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Originally Posted by orbitalaspect
MUSE was impressive because I think Jolin made every track count. It's also the first time I've seen an artist shorten the track list on their albums and heard an improvement. (I normally feel that the fewer the songs, the less likely I am to find more than one or two I like.)
There are ways I wish Jolin would scale back. One thing I've always admired Elva Hsiao for is that she proves she's an entertainer while making it look like she doesn't have to try to do that. I still feel that MUSE and Pei came off forced, but I still love watching Jolin's choreography and videos. I love that Pei was playful. MUSE was very much Jolin establishing her ground, but Pei was her having fun with it. I still think Phony Queen and Pei are two of her best PVs. It's awesome to see Jolin's humorous side.
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In MUSE we got one song more than usual (11)? Myself had 15 tracks including 10 songs (standard C-Pop albums have 10 tracks). The 5 interludes were only there to fit with the "non-stop party" concept of this album. It was a one-time thing.
It may look like she's been trying "too hard" with these 2 albums but maybe it's because she actually had a lot to prove (or felt like she had a lot to prove)?
When she won the Best Female Singer Award for Dancing Diva at the GMA, people said that it was not a singer who won, but a gymnast (Jolin is talking about it in MWT DVD). For years she has also been dubbed as the "copycat queen" and eventually, she got sick of that.
That's why since Myself (THE album where she started to involve herself more in her music) she's been looking for never-released demos for her albums, and why she's been wearing for the most part original outfits nowadays, designed for her.
With PLAY she wanted to prove that she was a real artist and singer and not just a "dancer". She took opera courses, singing courses, acting & performance courses, producing courses too for this album, chose to make simple choreographies for her MVs, barely danced and did no "acrobatics" during the Tour.
About her playful side, since Myself Jolin said she has learned to enjoy life and enjoy her performances more... She's now way more confident as well. And I think we can see that in her works, and in general.
(Elva is supposed to release a new album this year by the way if you didn't know)
Quote:
Originally Posted by orbitalaspect
Jesus Christ, aMEI is to me everything a respectable pop artist should strive to be. I didn't really fall in love with her until FACES OF PARANOIA. But that album and AMIT2 were back-to-back my favorite albums of 2014 and 2015. I just recently went back and listened to R U Watching Me?, and I'm still hoping someone who has the album can upload it for me, but aMEI is by far one of the most impressive people I've ever seen. I love that she is dripping with self confidence in herself and her image, and that she can entertain a crowd with top tier class. There's nothing gimmicky about her or her presence on stage. She can literally get a standing ovation with an empty stage and a handful of backup dancers. There's not enough good I can ever say about her. She's just one of very few people I've ever thought of as essential to music itself.
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Same for me ♥ Have you listened to AMIT (the first one)? Unfortunately I don't have R U Watching? I own AMIT 1 & 2, and Faces of Paranoia.
aMEI's Utopia Tour is ending in August, I'm really looking forward to the DVD/BD!!