with the R&B beats. But between him and Eason, I’d say in a sense Eason could have been a lot more creative but is unfortunately bounded by the preference for traditional Cantopop style “karaoke” showpieces on the part of many music fans in Hong Kong.
Speaking of this, there’s an album by Jan Lamb that’s pretty “non-mainstream” … “Thirty-Something.” And here’s my pick from that album:
http://divadamrau.blogspot.com/2011/01/karaoke-singing.html
(I refer you to my blog coz there’s also the English translation — which is the whole point of this “pop song” … :P)