[ImitationOfLife]

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Aya is a true rocker. Her company needs to stop making her to cheesy pop! At least that how I feel.

 

Totally agreed. I gravitate more toward her rock-oriented stuff (which isn't much, to be honest) rather than the pop.

 

[wind016]

 
Quote:

Totally agreed. I gravitate more toward her rock-oriented stuff (which isn't much, to be honest) rather than the pop.

She had a lot more rock material earlier in her career. Her song "Changing the World" is one of my favorites but not very popular. I think when she changed companies to Avex she lost a lot of her fanbase. Her music became really childish.
 
"Are You Happy Now?" is still pretty rock worthy though it was before signing onto Avex.
 

 

 

[ImitationOfLife]

Quote:

 

She had a lot more rock material earlier in her career. Her song "Changing the World" is one of my favorites but not very popular. I think when she changed companies to Avex she lost a lot of her fanbase. Her music became really childish.
 
"Are You Happy Now?" is still pretty rock worthy though.
 

 

Hm, well I am a new fan, but most of what I have heard has been poppy.
 
Anyway, I've heard the song you posted before (as well as "Changing the World"), and I really like it, but I still favor "Revolver." They're both fun, however.
 
I just need to figure out where I can grab one of her albums. Looks like I'll be checking Amazon.
 

 

[wind016]

 
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Hm, well I am a new fan, but most of what I have heard has been poppy.
 
Anyway, I've heard the song you posted before (as well as "Changing the World"), and I really like it, but I still favor "Revolver." They're both fun, however.
 
I just need to figure out where I can grab one of her albums. Looks like I'll be checking Amazon.
 

I found this really old video of Aya doing a cover of Green Day's "Basket Case." I thought it was cute and dam she was cute without makeup. And she can play guitar. That's HOT XP
 
She sings at around 3:00
 

 

 

[ImitationOfLife]

I'm not a fan of Green Day, but that was pretty fun. Personally, I hate all the comparisons I've seen of her to Avril Lavigne. No comparison in my eyes.

 

[wind016]

 
Quote:

I'm not a fan of Green Day, but that was pretty fun. Personally, I hate all the comparisons I've seen of her to Avril Lavigne. No comparison in my eyes.

Aya sounds more like a woman. I'm not really a fan of Avril's voice nor stuff like Paramore.
 
 
Imma share more of the beautiful Olivia Ong. A beautiful cover of "Driving" in Hi def

 

 

 

[miceblue]

Quote:

 
Yea, Chinese is a difficult language to make lyrical, especially Cantonese. I like some songs though, like GEM's "Where did you go?" When I was in a band, we did revisions of Korean music in Chinese, but never in Cantonese. Mandarin is just much easier to make sound better since Cantonese is such a pitch emphasized language, but even then, Mandarin is a masculine sounding language.
 

My how this thread has expanded! I took a look at this thread today and there are over 100 new posts just from the last 2 days.
 
I agree, it's hard to find good Cantonese music nowadays because of how much easier it is to create decent sounding songs in Mandarin. I haven't listened to Canto-pop in a while. I think the last artist I listened to was Janice Lan since my ex-girlfriend loved her music.
 

 
I think I'm in the minority of C-pop fans around here nowadays. Hardly any of my friends listen to it. >_<   I guess it's an acquired taste.
 
 
Apart from C-pop, I do listen to some of Epik High's music. I like one of their newer songs, "Run."
 

 

[wuwhere]

Japanese Kodo Drums, amazing drummers.

 

[Sylverant]

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No problem. I have a difference in opinion about hiphop. I think proper hiphop should be educational much like African American jazz music back in the days. Hip hop and jazz was created with the intention to share social or personal experiences/ideas with others and in turn make music a bonding experience. I only really see Epik High doing that while most pop music tend to be forgettable. Stuff like Big Bang will only be remembered for their catchy tunes and I'll find that stuff interesting for a short time but just becomes nothing after awhile. And for those that don't live in Korea, music is a way to understand the culture and issues of the country in a more direct emotional way than reading the news.
 
BTW, that guy's got a sweet guitar in the second vid =P It's the Ibanez RG760. I had it for a month and the freaking neck snapped. Legendary sound and playability though.
 
Anyways, here's Epik High's "Run"

 
I generally agree with this opinion. The thing is growing up I couldn't stand dance-pop/party music as a kid. What originally drew me to the asian music scene was seeing L'arc-en-Ciel's The 4th Avenue Cafe on Rurouni Kenshin. I asked my mom to order me the discs and she bought me bootlegs
 
From that point on I consumed asian music. Initially it was just L'Arc-en-Ciel. But then I moved on to EpikHigh and Korean hip-hop. I've bought nearly all of there releases at H Mart. The thing about EpikHigh for me is that they have a consistent, developing sound that really feels soulful. They can write haunting, dark music and not many others have done that. I've noticed that the asian music scene has a lot of powerful, emotional music that I'm not finding in the US. I typically search for that kind of stuff. The pop stuff reminds me of the stuff over here sometimes, in that it celebrates the culture its from and try's to be cool because of it. That's no different than pop music in the US, really.
 
However, Japanese music does tend to have this thing going with the theme style music that's trying too hard to be epic and has no base for it since the artists in question aren't writing there epic sounding music. Acid Black Cherry comes to mind.
 
With that said, a lot of Korean pop is amazingly cool. I love inline skating and break dancing. I had a giant DBSK and Jay Park fever years back in highschool. 

 
I still want airsket so bad. Best looking skates I've ever seen and so convenient looking.
 
Oh yeah, and here's old DBSK
 
 

 
Yes, Bolero is in Japanese, but that can be forgiven in this case
 

 
Edit: Here's 4th Avenue Cafe which I mentioned:
 

 

[Maxvla]

Really enjoying how this thread has sparked. Keep it up guys. Reminds me somewhat of the Asian Crew threads on offtopic.com.

 

[Soidus]

Old school KPOP fans may have heard of Bada.  I really like her voice.  Here some videos, they are not the best quality but you have to hear her voice on mp3 or CD to really appreciate it.  She does have an amazing voice.  I'm not a fan of her fast paced music, but her ballad skills are just amazing.
 

I found this, maybe a copy of the Japanese version?  

 

 
 
 
 
Also, these two girls from f(x) are very talented, this is a video of their recording of OST track.

 

[Maxvla]

Certainly remember Bada. Speaking of older school KPop, on my way to Harry Potter tonight I tossed BabyVox - Boyish Story in my car cd player and rocked out to it to and from the theater. My favorite kpop band of all time. Haven't listened to their stuff in a while though.

 

[Sylverant]

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Old school KPOP fans may have heard of Bada.  I really like her voice.  Here some videos, they are not the best quality but you have to hear her voice on mp3 or CD to really appreciate it.  She does have an amazing voice.  I'm not a fan of her fast paced music, but her ballad skills are just amazing.
 

 
I found this, maybe a copy of the Japanese version?  

Wow. Just wow. 

 
Amazing live cover. Your not lying about her voice. She should do more ballads. Thanks.
 
 
I've been thinking about all the things that were discussed before and its made me realize a good deal.
 
Your absolutely right about anime Soidus. Its impossible to like anime without your head being screwed on the wrong ways nowadays. Its nearly impossible to find an anime that one can watch with there 8 year old siblings without permanently scaring them in some way. The "hardcore" anime fans spend like crazy and now its all directed at them.
 
I think the best way to put Japan's biggest problem culturally is that everything in Japan has become a heavily fortified, niche market. There isn't much normalcy. And what a "normal"Japanese might listen to isn't much different than Kpop. Perhaps this niche market mentality allows for more creativity; but i'm not so sure about that. I've found and fallen in love with Korean rock bands that are very influenced by there culture. I bought the first and second Cloud9 albums and there incredible. Japan's record industry is a lot like the US but its definitely been taken to the extreme. 
 
Gone are the days of Morning Musume as far as Japanese girl groups are concerned. Now we have AKB48. As the name implies it has 48 members. Within it there is an ex pron star and a fake member digitized from the best facial features of the six best looking members. Everything in Japan is indeed devoid of morals; it is oversexed and too extreme.
 
That said, I have beef with just one comment you made: Japanese music has it's so called boring repetitive glamor rock with cross-dressing.
 
Don't insult mah Visual Kei! 

 
That genre was started by the likes of X Japan which you posted here. The thing about Japan is that it does have a strong western influence. Traditional Japanese music formed into Ryukoka in the 1920's which broke off into Modern Enka in the post war period. But a very popular form of music prevalent in the sixties was a genre inspired by The Beatles; known as Group Sounds. Eventually the Idols came around - whose entire lives were controlled by their labels back then.
 
Much of Modern Japanese culture does bother me. I don't care to ever see akihabara in my lifetime. But visual kei is probably the most original thing to come out of Japan in a while. If its repetitive that's only because its become much larger than it used to be. I only keep around 15 or so bands in my collection. Its popularity has destroyed it to a degree. Nowadays there are Visual Kei dance/pop groups that are all looks and typically no sound, with some exceptions. There called Osharei Kei.
 
I know I've posted Malice Mizer but there still my favorite VK band to this day:
 

 
Course its not like VK today, Malice Mizer put on an incredible show that was its own unique art form.
 
And the compulsory happy song
 

 

[Maxvla]

Japan is a crazy place. Their culture is so introverted, yet their creative media is so oversexed. They should just put that energy into pairing up and doing the deed for real. God knows they need to reinvigorate their workforce as old as it's getting. Their birthrate is 2nd to last on this list of 221 countries. And last place is part of a city (Monaco), not even a full country.

 

[Sylverant]

Here's some newer Visual Kei:
 

 

 
I can't help but notice that Visual kei has been slowly dropping its darker character and sound in order to appeal to a wider number of people.
 
Whats interesting is that in relation to Kpop I find I enjoy 2PM quite a bit, because of the effort they put off and there image as a "package" or "whole" which comes off as its own unique art form to me. I find that "I'll be back" and "Without U" which were posted here have impacted me quite a bit over the course of these last few days. From the style of music with rap dispersed in and the impressive dancing, It is perfect. Its catchy-ness might have to do with it as well
 
Now here's that Oshari Kei that I imagine is lost on so many people, myself included:
Its trying to be too many things and doesn't sound that good.