1) Hide & Seek 2) Full Moon 3) CAN'T SLEEP , CAN'T EAT , I'M SICK 4) It's all about you 5) FUNKY TOWN 6) Step With It 7) Hello 8) Should I Love Him ? 9) Top Secret 10) Violet Sauce (Spicy) 11) Baby Don't Cry 12) Pink Key
I downloaded & most recently bought a copy of Namie Amuro's 8th album PLAY . Namie's under Avex Trax so in S'pore , Avex Trax's under the sub-division of Warner Music . Warner Music S'pore only released & distributed her Play album that comes with the CD + DVD album cover .
This is also her first album to be released in both the CD and CD+DVD formats .
I'm sure you probably have heard about Namie Amuro , musically or/& non musically . For me I wasn't familiar with her music in any bit but I have heard lots of things about her non musically . She was the original Queen of JPop before Ayumi Hamasaki overtake her popularity & then some in the early 2000s .
When Ayumi's popularity & material was taking off , Namie suddenly found herself to be suffering a severe case of a demise in popularity & music as in the early 2000s , she released albums/singles that weren't really good & were not on par with her eariler material .
Rather than giving up , she solidered on & bounced back with a successful 2005 album named Queen of Hip Pop & this time round , she finally returned back from the shadows with a more successful follow up in the form of PLAY .
What's even more amazing's that PLAY's the 1st album for her to debut at No.1 in the Oricon album chart since her 2000 album Genius2000 so I'm happy that she has emerged & survived the worst times in her music career .
So far , PLAY's still at the No.1 spot in the Oricon album chart ie. it's still at No.1 , 2 weeks & counting . When its first week was over , PLAY became Namie's first weekly No.1 album since her 2000 album Genius 2000 with an amazing gap of 120,258 copies sold . For its first week, the album sold an impressive 250,619 copies, her highest first week sales since Genius 2000 .
If I'm correct , Namie's main forte lies in R&B . I never heard her older material before so I can't comment on that . But I do know that PLAY showcases her new style & it features a Rock number & a chic slow song .
Initally I didn't want to give her music a shot but after I heard the 1st single off the record which's the fanastic Hide & Seek , I decided why not ? It wouldn't do any harm & boy am I eating my words now . and Hide & Seek is possibly the catchiest song that I have heard in recent times & what better way to kick off the album with this no. . Too bad she didn't released this as a single as I felt it's a great single & that it was destined to be a no.1 single .
Her PLAY album's really good . There's not a single bad track on the record which's a rarity these days in the JPop music scene .
Aside from the fanastic track to kick things off which's Hide & Seek , I really like Violet Sauce (Spicy) which was the theme song for the Japanese release of Sin City , Top Secret , Should I Love Him ? , the only Rock No. in the album in the form of It's all about you , Pink Key & CAN'T SLEEP ,CAN'T EAT ,I'M SICK .
Full Moon's good too & I really like the melody of it as it's pretty unusual & so's FUNKY TOWN . I find Hello cheesy though , as in the melody of it with the handphones ringing & all . Step With It doesn't really register in my head but I'm sure with a few more listens to it , it will register in my head in no time .
Oddly enough , 2 tracks are excluded in her PLAY album , namely Ningyo (which means Mermaid in Japanese) & White Light which're the double A sides of CAN'T SLEEP ,CAN'T EAT , I'M SICK & Violet Sauce (Spicy) respectively . I have no idea why Namie didn't include both Ningyo & White Light in as I really like both of them . Ningyo's actually a cover . If I didn't know about it , I probably wouldn't have know about it .
But other than that , it's a great album & it's definitely a must buy . I'm just glad that Namie's finally back & is able to hold her head up high once again .
Blog Personnel
Karen Pang
# 10th Jan
# #1 BREAKERZ fan in Singapore since 2008 debut single ♥
# My music blog consists of JPop/Rock singles & albums reviews that I put my heart , efforts & soul into writing them as I'm disgusted with the way that JPop/Rock music is being treated/written/reviewed in Singapore so to the local media (yes you TEENS , Teenage Magazine & The Strait Times) , screw you all . I basically can write better JPop/Rock reviews , period
