Looking Ahead Part 2...

So it's May - four months of 2009 are done and over with. We got a few album releases and things have been quite slow these past few weeks but hopefully everything will go back into full swing soon enough. Who knows, we might get some albums in the coming weeks!

• From what I'm getting, Mitchel Musso is set to release a debut album 'sometime in the future'. I love Speed Dial, think it sounds like a Teddy Geiger song so I'll be looking forward to this.
• The BSB albummmmmmmm! From the demos we've been getting these past few days it seems really, really, good. Not only do they have Max Martin behind the whole thing(I assume he's working on at least most of the stuff...), the songs coming out just blow off all the competition. NLT, V Factory and Varsity - you're in for a lot of competition.
• Speaking of the new boybands, when will that Varsity Fanclub album ever come out? If they keep on pushing back the release date, we're gonna get bored of them and when we finally hear it we'll be unimpressed 'coz we've heard all their 'unreleased tracks'.
• Esmee Denters has really impressed me so far and she's only got one song out. She's out there somewhere recording so if we don't get an album from her by the first quarter of next year(that's my ultimatum), it's safe to say she's gone the Gia Farrell way. Amazing voice, great song - what more can I ask for? hahah.
• Nick Lachey seems to be planning a 'comeback'. Patience was disgusting but All In My Head redeemed the whole thing for me - at least now I'll try listening to the album when it comes out. I still have mixed feelings about this whole thing, mainly because I just can't stand his crappy Patience cover. Does he really think he can fool everyone by coming out with a cover of a gigantic hit from a British boyband? NO! hahah.
• I kinda got sick of the Ashley Tisdale song - that's bad. It's kinda like Just Dance, you listen to it more than a few times and it'll spill out of your ears like there's no tomorrow. There is already a tracklisting for Guilty Pleasure however.
• The biggest surprise of this year was the new Click Five song - I love it. Now if they don't push through with this style I'm going to track Eric Dill down, threaten him to go back to the Click Five and force the band to make another album like Greetings From Imrie House. Their lame 'we want to be FOB/Panic! At the Disco' thing is not working and it never will, no matter how hard they try.
• Leighton Meester signed a record deal a few weeks back. I so wanna know what she's gonna do - I'm curios. hahah. I do love that song she did the band though(Birthday?) - brilliance.
• Savannah Outen's album is definitely on my 'greatest expectations for 2009' list - the girl is fantastic. Take that Miley Cyrus and everyone else who Disney 'discovered' to replace you!(*ahem* Demi Lovato *ahem* Selena Gomez *ahem*)
• Mandy Moore's new album is shaping up to be somewhat brilliant - I Could Break Your Heart Any Day Of The Week(phew! that was a loooooong title.) was great. Wasn't a big fan of the other full songs that leaked though. Still, the album will get a listen from me, that's for sure.
• Pixie Lott! We're getting major progress with her - Mama Do has a music video and I assume the single will be out in due time plus she's supporting The Saturdays so that has to count for something. I do hope the rest of her album is just as brilliant as everything we've heard so far - I don't want to hear a disappointing album in a few months.

So there you have it. As much as I say nothing's happening, this might be an indication that the best is indeed yet to come. If I missed anything note-worthy, tell me! hahah.

New Music!

I can't help myself, there are quite a few things out. I'm almost done studying anyway! hmm.

• THE CRAIG DAVID CONCERT WAS SPECTACULAR. I promise to review the whole thing once all my requirements are done.. You had to be there to feel the brilliance.
• I've become a HUGE The Script fan. When I first heard them I thought they were this crappy Coldplay wannabe but then I turned the volume up and heard my dad's production in it. He didn't produce it, obviously, but all the qualities of something he'd produce were there and it made me tear up for some strange reason.
• Ronan Keating's cover album is out at it's number one in the UK. Not a big fan of the covers(Carrickfergus was better when Charlotte Church did it.), but hey - he's got four number one albums so you gotta hand it to him.
• Two new Mandy Moore songs are out. They're OK, but I Could Break Your Heart.... is still the best new song so far. Will be waiting for the album!
• Esmee Denters has a new song out - AND IT'S BRILLIANT. Just when I thought Gia Farrell would never come back, here's someone who sounds a lot like her! yay! hahah.
• Well, Kian Egan and Louis Walsh's STILL unnamed girl band had an Irish TV appearance the other day, singing a Dixie Chicks cover. They apparently have competition now, the new girl group with a girl who didn't get a place in the other band are rumored to record the new Grey's Anatomy theme song. This is WAR.
• Last year's Swedish Idol winner has an album out. There are some gorgeous songs on it but once again, there's no cohesion. They're nice songs to listen to though. I might review it after exams.
• Savannah Outen has a new song for this charity out and she sounds a lot like Jordan Pruitt at the start and though I will forever love Jordan Pruitt(and her utter brilliance), Savannah can be jaw-dropping at times.
• Pixie Lott got her first play Radio 2 some time back! Congrats!!!!!!
• I got re-addicted to Guy Sebastian some time back. I might do a few reviews as well... yay!
• Taylor Swift's song for the Hannah Montana movie has a video out already and may I say, it's the only good part of the whole soundtrack.
• Hold on, I thought the video for Moments That Matter was out already? Apparently not, here's a new one.
• Girls Aloud's new video is out. The album version was amazing, and I love the fact that Nicola sings first but something in the single mix and the video makes me uneasy about the whole thing. I'd love Revolution in the Head as a single though! haha.
  
  
  I guess that's it! Back to studying. Asian economics, systems of quadratic equations, uniform accelerated motion, Newton's laws of motion, Filipino short stories(which are like 10 pages each..), adverbial clauses of concession, congruence postulates, and everything else! UGH.

The return of fun.

That boyband love songs post will come, I just have to get my head around making it. While waiting, lemme just write some thoughts down.

I know I'm not the first to notice but I thought I'd say it anyway, pop is certainly coming back this year. It took me a few more listens to convince myself that it's real but I'm delighted by the return of fun, perky and upbeat pop songs amidst all those I-Hate-Your-Guts rock or heavy R&B stuff that had been coming out. Even with the deteriorating record sales and piracy all over the place, the return of pop will make me want to go out and buy albums even more now.

It feels like 2005 again (of course I don't really know what 2005 felt like music-wise but by the albums and the songs from 2005 that I've heard, it was a pretty good year for pop.) or even 2006.

Pop may never be like what it was five, six years ago but I can confidently say that it's getting somewhere thanks to the acts who stuck by the label during the 'down period' so to say and yes, even Disney. I wouldn't say 2008 was a bad year for pop, but I do think that there was very little of it reaching mainstream audiences but this year is different, I just know it.

Kelly Clarkson's now number one single is perky, fun American pop. Of course it's not the BSB/90's pop but it's something that when you hear it, you know it's American. It's a characteristic American song and even though I think that nothing will come close to Since You've Been Gone, this is pretty close. It's SYBG but not.

Corbin Bleu's Moments That Matter made me smile when I first heard it, and I think that's something important in a pop song, it has to somehow make the listeners happy, not just because the song is brilliant but because it's happy and it's perky and it's worth smiling for, worth supporting.

The Saturdays' Comic Relief single is fun, it's a song I want to play over and over again but I don't get sick of. Nearly 60 plays already and I'm still listening to it, it's infectious, it sticks to my head and it's brilliant. As much as I love the GA+ Sugababes Comic Relief thing, it just wasn't fun for me. I loved the Boyzone song and obviously the Westlife one because they were fun, they were uptempos with actual melodies and they sold a heck of a lot for charity.

In comes Tania Christopher, who has brilliantly made 2009's Forever. Like all the other songs I've mentioned, it's fun but what sets it apart is its obvious mainstream sound. R&B is obviously a big thing in the US and although I absolutely adore the genre, it can get repetitive. You have all these generic Usher/Beyonce wannabes coming and going with all these mediocre songs. Once in a while though, someone with all the right things shows up with the right song and blows us away. I think Tania is just that.

The song that inspired this post is the new offering from Mandy Moore's upcoming album. With the demise of perky pop, her 2007 album sounded like a bland Lily Allen without the tongue-in-cheek lyrics. Don't get me wrong, the songs were gorgeous but I feel like she went from this late 90's/early 2000's pop princess to a bland "folk" singer. I Could Break Your Heart Any Day Of The Week is close to what I thought she'd be doing in 2007, and I sure as hell am glad that she's doing it now. I do hope she gets the chart success she deserves, the song is brilliant.

I believe that pop songs are songs that make you want to turn the volume up and be happy, carefree and not think for those three minutes(or more..) and these songs just prove my point.

PBA095n3132p